The 'root infinitive' phenomenon in child speech is known from major languages such as Dutch. In this case study, a child acquiring the Papuan language Nungon in a remote village setting in Papua New Guinea uses two different non-finite verb forms as predicates of main clauses ('root' contexts) between ages 2;3 and 3;3. The first root non-finite…

This paper investigated the language resources needed for communication in Vietnam's import/export services and the level of alignment with the associated English for Specific Purposes (ESP) course. To examine the communicative practices used in this workplace, the study employed methods of semi-structured interviews and a collection of 48 emails…

With effective learning as its core principle, Production-oriented Approach (POA) was developed to address the problems of English classroom instruction in China, such as text-centeredness, the separation of learning and using and "dumb English". This study applied POA to college English classroom instruction in order to examine its…

This is a longitudinal and naturalistic study of the bilingual acquisition of English and Turkish languages simultaneously by a 28-month old Turkish infant. The emphasis is on empirical findings collected from a two-year period of observations beginning from the subject's birth and lasting until his 28-month old linguistic status. The study is…

Generative approaches to language have long recognized the natural link between theories of knowledge representation and theories of knowledge acquisition. The basic idea is that the knowledge representations provided by Universal Grammar enable children to acquire language as reliably as they do because these representations highlight the…

Via naturalistic observations, parent interview, and direct assessments, we examined language proficiency, language use, and differentiation of a 3-year, 4-month-old bilingual child exposed to Mandarin and English via the "one parent-one language" principle. Although noun versus verb dominance has been explored across verb-based…

Discourse markers (DMs) assist and persuade EFL classroom interlocutors to monitor their discourse production and comprehension process. This exploratory research investigated the index of pragmatic use (IPU), rate of use, frequency, and the pragmatic functions of "well" in Iranian university EFL teachers' and learners' classroom…

This paper reports on a case study of a child raised in the context of bilingual first-language acquisition in English and Bulgarian, where the latter represents a minority (heritage) language. Using diary data and spontaneous speech recordings, the study identifies a period of loss of production in Bulgarian (1;7-2;3) and a subsequent…

The present study investigates flexibility of verb use in the early stages of English multiword development, and its relationship with patterns attested in the input. The data is taken from a case study of a monolingual English-speaking boy aged 2; 5-2; 9 and his mother while engaged in daily activities in the home. Data were coded according to…

In two case studies of trilingual development in the home, it was not the home languages that were the strongest but the language of the respective daycare centres. This paper investigates, first, how well the trilingual children could separate their daycare language from their home languages. Then it explores the kinds of communicative…

In this case study, all parental talk directed to a young child with autism at home over a 3-day period was analyzed for internal state (IS) language, which explicitly focuses upon the thoughts, feelings, and perceptions of animate beings. The mother and father used IS terms in 33% and 24% of their utterances, respectively, with sensory and desire…

Although the language teaching profession has long emphasized the use of the target language in the classroom, student teachers face various challenges in their efforts to conduct class in their target language. This case study focused on 10 student teachers with respect to (1) their initial attitudes and beliefs about using the target language,…

Surveys 320 Japanese families residing temporarily in the United Kingdom about their language use and language needs and the priorities they attach to their children's learning of English and Japanese. Examines English and Japanese in the children's linguistic environment, including language used with parents, siblings, and care givers;…