Understanding how biological age affects language learning is of considerable significance in a v... more Understanding how biological age affects language learning is of considerable significance in a variety of contexts: in research, in setting national and international language policy, but also in families and in schools – especially in the context of 'early' foreign language instruction.This book discusses several empirical studies on how biological age influences foreign language learning. It covers topics such as whether the rate of acquisition varies with age, how the amount of time spent on the learning task correlates with age when attempting to achieve a particular level of mastery in a foreign language, whether developmental differences affect language subskills (e.g. pronunciation) or whether research should focus on a global operationalization of proficiency. By contributing to a constructive discussion of the characteristics and the possibilities in foreign language instruction in compulsory education, the book will be useful to experts and researchers interested in foreign language learning and teaching.
L’auteure utilise une approche issue de la pragmatique cognitive et des théories de l’argumentati... more L’auteure utilise une approche issue de la pragmatique cognitive et des théories de l’argumentation pour décortiquer avec précision les processus menant à la manipulation des représentations cognitives – ou « vision du monde » - des individus et à la construction d’un nouveau système de croyance. Deux types de discours manipulatoires sont utilisés : le discours politique du dictateur Augusto Pinochet dans le Chili des années 1973 à 1989 et le discours sectaire des Témoins de Jéhovah. L’analyse de ces deux corpus permet à l’auteure de mettre au jour des stratégies de manipulation dites locales comme le blocage des mécanismes d’évaluation, les sophismes d’argumentation ou l’utilisation fallacieuse de concepts ainsi que les stratégies sociales –désinformation, répétitions- menant à la création d’un nouvel univers de croyance et au remaniement de la référence lexicale au sein d’une société.
The aim of this article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understandi... more The aim of this article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understanding of the studies that address the topic of the advantages and disadvantages of early foreign language learning for young children and teenagers or adults that learn a foreign language. It briefly summarizes some aspects of a literature review – available soon at http://www.institut-plurilinguisme.ch – about the age factor and foreign language teaching at school.1
In this contribution we discuss a study of interlingual inferencing processes as the ones typical... more In this contribution we discuss a study of interlingual inferencing processes as the ones typically applied in intercomprehension tasks. Based on the assumption that bi- and multilingual competence has to be regarded as a dynamic and holistic ensemble of interacting partial competences, the informant’s capability of correctly inferring meanings of words and texts is quantitatively assessed. The role of linguistic distance between target words in unknown but typologically familiar (Romance) languages and the cognates in the first and second languages of the informants is assessed, as well as the contribution of individual types of bi- or multilingualism to the interlingual inferencing task.
Aims and Objectives / Purpose / Research questions: This article explores the connotations that e... more Aims and Objectives / Purpose / Research questions: This article explores the connotations that emergent bilinguals attach to grammatical gender and discusses the difficulties adults experience when learning a second grammatical gender system. The results from a study of emergent bilinguals with French as a second language suggest that these difficulties can be partly explained by gender connotations associated with the grammatical gender of the lexical item in the bilingual’s first language. The paper also discusses the dynamic side of these gender-linked connotations by asking if they are modified when learning the grammatical gender of the lexical items in a second language.
Design / Methodology / Approach: In the study, we surveyed 282 adult French L2 learners who were studying at two university language centers. Participants performed a voice attribution task, followed by a French grammatical gender production task.
Data and Analysis: We analysed answers to the voice attribution task using a generalized linear mixed model.
Findings / Conclusions: The results reveal a strong influence of the objects’ L1 grammatical gender, while we found no effects of L2 French grammatical gender on voice attribution. We did, however, observe an effect of the grammatical gender participants assigned to objects in the French grammatical gender production task. It appears that L2 grammatical gender has an influence on the voice attribution task, but that the effects are related to the participant’s own L2 French gender assignment, rather than to the correct French grammatical gender of the object.
Originality: This research investigates the difficulties experienced by adults learning a second grammatical gender system by tasks used in studies on grammatical gender and (bilingual) cognition.
Significance / Implications: The results exposed in this paper permit to discuss and precise the effects of grammatical gender on (bilingual) cognition by its focus on L2 grammatical gender learning.
