Mentalist views

of
L1 acquisition
Language is a
human-specific
faculty
Language exists as
an independent
faculty in the
human mind
The primary determinant
of L1 acquisition is the
child 'acquisition
device‘ (LAD), which is
genetically endowed
and provides the child
with a set of principles
about grammar.
 The process of
acquisition consists of
hypothesis-testing, by
which, the grammar of
the learner’s mother
tongue gets related to
the principles of the
universal grammar.
The concept of hypothesis-testing
was used to explain how the L2
learner progressed along the
Interlanguage continuum.
Through the interlanguage
continuum, the learners need to pass
through 4 different stages to attain
adequate success in L2
 Stages of
Emergent Interlanguage Stabilization
Stage
Development Stage
• The learner is only vaguely
aware that there is some
systematic order to a
particular class of items.

i.e. John cans sing.

Random Errors Stage

The learner grows in
consistency in linguistic
production.
i.e. John can sing, John
has a good voice, True
good voice.

Emergent Stage
The learner is now able to manifest
more consistency in producing
the second language.
i.e. John can sing,, Truly a good
voice, John can sing melodious
songs.
Systematic Stage
The learner has relatively few
errors and has mastered the
system to the point that
fluency and intended meanings
are not problematic.

Stabilization Stage
Five Principal processes
operated in
interlanguage
1
This was listed first,
perhaps in
Language deference to the
transfer contemporary
importance attached
to L1 interference.
2

Overgeneralization
of target language
rules
3
- i.e. a rule enters
the learner’s
Transfer of system as a
training result of
instruction
4
- i.e an
identifiable
Strategies of approach by
L2 learning the learner to
the material
to be learned
5
An identifiable
Strategies of approach by the
L2 learner to
communication communication with
native speakers
Fossilization
Learner stop learning
when their interlanguage
contains at least some
rules different from
those of the target
language system
 Fossilized
structure can
be realized as
errors or as
correct target
language forms
 The causes of
fossilization are both
internal and external
 Because the Changes in the
learner believes neutrall structure
that he does not of his brain as a
need to develop his result of age strict
interlanguage to the operation of
communicate hypothesis- testing
effectively mechanism
 The emphasis on hypothesis –
testing and internal processes,
together with the insistence on the
notion of a continuum of learning
involving successive restructuring
of an internal system are direct
borrowing from l1 acquisition
theory
 How did adults
succeed in learning
a L2 at all ?
Because they continue to
make use of acquisition
device
 Lenneberg Selinker
Latent language Latent psychological
structure structure
- transform the - genetically-
universal grammar determined but not
involve recourse to
into the structure of universal grammar
the grammar of the
-more general cognitive
target language mechanism
Cognitive Organizer- the term to
describe the mechanism responsible for
the second type of learning
Creative Construction – the process of
SLA that resulted from its operation
Three principal
In the sense that
features rules that
constitute the
1. Language- learner’s language
learner at any one stage
language is are not fixed but
permeable are open to
amendment
Three principal - Constantly
features changing

2. Language- -Slowly revises the

learner interim system to
language is accommodate new
hypotheses about
dynamic
the target language
Three principal
Despite the
features variability of
interlanguage it is
3. Language- possible to detect
learner the Rule based
language is nature of the
systematic learners use of the
L2
• The goals of error
Analysis were pedagogic
Error
• Error analysis is linguistic
analysis that focuses on the
Analysis
errors learners make by
comparing between the
errors made in the target
language (ii) and that TL
itself.
- Error analysis is an
important source of
information to teachers Error
It provides information on
Analysis
students’ errors
- Helps teachers to
correct students’ errors
Improves the
effectiveness of teachers,
students, researchers
• Errors- provided information which
could be used to sequence item for
teaching or to devise remedial lesson.
- An error according to Corder , takes place
when the deviation arises due to lack of
knowledge. An error cannot be self-
corrected.
 Procedure for error analysis
A corpus of language is selected
The errors in the corpus are identified

The errors are classified

The errors are explained
The errors are evaluated
 A corpus of language is selected

• Corpus - A collection of written text.

• (a) Collection of a Sample of Learner Language
The starting point in EA is deciding what
samples of learner language to use for the
analysis and how to collect these samples.
.
 The errors in the corpus are identified
• question arises whether the error is overt
or covert
• An overt error is easy to identify
because there is a clear
deviation in form, as when a learner says:
e.g. I runned all the way
I hungry!
• A covert error occurs in utterances that
are superficially well- formed but which do not
mean what the learner intended them to mean.
For example, the utterance from (Corder, 1971
a):
e.g. It was stopped.”

• is apparently grammatical until it becomes clear

that it” refers to the wind”.
 The errors are classified

• It is categorizing errors grammatically.

• Trying to identify general ways in which the
learners utterances differ from target-
language utterances.
• Corder (1973) proposed four major categories
 The errors are explained
Explanation is concerned with establishing the
source of the error, i.e. accounting for why it
was made. This stage is the most important
for SLA research as it involves an attempt to
establish the processes responsible for L2
acquisition.
•
EXAMPLE OF ERROR
ANALYSIS
 Overgeneralization
Devised used when the items do
not carry any obvious contrast
for the learners
EXAMPLE :
They wore ties
Walked on two legs
Drinked water (drank)
 Ignorance
of rule
restrictions
Occurs when rules are
extended to context
where in target
language usage they
do not apply. Example:
There are many
fishes in the lake
 Incomplete
application of rules
Involves failure to
learn the more
complex types of
structure .
 False concept
Hypothesized
Result from faulty
understanding of target
language distinction.
 Longitudinal Studies

An observational research method in

which data is gathered for the same
subject repeatedly over a period of
time
 Longitudinal Studies

Advantage
Provide data from different points of
time and therefore enable a reliable
profile of Sla of individual learner to be
constructed
 Longitudinal Studies

Disadvantage
Difficulty of making generalizations
based on the profiles of one or two
learners
 Transitional Construction

Language forms learners use while

they are still learning the grammar
of a language
 Example of transitional
construction

Relative
Negation Interrogation
clauses
 Negation
• The development of Negatives.
Negative Target
External Internal attachment language
negation negation to modal rule is
verb reached
 Negative utterances are
External characterized by
external negation.
negation That is, the negative
particle (usually “no”)
is attached to a
Example: declarative nucleus
No very good
No you playing here.
 - A little later internal negation
Internal develops; the negative particle
moved inside the utterance.
negation - This is often coincides with the
use of “not” and/or “don’t” which is
used variably “no” as the negative
particle
Example:
Mariana not coming today
I no can swim
I don’t see nothing mop.
 Negative
Example:
attachment I can’t play this one
to modal I won’t go
verb
Target The learner develops
language an auxiliary system
rule is and uses “not”
regularly as the
reached
negative particle
Example:
- He doesn’t know anything
- I didn’t said it
 Interrogation
Two types of interrogative :
Yes/no question
WH question

Intonation Appearance Embedded

of productive Inversion question
question
WH question
 Relative clauses
Relative clauses used to modify the object of a
sentence were acquired first
Example:
Joshua’s a boy who is silly