The data in this report were obtained from the base-year and follow-up surveys of the National Education Longitudinal Study of the Eighth Grade Class of 1988 (NELS:88). NELS:88 began with a sample of 1,052 schools and 24,599 eighth graders. The results of this report apply to students who were eighth-graders in 1988 and graduated from high school…

A study focused on ways in which literature might be used to support the literacy learning of English language learners in classrooms of diversity where a number of cultures and mother tongues were represented. The framework guiding the study (as in earlier work) is based on a sociocognitive view on literacy where literacy learning is socially…

Research indicates immersion learners tend to process the second language predominantly for meaning, rather than both meaning and form. Immersion learners appear to be fluent in the second language, but closer scrutiny reveals serious gaps in grammatical accuracy. A study investigated the effect of focus-on-form instruction on the acquisition of…

A study attempted to (1) define acoustically the learner's progress in acquisition of a set of phonological features, specifically interlingual differences in the voice onset time of voiceless stop consonants and the number of taps produced when attempting to produce the Spanish phoneme /r/ (trill); (2) determine if and at what stage of…

The development and validation of a scale to assess English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) learners' perceived self-efficacy are described. Self-efficacy expectations are beliefs about one's ability to perform a given task successfully. Research on self-efficacy and related concepts is reviewed, noting their significant role in predictor human…

Five perspectives are offered on the possible relationships between second language (L2) teachers and researchers. Discussion begins with an overview of traditions and transitions in the approaches, values, and concerns of L2 teachers and researchers. This is followed by discussion and illustration of four of the five relationships, including: (1)…

Eleven papers from the Finnish Association of Applied Linguistics (AFinLA) Symposium held at the University of Joensuu in November 1986, and three additional solicited papers are presented in this collection. The theme of the symposium was "language learning materials and language in learning materials." All but two of the papers are in…

Research on adult second-language (L2) learner's self-repair is reported. Repairs are defined as "structure shifts," which are types of correction or improvement where the speaker leaves a structure uncompleted, abandoning it or shifting to another structure. Two principal types of repairs are distinguished: code- and discourse-related…

A seminar sponsored by the Irish Association for Applied Linguistics on the role of media and media technologies in second and foreign language learning is reported. The organization of this report reflects the program of the seminar. Four plenary papers established some broad applied linguistic perspectives and presented an overview of recent…

Principles and strategies for learning second languages for the purpose of effective intercultural communication are discussed, with particular reference to the teaching of English, the dominant foreign language in Denmark. In the first section, the official, relatively open-ended Danish goals for English language teaching are outlined. The second…

Deviation for native-speaker norms in non-native varieties of English are often regarded as interlanguage features which must either be weeded out through teaching or which the learner will eventually abandon as his competency moves in the direction of the target language. It is argued in this paper that some deviations are motivated by style,…

A review of the literature on writing in a non-native or second language looked at empirical research, responded to a series of questions on the state of the art, and identified an agenda for future research. The questions addressed these issues: how writing ability in a non-native language (NNL) develops: whether there are developmental stages;…

This paper reports on a small-scale pilot study further investigating the perceptual development in the acquisition of durational contrasts by different levels of adult English-speakers of Japanese. Four kinds of naturally spoken word-tokens were edited by a synthesizer to generate word-stimuli varying the duration of a certain consonant/vowel…

A specialized bibliography on the study and practice of teaching interpreting is presented. Introductory comments note that interpreting is young as an academic discipline. Issues covered in this bibliography include the role of bilingualism, the relationship between translation and interpretation, and psychological, neurological, and sociological…

This Lao language textbook is the second draft of a book developed for teaching Lao to United States Peace Corps volunteers (PCVs) and is designed to be used with a Lao language instructor familiar with competency based curricula. It is not designed for self-instruction, although after some hours of use, students may be familiar enough with the…