A Preliminary Study on Why Second Language Learners Accept Ungrammatical Sentences: Its Theoretical Implications

Why do second language learners sometimes accept ungrammatical sentences in the target language? In the present study, we focus on Japanese-speaking learners of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) and investigate whether such “grammatical illusion” effect would be observed in them and whether the effect could be dependent on their proficiency.　The results of one acceptability judgment questionnaire experiment and of one preliminary self-paced reading experiment are reported.　The results of the questionnaire experiment showed that the lower-proficiency Japanese EFL learners were more likely to accept ungrammatical sentences in English compared to the higher-proficiency learners.　The results of the self-paced reading experiment indicated that the reading time difference between ungrammatical sentences and their grammatical counterparts was significant for one native English speaker but not for two Japanese EFL learners.　It is suggested that the “grammatical illusion” effect (i.e., erroneous acceptance of ungrammatical sentences) in second language learners is more likely to be observed when their proficiency is lower, and possibly that second language learners can accept ungrammatical sentences during their real-time processing.　We discuss a new approach to second language acquisition from the perspective of the grammatical illusion phenomenon

Malaysian and Indonesian Learners: They Are Judges of How They Learn English Most Effectively in and Out of Classrooms

The position of English is that of a Second Language in Malaysia and a Foreign Language in Indonesia. But the objective is the same that is to enable the learners to communicate effectively and efficiently in social and professional situations. Learners' beliefs and learners' strategies are also part of the learning processes. Strategies are ways of managing the complex information that the learners are receiving about the target language. This study aims to find out (i) the learners' beliefs on the importance of English (ii) what the learners will do (strategies) to manage their own learning. 100 respondents participated in the study. They responded to open ended questions. The results show that there are similarities and differences in the ways the Malaysian and Indonesian learners perceived the importance of English. They also have similarities and differences in their strategies to manage their own learning to achieve their goals. As a conclusion, even though the two countries adopted different language policy, the learners of English as a Second and Foreign Language have their own enthusiasms and they make judgements about how to learn the language effectively and they have the awareness of what language learning is like

Teaching Authentic English Pronounciation

Most of the evidence from different research and literature indicates that learners beyond the age of puberty cannot acquire authentic pronunciation of a second language, because the articulation muscles have already lost their flexibility to be able to make new sounds which has not been in the first language. However, there are some adult learners who have the ability to achieve a perfect native like pronunciation of English. In relating Howard Gardner?s (1983) theory of multiple intelligences (MI) to second language learning, we can more easily discern the acquisition of authentic accent by adult learners in spite of the flexibility loss of the vocal cords. According to Gardner?s theory, which attaches important features to the notion of intelligence, learners within a wide range of IQs can be successful in acquiring a second language. In this regard, “musical intelligence” -the forth intelligence in Gardner?s theory- can explain the relative ease that learners have in perceiving and producing the intonation patterns of a language. This research aims to seek ways to enhance the ability of language learners to acquire more native-like pronunciation by the aid of their musical intelligence which is almost an innate ability in everyone. Keywords: Teaching, English & Pronounciatio

The Innateness of Human Language: Viewing from Grammatical Errors of Second Language Learners

We explore a new approach to the long-standing issue in linguistics: of whether knowledge of language is innate or not. To this empirical issue, a variety of approaches have been proposed, but the purpose of the present study is not to deny those approaches bur rather to examine a new one for further verification of the innateness hypothesis. Our new approach is based on the methodology adopted in first language acquisition. Concretely, if a second language learner produces a string of words which is neither accepted grammatically in the target language nor attributed to their first language transfer but can be analyzed as a corresponding grammatically accepted structure in another language, then it follows that he/she can access to knowledge of the language to which he/she is never exposed and thus that knowledge of all particular languages is innately available. As a preliminary study, we analyze the relevant errors of Japanese-speaking learners of English and consider future issues for our new approach. 言語知識が生得的であるか否かは言語学における長年の課題であるが、本研究はその課題に対して新たなアプローチを探る。言語知識の生得性という経験的課題に対して、これまでさまざまなアプローチが提案されてきたが、本研究の目的はそれらのアプローチを否定することではなく、新たなアプローチを検討し、言語生得説に対するさらなる検証に貢献することである。新たなアプローチは第一言語獲得で採用されている方法論に基づいている。具体的には、第二言語学習者が、目標言語で文法的に容認されず、学習者の母語による干渉にも帰因しないが、他の言語では文法的に容認される構造であると分析できるような文を産出したとしたら、当該学習者は一度も経験したことのない言語に関する知識にアクセスしたことになり、すべての個別言語に関する知識は生得的に利用可能ということになる。 予備的な研究として、日本人英語学習者が産出するこのような誤りを分析し、新たなアプローチに対する今後の課題を検討する