The aim of this first article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better under... more The aim of this first article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understanding of the studies that address the topic of the advantages and disadvantages of early foreign language learning for young children and teenagers or adults that learn a foreign language. It briefly summarizes some aspects of a literature review – available soon at www.institut-plurilinguisme.ch – about the age factor and foreign language teaching at school.
In this contribution the notions of transfer and interdependence hypothesis are discussed in the ... more In this contribution the notions of transfer and interdependence hypothesis are discussed in the light of the results of a longitudinal study with migrant Portuguese children in Switzerland. The analysis of their argumentative written productions from the two first data collections shows an interesting pattern of skills’ transfer: the skills acquired in the school language seem to be predictive of the results in the heritage language, while the contrary is not verified. The parental input is also discussed, but doesn’t show any effect of the argumentative competence.
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Dans le cadre de cette contribution sont discutés les concepts de transfert de compétence et d’hypothèse de l’interdépendance à la lumière d’une étude longitudinale avec des enfants migrants lusophones en Suisse. L’analyse des productions écrites de type argumentatif des deux premières récoltes de données en langue d’origine et langue de scolarisation montre un motif intéressant de transfert de compétences : les compétences acquises en langue de scolarisation semblent être prédictives des résultats en langue d’origine, sans que la réciproque ne soit vérifié. L’input parental des enfants est aussi discuté, mais ne semble pas avoir d’effet direct sur la compétence argumentative telle qu’elle est mesurée.
Understanding how biological age affects language learning is of considerable significance in a v... more Understanding how biological age affects language learning is of considerable significance in a variety of contexts: in research, in setting national and international language policy, but also in families and in schools – especially in the context of 'early' foreign language instruction.This book discusses several empirical studies on how biological age influences foreign language learning. It covers topics such as whether the rate of acquisition varies with age, how the amount of time spent on the learning task correlates with age when attempting to achieve a particular level of mastery in a foreign language, whether developmental differences affect language subskills (e.g. pronunciation) or whether research should focus on a global operationalization of proficiency. By contributing to a constructive discussion of the characteristics and the possibilities in foreign language instruction in compulsory education, the book will be useful to experts and researchers interested in foreign language learning and teaching.
L’auteure utilise une approche issue de la pragmatique cognitive et des théories de l’argumentati... more L’auteure utilise une approche issue de la pragmatique cognitive et des théories de l’argumentation pour décortiquer avec précision les processus menant à la manipulation des représentations cognitives – ou « vision du monde » - des individus et à la construction d’un nouveau système de croyance. Deux types de discours manipulatoires sont utilisés : le discours politique du dictateur Augusto Pinochet dans le Chili des années 1973 à 1989 et le discours sectaire des Témoins de Jéhovah. L’analyse de ces deux corpus permet à l’auteure de mettre au jour des stratégies de manipulation dites locales comme le blocage des mécanismes d’évaluation, les sophismes d’argumentation ou l’utilisation fallacieuse de concepts ainsi que les stratégies sociales –désinformation, répétitions- menant à la création d’un nouvel univers de croyance et au remaniement de la référence lexicale au sein d’une société.
The aim of this article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understandi... more The aim of this article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understanding of the studies that address the topic of the advantages and disadvantages of early foreign language learning for young children and teenagers or adults that learn a foreign language. It briefly summarizes some aspects of a literature review – available soon at http://www.institut-plurilinguisme.ch – about the age factor and foreign language teaching at school.1
In this contribution we discuss a study of interlingual inferencing processes as the ones typical... more In this contribution we discuss a study of interlingual inferencing processes as the ones typically applied in intercomprehension tasks. Based on the assumption that bi- and multilingual competence has to be regarded as a dynamic and holistic ensemble of interacting partial competences, the informant’s capability of correctly inferring meanings of words and texts is quantitatively assessed. The role of linguistic distance between target words in unknown but typologically familiar (Romance) languages and the cognates in the first and second languages of the informants is assessed, as well as the contribution of individual types of bi- or multilingualism to the interlingual inferencing task.
Aims and Objectives / Purpose / Research questions: This article explores the connotations that e... more Aims and Objectives / Purpose / Research questions: This article explores the connotations that emergent bilinguals attach to grammatical gender and discusses the difficulties adults experience when learning a second grammatical gender system. The results from a study of emergent bilinguals with French as a second language suggest that these difficulties can be partly explained by gender connotations associated with the grammatical gender of the lexical item in the bilingual’s first language. The paper also discusses the dynamic side of these gender-linked connotations by asking if they are modified when learning the grammatical gender of the lexical items in a second language.
