Structure dependence, English Grammar and Universal Grammar

Traballo Fin de Grao en Lingua e Literatura Inglesas. Curso 2016-2017The aim of this work is twofold: (i) to present a thorough revision of structure dependence in relation to English Grammar from the point of view of linguistic innateness hypothesis, and (ii) to offer relevant criticism of such a theory, with the intention of providing a constructive and critical evaluation of the methodology and claims of linguistic innateness hypothesis. For this purpose, they were consulted numerous works from a wide array of authors, each of them notorious in their corresponding field of inquiry. Out of the many scholars whose works I have referred to, Noam Chomsky is to be highlighted, as he is the main theoretical defender of linguistic innateness theoryO obxectivo deste traballo é dobre: ​​(i) presentar unha revisión exhaustiva da dependencia da estrutura en relación coa gramática inglesa desde o punto de vista da hipótese do innato na lingüística, e (ii) ofrecer unha crítica relevante sobre tal teoría, coa intención de proporcionar unha avaliación constructiva e crítica da metodoloxía e as reivindicacións da hipótese do innato na lingüística. Para este propósito, foron consultados numerosos traballos procedentes dunha ampla gama de autores, cada un deles notorio no seu campo de investigación correspondente. Dende os moitos estudiosos cuxos traballos mencionei, Noam Chomsky é destacado, xa que é o principal defensor teórico da teoría do innato na lingüístic

The First Language Influence on the EFL-Learners’ Writing Performance: Errors Analysis and Remedial Perspective

The purpose of the  study was to inspect, identify, classify the source of errors to recognize the influence on learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) performance in writing text.  The study was intended to find a remedial strategies  to cope with the difficulties that affect the written works. A 100 students were chosen from the first level of English sections. It was found that the students’ spelling, syntactic and lexical errors could be attributed to many sources such as: interference, different learning styles, inexperienced instructing and negative attitude towards the writing process. It is recommended that teachers should be trained to master writing, style and usage of the language, along with a steady marking scheme and feed back to encourage the learners improve their writing performance; furthermore, an attractive syllabus ought to be designed to meet the students needs. Keywords: EFL-Learners; error analysis; first language; intralingual; interlanguage; writin

The potential influence of cognitive linguistics in second language teaching

Treballs Finals del Grau d'Estudis Anglesos, Facultat de Filologia, Universitat de Barcelona, Curs: 2016-2017, Tutora: Rosanna Rión Tetas[eng] Any development in the field of linguistics has the potential to influence second language teaching. However, the applications of cognitive linguistics to second language teaching have not received much attention from scholars. This essay builds upon theories from cognitive linguistics, selecting the ideas that have the most potential to benefit second language teaching and suggesting some ways in which cognitive linguistics could be applied to second language teaching. Then this project analyzes some of the challenges that have to be overcome in order to apply cognitive linguistics to second language teaching in a more efficient way. Finally, this essay proposes task-based language teaching as the most suitable teaching approach to benefit from cognitive linguistics.[cas] Cualquier desarrollo en el campo de la lingüística puede, potencialmente, tener un efecto en la docencia de lenguas extranjeras. Sin embargo, las aplicaciones de la lingüística cognitiva en el campo de la docencia de lenguas extranjeras no han recibido demasiada atención por parte de los expertos en la materia. Este trabajo se basa en las teorías del campo de la lingüística cognitiva y selecciona las ideas que tienen más potencial para beneficiar a la docencia de lenguas extranjeras y propone cómo estas ideas se podrían aplicar. A continuación, este trabajo analiza algunos de los problemas que se han de tratar para poder aplicar la lingüística cognitiva de una manera más eficiente. Finalmente, este trabajo propone que el método de enseñanza basado en tareas es el método que encaja mejor con este movimiento lingüístico

WRITTEN CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK: EFFECTS OF FOCUSED AND UNFOCUSED GRAMMAR CORRECTION ON THE CASE ACQUISITION IN L2 GERMAN

Thirty-three students of fourth semester German at the University Kansas participated in the study which sought to investigate whether focused written corrective feedback (WCF) promoted the acquisition of the German case morphology over the course of a semester. Participants received teacher WCF on five two-draft essay assignments under three treatment conditions: Group (1) received focused WCF on German case errors; group (2) received unfocused WCF on a variety of German grammar errors; and group (3) did not receive WCF on specific grammar errors. Combining quantitative and qualitative analyses, the study found that the focused group improved significantly in the accuracy of case forms while the unfocused and the control group did not make any apparent progress. The results indicate that focused WCF was effective in improving case accuracy in subjects' writings in German as a foreign language (GFL) context. WCF did not negatively affect writing fluency or students' attitude toward writing

The Study of Teacher Written Feedback: The Effectiveness of Electronic Feedback on Student Writing Revisions

The effectiveness of teacher written feedback has been a subject of debate in second language writing for decades. The most basic debate in this area among ESL writing researchers is whether teacher written feedback in various forms has any positive effects on student writing revisions. Among other researchers, Ferris, Lee, Ene & Upton and Stevenson & Phakiti argued that while the effectiveness of error feedback in the traditional paper-and-pen form (Ferris, 1999, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006 and Lee, 2008a, 2008b), computer-facilitated form (Ene & Upton, 2014) or computer-generated form (Stevenson & Phakiti, 2013) was not conclusive, more research should be done to explore in what ways error feedback can be improved. Indeed, the heterogeneity of these studies characterized by different focus, research designs, institutional and instructional contexts, and participant backgrounds, alongside some methodological flaws and misinterpretation of findings identified in my critical review has possibly undermined the validity and reliability of the studies, giving rise to these mixed results for both paper-and-pen feedback and computer-based feedback. As such, the causality between different forms of feedback treatment and their outcomes of error reduction is questioned. With the primary interest in improving the effectiveness of teacher written feedback in error correction, ‘Mark My Words’ (‘MMWs’), the interactive-based electronic feedback system, was designed in such a way to accommodate individual learners’ language needs and to be more responsive to various error types. This study focused on examining on the effectiveness of ‘Mark My Words’ (‘MMWs’), as a kind of computer-facilitated feedback (i.e. electronic feedback), in improving students’ error reduction in their writing revisions, under a controlled condition. The mixed methods approach was adopted, namely the ‘error count’ method and ‘questionnaire’, in this study. The participants were 62 second-year engineering students enrolled in an English for Specific Purposes course in a Hong Kong University. Efforts were made to avoid the impact of extraneous variables on the validity and reliability of the research outcomes under such controlled condition. The positive results of this study can contribute some sort of concrete evidence to the growing body of literature of the ‘effectiveness of teacher written feedback’ and ‘second language writing’, thus clarifying some mixed results of the previous research

A tentative analysis of the initial development of english syntax in UFSC students

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, 1984