Today

1
Today

• Review Knowing a Language
• Proficiency oriented curriculum
• Language components
• Proficiency guidelines
• Complete chapter 1
• Standards for foreign language learning
• Start chapter 2 On learning a language
• Theories of language learning

2
Two views on language learning

• Empiricist
• (Environmentalist)
• Learned
• General learning ability (human and animal
  learning are similar)

• Rationalist
• (Mentalist/Nativist)
• Innate
• Species-specific

3
Behaviorist Theory (Skinner)

• Human learning and animal learning are similar
• The childs mind is a tabula rasa. There is no
  innate pre-programming specifically for language
  learning at birth
• Psychological data should be limited to that
  which is observable
• All behavior is viewed as a response to stimuli
• Conditioning involves the strengthening of
  associations between a stimulus and a response
• Human language is a sophisticated response
  system acquired through operant conditioning.

4
Criticisms to Skinner

• This theory cannot explain creativity in
  generating language language behavior is more
  complex than the establishment of S-R connections
• Lack of empirical evidence
• the role of imitation and reinforcement is smaller

5
Universal Grammar Theory (Chomsky)

• Language is a species-specific, genetically
  determined capacity.
• Language learning is governed by biological
  mechanisms
• The ultimate form of any human language is a
  function of language universals, a set of fixed
  abstract principles that are innate
• Each language has its own parameters whose
  settings are learned on the basis of linguistic
  data
• There is a core grammar, congruent with
  universal principles, and a peripheral grammar,
  consisting of features that are not part of a
  universal grammar.
• Core grammar rules are thought to be relatively
  easier to acquire, in general, than peripheral
  rules.

6
Criticisms

• Are language universals still available in
  adulthood?
• Lack of empirical evidence
• Difficult to prove the existence of language
  universals (principles and parameters)

7
Krashens Monitor Theory L1 and L2 are similar

• Acquisition vs. learning (unconscious vs.
  conscious)
• 4 hypotheses
• The natural order hypothesis
• The monitor hypothesis
• The input hypothesis comprehensible input (i1)
• The affective filter hypothesis motivation and
  low level of anxiety
• The role of error correction

8
Connectionism/PDP (McCleland, Rumelhart PDP
Group, Gasser, Elman)

• Learning consists of the strengthening of
  connections between and among simple processing
  units
• Cognitive processing occurs in a parallel
  fashion, not serial
• Knowledge is in the connections rather than the
  processing units themselves
• The strength of the connections is determined by
  the relative frequency of patterns in the input
• There are no rules in connectionist systems,
  although they exhibit regular or rule-like
  behavior