Reports findings from a study that investigated the group interaction patterns of overseas Malaysian students in a British undergraduate program. Discusses the theoretical issues underlying the study. Findings and categories of idea framing, which arise from the analysis of group interaction data are highlighted. (Author/VWL)

Describes a reflective noticing activity in which pairs of adult learners of English for academic purposes transcribe their own performances of a routine classroom speaking task. Analysis of the process and product of these cycles of work suggest that collaborative transcribing and editing can encourage learners to focus on their form in output in…

Describes the development of a program for helping postgraduate students overcome both the cultural and linguistic problems they face when they go on to study in a country with very different traditions and ways of working than they are accustomed. (Author/VWL)

Presents findings of a study into the use of German as the main teaching medium in fourth- and fifth-form grammar school classes. The article focuses on pupil perceptions of the use of German in the classroom. Results indicate that students are aware of, and satisfied with, the extent to which German is used in their class. (27 references) (CK)

Examines students' views of an Initial Teacher (IT) Training component of a modern language course and their resulting attitudes toward the use of computers in the language classroom. Most of the students developed a positive attitude towards this use of computers and intended to use them in their future posts. (eight references) (CK)

Describes Greek language preparation for English students participating in an exchange program as part of their primary teacher training. It is concluded that the self-directed preparation can be improved by an outline of the stages in the learning of Greek, the availability of required support materials, progress checks, and testing of students…

Examines challenges facing scholarship in cultural fields at the university level. These challenges include economic concerns, political hostility, and a change in the status of foreign literatures. Departments of foreign languages and literatures must redefine their goal as foreign cultural literacy in order to remain viable. (nine references)…

Investigated the acquisition of base-generated topics in Mandarin Chinese by British students learning Chinese. The hypothesis is not confirmed that it would not be difficult for English speakers to acquire the base-generated topic in Chinese because in the acquisition of Chinese, English-speaking learners are exposed to positive evidence of…

Examines proposals for task-based approaches to instruction, reviews relevant research, investigates developments in cognitive psychology, proposes a framework for the implementation of task-based instruction drawing upon relevant theory, and organizes the methods to implement such instruction so as to minimize problems and maximize goal…

Suggests that additional attention to the sequencing of the grammatical structures needed for receptive comprehension might alleviate the problems associated with first-year German textbooks. The simple past tense, word order, and the indefinite pronoun "man" are used to illustrate the concept of a receptive grammar. (14 references) (Author/CK)

Discusses the English Language Fellows (ELF) Program, a pilot project that pairs specially-trained, native-speaking undergraduates with nonnative-speaking (NNS) classmates to study the content of courses that both are taking together. Woven into that study of course content, for the benefit of the NNS students, is the study of language as it is…

This article discusses the history and changes in the teaching of Chinese in the United States. It suggests that there is 1 standard Chinese language and no need to learn dialects, but that to be literate in Chinese means learning 3,500 characters. (CK)

Studied the relationship between modified oral input and the acquisition of word meanings by Japanese high school students. Results include a strong relationship between comprehension and word meaning acquisition was only evident in a test replicating learning format; and rate of word acquisition was faster with the premodified input. (54…

Examines the acquisition of tense-aspect morphology in children acquiring English. The article found that children start using past inflections with achievement verbs and progressive inflections with activity verbs. Results indicate that early development of tense-aspect morphology is influenced by the inherent aspect of the verbs. (56 references)…

It is proposed that negotiation of form can be effective in language immersion instruction. Students are pushed to produce ever more accurate and appropriate utterances, drawing on their own sociolinguistic resources. Examples are provided from an eighth-grade classroom where the teacher uses feedback, questioning, discussion, and…