Discusses current research in child language to help teachers understand how young children acquire language skills. (DR)

Focuses on theories concerning the origin of language. The article indicates that the language-origins theories most favored in contemporary science all have their roots in the intellectual preoccupations of the early scientists and philosophers of the European Enlightenment. The article concludes that the origin of language myth reveals itself as…

Argues that, from a transformational-generative perspective, errors in writing mechanics (such as run-on sentences, comma splices, and errors in subject-verb agreement) persist because writing instructors do not exploit students' language ability. Describes how transformational grammar is useful in correcting errors in sentence mechanics. (MM)

Describes the transformational-generative model of grammar and discusses how this theory has influenced composition teaching and theory. Outlines a new model of language being developed by cognitive scientists and how this model might inform composition in the future. (HB)

The inadequacies of traditional and transformational models of grammar are overcome in the systemic-functional approach of Halliday, where meaning is built into the grammar and the text is the basic unit. Here, the functional approach is seen in the stress on the role of social/cultural context and in the importance of the role of register, which…

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…

Linguistics is the study of human language, and has several major divisions: formal linguistics, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, and applied linguistics. Formal linguistics is the study of grammar, or the development of theories about how language works and is organized. Within formal linguistics there are three major schools of thought:…

Gives a brief overview of FL teaching, from the prelinguistic to the linguistic era, and discusses the advent of an era characterized by an eclectic approach which makes full use of all linguistic data, without being subservient to any linguistic theory, and gives full importance to sociolinguistic and psycholinguistic considerations. Available…

Discusses the role of linguistics in the study of phrase structure or expressive communication. Various linguistic approaches, including transformational grammar, structural linguistics, and the sociolinguistic approach, are discussed in connection with communication instruction. (Text is in French.) (AM)

In Onondaga and all northern Iroquoian languages, nouns can be incorporated into verbs. The function of this is semantic as well as syntactic. It is semantic in that the sense of an incorporated noun will be narrower than its unincorporated counterpart regardless of modifiers. Incorporation changes the transformational structure of the sentence.…

THE PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY WAS TO COMPARE THE COMPLEXITY OF WRITTEN COMPOSITIONS OF FIFTH-GRADE STUDENTS IN A LINGUISTICALLY-ORIENTED LANGUAGE ARTS PROGRAM WITH THE COMPLEXITY OF THE WRITTEN COMPOSITIONS OF STUDENTS WHO WERE TAUGHT TRADITIONAL GRAMMAR. AN EXPERIMENTAL GROUP AND A CONTROL GROUP WERE EACH COMPOSED OF 32 STUDENTS AND WERE EQUALIZED…

THESE FOUR TESTS--"MORE ABOUT QUESTIONS,""THE NEGATIVE,""EXPANSION OF TRANSITIVE VERBS," AND "DETERMINERS"--WERE DESIGNED BY THE OREGON CURRICULUM STUDY CENTER FOR A NINTH-GRADE LANGUAGE CURRICULUM. THEY ARE INTENDED TO ACCOMPANY CURRICULUM UNITS AVAILABLE AS ED 010 829 AND ED 010 830. (MM)