Design / Methodology / Approach: In the study, we surveyed 282 adult French L2 learners who were studying at two university language centers. Participants performed a voice attribution task, followed by a French grammatical gender production task.
Data and Analysis: We analysed answers to the voice attribution task using a generalized linear mixed model.
Findings / Conclusions: The results reveal a strong influence of the objects’ L1 grammatical gender, while we found no effects of L2 French grammatical gender on voice attribution. We did, however, observe an effect of the grammatical gender participants assigned to objects in the French grammatical gender production task. It appears that L2 grammatical gender has an influence on the voice attribution task, but that the effects are related to the participant’s own L2 French gender assignment, rather than to the correct French grammatical gender of the object.
Originality: This research investigates the difficulties experienced by adults learning a second grammatical gender system by tasks used in studies on grammatical gender and (bilingual) cognition.
Significance / Implications: The results exposed in this paper permit to discuss and precise the effects of grammatical gender on (bilingual) cognition by its focus on L2 grammatical gender learning.
The aim of this first article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better under... more The aim of this first article is to provide the readers with some key elements for a better understanding of the studies that address the topic of the advantages and disadvantages of early foreign language learning for young children and teenagers or adults that learn a foreign language. It briefly summarizes some aspects of a literature review – available soon at www.institut-plurilinguisme.ch – about the age factor and foreign language teaching at school.
In this contribution the notions of transfer and interdependence hypothesis are discussed in the ... more In this contribution the notions of transfer and interdependence hypothesis are discussed in the light of the results of a longitudinal study with migrant Portuguese children in Switzerland. The analysis of their argumentative written productions from the two first data collections shows an interesting pattern of skills’ transfer: the skills acquired in the school language seem to be predictive of the results in the heritage language, while the contrary is not verified. The parental input is also discussed, but doesn’t show any effect of the argumentative competence.
****
Dans le cadre de cette contribution sont discutés les concepts de transfert de compétence et d’hypothèse de l’interdépendance à la lumière d’une étude longitudinale avec des enfants migrants lusophones en Suisse. L’analyse des productions écrites de type argumentatif des deux premières récoltes de données en langue d’origine et langue de scolarisation montre un motif intéressant de transfert de compétences : les compétences acquises en langue de scolarisation semblent être prédictives des résultats en langue d’origine, sans que la réciproque ne soit vérifié. L’input parental des enfants est aussi discuté, mais ne semble pas avoir d’effet direct sur la compétence argumentative telle qu’elle est mesurée.
Negotiating methodological challenges in linguistic research is a conference held on 6-7 February... more Negotiating methodological challenges in linguistic research is a conference held on 6-7 February 2014 in Fribourg, Switzerland, devoted to the discussion of methodological difficulties pertaining to data collection, analysis and interpretation in linguistic research in an encouragingly open setting. Participants are given the opportunity to give a talk discussing the methodological challenges that they face in their own research, inviting constructive feedback from the other attendees. Alternatively, they can opt to conduct a workshop in order to tackle a specific issue together with others.
Negotiating methodological challenges in linguistic research is geared primarily to junior researchers working in the fields of applied linguistics, historical linguistics, psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics. Experienced researchers are of course warmly invited to weigh in on the discussion. A defining feature of this conference is its focus on research methodology rather than research results and theoretical implications. We therefore invited four highly regarded scholars who agreed to set the tone by discussing their personal experiences in dealing with methodological concerns and practical difficulties in some of their previous work:
•Johannes Kabatek, professor of Romance Philology and Linguistics at the University of Tübingen
•Gabriele Kasper, professor at the Department of Second Language Studies at the University of Hawai’i
•Elizabeth Lanza, professor at the Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies at the University of Oslo
•Marilyn Martin-Jones, emeritus professor at the School of Education at the University of Birmingham
The goal of the project Multilingual sequences in history lessons: processes to solve intercompre... more The goal of the project Multilingual sequences in history lessons: processes to solve intercomprehension tasks and appropriate learner profiles is twofold: First, the project will adjust worksheets designed in the context of materials development for improving intercomprehension at the secondary II level (reading texts in the source language in history lessons) for use in secondary school I. Second, the project aims to shed light on key processes in text comprehension when reading an unfamiliar language at school (history lessons at secondary school I). The project will also explore the degree to which intercomprehension can be periodically applied in cognitive and interactional learning processes, and determine for which learner profile this approach is or is not appropriate.
