Search results for "Comprehension approach"

Future language teachers’ pedagogical landscapes during their subject studies

2015

This article examines the experiences, attitudes and perceptions language students have regarding the use of ICT in language teaching. In addition, the article analyses the key characteristics of language students’ pedagogical designs. The data come from a pedagogically oriented subject-studies course that focuses on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages and the European Language Portfolio. The data, which consist of language students’ reflections and course plans, have been analysed using qualitative content analysis. The findings imply that language students’ pedagogical landscapes reflect their own experiences as learners. Furthermore, the literacy practices in languag…

From a bodily-based format of knowledge to symbols. The evolution of human language

2013

Although ontogeny cannot recapitulate phylogeny, a two-level model of the acquisition of language will be here proposed and its implication for the evolution of the faculty of language will be discussed. It is here proposed that the identification of the cognitive requirements of language during ontogeny could help us in the task of identifying the phylogenetic achievements that concurred, at some point, to the acquisition of language during phylogeny. In this model speaking will be considered as a complex ability that arises in two different steps. The first step of competence widely relies on a bodily-based format of knowledge. The second step relies on more abstract meta-representations …

Foreign Language Anxiety in the Context of Foreign Language Oral Performance, Language and Pronunciation Learning Strategies

2016

The aim of this chapter is to provide a theoretical background for the concept of language anxiety, emphasising the context of L2 oral performance and pronunciation. Thus, the construct of general anxiety is first explored and the definition of anxiety is analysed. Subsequently, the term foreign language anxiety is examined for the purpose of establishing its working definition. Next, a typology of causes of language anxiety experienced by L2 learners is proposed in order to fully grasp the complexity of the construct.

A Sociocultural Approach to Young Language Learners' Belief about Language Learning

2003

Can research into the diagnostic testing of reading in a second or foreign language contribute to SLA research?

2011

Language testing researchers have recently shown interest in diagnostic testing. However, diagnostic testing requires a better understanding of language abilities at a less general level than has been normal in language testing, and this has posed challenges to testers to define their diagnostic constructs both theoretically and operationally. In theory, second language acquisition (SLA) should be able to offer insights into the construct of reading in a second or foreign language (S/FL), and testing ought to be able to base diagnostic tests of S/FL reading on theoretical insights from SLA. It is, however, unclear whether this happens in practice. In this paper we examine the potential syne…

Investigations in Teaching and Learning Languages : Studies in Honour of Hanna Komorowska

2013

CLIL classroom discourse

2013

Under the label of Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) the teaching of curriculum subjects through the medium of a foreign language has become a widely accepted feature in mainstream education systems in Europe and other parts of the world. After contextualizing its subject matter in CLIL research as a whole, this article focuses on research into classroom discourse. In order to unravel the complexities involved, three different takes on CLIL classroom discourse are discussed as an evidence-base for (a) language learning, (b) language use and social-interactional aspects of L2-interaction, and (c) processes of knowledge construction in and through a second or foreign language. T…

Awareness of second language inflectional morphology: A case study on Finnish as a second language

2007

The Finnish language has a very extensive inflectional morphology, whereas Vietnamese, as an isolating language, has no inflection at all. Therefore, the major challenge encountered by Vietnamese immigrants learning Finnish is to develop awareness of the existence, function and use of inflection. This paper examines how this process manifests itself in native-non-native speaker (NS-NNS) conversations during the initial stages of second language acquisition. All the negotiation sequences including overt signals of problems in understanding were subjected to a closer analysis, and the linguistic modifications performed to solve the problems were analysed on the level of both interaction and g…

The birth of language ecology: interdisciplinary influences in Einar Haugen's “The ecology of language”

2015

Abstract Einar Haugen is generally regarded as the founding father of ‘language ecology’ or ‘ecology of language’. In his classic 1971 paper, he suggested that “[l]anguage ecology may be defined as the study of interactions between any given language and its environment”. After tracing the roots of language ecology in the social sciences and biology and the use of similar locutions by other linguists before him, the present paper discusses major conceptual and theoretical issues surrounding his proposal. Fundamental discrepancies between how the concept of ecology is understood in biology and sociology, on the one hand, and the attempted application to language, on the other, render details…

LANGUAGE POLICY AND PLANNING

2000

The field of language policy and planning is clearly a sub-field within applied linguistics. It generally does not draw heavily on formal linguistics, except for aspects of corpus and status planning. However, it does draw extensively from a range of disciplines in order to plan, implement, and evaluate language policies that respond to the needs of stake holders of various types. Despite continuous development of the field, aspects of language policy and planning need to be developed further. One of the key areas where policy can be enhanced considerably is in the area of policy and planning evaluation. This direction of inquiry is also relevant to a number of other areas within applied li…