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Fikes/FL 664: Synthesis Activity 1

PART A The Top 10 List

I have discovered a mix of new ideas and new vocabulary in the textbooks by Brown

(2014) and Gass (2013) while completing the reading and activity assignments for the course FL

664, Second Language Acquisition: Theory and Practice. What follows is a list of the top ten

most interesting items that I have encountered throughout the semester. I have ordered the list in

a chronologic sequence of when it was discovered. I limited the selection to one concept per

chapter, because I easily could have picked several items from each of the chapters on identity. I

have also considered both sources for a single idea rather than using the sources separately.

1. Stabilization This is the idea of stasis in the learners interlanguage (IL)

development. Brown (2014) point outs that this final stage of learner
language development is not an assessment of all aspects of the IL, but of the
subsystems. Gass (2013) highlights the difficulties of knowing whether or not
grammar has stabilized.
2. Learner Corpora Gass (2013) discusses the use of learner performance to
test hypotheses about language development. The author outlines four steps
for creating such a study: Selecting and/or compiling learner production,
Annotating the data, Extracting data, and Analyzing and interpreting. The
author cites the advantage of being able to access spontaneous learner
production through corpora.
3. Babbling According to Gass (2013), this is the production of more language
like sounds that occurs in infants beginning at about six months old. At times,
it seems that these sounds have no intended meaning. That is not to say,
however, that it does not serve a purpose. Research demonstrates the
existence of language-specific babbling patterns (Gass, 2013).
4. The Affective Filter Krashen proposed this as an alternate hypothesis to
explain nonlearning in situations where comprehensible input was not a factor
(Gass, 2013). This hypothesis asks for the teachers concern about the
affective domain, or emotional state, of the learner. Brown (2014) explains
that the affective filter must be low for learning to occur, meaning that the
learner should be in a low anxiety state.
5. Subordinate Clause Strategy Gass (2013) presents the Subordinate-clause
Strategy as a part of Processability Theory. The author defines it as the
processing mechanism that requires the most effort by language learners
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because the learner has to hold more items in mind before the meaning
becomes evident. When movement is learned, it happens in main clauses
before it does in subordinate clauses (Gass, 2013, p. 253).
6. Syntactic Priming We say what we hear, immediately. Gass (2013) defines
syntactic priming repeating what we hear instead of using as alternate
structure. According to the author, although its occurrence is well
documented, the relative likelihood of certain phrases to be repeated, but not
others, is not well established.
7. Language Ego This is the theory that personal identity develops along with
the language that a person speaks (Brown, 2014). Accordingly, learning a
new language necessitates the development of a second identity. Brown
(2014) explains how this is particularly troublesome for adults as they
generally have more ego concerns than children do.
8. Subsumption Brown (2014) defines subsumption as the process of relating
and anchoring new material to relevant established entities in cognitive
structure, also known as meaningful learning. This is contrasted with rote
learning. Mnemonics are listed as an example of creating artificial
meaningfulness.
9. Ambiguity Tolerance (AT) Brown (2014) presents ambiguity tolerance as
the willingness or ability to open-mindedly consider the views of others. It is
contrasted with Ambiguity Intolerance (AI). Too much of either can be
harmful in the acquisition of an L2, and it is suggested that at least some AT is
required.
10. Communities of Practice (CoP) Any group of people who share a craft or
profession,[including] classroom learners in an educational setting
(Brown, 2014). Within this community, teachers can manage situated
learning that takes into account the unique cultural space of second language
learners with a common L1. According to Brown (2014), mutual engagement,
joint enterprise, and shared repertoire are three characteristics associated with
this foray into the role of identity inL2 learning.

These ideas have influenced my concept of SLA in a variety of ways. Primarily,

however they have influenced how I appreciate the efforts of my learners and in myself as a

learner. When I think about stabilization of errors, I see my international peers operating outside

of their native contexts, making errors, but still being intelligibleand intelligent! I want to

show that to my learners as a realistic goal. There is so much more to language learning than
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perfecting. Learner corpora is such an interesting codification of the errors that we make in our

IL status. This allows education researchers to look at the difference in learner production and

target language or even native language forms. This will be a great resource for me to offer

students feedback on their level, while I develop my understanding of how the types of errors

learners make can clue me in to their developmental stage.

