Addresses, from a neurobiological perspective, the input-intake distinction commonly made in applied linguistics and the role of selective attention in transforming input to intake. The study places primary emphasis upon a neural structure (the nucleus reticularis thalami) that appears to be essential for selective attention. (79 references)…

Discusses aspects of context from a relevance-theoretic perspective and considers how this may lead to a better understanding of how language learners recover verbal input. Proposes that the way context is defined affects (1) the relationship between knowledge of language and context and (2) the way speakers access assumptions in everyday…

Presents the sources and solutions of listening-comprehension anxiety as reported by foreign-language students and discusses the pedagogical implications that relate to the results. (Author/VWL)

Clarifies the teaching of academic language functions (ALFs) at the secondary level. It is recommended that teaching should emphasize concepts underlyng ALFs, the forms for realizing them, and their names. Some pedagogic implications of the microfunction-macrofunction difference are outlined, and suggestions are given for teaching each type. (25…

Proposes that an important role for connectionist research in language acquisition is analyzing what linguistic information is present in the child's input. Recent connectionist and statistical work analyzing the properties of real language corpora suggest a priori objections against the utility of distributional information are misguided. This…

Variations in the amount and nature of early language to which children are exposed have been linked to their subsequent ability (e.g. Huttenlocher, Haight, Bryk, Seltzer & Lyons, 1991; Hart & Risley, 1995). In three computational simulations, we explore how differences in linguistic experience can explain differences in word learning ability due…

The present study evaluates the relative effectiveness of two types of input-based instruction, consciousness-raising instruction (the consciousness-raising task only) and consciousness-raising instruction with feedback (the consciousness-raising task + reactive explicit feedback) for teaching English polite requestive forms, involving 45 Japanese…

A pilot study of a larger project on second language comprehension under two input conditions is reported. The first condition is characterized by the availability of samples of target input that have been modified a priori toward greater semantic redundancy and transparency and less complex syntax. The second condition is characterized by the…

After discussing the ties between language teaching and second language acquisition research, the present paper reviews the role that second language acquisition research has played on two recent pedagogical proposals. First, communicative language teaching, advocated in the early eighties, in which focus on the code was excluded, and then the…

Describes a study conducted to test the hypothesis that focused conversations with native speakers held on a weekly basis will contribute to the development of learners' internal grammars of Spanish. This study centered on college students as they developed an appreciation of the different contexts requiring the preterite or the imperfect tense…

In response to Stephen D. Krashen, Patsy M. Lightbown and Manfred Pienemann argue that comprehensible input will not always be sufficient to bring about developmental change or increased accuracy in the learning environment. Krashen replies that the research shows that effects of direct instruction are typically short lasting and do not become…

Examined the role of exposure to speech in children's vocabulary growth. Characterized vocabulary growth rates for children from 14 to 26 months of age. Found a relation between individual differences in vocabulary acquisition and variations in the amount of a mother's speech to her children. (BC)

This report discusses an investigation on the processes involved in the acquisition of French by students in late immersion programs in Australia. An ethnographic style of data collection was used in the study, which covered a full year. (Contains 14 references.) (JL)

Offers additional means of evaluating parent speech by examining frequencies of individual nouns, verbs, and descriptors, and examining the learning task presented to children. Study one examines transcripts from the CHILDES database of English-speaking parents' speech to children at five developmental levels; study two examines 50 transcripts of…

This paper describes a framework for researching the Cognition Hypothesis which claims that pedagogic tasks be sequenced for learners on the basis of increases in their cognitive complexity. It distinguishes dimensions of complexity which increase the conceptual and linguistic demands tasks make on communication, so creating the conditions for L2…