239

Language learning and teaching -

theory and practice

THEORY AND PRINCIPLES

85-319 Crawshaw, Robert (U. of Lancaster). Information, awareness and
context as factors in foreign language learning. British Journal of Language
Teaching, 22, 2 (1984), 67-73.
The shift of emphasis away from the formal aspects of language production in favour
of communicative effectiveness may deprive young learners of ingredients essential
to their future progress and creative independence. Approaches to foreign language
learning, particularly at early secondary level, should reflect the assumption that
foreign language performance depends to some extent on the conscious application
of previously acquired knowledge. Learners need to utilise a combination of 'infor-
mation' and 'awareness', as suggested by Krashen's Monitor theory. While com-
munication and self-expression should have primacy from the beginning of the
learning process, it is equally necessary that linguistic information and (from age 13)
linguistic insight be developed concurrently. Knowledge of lexis and morphology and
the perception of syntactico-semantic relations should be a central preoccupation in
syllabus design and practical pedagogy, though they should never be allowed to inhibit
the attainment of communicative goals.
The problem for teachers is to know exactly how learners apply that mixture of
intuitive and conscious processes which forms the vital link between 'information',
'awareness' and authentic 'performance'. The use of metalanguage is a thorny but
important issue: a basic set of terms (subject, verb, object, active, passive, etc.) is
essential for developing further awareness.

85-320 Harley, Birgit. Second language acquisition in an immersion context.

ELTDocuments (London), 119 (1984), 53-64.
Research and evaluation studies of the French Immersion Program in Quebec are
summarised and their implications for second language teaching generally are
examined. Students whose performance on comprehension tasks appeared almost
native-like still had trouble with productive skills even after several years in the
programme. Students' interlanguage indicated a tendency to acquire more general L2
rules before more specific ones and to construct forms involving both LI transfer and
incorrect generalisations from target L2. Study of age-related factors by comparing
early and late immersion starters suggested that the slight advantage of late immersion
studies in academic non-communicative tasks related to their greater exposure to the
written word and to the kind of L2 input they had been receiving, which in turn was
related to the greater cognitive maturity of this group of students. Native speakers
were generally tolerant of pupils' errors, except those which affected their ability to
communicate.

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 240 Language learning and teaching

85-321 Krashen, Stephen D. (U. of S. California) and others. A theoretical

basis for teaching the receptive skills. Foreign Language Annals (New York), 17,
4(1984), 261-75.
There are two reasons for teaching receptive skills: firstly, as specific training in
understanding oral and written texts; secondly, to provide input for general language
acquisition. For the first purpose, students can benefit even from work with texts far
above their present level, but for the second purpose the text level is critical: it must
contain some structures and vocabulary that are only slightly beyond the students'
level.
At beginner level, teacher talk is the main source of comprehensible input. The focus
should be on listening comprehension activities - talking about pictures is especially
useful - requiring very little speaking from the students. Even at this stage, authentic
texts can be used, with simple general comprehension tasks. At higher levels, students
should learn about content, e.g. target-language culture and other academic subjects.
The new approach is likely to meet with resistance from both teachers and students,
as it conflicts with traditional academic conditioning. For some time, low accuracy
and low complexity of utterance must be accepted, in the expectation of higher final
competence. Teacher education must explain principles and assumptions, so that
teachers know what they are doing and why.

85-322 Magiste, Edith (Stockholm U.). Learning a third language. Journal of

Multilingual and Multicultural Development (Clevedon, Avon), 5, 5 (1984),
415-21.
The study deals with three investigations concerning the acquisition of a third
language in bilingual immigrant students. The most extensive investigation, initiated
by the National Swedish Board of Education, included the whole grade-8 population
of immigrant students in Sweden (n = 2,736). They were compared with Swedish
monolingual students at that level (n = 67,162) in their proficiency in English as
measured by standardised tests. The results provide evidence that immigrant students
who always use Swedish at home but have passive knowledge of their first or home
language clearly perform better in English than Swedish monolingual students.
However, those immigrant students who actively use their home language daily have
slightly lower test results in English than Swedish students. Another important factor
in learning a third language is the similarity between the mother tongue and the
language to be learned. In line with these findings are the results of two experimental
studies from Germany and Sweden, using different methods and careful control of
important background variables, such as intelligence, residence time and age.

85-323 Widdowson, H. G. Educational and pedagogical factors in syllabus

design. ELTDocuments (London), 118 (1984), 23-7.
As a projection of educational policy, a curriculum, and the different syllabuses within
it, will conform to varying ideological decisions about the nature of education. The
relationship between policy and methodology makes the syllabus a potential source

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 Theory and principles 241
of conflict, for example when a person-oriented pedagogy is applied to a position-
oriented education system, and to teachers and learners shaped by the established
educational orthodoxy which informs the teaching of other subjects. The role of the
syllabus must be defined so as to allow a pedagogically effective methodology to
operate within the constraints delimited by educational policy, for example by seeing
the syllabus as a framework (a stereotypic construct) within which activities in the
classroom can be carried out. The question then becomes what kind of stereotypes
are likely to be more effective: elements of the abstract system, such as the structural
syllabus, notions and functions, etc. Which alternative is chosen may not be important,
so long as it is acceptable locally. It is in methodology, rather than syllabus design,
that reform is likely to be feasible and effective.

PSYCHOLOGY OF LANGUAGE LEARNING

85-324 Byrnes, Heidi (Georgetown U.). The role of listening comprehension:
a theoretical base. Foreign Language Annals (New York), 17, 4 (1984), 317-29.
Approaches to listening comprehension can be grouped into three categories: (1)
linguistic, (2) conceptual, and (3) communicative. The vast majority of studies assume
that the linguistic categories set forth by transformational grammar are psycho-
logically real entities. This resulted in an essentially ' serial' metaphor dominating the
thinking about comprehension; it is characterised by unidirectional processing from
the bottom up. Most research on intended meanings sees contextual (higher-order)
clues as being admitted into the comprehension process only after a literal meaning
has been assigned. Listening comprehension has by no means always been regarded
as a highly complex problem-solving activity, however; the listener has often been
conceived of as being passive. Recently, the importance of listening comprehension
has come to the fore. It procedes production in all stages of language learning; there
can be no production without the provision of comprehensible intake.
Oral language occurs in four modes whose correct identification contributes
significantly to the comprehension task: spontaneous free speech, deliberate free
speech (interviews and discussions), oral presentation of a written text, and oral
presentation of a rehearsed script. All share the characteristic that hearers have
almost no control of events. The role of listening comprehension in first-language
acquisition is discussed, especially in terms of its effect on the acquisition of syntax
and semantics. This developmental focus is balanced by a synchronic view of the
modes of language processing presumed to operate in listening comprehension.
In second-language learning, the first-language experience inevitably has an effect,
both supportive and distractive. Much more experience with the second language is
needed than has customarily been allowed. Increased comprehension is not solely a
matter of the amount of exposure - comprehensibility is essential. Listening com-
prehension may not proceed in a steady upward line or spiral but involve discon-
tinuous progress at different levels of language learning.
Some specific teaching strategies and techniques are proposed, including Total
Physical Response, 'ethnographic cues', listening for detail and global listening.

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 242 Language learning and teaching
Learners fall into two main categories: (1) those who give primacy to fluency over
accuracy, making use of learning strategies which promote 'schema-driven, holistic
perception', and (2) learners who value linguistic accuracy more highly and favour
an input-based understanding. Which approach is taken is a matter of personal
learning style.

85-325 Carnine, Douglas (U. of Oregan) and others. Utilisation of con-

textual information in determining the meaning of unfamiliar words. Reading
Research Quarterly (Newark, Del), 19, 2 (1984), 188-204.
Two studies were conducted to evaluate students' ability to utilise contextual
information in learning the meaning of unfamiliar words. A descriptive study
involving fourth-, fifth- and sixth-grade children was designed to examine the
differential effects of form and proximity of contextual information on students'
learning of unfamiliar words. An experimental study involving the same-aged students
was conducted to examine the differential effects of three intervention strategies
designed to facilitate the use of contextual information in learning the meanings of
unfamiliar words. The results of the descriptive study suggest that students were
better able to determine the meaning of unfamiliar words when (a) contextual clues
were provided, (b) students were older, (c) the clues were in synonym rather than
inference form, and (d) contextual clues were closer to the unfamiliar word. In the
experimental study, rule-plus-systematic-practice and systematic-practice-only
conditions produced higher transfer scores than a no-intervention condition.

85-326 Carrell, Patricia L. (Southern Illinois U. at Carbondale). The effects

of rhetorical organisation on ESL readers. TESOL Quarterly (Washington, DC),
18,3 (1984), 441-69.
Theoretical as well as empirical research within the framework of schema-theoretical
approaches to reading has shown reading comprehension to be an interaction between
a text and a reader. More specifically, the interaction involves reader background
knowledge of text structure and the hierarchical content structure of the text. In her
investigations of both adult and adolescent native readers of English, Meyer has found
that certain types of rhetorical organisation of expository prose are processed and
recalled differently from other types. This article reports the results of a study of the
effects of rhetorical organisation of different types of expository prose on intermediate
ESL readers of different native languages. Results indicate that certain more highly
structured English rhetorical patterns are more facilitative of recall for non-native
readers in general, but there are interesting differences among the native language
groups represented in the study: Spanish, Arabic, and Oriental, probably because of
preferred native rhetorical patterns.

