In this volume, five working papers are presented. "Minimal Signs and Grammar" (Lars Hellan) proposes that a significant part of the "production" of grammar is incremental, building larger and larger constructs, with lexical objects called minimal signs as the first steps. It also suggests that the basic lexical information in…

This work examines the developing second language (L2) grammar of a 4-year-old girl who was a native speaker of Spanish and who acquired English as an L2. The evidence suggests that, in contrast to some recent proposals for child first-language acquisition, in the case of child L2 acquisition, nonthematic properties such as Case and INFL systems…

The question addressed in this paper is whether explicit instruction makes any difference in the acquisition of modals or whether opportunities for interaction are sufficient. Eight non-native speakers (NNSs), aged 17-35 and representing several nationalities, were tested. The language focus was "will,""be going to," and…

This manual is designed to assist both special and regular educators with mastering the skills for developing quality teacher-made tests consistent with content-oriented instruction. The manual presents tips for constructing both objective and subjective, supply and select test questions--namely, short answer, essay, fill in the blanks or…

An integrated analysis of the syntax and semantics of serial verb constructions (SVCs) in a group of West African languages is presented. With data from Dagaare and closest relatives, a structural definition for SVCs is developed (two or more lexical verbs that share grammatical categories within a clause), establishing SVCs as complex predicates.…

THE FOLLOWING IS THE FULL TEXT OF THIS DOCUMENT: LEVEL: High school and college. AUTHOR'S COMMENT: Many would like to abandon the distinction between "lay" and "lie," but I still receive enough questions about it to continue teaching it. Finding that students did not believe me when I taught them to substitute…

Shows the limitations of current foreign language teaching methods, particularly the audiolingual one. Unites certain findings of psycholinguistics, cognitive psychology and transformational grammar to construct a language teaching model. Examples of English verbs and nominals being taught to French children illustrate the…

Prepositions appear to be especially susceptible to misunderstanding by second language learners. Even upper-intermediate and advanced learners may have ingrained misconceptions. A proposed method for re-teaching prepositions to students at all levels is based on three ideas: (1) prepositions are spatial; (2) they are frequently used…

This glossary is a component of "Beginning Pashto," a set of materials (including a textbook, student workbook, teacher's manual, and tapescripts) that is designed for teaching and learning the Pashto language. The glossary contains, in dictionary form, the vocabulary and phrases that occur in the 14 units of the 5 components of the series. Each…

The nature and source of onomatopeic words in Spanish are discussed in order of decreasing resemblance to the sound imitated. The first group of onomatopeic words are the interjections, in which sound effects and animal sounds are expressed. Repetition is often used to enhance the effect. The second group includes verbs and nouns derived from the…

A study of English nouns derived from verbs and ending in "-ee" is outlined. The objective was to determine whether those nouns exhibit verbal characteristics (aspectual, temporal, or modal) that can be attributed to their derivation from verbs. The study examined 209 nouns. Progress made in the investigation of four hypotheses is…

In an examination of the acquisition of the spatial syntax of American Sign Language (ASL), 43 children aged 3-10 years were given a range of comprehension and elicitation tests designed to analyze the subsystems involved in the corrrect use of ASL syntax. The subsystems were nominal establishment, verb agreement, and consistency of reference. The…

Verb agreement, rules, and their application in Lakota, a Siouan language, are examined in the framework of relational grammar. It is argued that certain relational grammar concepts, especially the notions of level and working 2, provide the necessary theoretical apparatus for formulating concise rules of verb agreement in Lakota. The rules…

Six captioned illustrations present humorous situations for classroom discussion. A list of appropriate German vocabulary words and phrases (and English translations) accompanies each illustration. (MSE)

Two studies investigated whether young children acquiring verbs at an exceptional rate can use the syntactic structure of familiar and unfamiliar verbs to make conjectures about some aspect of the meanings of those verbs. The preferential looking paradigm (Golinkoff and Hirsh-Pasek, 1981) was used to set up a naturalistic pairing of scene and…