This investigation of English immersion learners explored processes of learning English, patterns of language use, and levels of comprehensibility among 34 predominantly Spanish-speaking 12th graders at the American School of Asuncion in Asuncion, Paraguay. The analysis of data from language learning histories, group interviews, perceived…

East Texas, home to a large English language learner (ELL) population, is the setting for a successful program that offers students support for both language development and subject-matter learning. In this article, the authors examine why East Texas is so successful in closing the achievement gap of its minority students. The authors also…

In this article, I examine the assimilationist assumptions embedded in the development and implementation of the Texas Reading Proficiency Test in English (RPTE). The RPTE was designed as a developmental bridge for English language learner (ELL) students to perform on the English Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS). These assumptions…

Socio-cultural models offer great scope for scope for theorising the complex processes involved in teaching and learning, and of capturing the nature of the co-constructions, which are important factors in success for both teachers and learners. But the implications of this theoretical stance are perhaps, not fully recognised in the attendant…

This paper reports on the grammatical and programmatical production aspects of the "Hebrewer," a cross-platform web-based reference work in the form of a Hebrew inflection generator. The Hebrewer, a Java applet/servlet combination, is currently capable of generating 2,500 nouns in full declension and 500 verbs in full conjugation,…

Truly current, up-to-the-minute video by native speakers using the language for real communication can make the language and culture come alive for students. With the explosion of broadband Internet access through cable and DSL, better connections in schools, faster low cost computers, and better graphics adapters, access to authentic video on the…

This study focuses on the various playful uses of language that occurred during a semester-long study of two German language courses using one type of synchronous network-based medium, the MOO. Research and use of synchronous computer-mediated communication (CMC) have flourished in the study of second-language acquisition (SLA) since the late…

The inspiration for our project arose from a perceived gap between research in foreign/second language learning and classroom practice. In order to address this issue, we created a web site containing summaries of seminal articles in the area of CALL--computer assisted language learning. The summaries are useful for many teachers who do not have…

Active communication with others is key to human learning. This straightforward premise currently undergirds much theory and research in student learning in general, and in second language and literacy learning in particular. Both of these academic areas have long acknowledged communication's central role in successful learning with the exact…

This study investigated the effect of English-language acquisition on the learning experiences of a four-year-old Taiwanese immigrant child in a state kindergarten in New Zealand. Data was collected through child observations and parents' and teachers' interviews. The child's learning experience was analysed based on five behaviours--"taking…

The teaching of grammar is discussed from an instrumental point of view: what beneficial effects does such teaching have for students' language abilities (especially writing)? Two ways of approaching grammar teaching are confronted with each other: the learning of explicit rules and meta-linguistic knowledge about language on one hand and learning…

Poetry performance is an approach to learning where students can use theatrical techniques to develop a response to the poem. This paper argues that ELL students can explore the aesthetic function of language and, more widely, develop confidence in using English as a communicative tool through the dramatization of poetry. We describe the process…

This paper proposes the existence of a cognitive process by which multilinguals who incorporate nontarget lexical items from one non-native language into another may (1) come to identify the lexical item transferred from a source to a guest system as belonging to the guest system and (2) fail to recognise the source of their knowledge in the…

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…

This article describes the evolution of communication technologies, accompanying transformations in everyday communicative activity, and pedagogical possibilities these tools support in second and foreign language (L2) settings. We begin with an overview of synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) and uses of the Internet to mediate…