Foreign Language Acquisition Anxiety and Project-Based Learning in Collaborative L2 Instruction: A Case Study

This article discusses the experiences of an instructor-student collaboration in combining English as a Second Language instruction with a project-based model. It provides information about a year-long period of instruction that made use of extensive collaboration in language instruction for the creation of business documents geared to a specific purpose. The article suggests that such a project-based and collaborative approach to Foreign Language Learning might be useful in alleviating foreign language learning anxiety for advanced speakers of a second language. Additionally, the article discusses instruction performed via the Zoom platform. The use of platforms such as Zoom, or Skype, are becoming more ubiquitous as an instructional trend that pre-dates recent public health concerns, and this technology is discussed here in terms of the opportunities for collaborative learning and feedback it offers in a discipline that is still favors traditional face-to-face instruction. Although the experiences described here occurred in a non-academic setting with an instructor-student dyad, we suggest that it may be useful in academic settings with additional students and fewer collaborative opportunities to create highly specific objectives.

Foreign Language Acquisition, Bilingualism, and Biculturalism

Biculturals (i.e., individuals who have experienced and internalized more than one culture) are recognized as a growing demographic, and as such will become important stakeholders in organizations. An emerging stream of research from psychology and organizational studies indicates that bicultural individuals have a particular set of cognitive skills and competencies that can contribute to the performance of international teams. However, research on biculturals in organizations is facing conceptual and methodological limits due to the complex nature of the construct of culture. While the constructs of culture and language are distinct, they are undoubtedly interwoven; hence, the latter may become a tool to analyze the phenomenon of biculturalism. In this chapter, the authors analyze the literature on social identity, foreign language acquisition, and bilingualism to find potential solutions for these critical challenges.

Het gebruik van vaste verbindingen tijdens examens „tolken”

Collocations, interpreting, native-like, foreign language acquisition Third year BA students of Dutch at Károli University followed a one semester long interpreting course. During their oral exam they had an interpreting task from Hungarian to Dutch. In my research I wanted to answer two questions: firstly, to what extent do students use collocations while performing an interpreting task; secondly to what extent is their use of collocations native-like? Based on the recorded data we can see that students often realize that they should use a collocation but cannot always retrieve the right one. Grammatical constructions in the students’ native language, in our case Hungarian, play also a role in the choice of collocations.

Should Language Acquisition Researchers Study “Grit”? A Cautionary Note and Some Suggestions

Grit is theoretically defined as the combination of perseverance and passion for long term goals. Both of these constructs are likely to be relevant for our understanding of how language acquisition occurs and for explaining between-person differences in the rate of language acquisition. Despite this relevance, there are methodological and theoretical reasons why language acquisition researchers should be cautious about studying “grit” as a construct that is predictive of or causally related to language acquisition. In this paper we discuss some of these reasons, with a specific focus on the problems associated with the aggregation of perseverance and passion into a single variable, and the lack of predictive validity for other important life outcomes. We also discuss and describe with examples other challenges involved in studying grit, passion, or perseverance. Finally, we offer suggestions for some potentially more fruitful ways in which perseverance and passion for long-term goals may be integrated into research on second/foreign language acquisition. For example, we discuss how the measurement of grit facets may need to be revised to be better aligned with the “persisting despite initial failure” theoretical definition of perseverance, and to also balance the negatively-worded and positively-worded item content of the scales. We also discuss how an examination of necessary-but-not-sufficient relationships between grit facets and language acquisition using Dul’s (2016) methodology may be particularly valuable. That is, perseverance and passion may both be required for successful language acquisition but be insufficient on their own because other variables also need to be present (e.g., opportunity to practice, feedback).

Methodological and cross-cultural aspects of foreign language acquisition by reference to Russian and British textbooks

This paper examines the methodological and cross-cultural aspects implemented in the British textbooks of Russian, Colloquial Russian: the Complete Course for Beginners and Colloquial Russian 2: the Next Step in Language Learning, and in the two volumes of the Russian textbook of English, Angliiskiy Shag za Shagom (English Step by Step). The article presents their structure, advantages and disadvantages. By way of conclusion, the author gives some considerations concerning the development of high-quality textbooks of foreign languages, and demonstrates a personally designed sample lesson.