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 Psychology of language learning 243

85-327 Chaudron, Craig (U. of Hawaii at Manoa). Research on metalinguistic

judgements: a review of theory, methods and results. Language Learning (Ann
Arbor, Mich), 33, 3 (1983), 343-77.
The origin of research into metalinguistic judgements was an interest in testing
descriptive grammars of a given language, but there has been little empirical research
of this type, and other purposes have emerged, including the study of individuals'
general metalinguistic awareness and, especially, of how source and target language
grammars interact in the development of an interlanguage.
Thirty-nine studies are mentioned and classified by subject type (LI adults, LI
children, L2 learners), judgement required (grammaticality, acceptability, compre-
hensibility, etc.) and other features. There was wide variation between subjects, and
judgements were made in very idiosyncratic ways, showing that grammaticality,
acceptability, meaningfulness, etc., are not socially uniform concepts; however, a
tendency to orthodoxy emerged in the case of grammaticality, where subjects judged
items more normatively than their production. Evidence that time limitations and task
complexity can restrict use of metalinguistic knowledge supports Bialystok's view that
language knowledge falls on an 'analysed' to 'unanalysed' dimension, differentially
accessible. The most encouraging result, however, was that metalinguistic judgements
in LI and L2 speakers tend to be validated by other measures of performance.

85-328 Corbett. Stephen S. and Smith, Wm. Flint. Identifying student

learning styles: proceed with cautionl Modern Language Journal (Madison, Wis),
68,3 (1984), 212-21.
This present paper describes a study which attempts to validate the Edmonds
Learning Style Identification Exercise (ELSIE), purported to be a quick and easy
means to identify and to analyse a postulated relationship between preference for
sensory modality in learning style and the potential for success in second-language
learning. The conclusions were (1) the data provided by ELSIE are problematic when
interpreted as a single index for groups of learners. The wide variety of individual
ranks across the categories in the learning-style exercise makes impossible the
identification of group preferences for learning mode and, by extension, the matching
of that preference with approach. (2) The category 'written word' and the division
of ranks within it — high, medium, low — does not seem to indicate accurately the
individual's preferred sensory modality for processing into memory auditory stimuli
converted to graphics in the mind's eye; nor is the strength of preference for that
mode of learning made clear through the instrument or its results. (3) ELSIE
similarly fails to provide an accurate identification of students who indicate the im-
portance and strength of the category 'listening' in addressing auditory stimuli and
how preference for 'listening' impacts significantly on the learner's ability to achieve
effectively on a listening-based criterion.
This study underscores the difficulty of identifying and accommodating learning-
style differences in the foreign language classroom. It further gives evidence that the
techniques and quantifiable instruments to ascertain preferential modes of learning

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 244 Language learning and teaching
are still in the infancy stage. Specifically, this research indicates that as a group
descriptor ELSIE is of questionable value in matching approach and students in
harmonious learning. The value of ELSIE in diagnosing individual preferences
remains clear. Still, it is obvious that further refinement of such instruments is
required before using them on a wholesale basis in our classrooms.

85-329 Day, Richard R. (U. of Hawaii at Manoa). Student participation in the

ESL classroom or some imperfections in practice. Language Learning (Ann Arbor,
Mich), 34, 3 (1984), 69-102.
This study explores the relationship between student participation in the ESL
classroom and proficiency in English, use of the target language outside the classroom,
and field sensitivity. The 58 subjects, mainly from Asia, were studying ESL in an
intensive programme in Honolulu. Their classroom participation, which, for the
purposes of the study, was defined as responses to teachers' general solicits and
self-initiated turns, was coded during the beginning and end of an eight-week term.
The subjects were also asked to fill out a questionnaire on their use of English outside
of the classroom. In the sixth and seventh weeks of the term, the subjects were given
an English cloze test and a measure of field dependence/independence; in addition,
26 subjects were administered an oral interview.
The results indicate that there was no significant relationship between classroom
participation and scores on either the oral interview or the cloze test, between
classroom participation and use of the target language away from the classroom, and
between classroom participation and field sensitivity. These findings are discussed
with respect to the work of others who have conducted similar research.

85-330 Fakhri, Ahmed (U. of Michigan). The use of communicative strategies

in narrative discourse: a case study of a learner of Moroccan Arabic as a second
language. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 34, 3 (1984), 15-37.
Research in second-language learners' communicative strategies has provided an
elaborate framework for analysing how learners manage to convey meanings and
messages in spite of their limited 'knowledge' of the target language. Many studies
have dealt with the identification and classification of communicative strategies (CSs).
This paper investigates a new aspect of the use of CSs, the interaction between the
application of CSs and narrative discourse features.
Twelve narratives were collected from a learner of Moroccan Arabic as a second
language over a four-week period during daily conversation sessions in the target
language. The analysis of the data draws upon research in narrative discourse and
language learners' CSs. The study suggests that the subject resorted to a number of
strategies to compensate for her linguistic deficiencies and that the application of these
strategies was not random but constrained by narrative discourse features. The
limitations of this study are discussed and suggestions for further research made.

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 Psychology of language learning 245

85-331 Frohlich, Maria and Paribakht, Tahereh. Can we teach our students
how to learn? ELT Documents (London), 119 (1984), 65-81.
Three studies were carried out in the Modern Language Centre of the Ontario
Institute for Studies in Education between 1975 and 1982 with the aim of finding out
what techniques are used by successful language learners. The first study adopted a
case-study approach employing semi-structured interviews as the method of enquiry.
Five main strategies were identified: 'active task approach', 'awareness of language
as a system', 'awareness of language as a means of communication', 'management
of affective demands' and 'monitoring of L2 performance'. The major points to
emerge were the following. (1) Each language learning career is unique, though they
share many common characteristics; the five main strategies can be combined in
many different ways. (2) The path to success can often be difficult - too many
students expect immediate success. (3) There is a complex interplay of learner and
situational factors. (4) It is important to develop learning strategies and techniques -
poor learners may require help. Different approaches to learning should be planned
and tried out.
Two further studies were conducted between 1979 and 1982; they followed a formal
experimental design. Both addressed themselves to these questions: (a) What types
of communication strategies (CS) do L2 learners employ when they lack the
appropriate target language vocabulary ? (b) What are the effects of proficiency on the
use of CS? In the picture reconstruction study of oral CS, subjects were asked to
describe a picture so that the interlocutor (who could not see the picture) would be
able to reconstruct it accurately. Most participants did not know the appropriate
lexical terms for the selected target items. The three sources of information which were
exploited for inferencing (i.e. utilising other sources of information to derive linguistic
hypotheses and make 'intelligent guesses') were (1) native language, (2) target
language, and (3) paralinguistic features. These strategies were often combined. Not
all are equally effective, particularly LI-based strategies. These latter were used less
by the more proficient students.
The third study, the concept identification study, investigated aspects of the use
of CS by non-native and native speakers of English, and examined the relationship
between the speakers' use of CS and their level of target-language proficiency. The
communicative task was a concept-identification task comprising both abstract and
concrete concepts. Each subject had to communicate a target item to a native speaker,
natural interaction being permitted. Strategies were classified into (1) linguistic
approach, (2) contextual approach, (3) conceptual approach, (4) mime. All four were
used to communicate both concrete and abstract concepts. Results showed that native
speakers, if they have communication problems, utilise the same strategies as
non-native speakers. The study suggests all adult speakers share a ' strategic compe-
tence', which they are often not able to transfer to their L2 because of lack of
motivation from classroom activities.
Learners should realise that they should play a very active role and that they have
many resources. All language classes should provide opportunities for the development
of all types of skills, and for the use of CS.

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 246 Language learning and teaching

85-332 Green, Michael (U. of North Carolina-Charlotte). Talk and double-

talk: the development of metacommunication knowledge about oral language.
Research in the Teaching of English (Urbana, III), 19, 1 (1985), 9-24.
Three levels of metacommunication knowledge and five factors that influence the
understanding of speaker meaning in oral language (gestures, intentions, making
sense, being 'easy to understand' and 'figuring out' what a speaker means) were
identified in pilot interviews with children and adolescents. To assess the extent to
which these three levels and five factors are generalisable to a large sample, 156
subjects from three age groups (5-7, 8-11 and 13-18 years) were interviewed. Analysis
of covariance and Scheffe comparisons indicated significant age-group differences.
Guttman scale analyses reflected a sequence in levels of metacommunication
knowledge.

85-333 Gregg, Kevin R. (Matsuyama U.). Krashen's monitor and Occam's

razor. Applied Linguistics (Oxford), 5, 2 (1984), 79-100.
While recognising the obvious Tightness of some of Krashen's claims about the
second-language acquisition process, the author shows the overall theory on which
they are based to be incoherent, owing to ill-defined or undefined terms and the
multiplication of entities for which there is no empirical evidence. Thefivehypotheses
on which the theory stands are examined in turn. The acquisition/learning distinction
is called in question because empirically learning can become acquisition and no
counter-evidence is offered. The Monitor hypothesis, restricting the value of conscious
rule-learning to the production of correct forms, is shown to contradict the Acquisi-
tion/Learning hypothesis. While espousing the Natural Order hypothesis, Krashen
undermines it by allowing for several concurrent natural orders. As his Input
hypothesis depends on the validity of the Natural Order hypothesis, it too is
undermined; and developmental mother tongue acquisition is confused with foreign-
language learning in adulthood. The Affective Filter hypothesis explains rather what
is rejected in language acquisition than what is retained and depends on an improbable
reconciliation between Piaget and Chomsky. It is concluded that Monitor theory is
misleading in proportion as it is ambitious.

