Looks at the large-scale experiments on the testing of oral proficiency in English, French, and German that have been carried out over the last five years in the Swedish gymnasium. Various kinds of tasks and different grading criteria have been used, and the practical problems of scheduling and of teacher training have been discussed. (nine…

Spanish-speaking preschoolers learning English in a bilingual preschool program were videotaped while working independently on tasks to examine their spontaneous private speech. Results show that the private speech of bilingual preschoolers appears to develop normally. Positive effects of second-language learning in a bilingual program on the…

Among six Mexican-American fifth graders who were native Spanish speakers and had varying levels of English proficiency, oral proficiency was related to reading comprehension within each language. Assisted line-by-line reading facilitated comprehension for low proficiency students, deficient in both English vocabulary and syntactic knowledge. (SV)

Discusses research regarding College of Liberal Arts students at the University of Minnesota where there are proficiency requirement-based second-language programs. Research results provide data that compare qualitative results on reading, listening, writing, and speaking proficiency tests of students from the proficiency requirement program at…

Studied the effect of grading classroom communicative activities on student performance at two different levels. Results indicated no significant difference in scores between the experimental and control groups at either level. (10 references) (VWL)

Discusses the practicalities associated with the introduction of proficiency-based instruction into university programs and courses that teach Arabic. Some of the additional responsibilities that such innovations place on the language teacher are identified, and issues for further discussion, research, and experimentation are raised. (19…

Discusses how second-language learners whose first languages contain an article system differ in their acquisition of English articles from learners whose first languages do not contain such a system. Reviews the approach of Mizuno's (1988) interlanguage analysis for uncovering the process in second-language acquisition, and summarizes findings of…

Investigates the hypothesis that a more field-dependent cognitive style may be adaptive for certain components of second language proficiency. Native English speakers or students of English as a Second Language (ESL) completed measures of language proficiency and field dependence-independence (FDI). Native English speakers performed better than…

Reports results of an extensive needs-analysis for English-as-a-Second-Language-speaking graduate nursing students. The analysis focuses on skills required for school, clinical practice, and interaction with a multicultural, socially stratified patient population. (Author/VWL)

Presents results of an exploratory study on advanced-level French second language (L2) learners' metalinguistic awareness. Specifically, learner performance was examined carrying out three steps of a written and oral grammaticality judgment test. Subjects' ability to identify and correct an error, and to provide the rule, were examined, and…

Assesses the linguistic nature of home community, recollections of early experiences in second language learning, and attitudes and beliefs about language learning and bilingualism in English-speaking Canadian college students who study French. Surveys provide support for a causal model which indicates that sociocultural experiences influence…

This study was originally constructed to examine effect of content-area reading on English-as-a-Second-Language writing proficiency but was restructured and extended because composition topics proved to be confounding factors. Although results of the study raise several issues, most significant are the influence of topic on the acquisition of ESL…

Most education systems prepare their students to function in the national language and at least one additional language. However, only one-third of U.S. elementary schools offer students language-learning opportunities. Multilingual societies have competitive advantages over monolingual societies in international trade. Ameliorative steps are…

Drawing on the unique opportunities that physical education settings provide, physical education specialists can assist English language learners (ELLs) in developing language by implementing language objectives in their lessons. Language objectives encourage teachers to provide explicit language instruction and language support for students who…

Five experiments are reported in which the picture naming performance of bilingual speakers in a language-switching task was explored. In Experiment 1, Spanish learners of Catalan and Korean learners of Spanish were asked to perform a switching task between their first and dominant language (L1, Spanish or Korean) and their second language (L2,…