To date, empirical studies on text comprehension or understanding individual words in an unfamiliar language have demonstrated that certain individual factors such as multilingualism (particularly in related languages) or the level of ability in another related language promotes the decoding process. Little attention has, however, been paid to processes that take place when students read texts in an unfamiliar language at school.
The current project aims to identify the processes involved in solving intercomprehension tasks in the classroom. The project considers learner profiles that are more or less suitable for such exercises as well as direct exposure (group interaction, problem solving, placement in the lesson plan, etc.).
There are four dimensions to the project:
1.The psycholinguistic dimension: Which cognitive processes are involved in reading texts in an unfamiliar language?
2.The dimension of the "individual profile": Is introducing an unfamiliar language via reading texts suitable for all learner types? Are there learner profiles particularly well suited to dealing with this type of problem?
3.The curricular dimension: How can reading activities in the source language during history lessons be acknowledged and incorporated (from the perspective of the teacher and the learners)?
4.The didactical dimension: How do activities for reading texts in the source language actually work with regard to processes of interaction within the working groups?
The project Language of origin and language at school: are language skills transferable? has been... more The project Language of origin and language at school: are language skills transferable? has been initiated to explore potential transfers between the language of origin and the language spoken at school in schoolchildren who attend heritage language and culture (HLC) courses. A particular focus is placed on reading and writing skills.
The project builds on research done by Moser et al. (2008) within the National Research Programme 56. This project focused on the transfer of language skills from the first language to the language spoken at school in 4 to 6-year-old children with an immigration background. Children who attended courses to advance their L1 were compared with their peers who did not participate in a programme to promote their language skills.
In the current project, the focus is placed on reading comprehension and writing skills in the second language of slightly older schoolchildren (8 to 9 years of age). The results aim to provide supplementary information to the work of Moser et al. (2008), which was concerned mainly with phonological awareness and with vocabulary. The current project also examines whether transfers between L1 and L2 are more pronounced between closely related languages than between languages with a disparate typology.
The project examines children in the 5th to 6th year of primary school (according to HarmoS) who have Portuguese roots. Their language skills in both Portuguese and the language at school (either French or German) undergo assessment at three different periods of time: before they attend HLC courses, and after one and two years of attendance.
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Design / Methodology / Approach: In the study, we surveyed 282 adult French L2 learners who were studying at two university language centers. Participants performed a voice attribution task, followed by a French grammatical gender production task.
Data and Analysis: We analysed answers to the voice attribution task using a generalized linear mixed model.
Findings / Conclusions: The results reveal a strong influence of the objects’ L1 grammatical gender, while we found no effects of L2 French grammatical gender on voice attribution. We did, however, observe an effect of the grammatical gender participants assigned to objects in the French grammatical gender production task. It appears that L2 grammatical gender has an influence on the voice attribution task, but that the effects are related to the participant’s own L2 French gender assignment, rather than to the correct French grammatical gender of the object.
Originality: This research investigates the difficulties experienced by adults learning a second grammatical gender system by tasks used in studies on grammatical gender and (bilingual) cognition.
Significance / Implications: The results exposed in this paper permit to discuss and precise the effects of grammatical gender on (bilingual) cognition by its focus on L2 grammatical gender learning.
****
Dans le cadre de cette contribution sont discutés les concepts de transfert de compétence et d’hypothèse de l’interdépendance à la lumière d’une étude longitudinale avec des enfants migrants lusophones en Suisse. L’analyse des productions écrites de type argumentatif des deux premières récoltes de données en langue d’origine et langue de scolarisation montre un motif intéressant de transfert de compétences : les compétences acquises en langue de scolarisation semblent être prédictives des résultats en langue d’origine, sans que la réciproque ne soit vérifié. L’input parental des enfants est aussi discuté, mais ne semble pas avoir d’effet direct sur la compétence argumentative telle qu’elle est mesurée.