An Application of Answer Set Programming to the Field of Second Language Acquisition

This paper explores the contributions of Answer Set Programming (ASP) to the study of an established theory from the field of Second Language Acquisition: Input Processing. The theory describes default strategies that learners of a second language use in extracting meaning out of a text, based on their knowledge of the second language and their background knowledge about the world. We formalized this theory in ASP, and as a result we were able to determine opportunities for refining its natural language description, as well as directions for future theory development. We applied our model to automating the prediction of how learners of English would interpret sentences containing the passive voice. We present a system, PIas, that uses these predictions to assist language instructors in designing teaching materials. To appear in Theory and Practice of Logic Programming (TPLP).Comment: 17 pages, 3 tables, to appear in Theory and Practice of Logic Programming (TPLP

The effects of teacher feedback on multiple-draft compositions in ESL classrooms

Teacher feedback plays a significant role in helping ESL learners acquire the writing skills. However, many research findings indicated that feedback on single draft essays does not help ESL learners much in improving the essays because these learners do not have the opportunity to revise, rewrite, and resubmit their work. Therefore, this study aims at examining the effects of teacher feedback on ESL learners’ compositions in terms of content, language and organization by instituting the multiple draft procedure. The participants of this study wrote a first draft; revised it after getting the feedback on content and further revised it after receiving feedback on language. The findings showed that there were significant mean differences in the content, language, organization and the total marks when the second and the third drafts were compared to the first draft

LEXTALE_CH: A quick, character-based proficiency test for Mandarin Chinese

Research in second language acquisition suggests that objective performance-based assessments may provide more reliable and valid measures of second language proficiency than subjective self-ratings. To measure proficiency in English as a second language, a quick, vocabulary-based test called LexTALE (Lexical Test for Advanced Learners of English) was developed and shown to be able to differentiate between various levels of English proficiency. Following in the line of adaptations of this test for other languages, we created a character-based adaptation for Mandarin Chinese: LEXTALE_CH. In this paper, we discuss the development and validation of LEXTALE_CH in detail. In short, LEXTALE_CH can discriminate between high and low levels of Mandarin proficiency and is sensitive to the significant differences in vocabulary size between native speakers and second language learners of Mandarin; further, it takes only a few minutes to administer and is simple to score, making it a practical tool for low-stakes estimation of Mandarin proficiency.http://www.lingref.com/bucld/42/BUCLD42-09.pdfPublished versio

Orthographic input and phonological representations in learners of Chinese as a foreign language.

This paper provides evidence that the second language orthographic input affects the mental representations of L2 phonology in instructed beginner L2 learners. Previous research has shown that orthographic representations affect monolinguals' performance in phonological awareness tasks; in instructed L2 learners such representations could also affect pronunciation. This study looked at the phonological representations of Chinese rimes in beginner learners of Chinese as a foreign language, using a phoneme counting task and a phoneme segmentation task. Results show that learners do not count or segment the main vowel in those syllables where it is not represented in the pinyin (romanisation) orthographic representations. It appears that the pinyin orthographic input is reinterpreted according to L1 phonology-orthography correspondences, and interacts with the phonological input in shaping the phonological representations of Chinese syllables in beginner learners. This explains previous findings that learners of Chinese do not pronounce the main vowel in these syllables