Thesis (doctoral)--Uppsala universitet, 1996. / Abstract p. laid in. Includes bibliographical references (p. [288]-298).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2005. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 133-139). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 2005. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

Thesis (B.Sc)--University of Hong Kong, 2000. / "A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Bachelor of Science (Speech and Hearing Sciences), The University of Hong Kong, May 10, 2000." Also available in print.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2005. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

No description available.

It was the purpose of this study to determine the effect of study trips and subsequent discussion on the vocabulary of kindergarten pupils from three social groups in Madora County. Seventy-nine pupils, selected from three classrooms in three rural school districts, were classified as middle-class Anglo-American, lower-class Anglo-American, and lower-class Mexican-American. Two of the three classes were designated as experimental and one as the control class. The instructional design, twelve study trips (one each week) and ensuing discussions, encourage pupils to use new words and develop and expand the meanings of words. The major source of data was the Watts Vocabulary Test for Young Children administered prior to and following the experimental instruction. To provide a basis for interpreting the vocabulary data, the language skills of the pupils were rated by their teachers. Nineteen pupils, selected as high, average, and low verbal responders, were observed in the classroom to determine the effect of the instruction on their verbal behavior. Data also were collected, by the use of observation techniques, to find the extent the instructional plan was implemented and its effect on the verbal behavior of all pupils. An analysis of variance technique was applied to the means obtained on the Watts test to determine the statistical relationship of the experimental and control groups and of the social-class groups. Significant differences, at the .05 level, were located by using post hoc tests. The t test was used to find differences between means. A correlation technique was used to compare vocabulary scores and the language ratings. Language ratings and social-class placements were compared with the quartile distribution of scores for the nineteen pupils selected for more intensive observation. The conclusions from the study include the following: (1) the vocabularies of the pupils in each of the social groups in the experimental classes were effectively stimulated by the instruction; (2) the instruction was most effective for the middle-class pupils, and the least effective for the lower-class Mexican-American pupils; (3) in the distribution of language ratings and vocabulary scores the Mexican-American pupils usually placed low, middle-class Anglo pupils high, and lower-class Anglo pupils in the middle. The findings suggest the needs for further research to: (1) validate the instructional plan by replicating the study in the same school districts; (2) evaluate the effect of the instruction on vocabulary skill after an interval of two years; (3) measure the results of similar curricula administered to the same pupils for at least three years; (4) determine the gain in English vocabulary when the discussions include the use of the native language of the Mexican-American pupils; (5) evaluate the effects of the plan when used with younger pupils.

The Problem: While middle class students can succeed in L2 immersion programs, there is growing evidence that language minority students from low socioeconomic backgrounds do better in Ll programs. Jim Cummins' linguistic interdependency hypothesis resolves this apparent paradox by proposing that middle class students enter school with cognitive academic language proficiencies (CALF), which allow them to succeed in language mismatch situations. He claims that CALF is best developed in Ll and that schools should_teach language minority students in their first language. This study attempted to test the validity of Cummins' CALF construct. It also investigated the effects of Ll and L2 instruction on CALF development. Procedures: CALF was operationally defined as metalinguistic awareness and was measured by a test of language ambiguities. Academic achievement was measured by the CTBS. A static group comparison design was used to determine the effects of Ll and L2 instruction on the development of CALF. Data were analyzed using Pearson Product Moment Correlation Analysis and analysis of variance. First-, second-, and third-grade students whose first language was Spanish were selected for the study. Half of the students were enrolled in bilingual programs and half in English language programs. I.Q. and socioeconomic background were controlled. The effect of gender was studied. Findings: Analysis of the data indicated some correlation between metalinguistic awareness in English and academic performance. Students from English language classrooms demonstrated a non-significant advantage in academic achievement. Bilingual classroom students showed a significant advantage in metalinguistic awareness in both languages. Conclusions: The study supports the hypothesis that bilinguality enhances some aspects of cognitive development. It also lends some support to the use of metalinguistic awareness as a measure of CALF. The study did not show that increased metalinguistic awareness led to enhanced academic achievement. There was no evidence of negative effects from bilingual instruction on limited English proficient students.

The purpose of this research survey is to investigate how the extramural English that primary-school pupils, grades 4-6, devote their leisure time to - playing games, listening to music, surfing the web and watching TV – may affect their performance of English in school. The study also investigates research about the teachers’ role in the pupils’ development of English proficiency. The research that I review in this essay shows that extramural English has positive effects on the pupils’ learning in school. The results also show that it is important for teachers to base their teaching on the pupils’ prior knowledge of, and interest in, English. In this way, teachers can help increase the pupils’ motivation to learn more English. How teachers encourage pupils to learn is also examined, to a limited extent, in this study, particularly how they make pupils take responsibility for their own language learning.

