michael a. sharwood smith may 18 th, 2013 12.00-13.30. current trends in l2 research najnowsze...
TRANSCRIPT
MICHAEL A. SHARWOOD SMITHMAY 18 T H , 2013 1 2 . 0 0 - 1 3 . 3 0 .
Current trends in L2 research
Najnowsze tendencje w badaniach nad nabywaniem jêzyka obcego/drugiego
Lecture Overview
1.What is “SLA”?2.The Main Questions.3.Differing Points of View
It’s NOT about Teaching!!
SLA (or L2A) is about how people acquire two (or more) languages at any age and under any circumstances
Simultaneous L2A
Young children fully acquiring more than one language in the home or in the community or both.
A ‘heritage’ language
Young children fully acquiring one language spoken widely in the community and...
partially acquiring another language at home (heritage language) up to near-native levels
Sequential L2A
Children acquiring another language in the community after gaining native levels in their first
For example, when the family moves to another country and the children are between 4 and 18
Sequential L2A
Children acquiring another language (at primary or secondary school) OR adults after gaining native levels in their first
Sometimes called ‘foreign language acquisition’ (FLA) or ‘instructed SLA’
Summarising...
L2A is about learners at any age and in any kind of learning situation.
It is not about instruction/language planning
Logically...
Instruction/language planning methodology should be informed by research on the relevant type of L2A.
In reality,...
it is often is not informed by the latest SLA research
Sometimes it is not informed by any SLA research at all!
]
The Basics of Language Acquisition
]
Early L1/2 Acqisition
]
What is actually happening during LA?
Language is a mental system, that humans in a given situation are able somehow to construct in their heads.
Basic Characteristics of Child Language Acquisition
The Miracle
Children master a very complex mental system..
before they can read and writebefore they can analyse what they are doingSpontaneously, without serious thought.Without their grammar being corrected.
(Parents know this isn’t needed!)
Stages in First Language (L1) Learning
Between five and seven months, babies begin to play with sounds and their vocal noises begin to sound like consonants and vowels.
Between seven and eight months they begin to babble in real syllables.
Around their first birthday, they begin to understand and produce words.
By four they have become little native speakers.
What remains is a process of literacy (language enrichment)
Basic Characteristics of sequential ‘SECOND’ Language Acquisition
Two fundamental points of view
L2A is fundamentally different from L1A Selinker [1972]; later: Bley-Vroman, Tsimpli
L2A is fundamentally the same as L1A Dulay, Burt [1973], Krashen [1976]; later: White,
Schwartz
Interlanguage Theory (
LARRY SELINKER
His paper ‘Interlanguage’ came out in 1972
IL is: an emerging L2 system.How do we recognise it?By the systematic behaviour of L2
learners
LARRY SELINKER
IMPORTANT:Interlanguage is not the same as ‘errors’.
INTERLANGUAGE (IL) is everything that is systematic whether or not it conforms to native speaker norms.
IL is by definition a NON-NATIVE SYSTEM.
LARRY SELINKER
Aspects of learner performance that are incidental, not revealing any system, are not part of interlanguage.
INTERLANGUAGE (IL) is everything that is systematic whether or not it conforms to native speaker norms.
LARRY SELINKER claimed that..
An L2 learner’s mind was not the same as the one that learned L1.
And the evidence for this? Only 5% gain anything like native like abilty
in L2. The end of Lenneberg's critical period for L1
acquisition also signals a critical period for any other, later learned language.
After this our mind/brain is no longer the same!
Analyse L2 production! What processes explain systematic features of IL?
IL PROCESSES: FOSSILISATION. Features not changing?
Despite repeated exposure and practice some or all of the system remains IL. More input no longer leads to intake!
