The pedagogue is caught between the qualitative and quantitative or regularized aspects of his work, a situation not automatically conducive to scientific study. The article refreshes the instructor on the elementary principles of experimentation: observation, systematization, elaboration of hypothesis, and startegies of comparison. (Text is in…

This inaugural address given at the first national convention of the Association of Teachers of English to Speakers of Italian (ATESI) discusses the scientific status of language teaching methodology. (CFM)

Proposes a scientific methodology for investigation into corrective phonetics, making use of a phonologic roster to classify foreign realizations according to a linguistic pertinence criterion. (Text is in French.) (AM)

Some theoretical definitions of attitudes, including various assumptions that underlie most approaches to attitude mesurement, are presented, and directions and findings of attitude research approaches to attitude measurement are the Bogardus Social Distance Scale, the semantic differential, and the Likert scale, each characterized by a particular…

Two small-scale studies of foreign language test validity are reviewed. The teacher variable is found to be the great threat to test validity, even when grammatical material is presented in the language laboratory. Suggestions for compensating for teacher influence are offered. (JB)

This article reports on a survey to determine the demand for foreign language skills in business in Illinois, to define the characteristics of foreign language use by Illinois business firms, and to determine the foreign language skills being developed in Illinois primary and secondary schools, and colleges. (CLK)

The teacher of English as a second language can perform valuable language research in the classroom. Types of research include: natural language acquisition; small-scale pedagogical intervention; and large-scale methodology in long-range studies. Procedures for formulating research questions, hypotheses and design are outlined. (CHK)

A pilot study is described which illustrates a methodology that can be used in determining the relative importance of different error types according to evaluations made by native speakers and presents preliminary results concerning the relative importance attached by native German teenagers to errors committed in German by English speakers. (SW)

A compilation of more than 300 studies completed since 1970 is presented in an effort to determine and analyze the topical areas that have interested foreign language researchers, the designs and methodologies they have utilized, and the educational milieu in which research is being done. A review was made of a number of studies that have appeared…

Outlines sociolinguistic data collection techniques and relates them to the language teaching situation. (AM)

Questions the adequacy of the data gathered through error analysis procedures, the status of the interlanguage as an autonomous system and the value of descriptions based on error analysis for the language teacher and learner. Suggests that error analysis procedures may prove more useful for historical linguistics. Available from Instituut voor…

At Abington High Schools' North Campus, Abington, Pennsylvania, beginning French and Spanish students were grouped according to ability after the first marking period in an effort to meet their individual needs. A summary of the project shows that the grades of ability-grouped students tended to improve and that there is no clear correspondence…

This paper describes a method to extract, by computer, maximum amounts of sequential information on pattern frequencies underlying verbal interactions in the foreign language classroom. For this purpose, an observation instrument was developed which was expected to allow the study of the structure of the interaction process; it was hypothesized…

This research report is concerned with establishing a minimum vocabulary of English instruction for French students at the secondary level. The approach to the investigation is based on choosing vocabulary that corresponds to the current communication needs of the students, has functional content, and takes the spoken language into account. The…

Limitations of language acquisition research are: the restricted linguistic scope of studies; lack of data in cognitive processes and learning strategies, the role of individual variables, second language acquisition, and the role of social and environmental variables; and undeveloped methodology for data collection and data analysis. (SCC)