Search results for "L2"

Imagined Identities and Communities in the Learning Context of Finnish as a Second Language

2022

This case study on two migrant pupils of Finnish as L2 was carried out in Finland, which lies outside the most common context of such research, i.e. ESL or EFL in an English-speaking country. The study thus attempts to address the need to expand the research contexts of L2 identity issues. Using ethnographic data collected inside and outside a preparatory language classroom, this study aims to examine how the pupils make sense of their new learning environment and how, through language learning, they construct identities. The results show that they extend their repertoire of identities and connect to a wider world of possibilities as they strive to gain greater resources in their imagined c…

The impact of a short auditory training on L2 pronunciation in languages with different orthographic depth

2021

It is sometimes assumed that the pronunciation of an L2 is more predictable and thus easier to learn if its orthography is transparent. This study aims to find out whether this assumption holds true in the first stages of L2 learning in languages with different orthographic depth. The study also examines the effect that a short auditory training (supported by simultaneous orthographic input) has on L2 pronunciation. A central finding was that the pronunciation of an L2 with a transparent orthography was not easier to learn for a naïve learner when compared to an L2 with an opaque orthography. A second finding was that even a short period of auditory training can introduce a significant impr…

Prosody and fluency of Finland Swedish as a second language: Investigating global parameters for automated speaking assessment

2023

This study investigates prosody and fluency of Finland Swedish as a second language (L2). The main objective is to investigate global measures of prosody and fluency as predictors of overall oral proficiency, fluency, and pronunciation ratings. We analyzed parameters related to temporal fluency, timing (based on syllable durations), and f0 change from spontaneous speech produced by 30 native and 235 non-native speakers of Finland Swedish representing proficiency levels from beginner to intermediate. We used pairwise comparisons to investigate the differences between native speech (L1) and L2 samples from different proficiency levels. To study the predictability of ratings with acoustic para…

Towards the phonetic basis of spoken second language assessment : temporal features as indicators of perceived proficiency level

2017

The role of pause location in perceived fluency and proficiency in L2 Finnish

2022

Fluency is a commonly used descriptor of second language (L2) speaking skills. Unplanned and too frequent pauses, hesitations, and repetitions disrupt the flow of speech and can cause temporal irregularities at all levels of speech hierarchy, from syllable rate to phrasing. However, most studies that attempt to quantify fluency disregard pause locations. The current study investigates, whether and which pause locations affect the perceived fluency and proficiency in L2 Finnish. Several pause parameters were computed from spontaneous L2 Finnish speech samples. Pause locations were investigated with regards to clauses and phrases as well as incomplete words. The effect of pause locations to h…

The Development of Russian Heritage Pupils' Writing Proficiency in Finnish and Russian

2018

James Cummins has stated that “a cognitively and academically beneficial form of bilingualism can be achieved only on the basis of adequately developed first language (L1) skills” (1979, p. 222). In this chapter we focus on bilingual writing development and its connections to learners’ cognitive and linguistic skills in L1 and L2 and background factors. Our participants come from Russian-speaking immigrant families living in Finland. All participants go to Finnish schools and are either integrated into mainstream classes or have started a preparatory class specially designed for recently arrived immigrant children. The basic aim of this chapter is two-fold and thus, the study is introduced …

Predicting Placement Accuracy and Language Outcomes in Immigrants’ L2 Finnish Education

2018

Dialogical view on learner agency of immigrant pupils : a case study of the learners of Finnish as L2

2022

This study explores the dialogical nature of agency when two immigrant pupils, who are learning Finnish as their new target language, are authoring their selves. Bakhtin’s dialogism was the inspiration for this examination of the discourses that surround the L2 pupils’ agency and how they respond to discourses through their agency. Ethnographically oriented data collection included classroom observations, the pupils’ portfolios, and interviews with the pupils (as main participants) and meaningful adults. These data yielded a set of narratives from multiple voices. The results show that the pupils negotiate more subjective meanings of their selves, and re-color them with their internal goals…

Begripligheten av finskspråkiga gymnasisters svenska uttal: lyssnarvärderingar

2018


 
 
 The aim of this study is to investigate how comprehensible L1 Finnish speakers’ L2 Swedish is considered to be and whether any listener- or speaker-specific background factors relating to the comprehensibility judgements can be found. The research material consists of Swedish read-aloud texts by 21 Finnish-speaking upper secondary school students. Judgements are given by 64 native Swedish-speakers (Finland-Swedish n = 35, Sweden-Swedish n = 29) using a verbalized scale from 1 to 7. The study shows that L2 Swedish, pronounced by L1 Finnish speakers, is on average considered to be comprehensible but the listener has to concentrate closely. Both Finland-Swedish and Sweden-…

Creaky voice and utterance fluency measures in predicting perceived fluency and oral proficiency of spontaneous L2 Finnish

2022

While utterance fluency measures are often studied in rela tion to perceived L2 fluency and proficiency, the effect of creaky voice remains ignored. However, creaky voice is frequent in a number of languages, including Finnish, where it serves as a cue for phrase-boundaries and turn-taking. In this study we inves tigate the roles of creaky voice and utterance fluency measures in predicting fluency and proficiency ratings of spontaneous L2 Finnish (F2) speech. In so doing, 16 expert raters participated in assessing narrative spontaneous speech samples from 160 learn ers of Finnish. The effect of creaky voice and utterance fluency measures on proficiency and fluency ratings was studied using …