LANGUAGE TRANSFER: Some IL rules are ones that derive from L1
OVERGENERALISATION: Some IL rules are regularisations of rules derived from L2
LARRY SELINKER
also: TRANSFER OF TRAINING. Unintended
effects of teacher focus: overuse of certain ‘difficult’ structures
STRATEGIES OF COMMUNICATION: simplification: dropping articles, only simple vocabulary, emphatic style
STRATEGIES OF LEARNING: Rote memorisation
IL1 IL2NATIVE
SPEAKER SYSTEM
IL5IL4IL3
IL as an emerging L2 systemINEVITABLE
FOSSILISATIONAT SOME STAGE
IL1 IL2NATIVE
SPEAKER SYSTEM
IL5IL3
An emerging L2 system
IL4
INEVITABLE FOSSILISATIONAT SOME STAGE
NATIVESPEAKER SYSTEM
An emerging L2 system
IL1 IL2 IL5IL3 IL4
Central IL processes result in recurring
patterns:• X% carried over from L1 (LT)
• X% as in L2• X% non-native, based on L2 (OG)
• X% caused by teaching (TofT)• Plus
• X% for easy communication (CS)• X% from attempts to learn (LS)
NATIVESPEAKER SYSTEM
Example 1
IL1 IL2 IL5IL3 IL4
Central IL processes result in recurring
patterns:• 40% carried over from L1 (LT)
• 10% as in L2• 45% non-native, based on L2
(OG)• 2% caused by teaching (TofT)
• Plus• 2% for easy communication (CS)• 1% from attempts to learn (LS)
NATIVESPEAKER SYSTEM
Example 2
IL1 IL2 IL5IL3 IL4
Central IL processes result in recurring
patterns:• 20% carried over from L1 (LT)
• 35% as in L2• 35% non-native, based on L2
(OG)• 2% caused by teaching (TofT)
• Plus• 3% for easy communication (CS)• 0% from attempts to learn (LS)
Creative Construction: early challenges to Selinker’s theory
There seems to be information in the outside world.
Somehow it has come inside the learner’s heads (minds)
First, ideas that many SLA researchers still share.
i
Crazy and less crazy statements that we make about ‘learning’ “I can’t get it into my head’ “She tried to hammer her point home” “Nothing seemed to penetrate his thick skull”
Growing, Developing, Learning
Language and other
‘facts’ODPORNY NA WIEDZĘ
A better way of looking at learning is in terms of
GROWTH or DEVELOPMENTTake the analogy of a plant.If it has access to nutrients in the soil and is
exposed to sunshine (warmth) and water, it ‘grows’
The sun, water or what nutrients there are in the earth do not determne how the plant will grow (how many leaves, what colour flowers etc.)
Growing, Developing, Learning
how many leaves, what colour flowers etc(determined inside!)
If language is not something that enters our heads and stays and decides what is inside then:
How does language ‘grow’ inside the learner?
So we need to have better idea of what, in LANGUAGE learning is the equivalent of the soil nutrient, sun and the water etc.
Language?
The learner is exposed to language information available in the outside world.
Watching how language grows INSIDE the learner:
it is plain to see that learners must need that information (for language to grow inside them)
Not all that information has an impact on the growth of the language
The arguments are about why that is so.
Conclusion SO FAR..
Selinker claims that SECOND language learning mechanism cannot do the job as the now absent FIRST language mechanisms.
That’s why L2 grammars ‘fossilise’.Grammatical growth almost always must
stop before native like ability emerges
DISAGREEMENT
Another school of thought claims that FIRST language learning mechanisms do not disappear and are ALSO used in SECOND language learning.
Grammatical growth may stop but it doesn’t have to. It does not stop because it can’t go on growing!
DISAGREEMENT
Burt and Dulay experimented on L2 learners and concluded that L2 grammatical growth more or less followed the same pattern as L1 growth.
Grammars grow following some inbuilt sequence!
IL1IL2
IL3IL5
IL4 Native!!!
12
43
65
7‘8’
Native!!!
Interlanguage Theory:
They took the radical line and claimed that, L2 acquisition was driven by the same processes as L1 acquisition.
this they called CREATIVE CONSTRUCTIONThe language is built anew in the
learner’s mind.Recreated from the L2 inputNot reconstructed from the L1.
RECREATED NOT RECONSTRUCTED
The learner REcreates the L2 from the beginning
subconsciously without the need for correctionThey even told teachers not to teach
syntax: Dulay, H. C., & Burt, M. K. (1973). Should we teach children
syntax? Language Learning, 23, 245-258
Dulay and Burt denied the validity of the ‘Critical Period for L2’ and hence also the basis for Selinker's theory.
Their evidence was drawn from immigrants in California (Spanish and Chinese speaking)
They were interested whether the sequence of learning English revealed by L1 studies could be replicated with L2 learners irrespective of their L1 background!
Shortcut: order of difficulty predicts order of actual acquisition.
Rather than painstakingly follow through individual learners (like Roger Brown’s Adam, Eve and Sarah) over a period of time they opted for a cross-sectional approach:
You take a groups of learners at one time and look at the percentage of errors with specially selected structures .