85-334 Grezel, Jan Erik and others (U. of Groningen). Het effect van
monitor-gebruik op het Nederlands als tweede taal. [The role of monitoring in the
acquisition of Dutch as a second language.] Toegepaste Taa/wetenschap in
Artikelen (Amsterdam), 17, 3 (1983), 58-81.
In this paper the effect of monitoring in the acquisition of Dutch as a second language
is investigated in a descriptive design. The starting point was an experimental
investigation carried out by Hulstijn (1982). As that investigation was restricted to
only two variables, a number of experimental conditions (unnatural situation) and to
correct sentences only, it was decided to replicate the investigation with the following
alterations: (1) only natural data from three different situations were used. These data
ranked from formal to informal: dialogue (informal), monologue (formal) and written

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 Psychology of language learning 247
report (formal); (2) all kinds of linguistic variables that were relevant for the
acquisition stage of the subjects were scored: syntactic, morphological, lexical
variables, both correct and incorrect usage; (3) subjects were subdivided with respect
to LI into English and less related languages (Slavic), and with respect to L2-
achievement according to the teacher: good and not so good achievers.
Results showed that (1) English-speaking subjects and good achievers had better
scores generally on the variables under investigation. This means that these variables
are valid for describing the language acquisition process of Dutch as L2. (2) Those
linguistic features that are well acquired are under the domain of monitoring in such
a way that under formal circumstances (more reflection time) fewer errors occurred:
word order, content words, and those morphological phenomena that are essential for
the meaning of the message (tense, plural). (3) Those linguistic features that are not
internalised completely are under the domain of monitoring in such a way that under
formal circumstances more errors occurred: morphological phenomena that are
less relevant with respect to meaning (e.g. incorrect plurals), and function words.
(4) English subjects and good achievers demonstrated more correct monitoring.
(5) Results (1) and (4) fit quite well into the LI = L2 hypothesis. There seems to be a
universal order for language acquisition that is influenced only in minor points by the
LI of the language learner. These findings have some interesting consequences for
L2-education.

85-335 Grover-Stripp, Magdalena and Bellin, Wynford. A comparative

study of syntagmatic associations among Polish and English adults. Linguistics
(The Hague), 21, 2 (1983), 419-33.
Free associations were obtained from stimulus words representing a variety of parts
of speech with groups of Polish and English monolinguals. These data provide a
comparison of the relative frequency of syntagmatic associations to translation
equivalents in Polish and English. For all the parts of speech used in the experiment,
many more syntagmatic responses were produced in Polish, suggesting that the type
of language (isolating or fusional) is important for the frequency of syntagmatic
responses. This finding is interpreted as the result of a tendency in fusional languages
to treat a single word form as part of an utterance. By contrast, in English, such a
single form is more likely to be treated as a complete utterance in itself.

85-336 Guiora, Alexander Z. The dialectic of language acquisition. Language

Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 33, 5 (1983), 3-12.
The acquisition of native and foreign language should not be treated as two
independent systems, but as complementary aspects of one basic cognitive-affective
schema, interacting and conflicting with each other in a variety of ways. Illuminating
the psychological processes impinging on one aspect can shed light on the other.
Native language is a powerful dimension of self-representation, one of the 'vital
rings' of identity. Confrontation with another language offers alternative ways not
only to describe but to conceptualise and even experience the world. Gender and time
are two ways in which different languages conceptualise the experiential world:

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 248 Language learning and teaching
children whose native language showed maximum gender loading (Hebrew) reached
this developmental milestone earlier than children whose native language showed
minimum gender loading (English), who in turn reached it before those whose native
language showed zero gender loading (Finnish). Research on the availability of
differentiated past-tense markers in the native language and other cognitive functions,
showed that English speakers (who have a multiplicity of forms to mark the 'before
now' to draw on) have an advantage over Hebrew speakers (who have only one form)
in placing events in a proper time sequence.
The task of learning a new language is a profoundly unsettling psychological
proposition; this is especially true of attempting to acquire native-like pronunciation
in a foreign language. What is needed is a 'softening' of the language ego boundaries,
to make them more 'permeable'. The difficulties encountered in learning a foreign
language underscore the immense importance of the native language, which itself is
the vehicle which needs reinforcement.

85-337 Henrichsen, Lynn E. (Brigham Young U.). Sandhi-variation: a filter

of input for learners of ESL. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 34, 3 (1984),
103-26.
When considering the process of second-language acquisition, it is useful and
important to distinguish between input and intake since, due to various factors,
language learners do not take in all the language they are exposed to. Perceptual
saliency - a formal characteristic of the input - is believed to be one of these factors.
This experiment was conducted to determine how the presence of sandhi-variation,
a common characteristic of spoken English which reduces the perceptual saliency of
many of its features, affects the comprehensibility of English input. Assuming that
comprehension is dependent not only on signal clarity but also on cognitive factors,
it was hypothesised that the presence of sandhi-variation in the input would reduce
comprehension less when listeners were proficient in English than when they were
learning the language.
The results support this hypothesis and lead to the conclusion that for those whose
knowledge of English is sufficient to compensate for reduced perceptual saliency,
sandhi-variation affects the input-to-intake process very little. For ESL learners,
however, sandhi-variation is an important input-intake filter.
These findings are discussed in connection with the input hypothesis of second-
language acquisition. Implications include the possible benefits of modified input and
formal instruction for ESL learners.

85-338 Hinds, John (Penn State U.). Retention of information using a

Japanese style of presentation. Studies in Language (Amsterdam), 8, 1 (1984),
45-69.
This study is part of a series of investigations into the nature of expository prose
organisation in Japanese, as compared with English. The hypothesis was that Japanese
speakers would be able to reproduce information presented in the ki-sho-ten-ketsu
framework (based on classical Chinese poetry) significantly better than English

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 Psychology of language learning 249
speakers, especially over time. American and Japanese subjects were given one of four
essays to read. After three minutes' study of the essay they had to reproduce as much
of it on paper as possible in ten minutes. On returning one week later, they had again
to reproduce as much of the essay as they could. Results showed that Japanese subjects
were able to reproduce the information significantly better than English subjects,
because they could perceive an appropriate schema whereas the English subjects could
not. Differences in ability to reproduce information were not always obvious in the
immediate condition, but were in the delay condition. Cultural expectations influence
the retention of information in memory, e.g. the English speaker's belief that a
conclusion is important may help him/her to retain that information better than
might otherwise be expected.

85-339 Hulstijn, Jan H. (Vrije U.). Componenten van tweede-taalbeheersing.

[Components of second-language proficiency.] Toegepaste Taalwetenschap in
Artikelen (Amsterdam), 17, 3 (1983), 82-111.
This study contains a reanalysis of some of the data collected by Cummins et at. (to
appear), in their study of Japanese and Vietnamese immigrant students in Canada.
The present study focuses on the English communicative test data elicited from 11
grade 2/3 and 11 grade 5/6 Japanese students who had been in Canada from 15 months
to 5^ years. The objectives of this study were (1) to code these data for characteristics
of various L2 proficiency aspects suggested in the literature, (2) to look for clustering
patterns among the coded variables by means of factor analyses and (3) to assess how
the variables and common factors in the students' L2 performance were related to
their Age and Length of Residence in Canada (by means of analyses of variance).
The findings demonstrate that there is more to L2 proficiency than 'just'
knowledge of words and grammar rules. It is the type of task in which this knowledge
has to be applied that plays a crucial moderating role. A paper-and-pencil reading test,
a face-to-face interview, and a story-telling task all measure linguistic skills, but each
does so in a very different way, and along with different nonlinguistic skills.
Furthermore, this study yielded 'Communicative Style' as a nonlinguistic L2
proficiency factor, not related to Age or Length of Residence. Future research will
have to show whether Communicative Style must be considered a genuine language-
proficiency component or rather an artifact (method effect) created by the use of two
types of test, interactional and non-interactional.

85-340 Le Compagnon, Betty (U. of New Hampshire). Interference and

overgeneralisation in second-language learning: the acquisition of English dative
verbs by native speakers of French. Language Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 34,
3 (1984), 39-67.
This paper examines the role of interference in the acquisition of English dative verbs
by native speakers of French. Two case studies involving the acquisition of English
in a natural environment are presented as well as the results of two judgement tests
in which each of four subjects was asked to judge the grammaticality of sentences
containing both correctly and incorrectly used dative verb structures. Analysis
10 LTA 18

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 250 Language learning and teaching
suggests that the process of lexical acquisition of verbs in English is similar for both
first- and second-language learners. However, second-language learners may produce
overgeneralisation errors unlike those of first-language learners due to incorrect
assumptions concerning marked and unmarked forms in English for which there is
positive evidence in both the source and target languages. Thus, although interference
plays a significant role in the process of lexical acquisition of verbs, this does not rule
out the hypothesis that first- and second-language acquisition are essentially like
processes. If a more sophisticated understanding of the process of interference can
be gained, it should be possible to predict the characteristic errors a second-language
learner will make based upon the particulars of the learner's native language.

85-341 Lightbown, Patsy M. Input and acquisition in second language

classrooms. TESL Canada Journal (Montreal), 1, 2 (1984), 55-67.
In the speech of a group of francophone ESL learners, introducer forms used to
initiate picture descriptions were examined. The learners' use of these forms was then
compared to the corresponding forms in the classroom language the learners were
exposed to - textbook language, the students' own classroom language, and their
teachers' language. The learners' use of introducers was also compared to that of
native speakers performing the same task. Some of the non-target-like characteristics
of the learners' language were found to correspond to characteristics of the input they
received.

