A study at Queens College (City University of New York, New York) investigated the literacy backgrounds of nine non-native-English-speaking students of varied ages and language groups who failed the freshman composition test. Data were gathered in focused interviews (questions appended), which asked for the student's recollections of the…

A study of German-speaking learners of English as a Second Language observed students telling a story, in English, based on an eight-frame cartoon provided to them. The cartoon had a surprising conclusion whose understanding required careful observation early on, creating a cognitive stress affecting language processing. It was found that in…

A British longitudinal study of language acquisition was followed up for further information on the relationship between language acquisition, language aptitude, and second language learning. One of the original cohorts (n=23), now in secondary school, was originally studied for native language learning achievement and was now being studied for…

Little data are available concerning the native languages of Scandinavian residents, other than the official languages, despite the linguistic diversity of the region. Foreign language teaching starts early in schooling, but there has been little study of actual language needs. Three basic program designs are available for teaching foreign…

This paper discusses non-native speakers' use of interactional strategies to elicit responses from or negotiate meaning with their interlocutors in an attempt to solve their problems in conversational listening. It is concerned with the question of whether these interactional listening strategies can be taught as a means to improve learners'…

A review of literature addresses two main issues: (1) how the acquisition of English by deaf signing children has been understood as an instance of second language learning; and (2) how deaf children learn to read English, given this understanding. The first chapter chronicles the history of language use in deaf education and reviews research on…

This paper examines the integration of Business Russian into the Russian curriculum at Michigan State University (MSU) and the creation of a capstone sequence of Business Russian courses at the advanced level. The establishment of the basic goals of the school's business language instruction and the needs of the students are discussed. The paper…

This article describes a paired storytelling technique that can be used in bilingual and English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) classrooms to help motivate students to maximize reading comprehension. The technique involves having the students: (1) pair off; (2) discuss the story theme; (3) read half of the story; (4) take notes on their half of the…

This issue of a journal designed to present works in progress by students and professors of linguistics contains the following papers: "In Praise of My Language" (Joshua A. Fishman); "How Does Social Status Affect the Sequencing Rules of Other-Introductions?" (Fred J. Chen); "The Role of Ethno-Lingual Relativity in Second…

This college-level textbook, entirely in Arabic, is designed to help students develop specific reading skills, namely, skimming and scanning. Users should have had at least 30 quarter hours of Arabic instruction previously. The reading selections and tasks are intended to promote reading fluency by also increasing reading speed. Learner tasks also…

This paper reviews recent research on English spelling and the alphabet, and examines the alphabet in terms of symbols, letter-names, and sounds. English is considerably less phonetic than most Western languages, with many symbols having more than one sound. This factor makes spelling difficult for learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) or…

Intended for teachers from kindergarten through adult education and for administrators, this book demonstrates how teachers have created environments that facilitate whole language evaluation. Articles in the book discuss strategies used in evaluating students' growth across many curricular areas, including reading, writing, and second language…

Two case studies of the specific vocabulary learning strategies used by native Chinese-speakers learning English as a Second Language (ESL) at Beijing Normal University are presented and discussed. Subjects were two university students identified as "good" and "poor" language learners. They read two passages, one with about…

This resource guide is designed to provide foreign language teachers with suggestions for helping students learn how to become better language learners. The four chapters of the guide for teaching listening skills are as follows: (1) Teaching Learning Strategies (e.g., rationale for teaching, types, useful strategies, guidelines, instructional…

A computer program is described that is a substack of the "Business German" HyperCard program previously developed by Paulsell and designed as a tutorial to be used with materials for a business German course on the third year college level. The program consists of six stacks, a central one providing graphics-based information on Germany…