Dr. Mohammad Hossein Hariri AslSociocultural Theory in Language Learning Sociocultural theory is based on work by the Russian psychologist, Vygotsky, and represents a fundamentally different way of looking at language and learning. Sociocultural theory is grounded in the ontology of the social individual. A sociocultural approach considers language and, by extension, second language acquisition as contextually situated and is…
Communicative Language Testing Communicative Language Testing The advent of communicative language testing saw a growing preference for face-to-face interaction as the context in which the assessment of spoken language skills would occur. In communicative language testing, the target of test inferences is performance of a set of communicative tasks in various contexts of use. The…
Conversation Analysis Conversation Analysis Like ‘discourse analysis’, Conversational Analysis provides a tool for conducting micro-analyses of classroom discourse and, in particular, for examining the sequential development of classroom talk (Mori, 2002). CA derives from a branch of sociology-ethnomethodology. Seedhouse (2004) identified five key principles of this method of enquiry: Indexicality, i.e. the use that interactants…
Output Hypothesis Output Hypothesis Swain’s Comprehensible Output Hypothesis emphasises the importance of consciousness, both in terms of learners’ noticing gaps in their interlanguage and developing metalinguistic awareness. The comprehensible output hypothesis constitutes an important addition to work on the role of interaction in L2 acquisition. In other words, output contributes to acquisition. It is in…
Interaction Hypothesis Interaction Hypothesis Long’s Interaction Hypothesis, especially the updated version, claims that learners do need to pay conscious attention to form in order to benefit from negotiated interaction. The origins of Long’s Interaction Hypothesis lies partly in Hatch’s work on discourse analysis and L2 acquisition and partly in Krashen’s Input Hypothesis. Hatch (1978, p.…
Inter-group Theory Inter-group Theory Giles and Byrne (1982) identified a number of factors that contribute to a group’s ‘ethnolinguistic vitality’—the key construct in the theory. They then discussed the conditions under which subordinate group members (e.g. immigrants or members of an ethnic minority) are most likely to acquire native-like proficiency in the dominant group’s language.…
Humanistic Language Learning Humanistic Language Learning The best introduction to humanistic learning within language education is Stevick (1997, as cited in Nunan, 2003). He believes that particular classroom techniques matter less than establishing the right emotional climate for the learners. According to Stevick (1990), among different language methods and approaches, Community Language Learning (CLL) seems…
Sensitive Period Hypothesis Sensitive Period Hypothesis in comparison to Critical Period Hypothesis The review showed variation in studies and findings with regard to the age groups considered, nature of the pronunciation tests, and length and type of exposure to the second language. One conclusion drawn is that cerebral lateralization is likely to be irrelevant to…
Recast Recast is another form of feedback, though they are less direct and more subtle than other forms of feedback. A recast is a reformulation of an incorrect utterance that maintains the original meaning of the utterance where the NS reformulates the NNS’s incorrect utterances. Recasts are complex, for instance, is it a partial recast?…
Connectionism Connectionism originated in the relativity well-established notion in psychology of ‘parallel processing. This was advanced by the work of the ‘parallel distributed processing’ (PDP) group held by Rumelhart and McClelland (1986). The term “connectionism” refers in general to a form of cognitive modeling wherein cognitive processing is represented in terms that can be implemented…