Presents an outline for a theory of syntax acquisition, surveys other approaches to language acquisition, and addresses the following methodological issues: (1) the relevance of linguistic theory to the model; (2) how the model is tested; and (3) the domain of the theory. (Author/AM)

When 20 highly talkative and 20 much less talkative preschool children were measured for articulation, grammar, receptive syntax, and sentence repetition, the performances of the highly talkative children were significantly superior on all measures. (Author/RL)

Suggests reintroducing Latin into the curriculum during the present educational trend of returning to the basics. A course is discussed called "Practical Latin," designed to deal directly with the areas where the students need the most help: vocabulary, spelling, and grammar. (NCR)

Discusses the utilization of songs to improve the pronunciation, listening comprehension, and grammar of second language learners. (CFM)

Describes a device or "game" using 3x5 cards to divide sentences in such a way as to guide the language learner to anticipate grammatical structures; to make him aware that grammar, as well as vocabulary, conveys meaning. (EJS)

The purpose of this study was to attempt to verify the theory of Taeschner and Volterra (1976) that bilingual children pass through three distinct phases while becoming perfectly bilingual. The 12 subjects were English-Italian bilingual children between the ages of 1.6 and 4.6. (CFM)

A project of computer research on the interconversion of Spanish texts between orthographematic and orthophonematic versions was carried out at Columbia University. That project is described here. (Author/CFM)

This article outlines the audio-visual structuro-global method of teaching foreign languages, discusses its positive and negative points, and discusses the causes of its negative points. (Text is in French.) (CLK)

Explores the relationship between Hong Kong secondary school English teachers' metalinguistic awareness and the ability to explain a grammar point. Teachers of different backgrounds and experience were asked to role play a grammar point on two separate occasions; videotapes of the role plays were transcribed and analyzed. (13 references)…

Presents accumulated insights for benefit of colleagues considering embarking on software development projects. Original purpose of project was to produce a set of grammar revision and extension modules allowing teachers to use computers as a means of ensuring that once a language point had been dealt with in class, students could be required to…

Describes a parser-driven Japanese tutor, "BANZAI," designed for second-language instruction and presents an empirical study of the program. Results indicate that ongoing rule-driven deductive feedback is more effective than example-driven inductive feedback for learning relatively complex structures whose grammatical rules are not…

To explore the potential learner benefits of early exposure to literature and suggest instructional guidelines for effective literature study at the beginning level, this article examines the nature of literature and surveys how current textbooks guide beginning learners to access literary works. (Author/JL)

Presents an account of a study of the role played by a dictionary in the completion of written (encoding) tasks by students of English as a foreign language. The study uses an introspective methodology based on the completion of flowcharts. Results indicate the importance of information on spelling and meanings and the neglect of coded syntactic…

Argues that a pattern analogous to that in speech errors also appears in intrasentential code-switching, i.e., the alternating use of two languages in a sentence by bilinguals. Notes that studies of spontaneous conversation of bilinguals indicate that open class items may be code-switched, but closed class items may not. (41 references) (Author/CK)

Research presented in this paper on the character of infant-directed speech and the nature of infant speech perception abilities from 6 to 12 months suggests that prosody contributes significantly to early analyses of child languages and assists infants in developing root processes of parsing. (104 references) (Author/CK)