This annotated bibliography is reformatted and customized by the Center for Positive Practices. Some of the authors featured on this page include Carolyn Kessler, Imelda Idar, Th. R. Hofmann, Roger W. Andersen, Ann Fathman, Jacquelyn Schachter, Anna Beth Doyle, Gerald G. Neufeld, William Rutherford, and Remy Porquier.
(1974). Bilingual Cognition: A Reply to Neufeld. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 4. This paper attempts to clarify some of the issues raised in the author's earlier paper, "A Theoretical Perspective on the Relationship between Bilingualism and Thought" (Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 1), as a response to Gerald Neufeld's critique, which appeared in No. 2 of the same series. The present paper argues that Neufeld mistakenly imputes to the first article certain beliefs regarding cognitive flexibility, the "switching hypothesis" and cultural stimulation. In the original paper these aspects of some bilingual learning situations were discussed purely as examples of possible non-linguistic explanatory factors for the positive effects of bilingualism on cognition that have been observed. The validity or lack of validity of these factors were not under examination in the original paper. The present paper also includes a table containing a summary of the observed effects of bilingualism on cognition and the suggested explanations of these effects. [More] Descriptors: Abstract Reasoning, Bilingual Students, Bilingualism, Code Switching (Language)
(1977). The Impoverished State of Cross-Sectional Morpheme Acquisition/Accuracy Methodology. (or: The Leftovers Are More Nourishing Than the Main Course.) Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 14. Current cross-sectional morpheme accuracy methodology whittles away the data until what remains in the final analysis is less interesting than what has been discarded. These methods of analysis obscure and eliminate variation in individual production of the morphemes under study and fail to reveal true systematicity in the data. Using data on eight verb-related morphemes, three "s" morphemes, and the use of articles from a study of Puerto Rican learners of English as a second language, the inadequacies in these methods are pointed out, and several improvements are suggested which will reveal whatever systematicity there is in the data without eliminating the individual variation which is so typical of learner interlanguage. Descriptors: Bilingual Students, Bilingualism, Data Analysis, Determiners (Languages)
(1979). Acquisition of English by a Vietnamese Mother and Child. Working Papers on Bilingualims, No. 18. A longitudinal study of English acquisition by a Vietnamese mother and her daughter is reported. Subjects of this study are Lan, a young Vietnamese woman in her late twenties, and her daughter Than, who was four years old at the time this study began. Neither knew any English when they resettled in Texas in the summer of 1975 after fleeing from Vietnam in the spring of that year. English acquisition began through interaction with the American family sponsors, with whom they continue to maintain close social ties. Vietnamese continues to be the language of the home, but English is developing through the mother's contacts at work and frequent visits with the American sponsors. Than is enrolled in an English-speaking school. A wide range of syntactic structures are examined; the adult acquisition sequencing of the mother is compared with that of her child. Findings have implications for a theory of language acquisition, both first and second, as well as for pedagogical considerations in teaching English as a second language. Descriptors: Adults, Children, Cultural Influences, Discourse Analysis
(1979). Une experience d'enseignement individualise de l'anglais langue seconde a l'elementaire (An Experiment in Individualized Instruction in English as a Second Language in Elementary School). Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 18, Working Papers on Bilingualism. The question of whether educational technology can be of assistance to the public school teacher who is in the position of having to teach the rudiments of a second language that he himself has not mastered is addresed in this paper. A series of teaching and learning units were constructed and experimented with for two years in teaching English as a second language to 10- and 11-year-old students. The technology that was used allowed for a high degree of individualization of instruction, due particularly to the use of the cassette tape-recorder. The results show that the 10-year-old students performed better than a control group in a similar context. The instructional method used also seems to increase the motivation and enjoyment of the students in relation to English as a school subject. However, the learning environment thus created retains a certain rigidity unless it is enlivened by a teacher capable of speaking the second language and promoting dynamic exchanges between students. Descriptors: Behavioral Objectives, Educational Technology, Elementary Education, English (Second Language)
(1979). Les voies d'apprentissage en langue etrangere (Learning Processes in a Foreign Language). Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 17. A general model for second language learning is proposed in this paper. First, this model aims to describe different components (input, intake, integration, output) of the learning process in terms of the information (explicit/implicit, linguistic/sociolinguistic) to which the learner is exposed. Secondly, the model serves to identify the stages, "learning pathways," which the learner follows to develop knowledge in the target language. These pathways, of course, vary according to individual factors and the learning setting. In the classroom, the type of input provided and the output required by the teaching method and teacher's strategies together with the learner's strategies determine the pathways taken. Thus the model should be useful in examining the pathways proposed or imposed by different teaching approaches, in identifying new ones not currently exploited, and in suggesting new directions for research on the learner. Descriptors: Cognitive Processes, Cognitive Style, Communication Skills, Communicative Competence (Languages)