85-342 Mazurkewich, Irene (Concordia U.). The acquisition of the dative

alternation by second-language learners and linguistic theory. Language Learning
(Ann Arbor, Mich), 34, 1 (1984), 91-109.
The research discussed in this paper attempts to demonstrate that evidence based on
the acquisition of dative structures in English by second-language learners provides
support for a theory of markedness. Within this theory it is claimed that unmarked
structures, which are postulated to be part of core grammar, will be acquired before
marked structures, which are considered to be peripheral rules of the core grammar.
Using a test that elicited intuitive judgements, data were obtained from native
French-speaking and Inuktitut-speaking (Eskimo) students as well as native English-
speaking students whose judgements were used as the norm. Dative structures in
which the dative noun phrase appears either in a prepositional phrase or as the first
noun phrase of a double object construction were tested. Within the framework of
markedness assumed here, it is argued that the former represents the unmarked
structure whereas the latter is the marked one. The results obtained show that the
unmarked structures were acquired first as predicted and the marked structures
followed. The theoretical implications of markedness regarding learnability of the
complement structures of alternating and non-alternating dative verbs are discussed.

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 Psychology of language learning 251

85-343 Rutherford, William E. (U. of Southern California). Description and

explanation in interlanguage syntax: state of the art. Language Learning (Ann
Arbor, Mich), 34, 3 (1984), 127-55.
The general theme chosen for this approach to interlanguage (IL) syntax ' state of the
art' is the presumed goal of all IL syntacticians: to find consistency and pattern in
syntactic variation. There are two overlapping subsidiary themes as well: those of
describing the systematicity in IL syntax and of explaining it.
Themes contributing to descriptive approaches include the transition from
morpho-syntax acquisition studies to those of more complex syntax, the emergence
of syntax from discourse, explicitness, the investigation of language 'process' as well
as language product, and the serious consideration of 'simplicity'. Themes
contributing to explanatory approaches include general frameworks such as language
universals, language typology, core grammar and markedness. The paper concludes
with suggestions and predictions as to the directions in which continuing research on
IL syntax might lead.

85-344 Stemmer, Nathan (Bar-Man U., Israel). Empiricist versus mentalist

theories of language acquisition. Semiotica (The Hague), 49,1/2(1984), 139-59.
In empiricist theories the capacity to generalise from certain entities to other entities
is said to play a crucial role in learning processes. The result of such a process is a
generalisation class. In many cases the generalisation classes used in language
acquisition are very similar to, even identical with, the generalisation classes used in
acquiring non linguistic knowledge. The part played in empiricist theories by salient
features of objects and their role in determining generalisation classes is considered.
Mentalist theories are shown to be incapable of solving the problem of overabundance
that occurs when children possess several different concepts that are suitable
candidates for becoming linked to a word. It is argued that the empiricist formulation
is more parsimonious than the mentalist one. Furthermore, mentalist theory is unable
to deal satisfactorily with the phenomenon of first-time learning. Until mentalist
theories have advanced a theory of concept formation, mentalist theories of language
acquisition are built upon an extremely weak basis. The innatist formulation of
mentalist theories has provided no evidence to justify which concepts are innate and
which not. Not only are empiricist theories superior to mentalist theories, but the
latter cannot be considered as serious candidates in accounting for the early stages
of language acquisition.

85-345 Strong, Michael (U. of California at San Francisco). Integrative

motivation: cause or result of successful second-language acquisition? Language
Learning (Ann Arbor, Mich), 34, 3 (1984), 1-14.
This study examines the relationship between integrative motivation and acquired
second-language proficiency among a group of Spanish-speaking kindergarteners in
an American classroom. Integrative motivation was measured by finding out the
children's preferences for friends and playmates and workmates and scoring them
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 252 Language learning and teaching
according to their tendencies to nominate members of the target language group.
Communicative English proficiency was assessed by analysing spontaneous language
and deriving measures of structural knowledge, vocabulary breadth, and pronunciation
skill. A Kendall's tau test showed no positive association between integrative
motivation and acquired English proficiency. A further comparison of beginners and
advanced level English speakers found that the advanced children showed significantly
more integrative orientation to the target language group than the beginners, lending
support to the notion that integrative attitudes follow second-language acquisition
skills rather than promoting them.

85-346 Vollmer, Helmut J. and Sang, Fritz. Zum psycholinguistischen

Konstrukt einer internalisierten Erwartungsgrammatik. [The psycholinguistic
structure of an internalised expectancy grammar.] Linguistik und Didaktik
(Munich, FRG), 42 (1980), 122-48.
This article examines the plausibility of the theory that all language performance is
based on a 'general language proficiency factor' and to what degree this theory can
be empirically proved. The theoretical background is presented. Particular emphasis
is placed on the psycholinguistic structure of an internalised expectancy grammar in
connection with foreign language acquisition, and this is examined in the light of
aspects of cognitive psychology. It is mainly findings from the psychology of
perception which are brought into the discussion. The concept of an 'expectancy
grammar' shows itself to be too formal and generalised since knowledge of the world
can vary enormously, even among speakers of the same language.
The concept of the 'expectancy grammar' is discussed in the light of current
research into language acquisition and its various theories about language competence.
On the empirical level, the hitherto most convincing evidence for the existence of
uniform linguistic competence is criticised and more careful interpretation is called
for: while the evidence for the existence of a strong 'general language proficiency
factor' cannot and should not be ignored, empirical evidence shows that its influence
on different aspects of language performance is not as great as was once assumed. Other
possible explanations for the origin of such a factor are examined.

RESEARCH METHODS
85-347 Linguistic Minorities Project (Inst. of Ed., U. of London). Linguistic
minorities in England: a short report on the Linguistic Minorities Project. Journal
of Multilingual and Multicultural Development (Clevedon, Avon), 5, 5 (1984),
531-66.
The Linguistic Minorities Project (LMP), the first research project in England to
focus on the importance of societal bilingualism, was set up in 1979 to investigate
patterns of bilingualism, gather basic factual information about linguistic diversity in
the school system and assess the educational implications.
The LMP developed the Schools Language Survey (SLS) as a policy-related

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 Research methods 253
instrument to help LEAs document the range of languages spoken in schools and the
extent of literacy in the minority languages. The Secondary Pupils Survey was
designed to complement the teacher-administered SLS with a wider range of
information on a limited number of older pupils. The Mother Tongue Teaching
Directory Survey was devised in collaboration with the National Council for Mother
Tongue Teaching; a Manual of use has been compiled so that local groups and LEAs
can carry out further surveys. The Adult Language Use Survey aimed to build up
a picture of language use and attitudes to languages maintenance among 11 linguistic
minorities.
The LMP has paved the way for future work by teachers, researchers and minority
associations. It is succeeded by two bodies which share its values and objectives: the
Commonwealth Languages and Education Project (CLE) and the EEC-funded
Language Information Network Coordination Project (LINC).

85-348 Poulisse, Nanda and others (U. of Nijmegen). On the use of

compensatory strategies in second language performance. Interlanguage Studies
Bulletin (Utrecht), 8, 1 (1984), 70-105.
As a preliminary to a four-year research project at the University of Nijmegen, the
literature on communication strategies is reviewed with particular reference to the
subset of compensatory strategies defined for the purposes of the study as ' strategies
which a language user employs in order to achieve his intended meaning on becoming
aware of problems arising during the planning phase of an utterance due to his own
linguistic shortcomings'. The typologies of strategies already set up are summarised
and compared. They do not coincide or reconcile though they frequently identify the
same phenomena. It is not clear from whose point of view paraphrases or circumlo-
cutions might be dubbed appropriate or acceptable, the learner's or the observer's,
and it is not clear what many of the types mean. Therefore the Nijmegen researchers
will adopt two broad categores of strategy, the 'interlingual' and the 'intralingual',
regrouping existing taxonomies accordingly into: borrowing, literal translation,
foreignising (interlingual); and approximation, word coinage, description, restructur-
ing, appeals for assistance, mime (intralingual). These are defined and it is questioned
whether L2 strategies are different in kind from similar behaviour in LI. The
Nijmegen project will be experimental, following in the wake of exploratory studies
already carried out and summarised here.

CONTRASTIVE/ERROR A N A L Y S I S
85-349 Machiko Netsu (U. of Hawaii). The role of error analysis in clarifying
linguistic distinctions between English 'when' and its Japanese equivalents. IRAL
(Heidelberg), 22, 3 (1984), 191-202.
Non-native students of Japanese (with English as their mother tongue) make many
errors in rendering the conjunction when. Error analysis was applied to these errors
and their nature described. This made it possible to make important linguistic

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 254 Language learning and teaching
distinctions between Japanese toki ('when') and tar a ('when' or 'after') on the one
hand, and the English when on the other. The inadequacy of standard textbook
explanations became apparent when set alongside the discussion of linguistic distinc-
tions between English when and its Japanese equivalents. This is undoubtedly one
source of students' learning problems with respect to temporal constructions. An
examination of a single textbook indicated that learners' errors are related not only
to interlingual transfer, but also to incomplete and misleading explanations of
structures found in materials often used by students.

