Second Language Acquisition and Second ... - Stephen Krashen

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classroom might be a very good place for second language acquisition. The literature (Upshur, 1968; Carroll, 1967; Mason, 1971) contains some interesting evidence that the informal environment might be better than the classroom, but my re-analysis of this data indicates that what is really at issue is the amount of intake the acquirer can get (Chapter 3). In intake-rich informal environments, acquisition occurs, and in intake-poor classrooms, acquisition suffers. The acquisition-rich classroom might be extremely efficient, perhaps the most efficient solution for the adult second language acquirer. There are several ways in which a classroom can promote language acquisition. Intake is available via meaningful and communicative activities supplied by the teacher; this is the most direct way the classroom can promote language acquisition. As we have seen, there are other ways in which the classroom can encourage acquisition: in second language situations, it can aid in the development of the foreign student peer group, which is quite possibly an important intermediate source of intake. What is considered the most essential component of language instruction, explicit information about the language, and mechanical drill, may be the least important contributions the second language classroom makes. Although I can certainly study grammar on my own, I would elect to attend a second language class if I were again abroad for some period of time in a country where I did not know the language; my intention would be to gain intake, from the teacher, the classroom exercises, and from my fellow students. The subjects in the "Good Language Learner" study (Naimon, Fröhlich, Stern, and Todesco, 1978) (the 34 case histories in the first section) combined "grammar" study and "immersion" as their preferred approach to second language acquisition. Naimon et al. note that there is some evidence that "... those subjects who learned a language in the country of the target language, though frequently combined with self-study, usually acquired it successfully" (p. 34). On the other hand, grammar study by itself was not the answer. Several "good language learners" had grammartype courses in the target language in school: "... in retrospect, several interviewees, who had achieved high marks in their language courses in school had attached little significance to this aspect of success... as they felt they were not able 116
to speak the language they were learning, or if so, only haltingly..." (p. 34). This evidence is consistent with the generalization that the chief value of second language classes is their ability to provide the acquirer with appropriate intake, a conclusion that language teachers, through practice and experience, have come up with, and one which "theory", in this case "theory of language acquisition", also supports. Notes 1 Especially important are routines that enable acquirers to "manage" conversations with speakers who are more competent than they are in the language, routines that allow acquirers to get speakers to slow down, interrupt when necessary, change the subject, get help with vocabulary, etc. 2 It often "looks like" learning causes acquisition. This occurs when a second language acquirer has learned a rule before actually acquiring it, and then subsequently does succeed in acquiring the rule. It may appear as if the learning led to the acquisition. I am claiming that this is not the way the acquisition really occurred. A hypothetical example may make this clear. Consider the case of two ESL performers living in the United States, M and U, M is a Monitor users, while U is not. They have acquired equal amounts of English and are exposed to identical input/intake. Let us also assume that there does indeed exist an "average" order of acquisition for grammatical items, as claimed in Chapter 4. Figure 3 illustrates M's and U's progress along this natural order. M Items to be acquired U 1 2 3 --------------------------------------------------------------------- Time 1 4 5 . . i . . 28 --------------------------------------------------------------------- Time 2 Fig. 3. Hypothetical case of two ESL acquirers. At time 1, both M and U have acquired up to item 3. (This is, of course, a vast oversimplification; there is some individual variation in order of acquisition, and it is known that items are not acquired in a rigidly linear order. Also, acquisition is not "all or none" as Brown (1973), Hakuta (1974), and Rosansky (1976) show; acquisition is not sudden and "acquisition curves" are not even necessarily linear.) Item 28, far down the line, happens to be an item that is easily "learnable" (such as the third person singular morpheme on regular verbs in English), and is typically presented early in ESL classes. M, being a conscious learner, has no problem gaining 117
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Second Language Acquisition and Sec
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Acknowledgments I would like to tha
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Introduction This book is concerned
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performance..." (p.35). Corder (196
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when it does not get in the way of
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language (some similarities to firs
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In the second part of this chapter,
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far more valuable then the exercise
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Monitoring generally improves accur
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overconcern with correctness, howev
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language is spoken or may be expose
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2. Attitude and Aptitude in Second
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1973, p. 8). Carroll also suggests
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outines and patterns, and at a more
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Sentences, Paired Associates, and S
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stay-ins appeared to be integrative
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motivation played no role because o
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(1977), after interviewing teachers
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did not produce the same results. T
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a stage many people, but not all, r
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The Good Language Learner Revisited
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predict differences in student achi
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settle the issue of whether adults
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language had higher scores than stu
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Table 1. English proficiency and ye
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The "self-study" reinterpretation o
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series the evidence for learning is
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4. The Domain of the Conscious Gram
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Ann Fathman, confirmed our earlier
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significant differences for any of
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Table 1. Studies analyzing grammati
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Table 3. Counterexamples to orderin
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Table 4 (cont.) ___________________
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ut *der Katze Ohr (The cat's ear).
Page 69 and 70: Research Findings 1. First language
Page 71 and 72: First-language-influenced errors he
Page 73 and 74: and (4) Ich weiss nicht, I know not
Page 75 and 76: ain", the right hemisphere, appears
Page 77 and 78: second language acquisition in adul
Page 79 and 80: hemisphere is removed, and the pati
Page 81 and 82: Monitor, to exist, and the degree t
Page 83 and 84: advantage in the first language. En
Page 85 and 86: while English "orients its users to
Page 87 and 88: 7. On Routines and Patterns in Lang
Page 89 and 90: adulthood. A. Smith (1966) describe
Page 91 and 92: "That's a _______") which were char
Page 93 and 94: variation. Nelson, for example, dis
Page 95 and 96: which he had learned by imitation.
Page 97 and 98: and often incorporated them into hi
Page 99 and 100: what utterances mean by observing h
Page 101 and 102: Furthermore, she associated strings
Page 103 and 104: and patterns other than as discours
Page 105 and 106: similar difficulty orders for gramm
Page 107 and 108: understanding language that is "a l
Page 109 and 110: up to the intermediate level. As Wa
Page 111 and 112: practical only in a foreign languag
Page 113 and 114: is making some effort at making him
Page 115 and 116: It may be useful to distinguish thr
Page 117 and 118: the luxury of building up acquired
Page 119: marker /-s/, and the regular and ir
Page 123 and 124: 9. The Theoretical and Practical Re
Page 125 and 126: contact with. "Teacher-talk" is the
Page 127 and 128: language in Los Angeles. S. K. also
Page 129 and 130: Caretaker Speech and Language Acqui
Page 131 and 132: speech is so well rooted in the "he
Page 133 and 134: speech is: they are simpler than na
Page 135 and 136: Freed (1980) reports that foreigner
Page 137 and 138: e boredom. When they overshoot, the
Page 139 and 140: class was conducted entirely in Fre
Page 141 and 142: more expansions as well as repetiti
Page 143 and 144: Broen, P. (1972) The Verbal Environ
Page 145 and 146: Dulay, H. and M. Burt (1977) "Remar
Page 147 and 148: Hakuta, K. and H. Cancino (1977) "T
Page 149 and 150: Learning Aptitude. Rowley, Ma.: New
Page 151 and 152: Academy of Aphasia. Victoria, Briti
Page 153 and 154: Smith, A. (1966) "Speech and other
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Second Language Acquisition and Second ... - Stephen Krashen

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