Design / Methodology / Approach: In the study, we surveyed 282 adult French L2 learners who were studying at two university language centers. Participants performed a voice attribution task, followed by a French grammatical gender production task.
Data and Analysis: We analysed answers to the voice attribution task using a generalized linear mixed model.
Findings / Conclusions: The results reveal a strong influence of the objects’ L1 grammatical gender, while we found no effects of L2 French grammatical gender on voice attribution. We did, however, observe an effect of the grammatical gender participants assigned to objects in the French grammatical gender production task. It appears that L2 grammatical gender has an influence on the voice attribution task, but that the effects are related to the participant’s own L2 French gender assignment, rather than to the correct French grammatical gender of the object.
Originality: This research investigates the difficulties experienced by adults learning a second grammatical gender system by tasks used in studies on grammatical gender and (bilingual) cognition.
Significance / Implications: The results exposed in this paper permit to discuss and precise the effects of grammatical gender on (bilingual) cognition by its focus on L2 grammatical gender learning.
****
Dans le cadre de cette contribution sont discutés les concepts de transfert de compétence et d’hypothèse de l’interdépendance à la lumière d’une étude longitudinale avec des enfants migrants lusophones en Suisse. L’analyse des productions écrites de type argumentatif des deux premières récoltes de données en langue d’origine et langue de scolarisation montre un motif intéressant de transfert de compétences : les compétences acquises en langue de scolarisation semblent être prédictives des résultats en langue d’origine, sans que la réciproque ne soit vérifié. L’input parental des enfants est aussi discuté, mais ne semble pas avoir d’effet direct sur la compétence argumentative telle qu’elle est mesurée.
Negotiating methodological challenges in linguistic research is geared primarily to junior researchers working in the fields of applied linguistics, historical linguistics, psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics. Experienced researchers are of course warmly invited to weigh in on the discussion. A defining feature of this conference is its focus on research methodology rather than research results and theoretical implications. We therefore invited four highly regarded scholars who agreed to set the tone by discussing their personal experiences in dealing with methodological concerns and practical difficulties in some of their previous work:
•Johannes Kabatek, professor of Romance Philology and Linguistics at the University of Tübingen
•Gabriele Kasper, professor at the Department of Second Language Studies at the University of Hawai’i
•Elizabeth Lanza, professor at the Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies at the University of Oslo
•Marilyn Martin-Jones, emeritus professor at the School of Education at the University of Birmingham
To date, empirical studies on text comprehension or understanding individual words in an unfamiliar language have demonstrated that certain individual factors such as multilingualism (particularly in related languages) or the level of ability in another related language promotes the decoding process. Little attention has, however, been paid to processes that take place when students read texts in an unfamiliar language at school.
The current project aims to identify the processes involved in solving intercomprehension tasks in the classroom. The project considers learner profiles that are more or less suitable for such exercises as well as direct exposure (group interaction, problem solving, placement in the lesson plan, etc.).
There are four dimensions to the project:
1.The psycholinguistic dimension: Which cognitive processes are involved in reading texts in an unfamiliar language?
2.The dimension of the "individual profile": Is introducing an unfamiliar language via reading texts suitable for all learner types? Are there learner profiles particularly well suited to dealing with this type of problem?
3.The curricular dimension: How can reading activities in the source language during history lessons be acknowledged and incorporated (from the perspective of the teacher and the learners)?
4.The didactical dimension: How do activities for reading texts in the source language actually work with regard to processes of interaction within the working groups?
The project builds on research done by Moser et al. (2008) within the National Research Programme 56. This project focused on the transfer of language skills from the first language to the language spoken at school in 4 to 6-year-old children with an immigration background. Children who attended courses to advance their L1 were compared with their peers who did not participate in a programme to promote their language skills.
In the current project, the focus is placed on reading comprehension and writing skills in the second language of slightly older schoolchildren (8 to 9 years of age). The results aim to provide supplementary information to the work of Moser et al. (2008), which was concerned mainly with phonological awareness and with vocabulary. The current project also examines whether transfers between L1 and L2 are more pronounced between closely related languages than between languages with a disparate typology.
The project examines children in the 5th to 6th year of primary school (according to HarmoS) who have Portuguese roots. Their language skills in both Portuguese and the language at school (either French or German) undergo assessment at three different periods of time: before they attend HLC courses, and after one and two years of attendance.