BURT & DULAY
The reasoning was that the order of error-causing structures should also reflect the order in which those structures would actually be acquired so that, in the experimental results, the form that always caused fewer errors relative to the others, would be fully acquired earlier..and so on.
BURT & DULAY
Missing contractible copula ‘s :
She’s here He’s my brother
always less frequent than:
Missing possessive ‘s
Mary’s carJohn’s Ipad.
Some research into L1 acquisition suggested that this was a safe assumption.
BURT & DULAY
How did they decide that structure was acquired?
Answer: they opted for figure like 90% correct in contexts where that form would be expected in native speech.
As soon as a form was not supplied in just 10% of those contexts, it was regarded as ‘officially’ “acquired”.
Note: It is assumed here that even natives do not score 100% all the time!
BURT & DULAY’s 90% CRITERION
Which structures did they decide to investigate?
They chose structures that had already been investigated in child language(L1), i.e., grammatical morphemes
You could guarantee these would turn up very frequently in spontaneous everyday speech
Examples: the, a(n), ‘s’ plural, 3rd person ‘s’, irregular past tense
BURT & DULAY
WHAT DID THEY FIND?
BURT & DULAY
They found an interesting similarity between the L1 and L2 English orders
Not identical but similar.
More to the point, all learners showed the same order of difficulty and were thus assumed also to be acquiring things in the same order
BURT, DULAY
01
01
01
01
01
01
01
01
Fixed morpheme orders (90%)
• catS
• they ARE runnING
• she’S a bad girl
• she’S in the house
• THE house, A house
• ran, went, saw
• she walkS, he runS
• Jim’S cat, Mary’S dog.
90
90
81
66
58
33
12
05
Error Rates<90% = ‘acquired”
01
01
01
01
01
01
01
01
Fixed morpheme orders (90%)
• catS
• they ARE runnING
• she’S a bad girl
• she’S in the house
• THE house, A house
• ran, went, saw
• she walkS, he runS
• Jim’S cat, Mary’S dog.
90
90
90
90
90
90
90
90
Error Rates<90% = ‘acquired”
Other fixed orders
1. Intonation questions2. Wh word added in front
3. Subj-verb inversion with do
1. Neg place finally (or in front)
2. Neg placed before verb
3. Neg placed before aux verb
4. Neg place after (MODAL) verb
5. Neg place after verb (DO)
• You know my friend?
• Why you come here?
• Why do you come here
• I like milk, no• I not like milk
• I not must see him
• I must not see him
• I do not like milk
'Interference' or 'developmental‘ errors?
They associated transfer explanations with (despised) behaviourism so..
What was Dulay and Burt's reaction to 'errors' than looked as though they were caused by L1 Interference? Example ‘I no can come' (from Spanish
BURT, DULAY
THEY SAID 2 THINGS:
1. Errors can often seem like L1-based but turn out to be equally explainable as 'developmental' because children learning L1 English produce the same construction
2. The same orders revealed by our experiments with learners with different language backgrounds suggest that we first look for developmental explanations where possible.
BURT, DULAY
THEIR CONCLUSION: Grammatical interference was much less
important than previously thought!Some L1 like errors were not interferenceOthers were simply performance
strategies and did not reflect the learner system but ambitioud ways to communicate when the current L2 system fails.
BURT, DULAY
Conscious learning of grammar had no
impact on the growth of the ‘acquired’ L2 system
It can however affect performance under certain circumstances.
KRASHEN’S CONTRIBITION
CorrectionFrom
‘outside’
Timing when you test
OUTPUT
Explicit knowledge about grammar
‘Natural’ SpontaneousSpeech or Writing
OUTPUT
CONSCIOUS Monitorthinking , analysing..
0
‘Corrected’Speech
& Writing
Test people NOW and you get a measure of ONLY their
acquired knowledge
WAIT & test people NOW
and you may get a measure of :a mixture
(acquired plus learned
knowledge)
COMPARE
100% subconsciousL2 Grammar
ACQUIRED SO FAR
Milliseconds
(1) The Acquisition-Learning Hypothesis.adults have two distinctive ways of
developing competences in second languages .. acquisition, that is by using language for real communication ... learning .. "knowing about" language‘
KRASHEN’S FIVE HYPOTHESES
(2) The Monitor Hypothesis'conscious learning ... can only be used
as a Monitor or an editor‘ (This expresses a development of the idea behind the original
Monitor Model)
Acquired grammar
Output 2(mixed and
possibly more correct)
subconscious
?
