Research into the effects of extensive reading (ER) in second language acquisition has surged over the past few decades. Many studies report several benefits that come from engaging in ER, including reading rate gains. However, these studies almost exclusively focus on English language learners and tend to be limited by their lack of control over how the ER treatment is conducted. Furthermore, experimental and quantitative studies that investigate the possible effects of ER on the reading skills of learners of Japanese have yet to be fully explored. The goal of this study was to investigate the possible effects of ER on the reading rate development of learners of Japanese as a foreign language. This study also aimed to examine the level of comprehension learners were able to maintain as their reading rates increased as well as the feasibility of a 12,000 character (7,200 standard word) per week reading goal. Finally, this study also surveyed learner perceptions of ER.<br><br>Using a quantitative single-case experiment design, eight intermediate-level learners of Japanese were monitored engaging in ER following strict adherence to ER principles over two and a half to four months. Longitudinal reading rate data as well as reading comprehension, ER, and survey data were collected over the course of the study. Results showed that participants’ reading rates increased significantly following the ER treatment. Furthermore, participants’ comprehension abilities were not hampered by an increase in their reading rates. Results also indicate that a weekly reading goal of 12,000 characters is likely feasible for intermediate-level learners. Finally, it was found that participants had overwhelmingly positive attitudes towards ER. This study provides evidence that ER has the potential to provide a highly enjoyable activity while substantially increasing learner reading rates without hindering comprehension.<p></p>

Based on the fact that the number of second/foreign language learners diminishes as their study advances to a higher level, this study investigates how learnersâ?? motivation affects their persistence/termination of the learning of Japanese. The subjects are university students studying Japanese at two levels, elementary and intermediate, either as their major or as an elective in south-east Queensland, Australia. It was assumed that there are many motivational variables, such as the purpose of study, the strength of commitment, their attitudes towards the target language and languages in general, their cultural/linguistic backgrounds, their interest in Japanese language and culture, gender, and the learning environment, which may affect learnersâ?? persistence differently, depending on their level of study. Questionnaires were used as a tool to collect data and were conducted twice, at the beginning and at the end of their course of study. Learnersâ?? motivational traits were examined from the data in accordance with their intention of continuing or discontinuing the study to the next semester. The results show that motivation is not something fixed in the learnersâ?? minds, but may change during the process of learning, and that motivational factors vary according to levels of language proficiency. Based on the findings, this study claims five major points: 1) learnersâ?? sustaining motivation which is based on studentsâ?? continuous appraisal of their learning events may be important for their persistence/termination decision making, 2) one of the most important factors which affect sustaining motivation is the studentsâ?? sense of investment in their Japanese language study, 3) development of the culture-based intrinsic interest in Japanese may work strongly for the investment, and learning environment, especially foreign language learning environment, may play a significant role for studentsâ?? investment, 4) a large gap between learnersâ?? self-efficacy and the demands of real study weakens their motivation, which often leads to the termination of their study, especially at the elementary level, and 5) studentsâ?? cultural/linguistic distance from Japanese, educational background, and gender may affect their sustaining motivation, thus, they perform differently with regard to their persistence in Japanese as a foreign language study in Australian context.