85-350 Snell-Hornby, Mary (U. of Zurich). The linguistic structure of public

directives in German and English. Multilingua (Amsterdam), 3, 3/4 (1984),
203-11.
Based on a contrastive analysis of a corpus of about 200 authentic public signs from
different English- and German-speaking countries, this paper investigates the differing
inherent laws of grammatical structure and of communicative function governing
public directives in English and German. The ultimate aim is to provide a frame of
reference for adequate and idiomatic translation with the intended communicative
impact. Proceeding from the concepts Request, Command, Warning and Prohibition,
viewed not as rigid categories but as merging elements of a continuum or cline, a
stratificational model is presented, whereby the directives are analysed (a) as speech
act types, (b) according to the relative status of the participants (Speaker and
Addressee), (c) in terms of grammatical structure and (d) in terms of lexical items.
Significant differences emerge between German and English, as for example, the
dominance of modal verbs beside increased identification and personalisation of the
addressee in English, as against impersonal verbal forms, abstract nouns and fixed
lexical stereotypes in German.

TESTING
85-351 Alderson, J. Charles (U. of Lancaster). Testing, the teacher and the
student. Cahiers de rAPUUT (Paris), 39, 3 (1984), 7-21.
Testing is regarded with distaste by many teachers and apprehension by many
students, not always for very good reasons. Conversely, testers do their cause no good
by claiming more for their tests than is justified and separating themselves by arcane
statistics from the teaching community. The various reasons for this divorce are
examined in turn.
Testers should be more concerned with what they are measuring than the nature
of measurement; they should test what teachers want to teach and what learners want
to learn. Since tests will always be subjective, if not in their marking then in their
construction, they should go hand in hand with teaching to sample worthwhile
behaviour, e.g. speaking, representing worthwhile educational goals. By consciously
testing for the washback effect on teaching the relationship between the teaching and
testing community will be a positive and mutually beneficial one. For teachers who
have to compose tests, 10 general precepts and 19 specific instructions are given.

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 Testing 255

85-352 Bensoussan, Marsha and Ramraz, Rachel. Testing EFL reading

comprehension using a multiple-choice rational cloze. Modern Language Journal
(Madison, Wis), 68, 3 (1984), 230-9.
A multiple-choice rational cloze dubbed a 'fill-in test' is shown to be as reliable in
scoring as the ordinary multiple-choice test while being easier to construct, more
adaptable, economical and more easily targeted on a particular aspect of language to
be tested.
The problems of multiple-choice and cloze testing are reviewed and the linguistic
basis of the fill-in test discussed. The designers left 20-30 spaces in a 300-word text;
the omissions were not random but chosen because of their key function in a rational
argument, which the candidate had to reconstruct. Four different multiple-choice and
fill-in tests were used on populations of over 50 students and the results compared
and correlated. Results correlated highly but the fill-in test proved more reliable, partly
because of the larger number of items tested. Because of these results the fill-in test
is now being used to test about 13,000 students annually for entrance to the universities
of Haifa and Tel Aviv.

85-353 Bogaards, Paul and Duijkers, Tom (Rijksuniversiteit Leiden).

Nadere onderzoekingen naar de taal attitude schaal. [Further investigations into
the language attitude scale (TAS).] Toegepaste Taalwetenschap in Artikelen
(Amsterdam), 17, 3 (1983), 132-50.
Contradictory results obtained with TAS by Spoelders (1978) and Bogaards (1982)
induced them to make further investigations into this language attitude scale. Two
problems were addressed in particular, (i) What is the predictive value of the TAS
in respect to school results, and (ii) Does the TAS measure one or more aspects of
language attitude ? The TAS was administered to 561 students in 25 classes {brugklas:
12—13 years old; 3 havo: 14—15 years old (comprehensive school); 3 vivo: 14—15 years
old (grammar school); 5 vwo: 16-17 years old (grammar school)). Analyses of the
results show that the predictive value of the TAS with respect to school results is
considerably higher than that mentioned by Spoelders (0-30 vs 0-18). The TAS
measures two aspects, namely 'fun' and 'usefulness'; a test that has been reduced
to 14 items seems to measure these aspects at least as accurately as the complete TAS.

85-354 Cohen, Andrew D. (Hebrew U. of Jerusalem). On taking language

tests: what the students report. Language Testing (London), 1,1 (1984), 70-81.
This paper discusses methods for obtaining verbal report data on second-language
test-taking strategies; reports on types of findings obtained in a number of studies
conducted by university students on how learners take reading tests, in particular cloze
and multiple-choice tests; and finally considers the implications of the findings for
prospective test takers and test constructors. The main conclusion is that a closer fit
should be obtained between how test constructors intend their tests to be taken and
how respondents actually take them.

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 256 Language learning and teaching

85-355 Davies, Alan (U. of Edinburgh). Validating three tests of English-

language proficiency. Language Testing (London), 1, 1 (1984), 50-69.
Language test construction is discussed as a possible variety of general psychological
test construction. Validation studies of three British English language proficiency tests
are described. The process of concurrent and predictive validation for these three tests
(EPTB, ELBA, ELTS) is discussed and the conclusion drawn that while these
procedures are necessary they do no more than determine the accuracy of the
preliminary construct and content validity consideration.

85-356 Foley, J. A. (National U. of Singapore). A rationale for the cloze

procedure. ITL (Louvain), 64 (1984), 71-89.
This article attempts to answer two questions: first, the question of what cloze actually
is. Explanations using the principle of 'redundancy' in the text and the 'grammar
expectancy' of the decoder seem to be more satisfactory than theories based on gestalt
psychology or 'information theory'.
Secondly, the question of what cloze actually does. This would appear to be only
satisfactorily answered by reference to the syntactic, semantic and rhetorical elements
of language. Comprehension assessment for which cloze is often used is normally
understood as getting at the conceptual world of the encoder. This cannot be directly
tapped by cloze as it would involve skills over and above those accessible by cloze,
such as skimming, scanning, reorganisation, inference and evaluation.

85-357 Johnston, Peter (State U. of New York at Albany). Prior knowledge

and reading comprehension test bias. Reading Research Quarterly (Newark, Del),
19,2 (1984), 219-39.
This paper addresses the problem of the effects of prior knowledge, especially those
relating to bias, in tests of reading comprehension. Quantitative and qualitative effects
of prior knowledge on reading comprehension were demonstrated through an
examination of performance on different question types. The availability of the text
during question answering was also found to influence performance on certain
question types. Peripheral textual items were most sensitive to such influence, central
items and scriptal items were least sensitive. Performance on central questions actually
improved when readers could not refer back to the text. The biasing effects of prior
knowledge were demonstrated both within subjects and between subpopulations
(rural and urban). Bias was shown to operate at the level of the individual and therefore
should be removed at that level, not at the population level. This was achieved by
using a content-specific vocabulary test to estimate prior knowledge, and incidentally
resulted in a decrease in the bias due to intelligence. A conventional approach to bias
removal (collapsing across several text content areas) also removed the bias due to prior
knowledge, but resulted in greater bias relating to intelligence. Results are interpreted
to suggest modifications of current reading comprehension tests and methods of
dealing with bias.

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 Testing 257

85-358 Krzanowski. Wojtek J. and Woods, Anthony J. (U. of Reading).

Statistical aspects of reliability in language testing. Language Testing (London),
1,1 (1984), 1-20.
Reliability is a concept central to testing. Whatever measure of reliability is used, its
value will always have to be estimated from a sample and will therefore be subject
to sampling variation. The magnitude of sampling error involved in measuring
reliability from a sample should be indicated by quoting the standard error of a
reliability estimate or by giving a confidence interval for its true value. This paper
considers several simple ANOVA models which can be used to define and estimate
reliability coefficients. It discusses the statistical properties of commonly used
measures of reliability and explains how to test hypotheses about their true values.

85-359 Scheibner-Herzig, G. (U. of Munster) and others. A study of

foreign language achievements and personality variables in 15-year-old pupils.
ITL (Louvain), 65 (1984), 43-56.
Using standard tests with an EFL test specially developed for the purpose, 112
15-year-old German students of EFL were assessed for performance, intelligence,
motivation and personality - and the relations between the various scores examined.
The tests are described and the measures tabulated, correlated (Spearman) and
subjected to factorial analysis by varimax rotation. Five factors are found to contribute
most to achievement: spatial and numerical reasoning independent of education 20 % ;
verbal intelligence dependent on education 18%; a well-balanced personality profile
17 ° o ; altruistic, social and artistic interest 1 3 % ; and business and administrative
interest 13 %. Thus the personality and interest factors explain more of the language
achievement of the pupils than the reasoning and language measures. Listening
comprehension is a more powerful determinant of language success than reading
comprehension.

85-360 Scott, Roger (Eurocentre, Bournemouth). Communicative evaluation

with particular reference to self-evaluation. Bulletin CILA (Neuchatel), 40 (1984),
42-52.
The language needs of a heterogeneous group of foreign learners of English were
assessed and a nine-level scale of proficiency was devised for them. Evaluation of the
students' performance of language tasks, i.e. their ability to communicate, has to yield
information about their ability to use the language they need in the context they
require it for. The context is a communicative one and will contain such characteristic
features as information gap, feedback and choice of language; the variables to be
controlled include size of text, complexity of text, range, speed, flexibility, accuracy,
appropriacy, independence, repetition and hesitation. Communicative evaluation will
not comprise discrete-point, norm-referenced tests because such testing does not yield
the information required.
The most direct way to find out if someone can do something is to get him/her to
do it. Regular communicative assessments should be incorporated in the teaching

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 258 Language learning and teaching
programme. Some suggested modes of evaluation are: role-plays; simulations;
letter-writing; listening and giving an oral account of what has been heard; reading
and giving an oral account of what has been read; listening and reading and giving
a written account of what has been heard. Ways of combining tasks in one activity
are suggested. A self-evaluation grid is presented which provides a simple and
manageable profile.