Babbling was presented by Gass as a part of the discussion of native and bilingual

language development. What struck me though was the need to babble in my target language.

French has some sounds that just do not exist in English. It occurred to me that if I am ever to

master them, I will need to put a little time on it. I think that this could also be important for my

learners, inviting them to make the sounds of the language and reminding them they did not start

out speaking English in fully formed sentences either. The Affective Filter is something to

remember is planning and deploying lessons and evaluating results. While self-management of

anxiety is important for learners, instructors also have a stake in contributing to the management

of anxiety in the classroom.

One thing that I find interesting about the Subordinate-clause strategy is its focus on how

the movement of words impacts the ability to produce and understand language. When I took

the Praxis test for French, one particular audio session left me with the feeling that I understood a

lot of words but I did not understand how they all fit together. I specifically felt like the words

were in funny positions and I did not know who or what was receiving the action of the verb. In

teaching French, I will know that this is an ultimate goal for my learners. I also understand,

based on my reading of Katz and Blyth (2007), that some movementlike the cest cleft and the

il y a cleft, if learners are familiar with the constructions, can make the spoken language easier to

understand. Syntactic priming might be a great way to present those two clefts. When I ask
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learners questions that they do not seem to understand, I often find myself supplying the answer

for myself as a way to initiate understanding and to create an example form.

Language ego was a little bit of a tough concept for me to understand at first. I think that

I was being guilty of the I have just the right amount syndrome where whatever ego level that

anyone else has is too much or too little. I could only imagine tough macho people who would

not say a word or the unfiltered learner who would not stop talking. In teaching foreign

languages, it is important instructors to have a good understanding of how all the language bits

fit together inside the learners headas much as could be possible. To that end, subsumption is

what we are talking about when we are trying to get our learners to the next step. We have to see

what they are working with in order to see what will work next. The challenge of getting our

learners involved in what they do not understand touches on ambiguity tolerance. We are

constantly asking our learners to view the cultural practices of countries that speak the target

languages we teach and to consider their view of us. This can be a challenging experience for

some students. I have personally extended this phrase to the not understanding of parts of

language and subsumed into my conception of my listening skill. One of the best and most

enduring pieces that I have received in my education at USM is the idea of Communities of

Practice. For language learning, I think that this is the gift that keeps on giving. Speak the TL

with your camarades de classe because it is not easy hunting down native French speakers, even

if your dad is one!

I feel enlightened and emboldened by all of these ideas. I use them on myself. I will be

the guiding light for my students who wish to become learners, and I will be the hostess for those

who do not. I know an amazing amount of things about SLA that I did not know 4 months

agoand thats why I am here.

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PART B The Myth

To the teacher that would say, I just taught my students the past tense last week, and

they are still making errors with it, I might simply respond, Its a processIm still working

on the subjunctive in all my languages. Given the time for a proper intervention, however,

there are quite a few points that I would like to make regarding teaching, learning, and errors.

When seeking to dispel this myth about student performance, I think that we have to

begin by asking some tough questions about teacher performance. Gass (2013) states that the

reason foreign language teachers study Second Language Acquisition (SLA) as a part of

language pedagogy is in order to develop methodologies and to inform teachers expectations of

learners. Did our myth-actuating teacher simply read the grammar pages from the textbook to

the class and call it a day? As a part of this teacher education program, I have been asked to

adapt textbook material as a part of most of my classes. These classes have given me the

opportunity to the take theoretical information that I read about, be it vocabulary, grammar,