Based on the fact that the number of second/foreign language learners diminishes as their study advances to a higher level, this study investigates how learnersâ?? motivation affects their persistence/termination of the learning of Japanese. The subjects are university students studying Japanese at two levels, elementary and intermediate, either as their major or as an elective in south-east Queensland, Australia. It was assumed that there are many motivational variables, such as the purpose of study, the strength of commitment, their attitudes towards the target language and languages in general, their cultural/linguistic backgrounds, their interest in Japanese language and culture, gender, and the learning environment, which may affect learnersâ?? persistence differently, depending on their level of study. Questionnaires were used as a tool to collect data and were conducted twice, at the beginning and at the end of their course of study. Learnersâ?? motivational traits were examined from the data in accordance with their intention of continuing or discontinuing the study to the next semester. The results show that motivation is not something fixed in the learnersâ?? minds, but may change during the process of learning, and that motivational factors vary according to levels of language proficiency. Based on the findings, this study claims five major points: 1) learnersâ?? sustaining motivation which is based on studentsâ?? continuous appraisal of their learning events may be important for their persistence/termination decision making, 2) one of the most important factors which affect sustaining motivation is the studentsâ?? sense of investment in their Japanese language study, 3) development of the culture-based intrinsic interest in Japanese may work strongly for the investment, and learning environment, especially foreign language learning environment, may play a significant role for studentsâ?? investment, 4) a large gap between learnersâ?? self-efficacy and the demands of real study weakens their motivation, which often leads to the termination of their study, especially at the elementary level, and 5) studentsâ?? cultural/linguistic distance from Japanese, educational background, and gender may affect their sustaining motivation, thus, they perform differently with regard to their persistence in Japanese as a foreign language study in Australian context.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-16T18:10:31Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Ana Kennya.pdf: 755001 bytes, checksum: dc8f6c701bfd14474b8e9a6c4b40a6d4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-12-28 / Address in this paper the conceptions of teaching of mother tongue and the theoretical assumptions that explain the emergence of belief in the homogeneity of Portuguese language and prejudice rooted in the educational practices of language teaching. Therefore, rescues briefly the socio-history of Brazilian Portuguese bounding up the objectives of the teaching of Portuguese in school, in the light of official documents (PCN and Curricular Guidelines), criticizing certain practices embedded in the school culture. Emphasis is placed on the Education Linguistics aimed to broaden the students' communicative competence and presents a brief analysis of the texts of high school students at the Federal Institute of Maranhão, to give visibility to the conceptions of language that are still rooted in the culture of students, using some elements of discourse theory. / Abordam-se neste trabalho as concepções acerca do ensino de língua materna e os pressupostos teóricos que explicam o surgimento da crença na homogeneidade da língua portuguesa e do preconceito linguístico enraizado nas práticas educacionais de ensino da língua. Para tanto, resgata-se brevemente a sócio-história do português brasileiro e delimitam-se os objetivos do ensino da língua portuguesa na escola, à luz dos documentos oficiais (PCN e Diretrizes Curriculares), criticando algumas práticas arraigadas na cultura escolar. Enfatiza-se a Educação Linguística como objetivo de ampliar a competência comunicativa dos alunos e apresenta-se uma breve análise dos depoimentos dos alunos do Ensino Médio do Instituto Federal do Maranhão, para dar visibilidade às concepções sobre a língua que ainda estão arraigadas na cultura dos alunos, usando alguns elementos da teoria do discurso.

<p>The present dissertation investigated the impact of scales / scoring methods and prompt linguistic features on the meausrement quality of L2 English elicited imitation (EI). Scales / scoring methods are an important feature for the validity and reliabilty of L2 EI test, but less is known (Yan et al., 2016). Prompt linguistic features are also known to influence EI test quaity, particularly item difficulty, but item discrimination or corpus-based, fine-grained meausres have rarely been incorporated into examining the contribution of prompt linguistic features. The current study addressed the research needs, using item response theory (IRT) and random forest modeling.</p><p>Data consisted of 9,348 oral responses to forty-eight items, including EI prompts, item scores, and rater comments, which were collected from 779 examinees of an L2 English EI test at Purdue Universtiy. First, the study explored the current and alternative EI scales / scoring methods that measure grammatical / semantic accuracy, focusing on optimal IRT-based measurement qualities (RQ1 through RQ4 in Phase Ⅰ). Next, the project identified important prompt linguistic features that predict EI item difficulty and discrimination across different scales / scoring methods and proficiency, using multi-level modeling and random forest regression (RQ5 and RQ6 in Phase Ⅱ).</p><p>The main findings were (although not limited to): 1) collapsing exact repetition and paraphrase categories led to more optimal measurement (i.e., adequacy of item parameter values, category functioning, and model / item / person fit) (RQ1); there were fewer misfitting persons with lower proficiency and higher frequency of unexpected responses in the extreme categories (RQ2); the inconsistency of qualitatively distinguishing semantic errors and the wide range of grammatical accuracy in the minor error category contributed to misfit (RQ3); a quantity-based, 4-category ordinal scale outperformed quality-based or binary scales (RQ4); sentence length significantly explained item difficulty only, with small variance explained (RQ5); Corpus-based lexical measures and phrase-level syntactic complexity were important to predicting item difficulty, particularly for the higher ability level. The findings made implications for EI scale / item development in human and automatic scoring settings and L2 English proficiency development.</p>

This dissertation is three interlinked studies that pilot new methods for combining corpus linguistics and semantic network analysis (SNA) to understand and teach academic language. Findings indicate that this approach leads to a deeper understanding of technical writing and offers an exciting new avenue for writing curriculum.<br><br>The first phase is a corpus study of fixed and variable formulaic language (n-grams and p-frames) in academic engineering writing. The results were analyzed functionally, semantically and rhetorically. In contrast to previous n-gram analyses, the p-frame analysis found that variable phrases are often participant-oriented and communicate author stance. <br><br>The second phase combined corpus and network analysis tools to create educational materials. Several elements of successful design were highlighted. The final phase tested the materials in two classes with fifteen graduate students, finding evidence for the value of this novel approach.<br>