SLOW LIMITED
CONSCIOUS MONITOR
Now not 1 but 3 limitations:1. TIME NEEDED but also:2. SIMPLE RULES ONLY3. WILLINGNESS TO
MONITOR (individual learners vary here)
CONSCIOUS
Output 1(‘pure’)
Monitor use: NOW three conditions not one.
(4) The Input Hypothesis.'humans acquire language in only one
way - by understanding messages or by receiving "comprehensible input
(5) The Affective Filter Hypothesis. a mental block, caused by affective
factors ... that prevents input from reaching the language acquisition device'
ORGANIZER
?
Emotional block
Reduced sensitivity to input
Affective Filter
input
The Creative Construction one explanation for ‘apparent’ fossilisation.
L2 inputSpeech/Writing
Later Developments in SLA
TWO AREAS OF FOCUS
1. The properties of learner systems at given points in time (T1,T2,T3)
2. Processing: the relationship between knowledge and how knowledge is processed on-line
Vast increase in linguistic sophistication
The same fundamental questions could be asked:
1) Must older L2 learners develop L2 grammatical knowledge without access to the limitations and help supplied by UG?
2) Do older L2 learners still have some/complete access to UG?
Predictions
IF older L2 learners develop L2 grammatical knowledge without access to UG, then:
1) the L2 systems they develop using general problem solving mechanisms may well have properties are not possible in natural languages.
2) they will need grammatical correction.3) their L2 grammar will never become
native.
Predictions
IF older L2 learners still have some/complete access to UG, then:
1) the L2 systems they develop will have only properties are possible in natural languages.
2) they will not need grammatical correction but will be even be able to acquaire subtle aspects of the L2 they have no conscious knowledge of.
3) their L2 grammar may become native given sufficient and adequate exposure to the language.
THE ‘UG’ GROUP
The properties of learner systems at given points in
time (T1,T2,T3)
•L2 PROCESSING DURING PRODUCTION•L2PROCESSING DURING COMPREHENSION•L2 PROCESSING DURING ACQUISITION
Processing: the relationship between knowledge and how knowledge is processed on-
line
L2 Processing during production
Manfred Pieneman
0
Up to this point, L2 performance had been used to support two different positions
Selinker says it shows L2 learners possess their own systems and these systems (ILs) remain non-native. LAD not working so:
L1A not =L2ABurt, Dulay & Krashen say that evidence
of fixed orders show that LAD is still working so:
L1A=L2A (essentially at least)
Explaining L2 Performance
B, D & K’s explanation? No explanation yet. Mysterious
operations of the L1/L2 Organiser (LAD).
There are fixed stages. Source of evidence? Development of grammatical
morphemes
Explaining Stages of Acquisition
1. Moving from easily processed structures to less easily processed structures.
2. Some constructions follow a fixed order.
3. Some do not.
Explaining Stages of Acquisition
Pienemann’s explanation?
Source of evidence? Development of syntax (word
order & lawful combinations of words)
Explaining Stages of Acquisition
Pienemann’s first explanation was called:
The MULTIDIMENSIONAL MODEL
Meisel, Clahsen and Pienemann (1981)
The major result from the ZISA research was the well known developmental sequence in the L2 acquisition of German word order
LARGE quantity of data (cf. BDK’s)
ZISA project (Zweitspracherwerb italienischer, portugiesischer und spanischer Arbeiter)
German word order is quite strict especially with regard to VERB order:
The finite verb must come second in main clauses/simple sentences (‘Often saw I John’)
Complex verb forms (‘have seen John’) separate and the non-finite form goes to the end (‘have John seen’) .
ZISA project (Zweitspracherwerb italienischer, portugiesischer und spanischer Arbeiter)
I see stars. [Also OK in English]
Often see I stars. [NOT OK in English]
Stars see I often. [NOT OK in English]
German main clauses/simple sentences[literal translations into English used as examples]
V2
Verb second
translations into English
Complex verb forms separate and the non-finite form goes to the end.
