CHAPTER 2: THE NATURE OF LEARNER LANGUAGE

(Ellis (1997): 15-30)

Error and Error Analysis

Identifying Errors
1. Compare the sentences learners produce with correct sentences in the TL
A man and a little boy was watching him (false)
A man and a little boy were watching him (correct)
2. Distinguish errors and mistakes
Error: gaps in learners` knowledge (They do not know what is correct)
Mistake: occasional lapses in performance (learners unable to perform what he
or she
knows)
Describing Errors
1. Classify errors into grammatical structure
Ex: Errors in the past tense
Teach

teached (taught)

2. Identify general ways in which the learners` utterances differ from the
reconstructed TL utterances
Ex: Omission, misinformation, and misordering
Explaining Errors
1. Errors are systematic and predictable
2. Errors are universal
Ex: omission errors, overgeneralization errors, transfer errors
Error Evaluation
1. Global errors (violate the overall structure of a sentence)
2. Local errors (affect only a single constituent in a sentence)

Teachers have to be able to evaluate their students in these kind of errors.

Development Pattern
The Early stage of L2 Acquisition
1. A silent period
2. Begin-to-speak period, which has two characteristics:
a. formulaic chunk
b . proportional simplification
3. Begin-to-learn-grammar period:
A. Acquisition order
B. Sequence of acquisition
The Order of Acquisition
Identifying an accuracy order.
Definite accuracy order (based on the same irrespective of the learners` mother
tongues, their age, whether or not they received formal language instruction)
Is L2 acquisition result of environmental factors of internal factors related to
acquiring grammatical structure?
Researchers: the order does vary somewhat according to the learners` FL.
Sequence of Acquisition
Acquisition of grammatical structure must be seen as a process including
transitional constructions.
Acquisition follows U-shaped course of development.
Some Implications
L2 acquisition is systematic and universal.
Some linguistic features (particularly grammatical ones) are inherently easier to
learn than others.
Learners naturally learn one feature before another they must necessarily do so.
Sequence of acquisition can be altered through formal instruction.

Variability in Learner Language

Learners vary in their use of L2 according to:
Linguistic context
Situational context
Psycholinguistic context
Form-Function Mapping
Variability in learner language is not random.
It is determined by linguistics context, situational context, and availability of
planning time.
This systematicity reflects a variable system of form-function mappings
Free variation
Some variability is free.
Learners sometimes use two or more forms.
Ex:

No look my card

Don`t look my card

(two negative utterances in close proximity)
It is possible for learners to be at different stages in sequence for different
grammatical features.
Ex: a learner may be at the completion stage of past tense, but in free variation
stage for articles a and the.
https://classicordinariness.wordpress.com/2012/10/07/summary-of-chapter-3-rodellis-2003/