Second Language Learning theories Prof. Abdulrahman Alabdan

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Second Language Learning theories Prof.
Abdulrahman Alabdan
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Second Language Learning Theories

• Contexts for Language Learning
• SLA theories need to account for language
  acquisition by learners with a variety of
  characteristics and learning in a variety of
  contexts.
• Behaviorism
• Innatism
• Cognitive/developmental perspective
• Information Processing
• Connectionism
• The Competition Model
• The Sociocultural Perspective

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Contexts for Language Learning

• SLA theories need to account for language
  acquisition by learners with a variety of
  characteristics and learning in a variety of
  contexts.

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Differences in Learning L1 L2Contexts
for Language Learning

• Learner Characteristics
• 1. Knowledge of another language
• 2. Cognitive maturity
• 3. Metalinguistic awareness
• 4. World Knowledge
• 5. Anxiety about speaking

L1 L2 L2 L2
Child Child (informal) Adolescent (formal) Adult (informal)
- ?
- -
- ?
- -
- -
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Differences in Learning L1 L2

• Learning Conditions
• 6. Freedom to be silent
• 7. Ample time contact
• 8. Corrective feedback (grammar and
  pronunciation)
• 9. Corrective feedback (meaning, word choice,
  politeness)
• 10. Modified input

L1 L2 L2 L2
Child Child (informal) Adolescent (formal) Adult (informal)
- -
- ?
- - -


Child-directed speech Foreigner talk or Teacher talk
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1- Behaviorism / summary

• imitation practice
  reinforcement habit formation

• A person learning an L2 starts off with the
  habits formed in the L1 and these habits would
  interfere with the new ones needed for the L2.
• Behaviorism was often linked to the Contrastive
  Analysis Hypothesis (CAH) It predicts that
  where there are similarities between the L1 and
  the target language, the learner will acquire
  target-language structures with ease where there
  are differences, the learner will have difficulty.

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Behaviorism/ summary

• Criticisms about the CAH
• Though a learners L1 influences the acquisition
  of an L2, researchers have found that L2 learners
  do not make all the errors predicted by the CAH.
• Many of their errors are not predictable on the
  basis of their L1 (e.g. putted cooker
  meaning a person who cooks badder than)
• Some errors are similar across learners from a
  variety of L1 backgrounds (e.g. he/she th
  sound the use of the past tense the relative
  clauses)

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Behaviorism/ summary

• The L1 influence may not simply be a matter of
  the transfer of habits, but a more subtle and
  complex process of
• - identifying points of similarity,
• - weighing the evidence in support of some
  particular feature, and
• - reflecting (though not necessarily
  consciously) about whether a certain feature
  seems to belong in the L2.
• By the 1970s, many researchers were convinced
  that behaviorism and the CAH were inadequate
  explanations for SLA.

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2- Innatism

• Universal Grammar (UG) in relation to second
  language development
• Competence vs. Performance
• Krashens monitor model

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Innatism Universal Grammar

• UG and SLA
• Chomsky has not made specific claims about the
  implications of his theory for second language
  learning.
• Linguists working within the innatist theory have
  argued that UG offers the best perspective to
  understand SLA. UG can explain why L2 learners
  eventually know more about the language than they
  could reasonably have learned (i.e. UG can
  explain L2 learners creativity and
  generalization ability).
• Other linguists argue that UG is not a good
  explanation for SLA, especially by learners who
  have passed the critical period (i.e. CPH does
  not work in SLA).

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Innatism Competence vs. Performance

• Competence
• It refers to the knowledge which underlies our
  ability to use language.
• Performance
• It refers to the way a person actually uses
  language in listening, speaking, reading, and
  writing. Performance is subject to variations due
  to inattention, anxiety, or fatigue whereas
  competence (at least for the mature native
  speaker) is more stable

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2- Cognitive/developmental perspectiveA-
Information processing

1. Attention-processing
2. Skill learning
3. Restructuring
4. Transfer appropriate processing

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A- Information processing

• Attention-processing
• This model suggests that learners have to pay
  attention at first to any aspect of the language
  that they are trying to understand or produce.

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A- Information processing

• Skill Learning
• Some researchers regard SLA as skill learning.
  They suggest that most learning, including
  language learning, starts with declarative
  knowledge (knowledge that).
• Through practice, declarative knowledge may
  become procedural knowledge (knowledge how).
• Once skills become procedualized and automatized,
  thinking about the declarative knowledge while
  trying to perform the skill disrupts the smooth
  performance of it.
• In SLA, the path from declarative to procedural
  knowledge is often like classroom learning where
  rule learning is followed by practice.

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A- Information processing

• . Restructuring
• Sometimes changes in language behavior do not
  seem to be explainable in terms of a gradual
  build-up of fluency through practice.
• Restructuring may account for what appear to be
  sudden bursts of progress and apparent
  backsliding.
• It may result from the interaction of knowledge
  we already have and the acquisition of new
  knowledge (without extensive practice).
• e.g. I saw ? I seed or I sawed
• overapplying the general rule

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B- Connectionism (I)

• Connectionists attribute greater importance to
  the role of the environment than to any specific
  innate knowledge.
• They argue that what is innate is simply the
  ability to learn, not any specifically linguistic
  principles.
• They emphasize the frequency with which learners
  encounter specific linguistic features in the
  input and the frequency with which features occur
  together.

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C- The Competition Model

• The competition model is closely related to the
  connectionist perspective. It is based on the
  hypothesis that language acquisition occurs
  without the necessity of a learner's focused
  attention or the need for any innate capacity
  specifically for language.
• This model takes into account not only language
  form but also language meaning and language use.
• Through exposure to thousands of examples of
  language associated with particular meanings,
  learners come to understand how to use the cues
  with which a language signals specific function.
• Most languages make use of multiple cues, but
  they differ in the primacy of each. Therefore,
  SLA requires that learners learn the relative
  importance of the different cues appropriate in
  the language they are learning.

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The Sociocultural Perspective

• Vygotskys sociocultural theory
• Language development takes place in the social
  interactions between individuals.
• Speaking (and writing) mediate thinking.
• Zone of proximal development (ZPD) when there is
  support from interaction with an interlocutor,
  the learner is capable of performing at a higher
  level.
• L2 learners advance to higher levels of
  linguistic knowledge when they collaborate and
  interact with speakers of the L2 who are more
  knowledgeable than they are.

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The Sociocultural Perspective

• The difference between Vygotskys socialcultural
  theory and the interaction hypothesis

Vygotsky Interaction hypothesis
Language acquisition takes place in the interactions of learner and interlocutor. Greater importance is attached to the conversations, with learning occurring through the social interaction. - Interaction needs to be modified and through negotiation for meaning. - Emphasis is on the individual cognitive processes in the mind of the learner.
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Summary

• There is no agreement on a complete theory of
  second language acquisition yet.
• Each theoretical framework has a different focus
  and its limitations.
• Behaviorism emphasizing stimuli and responses,
  but ignoring the mental processes that are
  involved in learning.
• Innatism innate LAD, based on intuitions
• Information processing and connectionism
  involving controlled laboratory experiments
  where human learning is similar to computer
  processing.
• Interactionist position modification of
  interaction promotes language acquisition and
  development.