<p>This project examined the acquisition of third person accusative clitics in Spanish by Chinese-speaking learners. Specifically, it focused on the role of cross-linguistic influence and patterns of language exposure and use in the acquisition of the syntactic and semantic properties constraining the production and intuition of overt and null clitics in Spanish. An elicited production task and an acceptability judgment task were performed on a total of 83 participants divided into four groups. A group of Chinese immigrants in Spain (n = 24), a group of classroom learners in China with study abroad experience (n = 23), and a group of learners without study abroad experience (n = 19) were compared to a group of native speakers of Spanish (n=17). The results showed that, while all the experimental groups showed knowledge of accusative clitics, their knowledge regarding the distribution of overt and null clitics was generally not related to definiteness or syntactic island. However, some participants with higher proficiency or more use of Spanish showed some sensitivity to the syntactic property of null clitics but not definiteness. Proficiency in Spanish had different effects on the immigrants and the classroom learners. Use of Spanish also played different roles between the pure classroom learners and the other two groups with naturalistic exposure. Finally, the results also showed that, while the three groups all showed influence from Chinese, the Spanish and Chinese grammars of the immigrants showed more similarity, compared to the two groups of classroom learners. Based on a proposed path of acquisition, the results were discussed in line with second language acquisition theorizing on feature accessibility and reassembly. Some implications on classroom instruction are also discussed. </p>

<div><b>Purpose:</b> Previous studies have shown that children with SSD speaking a language other than English produce different types of speech errors, although there is a paucity of information investigating these differences in speech sound production (e.g., Core & Scarpelli, 2015; Fabiano-Smith & Goldstein, 2010b; Fabiano-Smith & Hoffman, 2018). This study investigates the types of speech errors produced by bilingual Spanish-English and monolingual English-speaking children matched on age, receptive vocabulary, and articulation accuracy in single words.</div><div><br></div><div><b>Methods: </b>Twelve bilingual English-Spanish speaking children, ages 4;0 to 6;11, were matched to twelve monolingual English-Speaking children. Participants completed standardized and non-standardized tests of speech and language, and performance between groups and assessment measures were compared. Consonant sound productions were categorized as correct, substitution errors, omission errors, or distortion errors.</div><div><br></div><div><b>Results: </b>Bilingual Spanish-English children were significantly more likely than monolingual English children to produce omission errors, while monolingual English children were more likely to produce distortion errors. Both groups produced similar proportions of substitution errors. Bilingual children produced similar proportions of each error type in both of their languages.</div><div><br></div><div><b>Conclusion: </b>SLPs should not rely on English normative data to diagnose SSDs in monolingual and bilingual Spanish-speaking children, as they demonstrate different errors patterns from monolingual English-speakers.</div>