(1974). A Preliminary Report on the Development of Grammatical Morphemes in a Japanese Girl Learning English as a Second Language. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 3. Speech samples were taken every two weeks for a period of 40 weeks from a five-year-old Japanese girl learning English as a second language through her environment. The presence or absence of some grammatical morphemes in linguistic or nonlinguistic obligatory context was scored; using Brown's (1973) criterion for morpheme acquisition, a rank order of these morphemes was determined. The order obtained was different from those of native English-speaking children. Possible determinants for this rank order are hypothesized in terms of (1) presence/nonpresence of that semantic notion expressed by those individual English morphemes in Japanese, (2) a principle of simplicity, and (3) phonological interference. [More] Descriptors: Bilingualism, Child Language, English (Second Language), Interference (Language)
(1977). Some Issues in the Assessment of Linguistic Consequences of Early Bilingualism. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 14. The present paper discusses some linguistic correlates of early bilingualism, correlates which have implications for first cognitions about language. The paper also touches on the question of what linguistic environments are optimal for the very young child to acquire two languages fluently, testing the importance of a one-speaker/one-language presentation style. The validity of some measures of early bilingual fluency is also discussed. Data from two separate replications are presented. Thirteen bilinguals with mean age of 30 months are compared with matched monolingual controls on age of first word, receptive vocabulary, and general language development. Subsequently, 22 balanced bilinguals (mean age 51 months) are compared with monolingual controls on age of first word, receptive vocabulary, syntactic maturity and verbal fluency. The results suggest that bilingual preschoolers are not delayed in age of first words, may lag slightly in the acquisition of lexical items, but may be superior in ideational fluency. There is no evidence that the bilingual child's languages must be separated by speaker or location for optimum vocabulary growth. Descriptors: Bilingual Students, Bilingualism, Child Language, Cognitive Processes
(1979). Discourse Function and Language Transfer. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 19. Data delimited by the phonology-to-semantics framework of mainstream linguistics are inadequate to account for the subtle influences of first language (L1) upon second language (L2). Unique errors for which there is no L1 correlate are found in samples of written English produced by Japanese and Chinese second language learners. This is due to a variety of language transfer from L1 function to L2 form. In investigating the nature and causes of this variety of transfer, these questions are asked: (1) Does any part of written English that is identifiable as non-native reflect attempts by the learner to match features of English syntax to certain discourse functions? (2) Does this occur especially in cases where such functions are marked differently in the learner's native language than they are in English? (3) Do learner attempts to encode in English the notions topic/comment, theme/rheme, and so on differ from those of a native speaker of English? (4) What syntactic devices do different learners resort to for such purposes? Close study of written discourse will provide answers to these questions and more knowledge about the dynamic processes of language acquisition. Descriptors: Chinese, Code Switching (Language), Discourse Analysis, English (Second Language)
(1974). Levels of Competence in Oral Communication. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 4. A set of levels of useful oral competence in a second language are proposed, and a revision in its structure is shown that can make it applicable to first language and to passive-bilingual situations. Unlike many other scales of bilingualism, it integrates oral expression and oral comprehension into a single scale without losing validity. Its distinctions are gross enough to be easily perceived and easily tested for, to be objective and reliable, and to be easily interpreted in terms of ordinary experience. In addition to developing this scale, several principles about language competence and its measurement are discussed: (1) Skills with the oral language and the written language are logically independent of each other, though they are correlated in many populations. (2) Although it is obvious that language competence is not a dichotomous property, it is also not a single continuum, as it has often been described. Oral competence includes at least two independent dimensions, comprehension and expression. (3) Levels of competence in oral expression and oral comprehension can be combined, however, based on their utility in communication. (4) Because of this interconnection, they can be interleaved together into a single scale of competence. Descriptors: Bilingualism, Communicative Competence (Languages), Comprehension, Language Ability
(1979). Systems of Verb Classification and Cohesion of Verb-Complement Relations as Structural Conditions on Interference in a Child's L2 Development. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 18. Developmental data from the acquisition of English by a German child, aged 5, are analyzed with a view to identifying structural conditions that give rise to interference, and to determine which L2 structures are affected and which structures govern developmental changes. Word order in German and English sentences ahve reflexes in different degrees of cohesion between subject-verb and verb-complement relations in the two languages. The differences in cohesion interact with the systems of verb classification and constrain the kinds of revisions the subject can make in interrogation and negation. It is suggested that both the subject's development and changes in Early Modern English bear out Lehmann's hypothesis on the tendency of consistent verb-object and object-verb languages to place verbal modifiers in such a way as not to disrupt the unity of verb and object The subject's development and the significance of the parallels to the evolution of English are discussed in the light of current child L2 acquisition theory which overestimates the role of creativity vis-a-vis the structural constraints exercised by linguistic systems. Descriptors: Bilingualism, Child Language, Diachronic Linguistics, English (Second Language)
