As bilingual education shifts toward more instruction in English, research on effective practice becomes increasingly important. To merge English language development (ELD) with content area learning, educators should avoid oversimplified material, use visuals to reinforce verbal content, provide sensitive feedback, and use synonyms and native…

Reports on an experiment investigating adult second language (L2) acquisition of Spanish object clitic placement by native speakers of English and French. Two experimental methodologies are compared: an on-line sentence matching task and an off-line grammaticality judgment task. (Author/VWL)

Examines what opportunities test takers have to display their knowledge of managing conversations in the second language in two types of tasks: nonscripted interviews and guided role-play activities. Data consists of 30 interviews and 30 role-play activities between near-native examiners and intermediate learners used in language exams in Hungary.…

Explores the labels "native speaker" (NS) and "nonnative speaker" (NNS) from the perspective of seven nonnative-English-speaking Teaching English as a Second or Other Language (TESOL) professionals. Contends that these terms are related to issues such as the order of learned languages, language competence, language-learning environment, cultural…

Considers the ecological validity of tests in predicting the effects of speech and language impairment on communicative performance in real-world settings and the need for systematic observation of communicative behaviors, particularly of individuals from other cultures. Discusses whether standardized testing and systematic observation are…

Discusses a new test of English language proficiency for international medical graduates. The test, the Clinical Skills Assessment, consists of a series of encounters with "standardized patients" who have been trained to portray various medical conditions. (Author/VWL)

A project developed Navajo norms for the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Third Edition (WISC-III). Urban Navajo students and those who were proficient in English had higher WISC-III verbal scores than rural Navajo students and those who were functional in English. English-language proficiency did not affect scores on nonverbal…

Investigated the effects of pragmatic constraints on the acquisition of the binding of English reflexives by adult Turkish second-language learners. Pragmatically-biased and pragmatically-neutral sentences were compared to determine whether pragmatic bias towards a non-local antecedent overrides the parameter setting of English and causes learners…

Focuses on the strategies that adolescent learners use to discover the meaning of new words in a second language and to consolidate their knowledge of such words. A questionnaire is used to probe the perceptions of students in two content-oriented French second language classrooms at the secondary school level. (Author/VWL)

Among 42 second-generation Japanese-Canadian young adults who had attended Toronto secondary schools and a Japanese language Saturday school, Japanese oral and reading skills were related to each other and to ethnolinguistic identity and beliefs and interpersonal relationships with Japanese speakers. Japanese reading scores positively predicted…

As schools realize that every international school teacher is an ESL teacher, interest is focusing on helping subject-area specialists cope with their second-language students. Describes a Language Through Learning course designed to help subject teachers facilitate nonnative speakers' access to lessons, develop and improve students' language…

The paired-learner interview, in which learners take both the role of the interviewer and interviewee, has been used as a variation of the oral-proficiency interview since the 1980s. The purpose of this article is to show that the paired-learner interview is an effective means to reduce communicative stress for the nonnative learner and one that…

Describes the preliminary findings in the Basque Country of a project shared by four European countries to teach a second language or a foreign language to preschool and school-age children. The method used to teach the foreign language--English--is based on the use of dramatized formats. Examines level of language proficiency achieved with each…

Explores episodes of classroom interaction in which there is unplanned attention to form. Data consist of periodic recordings of learners in intensive English classes over a period of 8 weeks. Analysis of data points to a strong connection between attention to form and subsequent use of those forms and indicates that this connection is affected by…

Examines how differences in point of view influence the story production of Japanese English-as-a-foreign-language students with different levels of English proficiency. Students wrote two narrative stories based on the same series of pictures, one in the first-person perspective and the other in the third-person perspective. Sample writings were…