C U R R I C U L U M PLANNING
85-361 Richards, Jack C. (U. of Hawaii). Language curriculum development.
RELC Journal (Singapore), 15, 1 (1984), 1-29.
In this survey paper the field of language curriculum development is defined as
encompassing the processes of needs analysis, goal setting, syllabus design, method-
ology and evaluation. Each of these curriculum processes is surveyed, and issues and
practices in each area are discussed. Needs analysis is discussed in relation to language
programme planning and evaluation and different needs analysis procedures are
examined. Different approaches to the planning of programme objectives in language
teaching are illustrated and a distinction between behavioural, process, content and
proficiency-based objectives is made. The status of methodology within curriculum
development is discussed in terms of a distinction between content-oriented methods
and those concerned primarily with instructional processes. The role of a syllabus
within each approach is illustrated. The need for an empirical basis for methodological
statements is emphasised and it is suggested that the classroom processes methods
generate cannot necessarily be inferred from the philosophy of the method itself. The
role of evaluation is discussed and different procedures used in summative and
formative evaluation in language teaching are surveyed. The paper emphasises that
language curriculum development is not generally viewed in language teaching as a
systematic set of interrelated processes and procedures which generate the data needed
to develop sound educational practice. This may account for the lack of rigour and
accountability in many language teaching programmes.

85-362 Tansley, Paula and Craft, Alma (School Curriculum Development

Committee). Mother tongue teaching and support: a Schools Council enquiry.
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development (Clevedon, Avon), 5, 5
(1984), 367-84.
Results of a survey by the Schools Council Mother Tongue Project in June 1983 show
that the majority of Local Education Authorities in England and Wales now have
schools with at least 10 per cent bilingual pupils; most LEAs try to meet the needs
of bilingual pupils either by providing mother-tongue teaching in their schools or by
supporting community mother-tongue schools, or both. There remains a wide gap
between the known number of bilingual children and support for their languages, and
also between the knowledge LEAs have about the languages spoken in their area and
those for which provision is sought. Very few LEAs had a formal policy on

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 Curriculum planning 259
mother-tongue teaching, indicative perhaps of the relatively fluid nature of developing
policy in this new area of the curriculum.

C O U R S E / S Y L L A B U S DESIGN
85-363 Breen, Michael P. Process syllabuses for the language classroom. EL T
Documents (London), 118 (1984), 47-60.
A brief analysis is made of language teaching syllabus design in terms of the main
function of the syllabus and the principles of organisation which guide its construction.
From this analysis it is argued that, however carefully designed it may be, any syllabus
has to be continually reinterpreted and re-created by teacher and learners when it is
actually used in the classroom. An outline of alternatives now available is offered which
questions conventional priorities in syllabus design. In the context of these alternatives,
and with particular reference to the creative re-interpretation of the syllabus in the
classroom, the notion of a Process Syllabus is proposed. The paper concludes with
a brief account of the main characteristics of a Process Syllabus for classroom language
learning and teaching. It is a framework for decisions and alternative procedures,
activities, and tasks for the classroom group. On-going evaluation of the teaching/
learning process is crucial, and involves teachers and learners reconsidering other
alternatives at all levels of the syllabus. Its primary function is to guide and serve the
explicit interaction in the classroom between any content syllabus and the various
(changing) learner syllabuses within the group. Individual learners and groups can
thus directly participate in the creation of plans, rather than having plans made for
them.

85-364 Candlin, Christopher N. (U. of Lancaster). Syllabus design as a

critical process. ELTDocuments (London), 118 (1984), 29-46.
The traditional concept of syllabus, as items of content to be transmitted to the learner,
is unsatisfactory for several reasons. It implies a conservative ideology and an
authoritarian conception of received knowledge, conflicts with a learner-oriented
approach, and assumes a distinction between content and process which is not
sustainable. The lists of functions and notions which have replaced traditional lists
of structures reflect an inadequate language model disconfirmed by recent work in
discourse analysis. What requires learning is less speech acts as such, which are
probably universal, than their role in the totality of language.
In a good syllabus, learning experiences are as important as subject-matter content,
and learners negotiate their own objectives and routes, exploration and questioning
being encouraged. The syllabus becomes a retrospective record more than a prospective
plan; institutional demands for forward planning cannot be ignored, but should be
met at the general curriculum level by guidelines for purposes, content/experience
and evaluation, within which teachers and learners can negotiate an individual
syllabus. This should contain problem-solving tasks with the purpose of creating
conditions for value-identification, meaning-negotiation and comprehensible input.

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 260 Language learning and teaching

85-365 Chaudron, Craig (U. of Hawaii at Manoa). Languages for Special

Purposes. Journal of Pragmatics (Amsterdam), 7, 6 (1983), 713-26.
A review of Munby, Communicative Syllabus Design (1978), Mackay and Mountford
(eds.), English for Specific Purposes: a case study approach (1978), Mackay and Palmer
(eds.), Languages for Specific Purposes: program design and evaluation (1981), and
Selinker and others, English for Academic and Technical Purposes: studies in honour
of Louis Trimble (1981).
There is a spate of new textbooks about functional syllabuses and communi-
cative/specific-language teaching, not to mention a flood of LSP teaching materials.
The books reviewed here are highly representative of the recent publications, and
worth reading on that basis alone. Selinker, Tarone and Hanzeli's collection is by far
the most informative and stimulating, due to the diversity of opinion and depth of
analysis in its articles, while Mackay and Mountford's earlier anthology, a classic in
the field, presents several additional perspectives and examples of ESP courses.
Munby's complex model is an invaluable reference source for the LSP curriculum
developer, regardless of whether the entire model is to be employed in the syllabus
design. The Mackay and Palmer volume is the weakest of these, for although two or
three contributions in it present useful new insights, the articles tend to be either too
vague or superficial, at times bordering on triteness.

85-366 Finkensiep, Klaus-Peter and others. 'Kommunikationsfahigkeit in

einer Herkunftssprache'-Oberlegungen zur Konzeption eines Sprachkurses.
['Communicative competence in the language of an ethnic minority' - ideas for
the conception of a language course.] Deutsch Lernen (Mainz, FRG), 1 (1983),
31-41.
A course in the language of an ethnic minority in Germany must be more practically
orientated than traditional language courses since it is designed to equip learners for
everyday communication in the language in question. This discussion is based on a
course in Turkish for trainee teachers at the Ruhr University of Bochum. The basic
assumptions underlying the construction of the course were as follows: the aim was
to enable learners to cope with everyday language situations in a school context; the
learning of a language should start out with learning about the society in which the
language is spoken; language is the medium for the communication of content and
meaning; texts used should encourage reflection and discussion and not only language
learning per se.
In the construction of the course, three basic factors had to be taken into account:
(1) the linguistic needs of the learners - the situations in which they would need to
use Turkish and the language functions necessary to enable them to cope with these
situations; (2) establishing the learning aims resulting from the learners' linguistic
needs - spoken proficiency, listening comprehension skills, reading skills, writing
skills, knowledge of grammar, use of the dictionary, and development of awareness
of the problems of ethnic minorities; (3) the development of an appropriate method - it
should not be grammar-centred but should provide insight into grammar, texts used
should give insight into life in Turkish society and in immigrant families in the FRG,

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 Course/syllabus design 261
role play should be enjoyable and serve to train learners in speaking and listening skills,
listening comprehension should be based on authentic materials.
A suggested exercise typology to meet these various requirements is put forward;
the article concludes with a critical look at some of the best-known available course
materials for the teaching of Turkish.

85-367 Furnborough, Peter and Munns, Roger. Communication for em-

ployment and training. ESP Journal (Washington, DC), 3, 2 (1984), 97-108.
This is a description of retraining programmes devised and developed by the
Lancashire Industrial Language Training Unit during the period 1980-3 in order to
meet the specific needs of adult South Asian textile workers in the county who had
become unemployed as a result of the current economic recession in Britain. The
Industrial Language Training Service was originally established in Britain to improve
communications in multiracial workplaces. This has always involved a combination
of: (i) job-related language training for ethnic minority workers in their place of
employment, and (ii) communications awareness training for indigenous managers,
supervisors, and union respresentatives. All programmes are based on a survey of
communication needs in the specific workplace and the active involvement of key
company personnel in the language training. The programme described here adapts
this approach to meet the needs of unemployed adult speakers of English as a second
language. The aims of the programme are to integrate communications and trade
training in order to increase learners' trainability and employability; and thus equip
them for either re-entry to employment or further specific skills training. This article
describes the steps taken to achieve this. [The whole issue is devoted to vocational
ESL.]

85-368 Guntermann, Gail (Arizona State U.). Designing basic programmes

for special needs plus general proficiency. Foreign Language Annals (New York),
17, 6 (1984), 585-91.
Students who begin the study of a foreign language in college are typically placed
together in an omnibus course, regardless of individual professional and educational
aims. This paper recommends that the basic courses be restructured, with separate
tracks for students pursuing language study for different purposes. Three possible
tracks are outlined: one for language majors, another for students preparing for
international professions, and a third for students who need to fulfil the expectations
implied by a language requirement. The Languages for International Professions
Program at Arizona State University is described as an example for the pre-professional
track.

