Traditionally, the explanation of grammatical rules of a second language has been done in an explicit and deductive way. This means that the instructor explains the rules, and these grammatical explanations are followed by communicative practice activities. This case study will analyze the results obtained in the grammatical teaching of a Spanish rule using the PACE method (Adair-Hauck and Donato, 2016). This method is explicit and inductive, which means that the instructor who teaches the grammar rule guides the discussion of that rule to see if students are able to extract it from the text presented to them. Then, communicative activities of linguistic production follow.This study assumes that there is a connection between explicit and implicit knowledge of grammar (Ellis, 2005). This study teaches three lessons using the PACE method. One lesson teaches impersonal se, another teaches the passive se, and another lesson teaches the inchoative se to students who have studied three years of Spanish at an urban public school in Madison. This structure is complicated both syntactically and semantically for Spanish students as a second language. For this study, I fully transcribed the conversations about the grammar rule of three groups of students in the three lessons they received. I counted the amount of time they spent discussing the grammatical rule of the lesson of the day, and I also divided that conversation into four levels of increasing depth of analysis. I then fully transcribed all the communicative activities they had practicing the rule they previously discussed. Thus, I counted the number of cases that each student performed the correct or incorrect use of the rule. Finally, I counted the cases in which the activity stops being of a communicative nature because of problem or challenge arises. In order for students to solve the problem, they need to pay attention to the form. Therefore, I counted these interruptions and then divided such interruptions in four different categories, so that I could analyze the nature of the challenges students face when they communicate using the target rule. The results of my study did not count on the individual variability I found. In order to explain this unexpected variability, I used Storch's group dynamics (2002). According to his study, collaborative and expert/novice dyads are the ones that produce the best results in linguistic accuracy. The results of my study show that the collaborative dyad is the one that gets the best results in accuracy using the target rule, while in the other two groups that are an expert/novice dyad, the results obtained were positive as well, despite two texts missing in the communicative activities. This study concludes that the PACE method is a valid one, and an alternative to the traditional deductive way of teaching of grammar. Although this study makes no comparison with deductive teaching, the results point to a positive connection and impact between explicit grammatical explanations that are developed through PACE, and their subsequent realization in communicative activities where students speak spontaneously. In addition, this study proposes to encourage and analyze mutuality in groups that discuss the rule in future studies. It is the common element of the two most productive dyads, and it seems to be the easiest variable to control. / Spanish

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Students in Sweden are exposed to English education in the classroom from a very young age. This paper sets out to see whether bilingual or multilingual students perform better than monolingual students when acquiring English as a second or third language in Sweden. The research questions look at whether or not complex noun phrase structures can be connected to the language background of the students. The Dynamic Model of Multilingualism along with Second Language Acquisition theories suggest that students who have already acquired a second language have achieved a multilingual competence that monolingual speakers do not have, and that this multilingual competence can benefit a learner in acquiring additional languages. 64 students submitted language background surveys and essays. 12 essays were chosen to represent three different language categories: monolingual, bilingual and multilingual. The method of comparing the essays was based on the use of complex noun phrases. Two analyses were carried out: 1) on the modification of noun phrases at phrase level, and 2) on the embedding and modification of embedded noun phrases at the clause level. The results of the study are not statistically significant, but they may indicate that bilingual students create the most complex noun phrases, though the monolingual students were not far behind. The multilingual students used the least modification and also the least embedded noun phrases. Further research in this area is warranted based on the results found here.

Mastery of idioms in a second language is an important part of learners' lexical and cultural competence. This study provided insights into the processes that partake in interlanguage idiomatics. It also looked at the role of participants' first language in the comprehension and production of idioms in their second language. Participants were 31 Saudi graduate students' who were learners of English. They were tested in receptive and productive knowledge of 15 English idioms of three types of idiomatic expressions: a) English idioms which have their exact equivalents in Arabic; b) English idioms which are similarly expressed in both languages, and c) English idioms which have no counterparts in Arabic. The data were examined through statistical analysis. Results showed that identical idioms were the easiest to comprehend and produce, followed by similar idioms. Different idioms were the most difficult to comprehend and produce and showed the highest interference from the first language. In addition, a rather unexpected negative correlation was found between participants' length of stay in the US and their knowledge of English idioms. These findings offer insightful implications for the teaching and learning of second language idioms. Most importantly language teachers and researchers should be aware that the acquisition of idioms is influenced by the similarities and differences between idioms in learners' L1s and the target L2. This suggests that building learners' idiomatic knowledge in a second language should be done in a systematic and persistent way. In more general terms, the study's results confirm the trends and patterns reported in previous research about the acquisition of second language idiomatic competence and its important role for the effective comprehension and production of the target language.

The objective of the present research is to explore the present state of EFL (English as a foreign language) in Korean culture which is assumed to be different from that of English speaking countries, and to investigate learners' attitudes toward needs and motivation for the English language. Since it seems to be recognised that language and culture are inseparable, EFL in the Korean cultural context might reflect its own typical aspects. Chapter 1 deals with problems in EFL in Korea, and the relationship between foreign language acquisition and cultural background. The meaning of culture and its importance in a foreign language learning and teaching is elaborated. Chapter 2 reflects the characteristics of Korean culture, with an account of her history, education system and national policy of EFL. Current implementation of English language teaching at Korean universities, with its developmental history, is presented with evidences obtained from previous research. Chapter 3 reviews the theoretical literature on needs, attitudes, interest, anxiety and motivation in foreign/second language learning, since they are recognised as central to foreign language acquisition. Research studies on these variables are introduced, compared with each other and critically discussed. In Chapter 4, research questions and hypotheses are drawn, based on the theoretical framework reviewed in Chapter 3. The research design (sampling, methods of and procedures for data-collection) is elaborated. Chapter 5 begins with a description of data-interpretation methods employed in the study. Data obtained from these instruments were statistically analysed through a computer programme `SPSS'. The findings of the research are presented, followed by a discussion of the results. In Chapter 6, more detailed profiles of analysis than those given in Chapter 5 are presented. Particularly, item-by-item comparison is made between the college students' and graduates' questionnaires. Chapter 7, as a closing chapter of the present research, reviews the foregoing chapters and derives conclusions, suggesting implications for further research. Key implications arising from the research are: priority for teaching EFL from intercultural perspectives, and (so far as learners are concerned) to tolerating the new approaches to teaching that are required.

