Second language acquisition is something that both teachers and students are having to deal with on a more regular basis than ever before. It is important for teachers to understand how the students are learning and what should be expected of them.
One important second language acquisition theory is formed by Krashen, in following the innatist tradition. Stephen Krashen developed a series of five hypotheses about second language acquisition. His hypotheses are as follows:
1. The Acquisition- Learning Hypothesis -> Acquisition is a natural language development process that occurs when the language is used in meaningful interations. Learning refers to the formal study of language forms, such as what is learned in the classroom.
2. The Monitor Hypothesis -> According to Krashen, the formal study of language leads to an internal grammar monior.
3. The Natural Order Hypothesis -> Accoriding to this hypothesis, language is acquired rather than learned in a predictable sequence.
4. The Input Hypothesis -> Language needs to be both comprehensible and understandable. It should be just a bit above the learner's current level of language development. This is refered to as i + 1.
5. The Affective Filter Hypothesis -> This hypothesis suggests that students should be able to learn language in a low-anxiety environment. It suggests to allow students a silent period. Teachers should not force langugage production, just let it happen!
A second important second language acquisition theory is from the interactionist perspective. With this perspective, an importance is placed on social interaction. Learners negotiate the meaning of words through meaningful conversations. Natural conversations between native and non-native speakers is crucial to this language acquisition process. A great way for this to happen in classrooms is to plan for group work. Not only will all learners be learning content information, ELL students can work on their language skills with the help of their peers.
While researching, I found the following websites to be helpful. The first website is a list of terms and abbreviations with their usages. The second website is a list of theories with their descriptions.
http://earthrenewal.org/secondlang.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_language_acquisition#Individual_variation
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I just began to learn about Krashen this semester and I really agree with his theory. Especially the affective filter hypothesis. Many teachers do not allow a silent period and try and force the language learning on students. This definitely increases the anxiety and may make the student reluctant and afraid to learn the language because of the stress. As teachers, we need to think about the scary experience the ELL may be going through learning a whole other language.
ReplyDelete