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 262 Language learning and teaching
TEACHER T R A I N I N G
85-369 Brumfit, Christopher (U. of London Inst. of Ed.). Teacher train-
ing and later practical problems. Toegepaste Taalwetenschap in Artikelen
(Amsterdam), 18, 1 (1984), 7-17.
Teacher training should not be primarily about either theory or practice, but about
the relationship between them. Developing this relationship has implications for
administrators as well as teacher trainers. The training of teachers is a crucial part
of the total educational system and must be co-ordinated with curriculum development,
evaluation and testing, research, advisory and inspection services, teachers'
organisations and schools. Trainees need to understand how their training fits into
a coherent picture of education and society. Research can only answer the questions
that are possible within the research model being used. The intuitive feelings of
experienced teachers also need to be taken into account in interpreting research
findings.
While initial teacher training can be seen as a process of socialising new recruits
to the value system of the profession, in-service training could often be deliberately
de-stabilising and challenging, in addition to the more conventional kind of courses
updating teachers. The theoretical condition to be met is that conceptual categories
need to be developed which are principled enough to relate to theoretical argument
and at the same time practical enough to enable teachers to classify their own classroom
behaviour. The theoretical condition to be met is support for the channels of
communication. Teachers need more time to think, prepare materials and plan.
The three key elements in traditional teaching - (a) the teacher, (b) the students,
and (c) conventional views of language education and the world - are subject to change.
Categories to guide teacher's activities should reflect the changes in (c) while enabling
them to build on the secure relationship established between (a) and (b). The
traditional 'four skills' categories would be better adjusted to make categories for (i)
conversation discussion, (ii) comprehension (spoken or written), (iii) extended writing,
and (iv) extended speech. Such a classification relates to genuinely communicative
goals. More abstract categories would be the author's 'accuracy' and 'fluency'.
Teachers may usefully think of their classroom work in terms of these categories, for
example. They are methodological rather than psycholinguistic, but can lead to
consideration of classroom decision-making as well as being referred back to relevant
research.

TEACHING METHODS
85-370 Agor, Barbara J. (U. of Rochester). Exploring language learning with
the computer. Unterrichtspraxis (Philadelphia, Pa), 17, 1 (1984), 116-22.
'The Refrigerator Game' was designed for limited-English-proficient refugees from
Indochina and Ethiopia. It became 'La Tienda' and 'Der Supermarkt' in later
versions. It was based on an authoring language called SuperPILOT suitable for
teachers new to computers. The game is to guess about 10 items in the imaginary store.

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 Teaching methods 263
Then students can change the items and try to baffle their fellows. The game helps
students to learn specified vocabulary, and is perfectly acceptable as a game. Students
learn by focusing on the game's goal rather than on language itself. Students needed
and accepted a surprising amount of practice.

85-371 Anderson, Richard C. and others (U. of Illinois at Champaign-

Urbana). The reading group: an experimental investigation of a labyrinth. Reading
Research Quarterly (Newark, Del), 20, 1 (1984), 6-38.
Reported are two experiments with third-grade children in which a number of
dimensions of reading instruction were investigated. The major findings: an emphasis
on meaning produces better sentence recall than an emphasis on accurate oral reading;
in groups receiving an accurate reading emphasis, but not groups receiving a meaning
emphasis, sentence recall depends upon instructional time; the child who is taking
an active turn remembers more sentences from a lesson than the children who are
following along; and the interestingness of the material is a major factor in sentence
recall, one that is much more important than readability.

85-372 Brown, James W. (Dalhousie U.). Trends in pictorial pedagogics:

adding to the ads. Canadian Modern Language Review (Toronto), 39, 4 (1983),
859-88.
Recent research has indicated the value of using visual materials, particularly
advertisements, but as yet no coherent methodology has been developed. Such a
methodology should have a firm theoretical basis in the communication sciences,
especially semiotics. Students should learn that pictures, like words, can have totally
different meanings in different communities, and the definition of 'reading' should
be enlarged to include the decoding and deciphering of a visual message. To employ
advertisements effectively, a teacher must identify in them Jakobson's six features and
associated functions, and focus especially on the metalingual and poetic functions: not
so much on what the message conveys as on how it conveys it. Students will also need
to understand the mythology and ideology of the target culture.
For pedagogical simplicity, the codes can be reduced to three: linguistic, icono-
graphic and cultural. The student must be made aware of how information is
transmitted in and by the total text, and must demonstrate understanding by
'transcoding' non-linguistic parts of the message into the linguistic code [examples].
The method is usable from early in a first-year course. Reported outcomes include
increased cultural awareness, vocabulary acquisition and expanded topics of con-
versation.

85-373 Courtillon, Janine (CREDIF). La notion de progression applique~e a

I'enseignement de la civilisation. [The notion of progression as applied to the
teaching of the culture of the language.] Frangais dans le Monde (Paris), 188
(1984), 51-6.
The learner's first concern is to acquire grammar and syntax, then the ability to react
automatically in the language; command of the cultural dimension is the ultimate stage

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 264 Language learning and teaching
in its acquisition. Nevertheless, for many language learners the attraction of another
culture and a new and different way of thinking is a more powerful motivation than
the usefulness of languages. Interest in and awareness of the culture are present from
the beginning. Students should be exposed throughout their studies to materials
calculated to arouse their interest and curiosity. Such materials should be systematically
presented, appropriate to the language level and accessible to students who should be
encouraged to formulate their own intepretations. The teacher should try to create
interest and motivation if these are not present from the start.

85-374 Garner, Ruth and others (U. of Maryland). Readers' acquisition of

the components of the text-lookback strategy. Journal of Educational Psychology
(Washington, DC), 76, 2 (1984), 300-9.
To investigate the order in which the components of the text-lookback strategy are
acquired, 100 fifth-grade students at two reading proficiency levels were asked to tutor
younger readers. As the younger students read a short expository text and answered
five questions, tutor encouragement of text-lookback behaviours was observed; tutees,
confederates in the study, did not initiate any lookbacks. For both proficient and less
proficient readers, the order of acquisition posited and confirmed statistically was as
follows: undifferentiated re-reading (general re-accessing of text to locate unrecalled
information) as the first component preceding the two components of text sampling
(scanning the text, re-reading only the relevant segments) and question differentiation
(deciding which questions cue re-accessing) that in turn preceded the final component
of text manipulation (integrating information across sentences to answer questions).
Reader proficiency groups differed in the proportion of members having acquired
particular strategic components.

85-375 Gayle, Grace M. H. (U. of Ottawa). Effective second-language

teaching styles. Canadian Modern Language Review (Toronto), 40, 5 (1984),
525-41.
Style is defined here as the configuration of techniques or teacher characteristics
identified on specific dimensions of teaching. Earlier research identified a number of
distinct second-language teaching styles: Open (LATERAL) Language, LINER
Language, BALANCED and INFORMATION. Groups of discourse functions can
be regarded as forming strategies: Basic/Stock Strategy, Language Exposure,
Independent Analysis and Use of Language (Enterprise), Mechanical Use of
Language, Direction and Verbal Processing. In all the teaching styles examined in
earlier research, the basic strategy characterised by the close-ended exchange
(questions and answers on structure and/or content) occurred by far the most
frequently. [Characteristics of the various styles are described.]
This study aimed to find out how different teaching styles affect achievement in
listening comprehension, using the author's Language Teaching Record Scheme to
classify various dimensions of teaching; the LTRS employs 24 discrete non-redundant
categories of discourse function. Results showed four significant main effects for
teaching style. Six significant interaction effects were found, illustrating that often a

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 Teaching methods 265
teaching style is not consistently more effective than another style in promoting
learning since it may demonstrate better effects for only certain types of student. It
is concluded that while attitude and aptitude are known as significant factors in
language learning, teaching style also makes a difference. Specific styles have been
found to be differentially beneficial for specific types of student.

85-376 Hammerly, Hector (Simon Fraser U.). Contextualised visual aids

(filmstrips) as conveyors of sentence meaning. IRAL (Heidelberg), 22, 2 (1984),
87-94.
Whatever their other advantages, visual aids are not effective in conveying meaning.
Experienced teachers of French were shown two filmstrips, one in an unknown
language (Vietnamese), and the other silent. Each filmstrip had 10 sentences matched
to 10 frames; the teachers had to write down what they thought the characters in the
dialogue were saying. Results showed that comprehension of the Vietnamese dialogue
averaged 0-49. Comprehension of the silent dialogue averaged 0-58, demonstrating that
the meaning of many sentences cannot be conveyed clearly by visual means. There
were marked individual differences in ability to interpret the filmstrips. The teachers
realised that pictures which seemed clear to them as teachers might not be at all clear
to students who did not know the language. It is concluded that initial presentation
of language material should be as efficient and overt as possible, providing beginners
with contextually delimited interlingual equivalence (i.e. making use of the mother
tongue) and thus ensuring total comprehension.

85-377 Phillips, June K. (Indiana U. of Pennsylvania). Practical implications

of recent research in reading. Foreign Language Annals (New York), 17,4 (1984),
285-96.
Reading is a very complex process, more challenging than many other language skills
since it involves linguistic ability, cognitive development and background knowledge
to reduce the uncertainty between the message on the page and the meaning in the
reader's mind, for second-language learners, it is more a matter of bringing meaning
to print than extracting sound from print and is more complex, requiring information
processing using language skills still developing and insecurely established. Therefore
reading needs to be actively taught with due regard for the utter individuality of each
reader. It involves matching the visual information on the page with non-visual
information in the reader's head and has both intensive and extensive modes, plus
skimming and scanning as sub-skills. Definitions of reading, ways of classifying
readers and other recent research are quoted. Five stages are identified in the teaching
of reading and each is discussed and exemplified: preteaching/preparation;
skimming/scanning; decoding/intensive; checking comprehension; integration and
transference of skills.

