Some personal observations are offered about second-language teaching where nonnative speakers of Portuguese participated in class discussions via real time computer networks. Preliminary observations suggest that computer-assisted class discussions may promote student participation, reduce anxiety, and increase identification of language errors.…

The ability of 378 elementary school students (aged 9-12 years) in Israel to extract "lawfulnesses" (invariants) from experience and to react to error by reexamining the problem and finding the error was studied on a self-paced inference task. Results are discussed in terms of postfailure reflectivity and postfailure impulsivity. (SLD)

Typical markup methods for providing feedback to foreign language learners are not applicable to languages not written in a strictly linear fashion. A modification of Hart's edit markup software is described, along with a second variation based on a simple edit distance algorithm adapted to a general Southeast Asian font system. (10 references)…

A one-year study is reported that addresses whether and in which way grammatically computer-assisted language learning (CALL) can help English writing instruction in a Taiwanese setting. Results of a CALL courseware intervention with first-year college students suggest that classroom instruction combined with grammatical CALL is at least not…

Describes an on-line mark-up-based composition learning environment system called CoCoA (Communicative Collection Assisting System). This system allows students and teachers to engage in marked-up documents via the Internet, and its environment is very similar to a real-world one in which people use pen and paper. CCML also facilitates teachers to…

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…

Examined a possible link between computer-generated feedback and changes in writing strategies of English-as-a-foreign-language business-writing students in Taiwan. Numerous detailed analyses were carried out using computer software that measured students' writing, including time spent on a document, amount of editing of a document, specific…

The relationship between the library and its patrons is damaged and the library's reputation suffers when returned items are not checked in. An informal survey reveals librarians' concern for this problem and their efforts to combat it, although few libraries collect objective measurements of errors or the effects of improvement efforts. Brigham…

Decision-makers in organizations often make what appear as being intuitively obviously and reasonable decisions, which often turn out to yield unintended outcomes. The cause of such ineffective decisions can be a combination of cognitive biases, poor mental models of complex systems, and errors in thinking provoked by anxiety, all of which tend to…

Rodrigo, Chamizo, McLaren, & Mackintosh (1997) demonstrated the blocking effect in a navigational task using a swimming pool: rats initially trained to use three landmarks (ABC) to find an invisible platform learned less about a fourth landmark (X) added later than did rats trained from the outset with these four landmarks (ABCX). The aim of the…

ISO 9000 is a set of quality standards that assists an organization to identify, correct and prevent errors, and to promote continual improvement. Educational institutions worldwide are implementing ISO 9000 as they face increasing external pressure to maintain accountability for funding. Similar to other countries, in the United States vocational…

This empirical investigation compares the ability of adult multilingual learners of English to perform a metalinguistic task involving paying close attention to meaning and/or form in target utterances/sentences varying in semantic appropriateness and grammatical correctness. In a listening task, adult multilingual learners of English heard these…

As recent second language acquisition (SLA) studies have shown, the negotiation of linguistic items such as vocabulary, verb tenses, and grammar rules with different types of interlocutors--native speakers (NSs) and advanced non-native speakers (NNSs) of English--seems to facilitate second language development among students. Findings from…

The guide offers instructors a system for responding to their English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students' writing, and is designed to accompany an ESL student guide to editing. It include information on how to: respond as a collaborator and constructive critic; respond to content; respond to sentence-level errors; assign grades; help students…

This monograph provides an historical overview of handwriting assessment, followed by suggestions for informally assessing student handwriting errors and implementing improvement strategies. The monograph specifically addresses: (1) research on handwriting; (2) a rationale for remediation of handwriting errors; (3) techniques for evaluating…