Describes a one-semester conversational course taught at Harvard University designed to teach basic oral communication skills in French with the main emphasis on teaching students to pause while speaking. (AM)

Focuses on the importance of developing the native language (L1), i.e., "Bahasa Melayu," as a firm foundation for the learning of a second language (L2) in Brunei and analyzes problems facing learners of "Bahasa Melayu" and English in Brunei classrooms. Saravanan's response focuses on the structure of the Brunesian bilingual…

Studied code-switching between Papiamento and Dutch in bilingual parent-child reading sessions in Antillian migrant families in the Netherlands. Findings reveal that intimate code-switching within a clause is characteristic of fluent bilinguals and that the type of code switching is predominantly insertional (with Papiamento as the dominant…

Presents activities that demonstrate how productivity software can be used to motivate beginning middle-school foreign- language students (or elementary-school foreign-language- immersion students.) The exercises employ word-processing tools to increase language fluency, spelling, and agreement skills. (Author/LRW)

Describes a study conducted in the United Kingdom that assessed recall and comprehension scores of elementary and secondary school children following the viewing of two prime-time science television programs. Predictor variables including age, sex, linguistic fluency, prior television viewing, and reading habits were investigated. (Contains 13…

This commentary reviews the articles in this special issue focusing on treatment of preschool and school-aged students with fluency disorders. The commentary addresses therapy and counseling models, the importance of attending to attitudes among children and parents, service delivery models for school programs, transfer of training, and recent…

Czech and German secondary students improved their English and learned more about each other's cultures by producing and exchanging English-language videos. The project is described, examining seven areas of student growth (e.g., improved self-image, English fluency, presentation skills, technological expertise, and cultural knowledge) and noting…

Describes the use of secret student/student dialog exchange journals with English-as-a-Foreign-Language students at Tamkang University in Taiwan. This activity helps develop students' fluency and expressive language and increases their awareness of an audience. (Author/VWL)

Investigates the relationship between French instruction and the phenomena of discontinued lexical development, lexical attrition, and lexical deficiency in the speech of Mauritanians. Findings indicate native-language lexical deficiency was reflected in code switching, and subjects (Ss) with low native-language fluency code switched more than Ss…

Focuses on factors influencing the mastery of a foreign language and one's native tongue. Both the child-mother relationship and the teacher-student relationship greatly influence the desire and propensity of an individual to acquire fluency in the language being taught. To learn to speak signifies a wish to use a language and become immersed in…

This cross sectional study used verbal protocol analysis to compare the temporal distribution of formulation processes of Spanish English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) writers composing first and second language (L1, L2) argumentative texts. Studied three groups at different levels of second language proficiency. Results showed the same total…

The relationship between attention to linguistic form and accuracy or to meaning and fluency in language learning has been explored by language learning researchers for many years. They point to the potential difficulties for learners in attending to form and meaning at the same time and the importance of exposure to meaningful target language…

A study investigated lexical decision-making among Dutch-English bilinguals in the auditory modality. Subjects, bilinguals at three proficiency levels (intermediate, high, and near-native) were presented with 40 cognate and 40 non-cognate word pairs, a similar number of English and Dutch distractors, and a similar number of nonsense words in each…

A study investigated the validity of a second-language student's actual speed of delivery of a passage read aloud as an indicator of second-language fluency. The study, conducted in Hong Kong with 83 secondary school students, used the oral dialogue test in a standardized secondary school-leaving examination. The dialogues were timed and the rate…

A number of language classroom activities designed to incorporate the senses into the English-as-a-Second-Language learning process are described. The strategies used involve group problem-solving, role-playing, information-gap activities using drawing and visual aids, the Total Physical Response approach, student-developed illustrations, games…