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 266 Language learning and teaching

85-378 Pons-Ridler, Suzanne (U. of Brunswick). British JournalofLanguage

Teaching, 22, 2 (1984), 87-102.
Teachers of French should stress the similarities between English and French
vocabularies (in particular the thousands of words of the basic vocabularies which are
cognates). The aim of the suggested technique is to improve oral comprehension,
hence pronunciation is stressed and the phonetic link between cognates demonstrated.
Cognates are classified into (1) non-predicative words and (2) predicates, organised
according to the phonetic ending of the words. Each word is listed with its phonetic
transcription and a short example. Examples of all meanings are included, cognate
before non-cognate. Gender is also indicated. Adjectives, nouns and adverbs appear
on the same list. The examples are recorded, with blanks for repetition. Since written
examples present no difficulty, classroom emphasis is on oral examples. It is easier
to begin with words which have the same spelling. The technique allows students to
recognise many words orally at a very early stage, with a minimum of effort. They
become more aware of word formation.

85-379 Pouw, Aart. Het korrigeren van fouten bij het leren spreken van een
vreemde taal. [The treatment of errors in communicative oral training: a review].
Toegepaste Taalwetenschap in Artikelen (Amsterdam), 18, 1 (1984), 81-97.
Teachers of foreign languages have many problems in dealing with errors in oral
communicative exercises: should errors be corrected or does correction interfere with
the communicative effort of students ? This study reviews research in this field, in
particular the need for correction, its effects and the risk of 'fossilisation'. Emphasis
is on the studies of teachers' correction behaviour in the classroom, which seems to
be ambiguous for students; the effects on communication are rather negative. There
are few studies dealing with oral work and peer-correction or self-correction. Studies
on grammatical judgements show the need for prudence. Effective studies of error
gravity from a communicative point of view have to be set up. The effects of
methodologies of error prevention or correction need to be studied. The effects of
errors have to be measured in communicative situations by means of native-
non-native interaction.

85-380 Siegel, Martin A, and Misselt, A. Lynn (U. of Illinois at Urbana-

Champaign). Adaptive feedback and review paradigm for computer-based drills.
Journal of Educational Psychology (Washington, DC), 76, 2 (1984), 310-17.
Since the early uses of computers in education, drill and practice programmes have
ranked as one of the most widely employed and effective of computer-based
instructional techniques. Yet in spite of the pervasiveness of these drills, relatively little
attention has been devoted to discovering ways of maximising their efficiency and
effectiveness, thereby decreasing instructional time and increasing retention. A
direct-instruction approach is proposed in this paper with the corrective feedback
paradigm (CFP). Features of the paradigm include adaptive feedback techniques
with discrimination training, and increasing ratio review. The subjects were 102

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 Teaching methods 267
undergraduate students randomly assigned to one of six drill-treatment groups. The
task consisted of learning 20 English-Japanese (transliterated) word pairs. Planned
orthogonal comparisons demonstrated the statistical superiority on post-test perfor-
mance of increasing ratio review and adaptive feedback with discrimination training,
with no significant difference in time to mastery. Using CFP to teach generalisations
is presented.

85-381 Strevens, Peter. Elements in the language teaching/learning process:

' Did he learn or was he taught?' TESL Canada Journal (Montreal), 2, 1 (1984),
11-25.
When teachers understand the learning/teaching process, they are better prepared to
manage learning more effectively. The process begins with language intake being
worked upon by the learner's qualities, including his intention to comprehend, and by
a wide range of mental processes ('types of thinking'). When this is accompanied by
suitable conditionsfor learning (which comprise impact, interest, variety and organisation
conducive to learning) comprehension occurs. Some of what is comprehended is also
internalised as receptive learning. A further effort is required, in which the learner
re-creates in sound a simulacrum (rough and ready likeness) of his receptive learning,
in order to induce productive learning and use. At every single stage, the process can
be made more rapid and effective through the intervention of a skilled teacher: good
teaching recognises the learner's needs at any moment and provides assistance of an
appropriate kind.

85-382 Turner, Iren6 F. and others (Queen's U. of Belfast). Relationship

between reading proficiency and two types of classificatory ability. Journal of
Research in Reading (Leeds), 7, 2 (1984), 123-34.
The object of this investigation was to assess the validity of the emphasis placed by
the substrata factor theory on the importance of classification in the process of learning
to read. From an initial pool of 59 boys of similar working-class background and a
mean age of 15-69 years, attending secondary schools in Belfast, Northern Ireland,
two groups of 12 were selected. One group was identified as a 'normal reader' group;
the other as a 'poor reader' group. The classificatory ability of the two groups was
assessed by two tasks. The first was a free sort task, which tested the subjects' use
of conceptual and idiosyncratic grouping strategies in their recall of pictorial stimuli.
The second was the associative grouping task, which measured the subjects' use of
superordination. The results of both tasks showed a positive correlation between
reading proficiency and classificatory ability in support of the substrata factor theory.
The pattern of correlations obtained lends some support to the view that reading
disability is associated with a poorly integrated network of abilities. Differences in
scores between good and poor readers on the free sort task were not as marked as might
be expected from earlier research, and explanations for this discrepancy are suggested.

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 268 Language learning and teaching

85-383 Verhoeven, Ludo Th. and others. Tweetalig leesonderwijs aan

Turkse kinderen. [Learning to read in two languages by Turkish children.]
Toegepaste Taalwetenschap in Artikelen (Amsterdam), 17, 3 (1983), 182-201.
A report of a study concerning the processes involved in the learning of reading by
Turkish children when the reading instruction is simultaneously given in LI and L2.
After a short survey of the literature concerning bilingualism and learning to read,
the design of the study is worked out with reference to three research questions. (1)
What is the linguistic and socio-cultural background of Turkish children at the
moment when they start to read ? (2) To what extent does interference play a role in
the simultaneous acquisition of two written codes? (3) How can the individual
variation in L1/L2 reading results after one year of reading instruction be explained ?
The results of the study show that the Turkish children are mainly dominant in
LI skills. The simultaneous acquisition of the written codes of two languages does
not have to lead to negative learning results. It seems that LI reading skills result in
a positive transfer to L2 reading skills.

85-384 White, Joan (McGill U.). Drama, communicative competence and

language teaching: an overview. Canadian Modern Language Review (Toronto),
40, 5 (1984), 595-9.
The discourse of drama results from the natural outcome of all situational variables;
it is language in action and as such provides a satisfactory linguistic base on which
to build communicative competence. Priority is given to contextually appropriate
utterances. The pedagogical use of drama helps to produce the 'community class-
room', encourages student motivation, and creates a non-threatening situation.
Procedures are similar to the natural approaches (Total Physical Response, Sugges-
topedia, Community Language Learning, the Silent Way), but more emphasis is put
on developing the senses and the imagination, and more careful cultivation of
experiences which precede speech. Traditional L2 exercises can be broadened to
include sense experiences: re-living sensations; miming understanding of a listening
comprehension exercise, with background music helping to create mood and
atmosphere; bringing action pictures, stories, poems, etc., slowly to life through
observation and analysis. The teacher makes suggestions and corrections in the inter-
mediate stages before the final speaking activity.

85-385 Wubbels, Th. and others. Interactioneel leraarsgedrag in relatie tot

het schoolvak. [Teacher/pupil relations in modern language lessons.] Toegepaste
Taalwetenschap in Artikelen (Amsterdam), 18, 1 (1984), 52-69.
Findings concerning a limited part of teacher behaviour, namely relational skills, are
discussed. These skills are of vital importance if a teacher is to create a good classroom
atmosphere. On the basis of theories of Leary (1957) and Watzlawick et al. (1968) a
model was constructed that describes relational aspects of teacher behaviour as
revealed in teacher/pupil interactions. These interactions are analysed by means of
the system theory of communication, with the help of an instrument called 'The

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 Teaching methods 269
Questionnaire for Interactional Teacher Behaviour'. From the pupils' point of view,
good teachers are distinguished from bad teachers by the amount of kindness and
understanding they show, their helpfulness and the way they manage a class. The
behaviour that teachers themselves wish to display was also investigated. They agree
about the need to be kind, helpful and understanding but differ in the amount of strict
behaviour they want to display and in the amount of freedom and independence they
want to give to pupils. The teacher behaviour of teachers who teach different subjects
was also investigated and it was found that pupils consider that modern language
teachers in particular behave differently from other teachers; they are stricter, less kind
and give less independence to pupils. This different behaviour of modern language
teachers may be due to the structure of the subject matter, or to the way in which
languages are taught at universities to future teachers. Teacher trainers should be
concerned with these findings because when teachers, and particularly language
teachers, become older they seem to have increasing difficulty in creating and
maintaining an adequate relationship with their pupils.

85-386 Zapp, Franz Josef. Sprachbetrachtung im lexikalisch-semantischen

Bereich: eine Hilfe beim Z w e i t - u n d Drittsprachenenwerb. [Examination of the
lexical and semantic area of language: an aid to learning a second or third
language.] Fremdsprachliche Unterricht (Stuttgart, FRG), 67 (1983), 193-9.
European languages bear the strongest resemblance to one another in the area of lexis
and semantics. This facilitates the learning process although it presents hidden
dangers. School pupils must therefore develop learning strategies which enable them
to use the common features of these languages for economical learning of second and
third languages. To help pupils to develop these strategies, they must be made aware
of the strengths and limitations of contrastive language analysis.

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