*I have stars seen*Often have I stars seen*Stars I have often seen
Verb final position (in main clauses/simple sentences)
NON-finiteFormFINAL
POSITION
Another example with modal auxiliary can:
*I can stars see*Often can I stars see*Stars I can often see
main clauses/simple sentences
NON-FINITE
Verb Formin
FINAL POSITION
Subclauses in complex sentences
Learners only use simple sentences at the beginning. Later on, after first copying in subordinate clauses the order they have already acquired, L2 learners are finally able to go and apply Verb Final position to ALL verbs in subordinate clauses :
1. (I said) that I stars saw2. (I said) that I stars seen have
Stage 1: Canonical Word Order (SVO)
Stage 2: Adverb pre/postposing (A SVO A)
Stage 3: Verb Separation (SVOv)
Verb 2nd (AVSO, OVS..)Verb final (in subclauses) (---,SOvV)
German Basic Word Order stages summarised00
1. SVO
2. SVO KEPT [NO SUBJECT VERB INVERSION when adverb optionally added]
3. NON-FINITE VERBS NOW GO TO THE END
4. VERB GOES TO OBLIG. VERB 2nd POSITION FORCING SUBJ. AND VERB TO INVERT
5. FINITE VERBS GO TO THE END OF A SUBCLAUSE (AFTER ANY NON-FINITE VERB)
German Word Order: Examples (adapted)
KINDER SPIELEN MIM BALL ‘Children play with (the) ball)
DA KINDER SPIELEN‘THERE children play’
ALLE KINDER MUSS DIE PAUSE MACHEN ‘All children MUST the break HAVE’
DAN HAT SIE WIEDER DIE KNOCH GEBRINGT ‘Then HAVE THEY again the bone bringed’
ER ZAGTE DASS ER NACH HAUSE KOMT‘He said that HE to house COMES’
12m
Pienemann then asked:
Is everything in the L2 grammar acquired in a fixed order?
ANSWER: NO
Developmental Features
Some aspects of grammar develop in a fixed order according to their current processability.
Here, learners differ in their speed (rate) of learning grammatical features but follow the same order
These features are called “developmental features”
Individuals CANNOT follow different paths in acquiring these features: the order cannot be influenced in any way
Variational features
Some aspects of grammar vary according to learning situation sand the individual
grammatical features may IN PRINCIPLE be acquired in any order
these are called “variational features’ (like? prepositions, different types of article, adverb)
Individuals may follow different paths in acquiring these features.
Subects Italian & Spanish migrant workers learning L2 German
Much larger body of data (compare with creative construction data)
Major traditional area of syntax (compare with the morpheme order)
More comparisons with DBK research
Description vs Explanation
The developmental (fixed) sequence is actually provided with an “explanation” (compare with Creative Construction model)
‘Explanation’ is different from ‘description’!!
P.’s explanation has to do with EASE OF PROCESSING
Easily processed constructions acquired first
Processability: the general idea
Canonical Word Order (SVO) is the most “processable” order of elements
Processability: the general idea
Placing things at the beginning and end is next
“preserving the canonical order”
Processability: the general idea
Then comes moving things from inside to outside and vice versa
“disrupting the canonical order”
Processability: the general idea as first conceived
Switching things round inside the sentence is the least processable
“disrupting the canonical order”
• Pienemann later introduced a new criterion for acquisition called the EMERGENCE criterion.
‘EMERGENCE’
Important: A New Definition of ‘Acquisition’!
when the the new feature “emerges” this for acquisition
implies only a few spontaneous occurrences of the new features (4 or 5x)
this contrasts sharply with the Brown L1/ D,B & K 90% criterion of acquisition
emergence criterion
We now have two alternative definitions of ‘acquired’!
“Acquired” implies a particular construction/form:
A) ‘regularly appears in learner production’ (BDK)
ORB) has spontaneously appeared a few times
in learner production(Pienemann)
He turned to TWO sources to expand his model
Levelt’s speech production modelLexical Functional GrammarRESULT: an considerable enrichment of his
model AND A NEW NAME:PROCESSABILITY THEORY
Developments in P’S theory
• Teaching cannot force a new developmental stage to appear.
• Compare this to Krashen’s approach to grammar teaching
Just don’t teach grammar!)
Teachability Hypothesis
PT is a theory of second language acquisition centered on the premise that the ability to produce speech in a second language is limited by the one-by-one acquisition of five speech processing procedures, all of which are the same procedures by which a mature speaker generates grammatical utterances.
