Foreign language instruction and related research on second language acquisition in the United States can be understood only in the context of the role of English, of American education, and of speech and language research. Any part of an educational system is both a result of historical processes and a response to current needs and values. The…

A study of the language used in the dialogue journals of beginning students of English as a second language (ESL) focused on the acquisition of English morphology. The study used two methodological approaches: a comparison of journal language with that used in speech and other written samples, and a longitudinal look at change patterns that also…

In order to accurately assess the learning of vocabulary words, a criterion of learning achievement must be set for each word or group of words. This criterion would reflect: (1) the amount of semantic, grammatical, and phonological information the learner had to possess in order to have learned the word; (2) the receptive and productive processes…

A study was undertaken to investigate the variation in the speech of child second language learners as a function of the different discourse constraints imposed by three participant structures: narrator-audience, child-adult conversation, and child-child conversation. The subjects were 18 children aged 7 to 12, temporary residents in the United…

The origins of error analysis as a pedagogical tool can be traced to the beginnings of the notion of interference and the use of contrastive analysis (CA) to predict learners' errors. With the focus narrowing to actual errors committed by students, it was found that all learners of English as a second language seemed to make errors in the same…

Several recent reports on the untutored second language acquisition of English have suggested that the same developmental sequence holds for the acquisition of the interrogative structures irrespective of whether English is acquired as a first language (L1) or a second language (L2). These studies have been conducted within the Klima & Bellugi…

The following papers on research in foreign language are presented: (1) "Research and Design," by Thomas C. Cooper; (2) "Action Research versus Needed Research for the 1980s," by Gilbert A. Jarvis; and (3) "Second Language Acquisition Research: Needs and Priorities," by Stephen D. Krashen. The first paper discusses three research procedures…

The achievement of bilingualism appears to have positive consequences for the bilingual child, enhancing universal aspects of cognitive functioning available to all normal children. However, little is yet known about the interaction between educational treatment and the input factors the bilingual child brings to the situation. Focusing on the…

THIS ADDRESS, GIVEN AT THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MODERN FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING (BERLIN, SEPTEMBER 1964), PRESENTS A GENERAL DISCUSSION OF THE PRESENT SCOPE, ROLE, AND POTENTIAL USE OF RESEARCH IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING METHODOLOGY, AND MAINTAINS THAT THE BEST RESEARCH IS THAT WHICH IS CLOSELY ALLIED WITH THEORY, AND THE HARDEST TO…

The recent development of the communicative approach to foreign language instruction has been accompanied by many methodological applications, most of which have revolved around an authentic use of discourse. This evolution in language instruction presents some problems, especially when communicative competence is interpreted too narrowly. Some…

Community Language Learning (CLL) is a humanistic approach to learning which emphasizes the learner and learning rather than the teacher and teaching. In some situations where the teacher is not fluent in the various languages spoken by the students, such as in the English as a second language (ESL) classroom, advanced students may serve as…

A study of non-native children's acquisition of communicative competence examined the child's construction of rules of conversation in the second language. The linguistic devices that children use to link up their utterances with those of another speaker, i.e., cohesion-creating devices that create textual unity, were focused upon. Repetition, one…

Three stages of the developing second language of a 3;9-3;11 year-old English-speaking child in an Urdu speech milieu were examined and compared with findings that have been accumulated about the order and process of first language acquisition. The study showed that in the development of many syntactic and morphological features the child used…

It is hypothesized that free, spontaneous interaction cannot be easily attained in language courses which are rigid and mechanical. For this reason, the author urges the development of instructional materials which facilitate a smooth and natural transition from "skill-getting" to "skill-using." Discussion of Jerome Bruner's theory of language…

This paper proposes a broader and more rigorous approach to the analysis of errors produced by second language learners. As a supplement to longitudinal studies, a procedure called "lateralisation" is advocated as a way of providing the researcher with more data than is normally available through examination of learner text alone. In…