This article explores French L1 speakers' attitudes toward French L2 speakers' negation use. Negation in prescriptive grammars calls for a pre-verbal ne and a post-verbal element like "pas." Although orally "ne" deletion is frequent, it is rarely or never taught. One common, albeit meagerly supported, explanation is that L1…

The effects of song and elaboration were assessed on the acquisition and retention of lexical items by beginner learners of Italian. Lexical acquisition investigated through an incidental learning experiment based on the premise that growth in L2 vocabulary can be facilitated by subvocal rehearsal and elaborate processing of lexical items.…

Second language (L2) learning is widely acknowledged as complex due to variables such as learner, context, and target language. Such variables are particularly relevant to the learning of immigrant or indigenous languages in countries such as Canada, the United States, and New Zealand. The motivational roles of such variables are considered…

The majority of L2 vocabulary studies concentrate on learning word meaning and provide learners with opportunities for semantic elaboration (i.e., focus on word meaning). However, in initial vocabulary learning, engaging in structural elaboration (i.e., focus on word form) with a view to acquiring L2 word form is equally important. The present…

This study reports on a year-long intervention based on comprehension practice of input-rich materials. It was inspired by an innovative program in Canada in which primary school francophone children learned English as a second language (ESL) through simultaneous reading and listening. In our study the participants are a class of 10- to…

This article describes a collaborative research project with four Quebec college teachers offering French and ESL classes designed to support immigrant students' bilingual learning. Using action research, a professional learning community was created that allowed the researcher and teacher participants, through cycles of planning, action, and…

This study examines the opportunities that a collaborative writing task completed in pairs and in small groups offers for attention to form. Previous research suggests that collaborative writing activities encourage learners to focus their attention on language and to collaborate in the resolution of their language-related problems in ways that…

This article explores the use of gesture by a French language teacher during lexical focus on form (FonF). The analysis compares pre-emptive FonF (before a problem in communication has occurred), and reactive FonF (after a problem has occurred) and looks at the differences between teacher-initiated and learner-initiated FonF in the use and type of…

Explanations for the well-documented second language (L2) learning challenge of the English regular past include verb semantics (Bardovi-Harlig, 2000), phonetic properties (Goad, White, & Steele, 2003), and frequency factors (Collins, Trofimovich, White, Cardoso, & Horst, 2009). Difficulty perceiving past-tense morphology (i.e., hearing…

This study examines factors correlated with the use of "nous" and "on" by university students formerly enrolled in French immersion programs. Their variant frequency and stylistic appropriateness are compared to those of (1) former core French university students; (2) French as a second language (FSL) speakers in a francophone environment; and (3)…

Outlines comparative approach to translation as flexible method which consists of comparing literary works from the target language word for word with several competent translations. Uses concrete example from Spanish literature. (BK)

An experiment compared three approaches to error correction in college-level written composition and found that the ideal approach would be to combine, in a simple and realistic formula, the best features of the three models. (Author/MSE)

Challenges basic assumptions underlying the claim that reading is the major source of vocabulary acquisition in a second language, including the noticing assumption, the guessing ability assumption, the guessing-retention link assumption, and the cumulative gain assumption. Reports on three experiments in which vocabulary gains from reading were…

This article first presents an overview of some trends behind the acquisition of sociolinguistic variation in a second language. A study is then presented that aims to test the validity of these trends in a quantitative study of a range of socio- and morpho-phonetic variables in French, including liaison, /l/ deletion, and subject-verb agreement…

The features necessary in an introductory course on translation are described, and the standard text for this kind of course is evaluated with reference to two critical accounts of it. Differences in general structure between the standard text and one in preparation and some theories needing modification are examined. (Author/MSE)