The main claim of PT is that learnability is restricted by computational constraints of the language processor: as such, learning a language requires the gradual acquisition of language-specific processing procedures based on Levelt’s (1989) speaking model (Pienemann, 2005, p. 2).
The main claim of PT
This view of language performance is complimented by a theory of grammar; PT is based on Lexical-functional grammar [LFG] (Kaplan & Bresnan, 1982) a model of grammar that reflects many of the psycholinguistic principles prominent in Levelt’s (1989) theory of production.
The main claim of PT
Stages of Acquisition Predicted by Processability Theory.
Processability Theory predicts a universal order of acquisition of five processing procedures illustrated by five stages.
Stages of Acquisition
First, at Stage 1, learners are limited to producing lemma, i.e. words or formulaic expressions. No exchange of information is possible, and thus no feature matching, or unification..
Stage 1
At Stage 2, category procedure, the ability to assign a category to the lemma, develops. An example of a category is the feature ‘plurality’; in Spanish, for example, the plural -s would emerge here as the learner becomes able to add ‘s’ to lemmas to indicate plurality.
Stage 2
In terms of syntax, at Stage 2, learners begin to produce strings based on canonical word order, which involves a prototypical mapping of the most prominent thematic role, i.e. agent, to the initial position in c-structure, i.e. subject (The Unmarked Alignment Hypothesis; Pienemann, Di Biase, and Kawaguchi, 2005, p.229).
This is possible because it is assumed that learners are able to define categories such as ‘verb’ and ‘subject’, but mapping is restricted by the inability to unify features.
Stage 2
At Stage 3, phrasal procedure emerges, which involves the ability to merge features as well as the ability to determine “positions” in terms of phrases instead of just words (Pienemann, 2005, p.27). At this point, in terms of morphology, features such as plurality can be matched across other elements within the same constituent, i.e. noun phrase agreement.
Stage 3
At Stage 4, s-procedure develops: that is, at this stage, the function of the phrase is determined through appointment rules and sent to s-procedure, where the information is stored as the sentence is developed.
Through s-procedure, information can be exchanged across constituent boundaries, and more target-like word order phenomena are found based on language-specific syntactic rules.
Stage 4
In terms of morphology, inter-phrasal information can be exchanged, which involves the exchange of information across constituent boundaries, e.g. subject-verb agreement in English.
Stage 4
At the final stage, Stage 5, s-procedure is able to call ‘S’ as a procedure, which means that subordinate clauses can be formed.
Stage 5
Conclusion
PIENEMANN’S EXPERIMENTATION AND THEORISING PROVIDE AN INTERESTING ALTERNATIVE TO
THE OTHER PROPOSALSPROCESSABILITY AND
TEACHABILITY ARE THE MAIN IDEAS
AT THE VERY LEAST, AN EXPLANATION IS PROVIDED FOR
FIXED ORDERS OF DEVELOPMENT IN PRODUCTION
L2 Processing during comprehension
Bill VanPatten
0
Input processing (VanPatten)
How learners make connections between form in the input and meaning
His theory is based on processing so….
Is this like Pienemann?
Input processing (VanPatten)
No. This is about
input processingIt is not about learner
production (output)
Input processing (VanPatten)
VanPatten’s approach is all about what learners NOTICE in the input
What do they PAY ATTENTION TO as they are trying to understand L2 utterances?
Assumption:
Input processing capacity of L2 learners is limited
Only certain features will receive attention during input processing.
When learners process input, they filter the input
Everyone agrees that input is reduced and modified into a new entity called ‘intake’
What becomes INTAKE?
For example:
• The Primacy of Content Words Principle
• The Lexical Preference Principle
• The Preference for Nonredundancy Principle
• The Meaning-before-Nonmeaning Principle)
• The Availability of Resources Principle
• The Sentence Location Principle
It suggests that there are biases and constraints in input processing behaviour
Because of working memory constraints and because they are paying attention to meaning-bearing prosodic cues are only able to:
process input for meaning before they can process it for form.
This he calls the Primacy of Meaning
Principle
Primacy of Meaning Principle
The Primacy of Meaning Principle comprises of sub-principles:
The Primacy of Content Words Principle
going to, chicken, the, kitchen, who, nasty, beauty, when, well, as, and, have (as in ‘I have finished’), have (as in ‘I have three chairs’), her
1. Content Words are in white, below)
The Primacy of Content Words
going to, chicken, the, kitchen, who, nasty, beauty, when, well, as, and, have (as in ‘I have finished’), have (as in ‘I have three chairs’), her
Learners will tend to rely on lexical items, not grammatical form, to get meaning when both encode the same semantic information.