本 研究主要探討句法意識在香港兒童篇章閱讀理解及篇章寫作中的作用，包括三个研究。研究一主要探討句法意識是否能夠獨立預測香港兒童的篇章閱讀理解能力。 受試者為89名母語為粤語的香港五年級兒童。實驗中，受試者接受一系列認知及語言相關的個別測試。主要包括智力測驗、中文篇章閱讀理解測驗、語音意識測 驗、語素意識測驗、語義知識測驗、句法意識測驗、記憶能力測驗及詞彙能力測驗。相關分析表明兩種句法意識測驗顯著與兒童中文閱讀理解能力相關。回歸分析表明即使在控制了兒童在智力水平，語音意識，語義意識，語素意識，詞彙能力及工作記憶能力的差异的情況下，句法意識，尤其是連詞應能力，仍能夠顯著地預測兒 童在中文篇章理解的成绩。 / 研究二應用追踪研究探討句法意識在中文閱讀中的重要作用及中文篇章理解與句法意識是否是雙向相關。即兒童在低一年級的句法意識是否可以用來預測兒童在高一年的篇章閱讀理解成績及兒童在低一年級的阅读理解成績是否可以用來預測兒童在高一年級的句法能力。相關分析表明兒童在五年級的句法能力顯著與兒童六年 級的閱讀理解能力相關，五年级的阅读理解能力显著与儿童六年级的句法能力相关。回歸分析表明，兒童在五年級的句法能力能夠顯著預測兒童在六年級的篇章閱讀 理解成绩。路徑分析表明兒童的句法能力與篇章閱讀理解能力是相互影響的關係。即兒童的句法能力可以用來預測兒童的篇章閱讀理解成绩， 同時兒童的篇章閱讀理解成绩同樣可以用來測兒童的句法能力。 / 研究三主要探討句法意識在兒童篇章寫作中的重要作用。研究三主要採用追踪研究的方法。受试者与测量任务同研究二相同，这些儿童同时接受了写作能力测验。 句法任务包括句法判断和连词填写任务。同时，我们还采用了句 / 法错误分析的方法来探讨儿童写作中句法能力的发展。 相關分析表明兩種句法能力測驗顯著與兒童的寫作能力相關。回歸分析表明，兒童的 句法能力是兒童寫作能力的一個顯著预测因子。路徑分析表明兒童的句法能力與兒童的寫作能力是相互影響的關係。即兒童的句法能力可以用來預測兒童的寫作能 力， 同時兒童的寫作能力同樣可以用來測兒童的句法能力。 句法錯誤分析表明兒童在語序，詞性，成份完整性及標點符號的使用上表現出規律性的語法錯誤。本研究揭示了句法能力在兒童篇章閱讀理解及篇章寫作中的重要作用， 為中文篇章閱讀及篇章写作的困難兒童的診斷提供了重要參考。 / This research aimed to explore the role of syntactic awareness in text reading comprehension and writing composition in Hong Kong Chinese children. Three studies were included. In Study 1, the question of whether syntactic awareness uniquely correlated with text reading comprehension in Hong Kong Chinese fifth graders was examined. A total of 89 fifth graders from two primary schools were recruited (45 boys, and 44 girls, mean age = 9.15 years, SD = .43). These children were administered a set of cognitive and linguistic measures including two tasks on syntactic awareness, i.e. syntactic judgment/correction task and conjunction cloze task. The results of Study1 indicated that syntactic skills, especially knowledge of conjunctive word usage, accounted for unique variance in text reading comprehension in Chinese children even when age, nonverbal IQ, phonological awareness, morphological awareness, semantic knowledge, vocabulary knowledge, morhosyntactic knowledge and working memory as well as word reading were statistically controlled. / The purpose of Study 2 was twofold. First, it aimed to investigate the longitudinal predictive effect of syntactic awareness on text reading comprehension in Hong Kong Chinese children. Second, the bidirectional relationship between syntactic awareness and text reading comprehension was explored. A total of 129 children (50 boys and 79 girls), from a ten-year longitudinal study, were sampled. They were tested on a set of cognitive and linguistic measures including the same two syntactic tasks used as those in Study1. Results showed that syntactic awareness was longitudinally predictive of text reading comprehension, even when the contributions of children’s age, nonverbal and verbal abilities, phonological awareness, and morphological awareness were taken into account. In addition, children’s early reading comprehension was significantly correlated with their growth in syntactic awareness, suggesting a bidirectional relationship between syntactic awareness and reading comprehension. / In Study 3, the relationship between syntactic awareness and writing composition was examined in Hong Kong Chinese children. The participants and measures were the same as those in Study 2. In addition, those children were administered a writing composition task both at age 11 and 12. Results revealed that syntactic awareness was significantly predictive of children’s writing, controlling for the contribution of age, nonverbal and verbal abilities, phonological awareness and morphological awareness. Children’s performance in early writing compositions was also significantly associated with their later syntactic skills. This may suggest a reciprocal relationship between syntactic awareness and writing. In addition, syntactic error analyses revealed that children made certain syntactic errors in sentence construction and these errors were not random. / Findings in this study not only help us unravel the relations between syntactic awareness and reading comprehension and writing composition, contributing to a fuller understanding of the foundation of Chinese reading comprehension and writing composition, but also provide a potentially useful direction for the diagnosis of reading and writing difficulties for Chinese children. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Tong, Xiuhong. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2013. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 127-149). / Abstract also in Chinese; appendixes in Chinese. / Acknowledgements --- p.II / Abstract (in English) --- p.IV / Abstract (in Chinese) --- p.VII / List of Tables --- p.X / List of Figures --- p.XII / Chapter CHAPTER ONE: --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter CHATPER TWO: --- SYNTACTIC AWARENESS AND READING --- p.17 / Syntactic Awareness Reading in Readers of Alphabetic Languages --- p.18 / Syntactic Awareness in Chinese Children’s Reading --- p.25 / Chapter CHAPTER THREE: --- SYNTACTIC AWARENESS AND WRITING COMPOSITION --- p.31 / Model of Writing --- p.32 / Syntax and Writing in Alphabetic Languages --- p.35 / Syntax and writing in Chinese children --- p.39 / Chapter CHAPTER FOUR: --- THE PRESENT STUDY --- p.42 / Study 1 --- p.46 / Study 2 --- p.62 / Study 3 --- p.78 / Chapter CHAPTER FIVE: --- DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION --- p.103 / REFERENCES --- p.127 / APPENDIX --- p.150