(1974). Alternatives to Spontaneous Speech: Elicited Translation and Imitation as Indicators of Second Language Competence. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 3. Elicited imitation occurs in an experimental situation during which subjects are requested to repeat a model sentence constructed so as to include specific desired grammatical structures. Elicited translation involves giving subjects a sentence in one language, and asking them to say the same thing, but in another language; elicited translation may work from native language to second language or vice versa. This study finds both methods useful as indicators of second language competence. Imitation taps both comprehension and production; data obtained through imitation may be interpreted to determine the stage of acquisition of a given structure. Translation also taps aspects of second language competence, although additional investigation is needed into the translation process itself and into other variations of the translation task. [More] Descriptors: Communicative Competence (Languages), Comprehension, Data Collection, Imitation
(1979). The Value of Morpheme Order Studies for Second Language Learning. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 18. The results from three studies using data provided by the SLOPE Test and oral interviews are reported. The studies include: (1) a comparison of rank orders obtained over a period of time; (2) a comparison of rank orders obtained in instrument-elicited and spontaneous speech; and (3) a comparison of results obtained using two methods of analysis, rank ordering and error analysis. The results of these studies suggest that morpheme rank ordering, using cross-sectional data and based upon instrument-elicited speech, can be a valid method of analysis. Certain limitations to this method are noted, however, for morpheme ordering appears to obscure important data. A recommendation is made for supplementing results with other types of analysis which examine the basic forms produced by language learners. Descriptors: Bilingualism, English (Second Language), Error Analysis (Language), Language Acquisition
(1979). Quelques caracteristiques du comportement linguistique des apprenants lents (Some Characteristics of the Linguistic Behavior of Slow Learners). Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 18. In order to attempt to identify the linguistic difficulties of slow learners, errors made by two groups of English-speaking adults learning French as a second language were compared. The subjects of the two groups shared similar characteristics, with the exception of the amount of time required to cover the same linguistic material (Group 1: 17 weeks; Group 2: 30 weeks). To elicit oral utterances three techniques were used: (1) free expression; (2) translation; and (3) the oral part of an achievement test. Results showed that the number of errors made by slow learners increased in proportion to the degree of constraint imposed by the task, that the difference between the two groups is highly significant for the total number of verb errors, and that slow learners are much more likely than others to commit some kinds of errors. The data from the two groups are compared and interpreted from three aspects: the role of the native language, use of rules, and overgeneralization. Learner strategies are hypothesized and a few tentative suggestions are made for teaching. Descriptors: Adults, Cognitive Style, Error Analysis (Language), Error Patterns
(1978). Division of Continuing Education and Extension Services. Annual Report, 1977-1978. The Division of Continuing Education at New York City Community College witnessed its third year of budgetary reduction and staff losses in 1977-78. The college's grant income declined by $300,000 from 1976-77 and enrollment in tuition courses fell. Factors influencing the drop in tuition course enrollment included a loss of central staff initiative in tuition course development and raising of fees to meet the mandate that tuition cover not only instructional costs but other costs previously underwritten by the college. Overall enrollment, however, rose by about 650 from the previous year. The worse blows to the continuing education division were the loss of refunding for the Voorhees vocational training program for ex-offenders and the ethnic heritage studies program for older adults. Other programs that are described with regard to enrollments, evaluation, problems and achievements, and future plans are the vocational programs for deaf adults, and technical programs in food service training, day care cooks' training, biomedical equipment technology, hearing aid technology, and welding. Discussions of credit for continuing education, the state civil service employee benefits training program, and the sanitation management certificate program are also included. A statistical summary of the tuition and grant programs is also provided. Descriptors: Adult Education, Annual Reports, Community Colleges, Educational Finance
(1977). Language Learning Ability in Adults: A Study on the Acquisition of Prosodic and Articulatory Features. Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 12. This paper reports on a study in which twenty young adults were tested for their ability to accurately reproduce the articulatory and prosodic features of three non-Indo-European languages in which they had received instruction. The first of two basic goals of this research was to test, at the purely phonetic level, the "critical period for language learning" hypothesis (Lenneberg, 1967). The second problem was to see if students could acquire the linguistic features associated with "language accent" with no reference to grammar or lexical meaning. Both questions are considered, with special attention to the concrete results of the study and to their implications. The final section of the paper includes a discussion of the acoustic image imprinting theory, which is the basis for the method used to teach phonetic material in this experiment. [More] Descriptors: Acoustic Phonetics, Adults, Articulation (Speech), Child Language