This quasi-experimental study investigated the effectiveness of two types of vocabulary instruction--image-schema-based instruction (ISBI) and translation-based instruction (TBI)--on the acquisition of second language (L2) polysemous words. Fifty-eight Japanese high school learners of English were divided into two treatment groups (ISBI and TBI)…

This article explores the attribution of linguistic resources to multilingual students in a primary school in the Netherlands. Drawing on an ethnographic study of a regular, multicultural classroom, it describes patterns of attribution emerging from observations of classroom activities and interviews with the teacher. Its focus is on the…

Using the tools of corpus linguistics, genre analysts are now able to easily identify the common linguistic features of the moves and strategies of genres. Such analyses produce large amounts of linguistic data which must be presented to language learners in a meaningful context. One proposed method of doing so is by hyperlinking the data to form…

What syntactic patterns emerge in students' use of articles and modals? What are the reasons for these patterns? What implications do the findings of the study have for English language instruction in Botswana? Exactly 1556 essays comprising class assignments, written seminar presentations, test papers and examination scripts from 514 randomly…

This investigation is an ethnographic case study of the literacy learning opportunities of a fifth-grade Hmong child (pseudonym Deng) who came to the United States from Laos via Thailand at the very end of his third-grade year in school. Deng was one of 25 students in a mainstream urban classroom in the Midwest during his fifth grade in school…

English language learners are students with a primary language other than English who have a limited range of speaking, reading, writing, and listening skills in English. English language learners also include students identified and determined by their school as having limited English proficiency and a language other than English spoken in the…

Some Grade 4 educators have expressed feelings of ineptitude regarding the support of ESL (English Second Language) learners with limited English proficiency as they do not know how to support these learners effectively. Their litany emphasises ESL educators' need for supportive and preventive intervention. A story-based Language Enrichment…

The ways in which children learn a language--be it their mother tongue or their second language--can have a strong influence on their success in school. Researchers in linguistics and early child development have tried to determine the factors that can help and hinder language acquisition in young children, with some conflicting results. In this…

"Beyond Tracking" responds to the a sobering assessment of American high schools by delineating and promoting an innovative and well-defined notion of multiple pathways. The book's authors clearly distinguish their use of the term "multiple pathways" from any updated version of the tracking system that marked so many American high schools during…

The purpose of this publication is to provide basic descriptive information about the 100 largest school districts (ranked by student membership, that is, the number of students enrolled at the beginning of the school year) for the 2004-05 school year in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Bureau of Indian Education, the…

In order to become "the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion" the European Union realizes its people as the most important asset. Moreover, every human becomes a value for the whole society. It makes significant to…

The history, culture and practices of Central America are inadequately addressed in teacher preparation and professional development across the United States, and especially in California based on the author's analysis of teacher preparation. Information about the histories, cultures and practices add to the linguistic and pedagogic knowledge-base…

The major purpose of this study is to assist college students in constructing mental representation of referential resolution in a computer system. Ninety students were asked to draw mental maps indicating the relationships between references, take reading comprehension tests, and fill out open-ended questionnaire. Results showed that the…

This article reports the results of a preliminary study that applied a randomized posttest-only design to evaluate the effectiveness of a literacy curriculum that incorporated explicit opportunities for Spanish-speaking Head Start preschool children (N = 76) to develop writing abilities in English. The study also addressed English language…

In recent years, increasing emphasis has been put on pragmatic competence as part of foreign language curricula. This article analyzes the devices used by learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) in order to perform the "speech act of disagreement" in their L2. Data from 27 ESL learners were gathered by means of Discourse…