Background: Bilingual assessment is particularly difficult in the very first period of children's second language (L2) exposure. This exploratory, longitudinal study examined L2 learning after 1 and 2 years of L2 exposure by young immigrants and how it is affected by their age at first exposure to the L2 (AoE). Method: Participants were 18…

Completing a postgraduate dissertation requires various types of support, whether it be academic, moral, or financial. One way to express gratitude towards those who contribute is through the acknowledgement section. However, the guidelines provided by universities appear to be inadequate to support students, which poses challenges for those who…

Evidence of sensitivity to graphotactic and morphological patterns in English spelling has been extensively examined in monolinguals. Comparatively few studies have examined bilinguals' sensitivity to spelling regularities. The present study compared late Chinese-English bilinguals and English monolinguals on their sensitivity to systematic…

This study examines Korean L2 learners' production of English phonological contrasts (e.g., consonant-final versus vowel-final forms) that are absent in their L1. Twenty university students divided into high- and low-proficiency groups participated in the study. Their productions were analyzed for segmental accuracy and error patterns. Results…

Word stress is frequently afforded secondary importance in English teaching as stress placement rules are complex and because stress can be learnt along with each new word. However, training learners to pay more attention to word stress cues can support them in predicting the stress patterns of new vocabulary. Also, for speakers of fixed stress…

Purpose: This study investigated the efficacy of ultrasound biofeedback compared to a traditional acoustic input-only method in the second-language (L2) production training of English tense-lax vowel contrasts (/i-[near-close near-front unrounded vowel]/ and /e-[open-mid front unrounded vowel]/). The relationship between the degrees of production…

This systematic review explores the evolution and impact of corpus-based methodologies in textbook analysis within the field of language education between 2010 and 2024. Utilizing the PRISMA framework, 29 studies were identified and analyzed, highlighting the transition from basic frequency analyses to sophisticated examinations of lexical,…

German plural formation appears unsystematic and largely arbitrary to many second language (L2) learners. While some approaches have attempted to identify patterns and rules to help L2 learners (e.g., Anton et al., 2017; Di Donato & Clyde, 2020; Kraiss, 2014), one central observation from linguistic analysis has been absent from pedagogical…

Exploring the longitudinal development of second language (L2) lexical use has been one of the important topics in L2 vocabulary research. One approach to examining longitudinal changes in L2 lexical use is to capture changes in lexical features as found in learner production, such as L2 writing, over time. To further facilitate this approach, the…

This conceptual article discusses a collaborative approach to building teacher capacity to support multilingual learners in secondary science classrooms. The article advocates for the collaborative analysis of student writing samples and the sharing of pedagogical insights between English language and content area teachers. Samples of student…

This article uses cognitive measures previously developed within linguistic relativity research to explore the thinking patterns of Yucatec Maya-Spanish bilingual children in the Yucatan peninsula. These measures were designed to detect cognitive patterns associated with specific language patterns. Here, these measures are used to test whether 12…

If maximal exposure were the key to success in language learning, then adult learners at the university level would be doomed to fail. Not only are they presumably too old to learn additional languages effectively, but target language (TL) input appears to be insufficient, especially when other languages are allowed in class. Nevertheless,…

Learners frequently encounter challenges in accurately utilizing near-synonyms in the English language. This investigation explored the similarities and differences among four near-synonymous verbs: "attempt, endeavor, strive," and "try." The analysis encompassed their prevalence across diverse genres, formality levels,…

To become a native speaker, beyond obligatory rules, children need to learn systematic variation in the language, as it is present at all levels of language structure and is an integral part of linguistic knowledge. To give an example in English, speakers sometimes pronounce words ending in -ing with -in' (e.g., working vs. workin') depending on…

This study explored the relationship between linguistic features and the rated quality of letters of application (LAs) and argumentative essays (AEs) composed in English by Chinese college-level English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. A corpus of 260 LAs and 260 AEs were analyzed via a confirmatory factor analysis. Latent variables were EFL…