French media, French government, or French theatre, and imagine a plan for integrating it into

the curriculum. The first lesson that I taught was, for me, a complete disaster; the professor

kindly gave me an 80 on it. I have taught several lessons since that day, and I believe that things

have gotten much better. I understand more about what my professors are looking to instill and

see reflected in the educators that they are training. I also have a clearer vision about the types of

learning experiences that I want to create for my students. Much like my foreign language skills,

my teaching skills will benefit from some additional immersion opportunities. Creating

experiences that make up for the lack of immersion opportunities is one of the challenges for

foreign language educators, as opposed to second language instruction which occurs in the

context of an area where the target language (TL) is spoken. This is one of the deficiencies that
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situated learning within Communities of Practice seeks to overcome (Brown, 2014). In

discussions about teaching methodologies, learner input and frequency of exposure are common

talking points. Katz and Blyth (2007) caution that teachers need to give sufficient input to

learners before demanding output. Furthermore, Brown (2014) points out that transitioning from

input to intake involves a complex mix of factors, such as attention, cognitive style, affective

disposition, general interest, and linguistic factors including L1 and L2 transfer and universal

grammar constraints. As teachers, we have to make sure that we are creating lessons that attend

to these differences through building repeated exposures to grammar points into out lessons.

Even so, no matter how great a driving lesson is, just a single driving lesson probably would not

prepare the driver to do much more than make a couple of dangerous turns in an empty parking

lot, and neither will one grammar lesson.

Specifically, a single pass on the past tense would never do it justice. My experiences as

a French and Spanish learner, as well those from observing French classes, tells me that students

do not normally have a more that the broadest conception of the past tense in English.

Depending on the learner, I could replace past tense with virtually any other grammatical

element, which based on a recent experience would even include nouns. We spent a fair amount

of class time this semester discussing the difference between individuals and the influences that

those differences have on us as learners and teachers. Based on the readings in this course and

my other experiences, it seems that a teachers main role is as curator of learning opportunities

that will work for the mix of learners at hand.

The next idea that I would like to invite my teacher-friend to think about is what the

learning process really looks like from the perspective of the learner. A classroom, especially at

a university, will house a wide variety of learners. Not all of these learners will have the same
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mix of abilities and experience. Some students will be developmentally ready to receive a

process, while others will not be. In fact, some students may be developmentally ready for

learning but inhibited by affective or psychological factors within themselves (Brown, 2014) or

the behavior of other students (Dewaele, 2013).

The final point that I would like to make is that errors are a part of the learning process

and excellent feedback for the teacher. I designed and presented my first quiz to a class last

week. As soon as class was finished, I was eager to run to my office and collect the results. I

had a few questions that I thought would be easythey werent. I had a few questions that I

thought would be more challengingthey werent. Luckily, they balanced each other out.

Based on the performance from a recent daily activity that I helped grade, I added a small

matching section on pronouns that all but one student in two classes aced. What that told me is

that either everyone figured out pronouns in the past two weeks or, more likely, pronouns were

not the real issue. For a couple of free points, I have eliminated my concern that they did not

understand pronouns. As Gass reminds us, A researcher must interpret the results (2013, p.

66). Thus, I would caution Professor Myth to check the basis of the assessment.

In sum, neither teaching nor learning is necessarily an instantaneous event and errors are

road maps along the way that tell teachers about what topics still need to be taught and what

activities were or were not effective. For a teacher concerned about a learners failure to learn,

they should equally concern themselves with their own failure to teachthe problem is rarely

everyone else. More importantly, however, they should concern themselves with the next steps

in the process for the learner and the teacher, more frequency of input balanced with

opportunities for output. The teacher should keep in mind the issues that could be impacting the
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learner and question the data that is the basis of any conclusions while looking for confounding

factors.
N. Fikes/FL 664: Synthesis Activity 9

References

Brown, H. D. (2014). Principles of language learning and teaching: A course in second

language acquisition (Sixth ed.). White Plains, N.Y.: Pearson Education.

Dewaele, J. (2013). The link between foreign language classroom anxiety and psychoticism,

extraversion, and neuroticism among adult Bi- and multilinguals. The Modern Language

Journal Modern Language Journal, 97(3), 670-684. Retrieved February 25, 2016, from

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1540-4781

Gass, S. M. (2013). Second language acquisition: An introductory course (Fourth ed.). New

York, N.Y.: Routledge.

Katz, S. & Blyth, C. (2007). Teaching French grammar in context. New Haven, CT: Yale

University Press.