Comprehensibility has emerged as a useful and intuitive means of globally evaluating second language (L2) speakers in many research and instructional contexts. In most cases, L2 speakers' comprehensibility is assessed by external listeners who do not engage in extensive communication with the speakers, even though the degree to which a speaker is…

Translation has recently been revived as an approach to language learning that builds on students' linguistic repertoires, particularly in linguistically diverse classrooms. However, few studies have examined how students use translation as part of writing in an additional language. This article provides new insights based on the translation…

Within the framework of Conversation Analysis for Second Language Acquisition (CA-SLA), this study uses learning behavior tracking (LBT) (Markee, 2008) with longitudinal data to investigate word learning by one adult second language (L2) user of English. The adult is a first language (L1) user of Japanese with limited proficiency in English. Data…

Robinson's (2001) Cognition Hypothesis claims that more complex tasks promote interaction and language development. This study examined the effect of task complexity in the learning of request-making expressions. Task complexity was operationalized as [+/- reasoning] following Robinson's framework. The study employed a pretest-posttest research…

This article explores the value of judiciously used first language (L1)-to-second language (L2) translation in meaning-focused, advanced-level academic language education. It examines languaging in the teacher-led discourse (TLD) that arises when translation tasks are used and compares it to languaging during the TLD engendered by 4 other…

The goal of this article is to further our understanding of how learning opportunities are created in interactions. Based on a conversation analysis of peer interactions of foreign language learners, we investigate how the negotiation of expert positions among these learners affects this process. The focus of the analysis is on the relationship…

Motivated by cognitive-interactionist frameworks for task-based learning, this study explores whether task complexity affects the extent to which learners focus on form-meaning connections during task-based work in a classroom setting, and whether this relationship is modulated by 3 individual difference factors--linguistic self-confidence,…

This study examined Japanese language teachers' and learners' perceptions of corrective feedback (CF), focusing on the cases in which the learners responded to the teachers' CF. Data were collected from the second-year course of an Australian university for 1 semester by classroom observation and audio recording and stimulated recall interviews.…