<p>This investigation examined the effectiveness of different types of explicit classroom instruction on second language (L2) development of the Spanish discourse marker (DM) <em>pues</em>. While several studies have addressed the positive effect of explicit instruction on L2 DM development, the current investigation moves beyond the explicit-implicit method debate by examining the comparative effectiveness of different types of explicit instruction, specifically by comparing the effects of concept-based instruction (CBI), rule-based instruction (RBI), and a control group (CTRL). This investigation contributes to the field of instructed pragmatics by demonstrating how different types of explicit instruction can affect the robustness of pragmatics learning outcomes. Furthermore, with the inclusion of CBI, this investigation expands theoretical paradigms for L2 pragmatics teaching to include a less explored framework for instruction — sociocultural theory (Vygotsky, 1987).</p> <p><br></p> <p>Given the learnability problem posed by the low perceptual salience and extensive multifunctionality of DMs, along with their conceptual connections to important interactional practices and to a semantic core that guides their use in discourse, DMs and <em>pues</em> specifically were identified as a potentially ideal candidate for development through CBI. <em>Pues</em> is translated in English to ‘so’, ‘then’, ‘cos’, and ‘well’ and is a highly frequent feature of Spanish conversation (Domínguez García, 2016; Stenström, 2006a; Stenström, 2006b). DMs like <em>pues </em>contribute to speakers’ ability to communicate effectively and participate in social interaction (Crible & Pascual, 2020; Hayano, 2011; Hoshi, 2017; Thörle, 2016) and, thus, they are important linguistic features for L2 speakers.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Using a pre, post, and delayed post design, data were collected using an oral decision-making task and a dialogue reflection task. The analyses addressed whether CBI, RBI, and CTRL produce the same effect on L2 Spanish learners’ <em>pues</em> frequency of use, <em>pues</em> functional range, and use of <em>pues</em> in interaction. As a secondary objective, the analyses also considered whether CBI and RBI produce the same effect on L2 Spanish learners’ ability to transfer learning to unlearned DMs.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Quantitative analyses, which addressed the learners’ ability to use <em>pues</em> frequently and for a range of functions, indicated an advantage for the CBI group, with CBI learners using <em>pues</em> with greater frequency of use and functional range than RBI and CTRL learners. The qualitative analysis, which addressed the learners’ ability to use <em>pues</em> in interaction, also indicated an advantage for the CBI group, with CBI learners using <em>pues</em> to express a stance of givenness towards utterances as well as to manage turn-taking in interaction. CBI learners’ use of <em>pues</em> for accomplishing these two interactional practices indicated a deeper understanding of <em>pues</em> and how the DM can be used to accomplish social actions in interaction.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Overall, the findings provide support for the claim that CBI is superior to traditional explicit models of instruction (Erikson, Lanning, & French, 2017) and suggest that the learnability problem of DMs may be lessened by providing a conceptual structure that presents learners with a framework for organizing DM multifunctionality and that also highlights the interactional importance of DMs as tools that can be used to accomplish social actions. The findings are discussed considering the role of conceptual knowledge in L2 DM development and implications for pragmatics instruction.</p>

Beginning in April 2020, the Japanese government continued its English education language policy reform by introducing foreign language instruction as an academic subject for Grade 5 and Grade 6 students. The purpose of this study was to investigate how stakeholders across the education system have contended with policy creation, policy interpretation, and policy appropriation in public elementary school classrooms. Using a conceptual framework of ethnography of language policy and open systems theory, this multiple case study was designed to investigate policy as text, policy as discourse, and policy as classroom practice. In order to achieve these aims I used qualitative methods of data collection that included content analysis of policy documents, and interviews with national policymakers, educational authorities from local Boards of Education, school principals, and classroom teachers. In addition, observations of English lessons at three public elementary schools within the same prefecture were analyzed to understand how the schools approached policy implementation and how close did the teachers’ appropriation of EFL lessons correspond with the goals of the 2020 Course of Study. The 2020 Elementary School Course of Study established English as an academic subject for students in Grades 5 and 6. An analysis of the policy documents revealed positive changes in the realignment of the purpose and aims of education from elementary school through high school. In addition, the 2020 Course of Study introduces an updated assessment framework for teaching and learning across all subjects for elementary school, junior high school and high school. However, how English is conceptualized and integrated into the national curriculum appears in places not to match some of the new aims of the 2020 Course of Study and uses ambivalent terms, such as language activities with little guidance for teachers on how to teach English. The interviews with participants provided insights from various stakeholders on their beliefs and experiences towards educational language policy creation, transmission, and implementation. A total of 72 interviews were conducted for this study. National-level policymakers and advisors spoke of the politics during policy formulation. In addition, discursive struggles between conservative and progress views of education and foreign language education also influenced policymakers’ objectives. A discourse of expertise, which restricted agency and voice for certain participants, also emerged from the interview data. All of these points and others created a situation where policy implementation took on a form of bricolage. During the 17 months of field work at the three participating schools, 58 lessons were observed, recorded, and analyzed. The findings from the classroom observations revealed that each school’s approach to implementing English as a subject in Grades 5 and 6 changed each year. Teachers had difficulties navigating shifting discourses towards English lessons, along with understanding new and ambiguous terminology towards teaching practices and assessment. The findings showed that teachers were generally meeting the goals of the 2020 English Course of Study; however, the teaching of reading and listening were problematic for many teachers. The discussion section comprises implications for future policy creation and implementation, classroom pedagogy, and the theoretical implications. The intended audience for this investigation includes stakeholders interested in applied linguistics, language policy and planning, comparative education, and Japanese studies. This study contributes to the research on educational language policy and our understanding that policy is more than declaring and seeking particular outcomes, but a consistently evolving process with conflicting discourses and ideologies. This study adds to our understanding how the structure of Japan’s education system and the social organization of the schools can enable and inhibit certain stakeholders positioned across the education system. Lastly, this study contributes to our understanding of what it means to be an English teacher in Japan’s public elementary school schools. / Applied Linguistics