This research aims to find out how a small sized school in western Sweden, where the experience regarding second language students is not very high, accept the challenge to find and use teaching methods adapted to the students. It will investigate what specific methods or theaching materials are used and why they have been chosen, all this with a focus on literacy learning. The method applied is qualitive interviews. Four teachers have been interviewed from three different grades. In the result and discussion the empiricism according to the four issues about teaching materials and choice of methods is presented. The results show that the teachers more or less use specific methods and materials. Among these are genre pedagogy and copying as methods for second language students learning swedish writing skills. The materials presented include something called ”ZickZack” and ” my words” and are used mainly during Swedish class.

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The communicative language approach (CLA) dominates pedagogical practice in second language acquisition classrooms in the US. However, this approach does not emphasize independent pronunciation instruction, leaving learners to improve pronunciation on their own. This study explored the perspectives of English language learners (ELLs) being instructed via the CLA regarding the effectiveness of the CLA in providing intelligible pronunciation skills. The intelligibility principle of language served as the theoretical foundation underlying this study guided by research questions addressing how well the CLA met ELLs' pronunciation intelligibility needs and their perspectives on receiving independent pronunciation instruction to meet these needs. Using qualitative case study methods, the research questions were addressed through an analysis of interviews of 10 community college ELL adult volunteers who received instruction using the CLA as current or former students in the intensive English program, had linguistic skill levels ranging from beginner to advanced, and were graduates of U.S. schools. A typological analysis model was followed where the data were organized by themes, patterns, and identified relationships. Participants reported wanting to improve their pronunciation and that their pronunciation had improved with the CLA instructional strategies. Although all participants desired to receive some independent instruction in pronunciation, their preferred instructional modes differed. It is recommended that ELLs' perspectives be heard and that English as a Second Language educators instruct with the CLA while also providing explicit pronunciation instruction. The results of this study indicating student satisfaction with the CLA may elicit positive social change within the ELL community by providing a voice to ELLs.

Collaborative work in pairs or groups is a common practice in the workplace, in content courses, and in classrooms across languages, settings, and geopolitical boundaries. However, research on collaborative writing—working with a partner to jointly produce a text, including both planning and writing phases—is limited. In addition, it has resulted in contradictory findings, especially in terms of whether learners deliberate about language and how the composition process affects the written texts produced learners produce. The present study, carried out in a fifth-semester university Spanish Writing course, examines the process (i.e., interaction) and product (i.e., written document) of a collaborative writing module that focused on the creation of narratives. The analysis of learners’ collaborative dialogue produced during the planning and writing phases of the interaction focuses on: (1) at a macro level, how learners apportion their time while collaboratively planning and producing a written narrative (e.g., planning, formulating, revising); and (2) at a micro level, the types (e.g., discourse, grammatical, lexical, mechanical), frequency, and resolution (e.g., resolved, unresolved, resolved incorrectly) of their language-related episodes (i.e., the instances where they talk about the language they are producing and question their language use). Learners’ jointly produced texts were examined analytically in terms of complexity, fluency, and accuracy measures, as well as holistically using a rubric. Additionally, a microdiscourse analytic approach was used to examine the means by which members of a collaborative pair position themselves as partners in a collaborative writing activity. Results indicate that a fully collaborative writing event is a productive site for co- constructed learning as students pool their knowledge to solve language-use problems, particularly those related to word choice and grammatical structures. Additionally, the texts composed collaboratively are of higher quality, based on several of the measures utilized, than texts composed individually by members of the collaborative pair. Finally, implications for implementing collaborative writing tasks in L2 classrooms are discussed.

Master of Arts / Department of Modern Languages / Young-Ok Yum / Writing well, especially in English, is an asset to anyone who aspires to succeed in the academic or other professional fields in this age of English as a lingua franca. Numerous scholars have investigated errors committed by English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) learners. However, to date there is no empirical study on the error patterns displayed in native Dari speakers’ EFL writing in English and in Dari. The present study investigates error occurrences in 20 native Dari speakers’ English and Dari writing. These participants were English majors attending Balkh University, in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan. Most of the participants self-identified their English proficiency levels as “advanced.” The data were collected through convenience sampling of the students enrolled in EFL writing courses who voluntarily participated in two writing tasks of different levels of difficulty; they completed these first in English and then a week later in Dari. In order to observe any patterns, all spelling and word choice errors were identified by three independent judges (one Dari instructor at BU, one native-American-English-speaking graduate student in the English Department, and the author who is bilingual and works as an English instructor). All three worked separately initially and then discussed any discrepancies together in person (English) or via Skype (Dari), until they reached consensus. The analysis, concerning the three research hypotheses, supported these findings: (1) as predicted, the native Dari speakers committed a variety of errors similar to learners from previous studies; (2) as predicted, the participants made fewer errors in English than in Dari; and (3) counter to the hypothesis, the results indicated that the participants, when writing in Dari, demonstrated more errors in the simpler tasks; yet, the participants committed more errors in the more complex (versus simpler) English writing task, consistent with this hypothesis.