I will go tomorrow (future time) Two houses (plurality)John avoids Halina (third person singular)
The Lexical Preference Principle
Learners will tend to rely on lexical items, not grammatical forms, to get meaning when both encode the same semantic information.
The Lexical Preference Principle
I will go tomorrow (future time) Two houses (plurality)John avoids Halina (third person singular)
Question: When will you go?Answer? I ..... go tomorrow
Question: What does John do?Answer? He avoid.. Halina
Consequence?
Learners are more likely to process nonredundant meaningful grammatical form before they process redundant
meaningful grammatical forms My cat sleeps ten hours everyday
The Preference for Nonredundancy Principle
Learners are more likely to process nonredundant meaningful grammatical form before they process redundant
meaningful forms My cat sleep ten hour everyday
The Preference for Nonredundancy Principle
The Availability of Resources Principle
Learners tend to process items in sentence initial position before those in final position and those in medial position
The Sentence Location Principle
1 3 3 2
Learners tend to interpret the first noun as the Agent/Subject.
Example: learners of L2 Polish will first tends to interpret Kota przystraszyl pies as:
The cat frightened the dog.
They do not at first pay attention to the morphology of kot signallin OBJECT status!
The First Noun Principle
He turned to TWO sources to expand his model
Levelt’s speech production modelLexical Functional GrammarRESULT: an considerable enrichment of his
model AND A NEW NAME:PROCESSABILITY THEORY
Developments in P’S theory
VanPatten summarised
VANPATTEN’S EXPERIMENTATION AND THEORISING PROVIDE AN INTERESTING ALTERNATIVE TO
THE OTHER PROPOSALSHE PROVIDES NO NEW
EXPLANATIONS FOR FIXED ORDERS OF DEVELOPMENT BUT
RATHER PRINCIPLES TO EXPLAIN HOW L2 FORMS IN THE INPUT GET
NOTICED
Implications for teaching
UG groupPienemannVanPatten
• UG researchers had no special interest in pedagogical implications.• It was clear to them that if L2 learners maintained access to UG, they need to acquire the L2 ‘naturally’ as suggested by Dulay, Burt and Krashen
• If they have no access and if pushed to talk about pedagogy, they might say that, then traditional teaching methods should be applied.
UG group and teaching.
• Teaching cannot force a new developmental stage to appear.
• Compare this to Krashen’s approach to grammar teaching
Just don’t teach grammar!)
Pienemann’s Teachability Hypothesis
Teachability Hypothesis
•Variational features can be taught•Developmental features cannot be taught
• “An L2 structure can be learnt from instruction only if the learner's IL is close to the point when this structure is acquired in the natural setting" (Pienemann 1984:201) [my italics].
Teachability Hypothesis
•QuestionS:1. What does ‘close to the point
when this structure is acquired in the natural setting’ mean?
2. How do you know when that point has arrived?
• The feature must emerge independently in the learner’s spontaneous production (a few times)
• Practising a developmental feature in class once it has emerged can help the learner to get through to the next stage faster.
Teachers must wait until it appears.
Pienemann’s Teachability Hypothesis
• Focus on processing L2 INPUT and not on producing L2 utterances.
• It’s all about noticing.
VanPatten’s Processing Instruction (PI) approach
• Techniques can be applied to help learners process input.
• These techniques must exploit the leaner’s instinctive preference for extracting meaning (and related strategies)
• They must make certain forms and syntactic structures easier to notice and process.
VanPatten’s Processing Instruction (PI) approach
• Learner’s follow First Noun Principle• Many languages allow first noun to be an OBJECT.
• English learners of Spanish will initially not notice object markers and process the first noun as a subject/agent.
• An exercise might take the following form:
Just one example
Picture showing
Juan calling Maria
Picture showing Maria
calling John
Question: match the following sentence to the right picture:
A Maria la llama Juan
A B
Object
marker
Object
marker
Many, many other developments in L2 theory
Different approachesDifferent areas of the languageDifferent aspects of L2 systems (properties/processing/transition)
New techniques (eye-tracking, brain-imaging)
CONCLUSION
From a new field of research which branched from the applied linguistics of language teaching
SLA has become a fully-fledged independent area of theoretical and experimental research
The End