USING POP SONGS IN TEACHING ENGLISH LANGUAGE TO STUDENTS MAJORING IN MUSIC ARTS. PHONOLOGICAL ASPECT

In the process of foreign language acquisition, students can face various obstacles, which can prevent them from achieving the desired goal. English pronunciation is traditionally considered one of the most challenging issues, which require special approach and teaching techniques to tackle. Teaching English language using popular songs appears to be a very effective method as songs provide students with plethora of pronunciation patterns they can master in an effective and at the same time enjoyable way. Moreover, music influences students' feelings thus developing their emotional intelligence, ensure relaxed atmosphere in the classroom, thus motivating them to learn various aspects of English language. Another indisputable argument for using songs and music in the process of EFL/ESL teaching is that these two notions have a lot in common. Both language and music have acoustic parameters like pitch, duration, stress and intonation. Having analyzed the research works of domestic and foreign scholars and practitioners, it was concluded that popular songs can be used to practice all language skills – grammar, vocabulary, reading, listening, writing and most importantly, pronunciation skills. It is clear that inadequate phonetic interpretation of the vocal text can cause deviation from the original (authentic) content and result in total misunderstanding or spoilt aesthetic perception of a song. In the process of mastering pronunciation with vocalists, it is necessary to take into account the peculiarities of vocal speech too. The article focuses on the methodological value of popular songs in the development of phonetic abilities in students majoring in music arts. The article also outlines the difficulties students face in the process of honing phonological skills such as certain consonant sounds and diphthongs as well as connected speech and provides the methodological approach to using songs in the classroom. It is strongly advised that language instructors carefully select the songs, taking into account many factors such as the students' level of English, age, and interests, as well as the complexity of the songs and their rhythm. It is recommended to follow a certain sequence of activities when working on the song material in order to facilitate the process of improving pronunciation of English sounds

The Use of Popular Songs and Films in Overcoming the Typical Mistakes of Georgian Learners of English

The paper focuses on the typical mistakes of Georgian learners of English. The students’ errors are usually caused by native language interference. The theoretical framework embraces the works of Lado, 1957; Corder, 1981; Spicher & Sweeney, 2007; Salcedo, 2002; Ludke, 2009 etc. The empirical material is obtained from personal experience of teaching as well as popular media patfroms. As English and Georgian are structurally extremely different, the errors of Georgian students are most frequently related to grammar. Based on the longstanding experience of teaching English as a foreign language, the author argues that students easily overcome the problem of native language interference and related frequent errors if they are given examples from the texts of popular songs and films. Taking into account that songs and films represent authentic, natural language, they serve as an ideal medium for improving pronunciation, learning morphological and syntactic patterns, enriching the vocabulary, improving the students’ listening skills and so on. Besides, the lyrics of songs are usually very easily obtainable from Youtube or other media platforms. It is widely discussed that songs facilitate foreign language acquisition. Listening to songs and watching interesting fragments of films is not as time-consuming as reading grammar textbooks, learning the rules and doing exercises. The process is very efficient and enjoyable both for the teacher and the students. Thanks to the refrains of songs, which are repeated several times, certain words and syntactical patterns are firmly fixed in the learner’s mind. This is especially important when the teacher tries to help students overcome the typical errors caused by the so-called “negative transfer” i.e. native language interference. The paper analyzes cases when the texts of songs and films have helped overcome issues like: complex object vs direct object, the use of relative pronouns and conjunctions, various types of subordinate clauses, the rules of using so/such, conditional sentences of different types and so on. The paper gives recommendations as to which particular song or film is the most efficient in overcoming each of the above-mentioned problems. The author also notes that, in some cases, the lyrics of songs have the opposite effect on the learner, i.e. the grammar and spelling rules are completely ignored in some songs. The paper argues that in such cases teachers should be extremely careful and offer special explanation to students in order to prevent them from making such errors.

SPANISH LANGUAGE ACQUISITION IN TERTIARY EDUCATION: THE ACTUAL SITUATION IN LATVIA

The data published by The Instituto Cervantes (2021) prove that Spanish language use in the world is constantly rising. The current number of native speakers is 489 million people, and there are more than 22 million learners worldwide. It is the fourth most spoken language in the EU and the third in the UN. The newest Latvian Educational Standard states that the first and second-level educational institutions should offer a minimum of two foreign language acquisition. Nevertheless, the Latvian Educational Curriculum does not include Spanish as an option; therefore, it lacks institutional support to establish Spanish studies in all educational levels with the proper follow-up. The article presents the current situation in various study programs proposed by several Latvian tertiary education institutions in 2020/2021. The data has been collected by contacting current Spanish lecturers and analyzing the current study programs offering Spanish language acquisition in tertiary education institutions mentioned in the article. The analysis presents the content of the study programs in the bachelor and master study levels and the estimated number of students in each study program. It is a panoramic insight into Latvia's Spanish language teaching situation, which is necessary to understand Latvian-speaking Spanish learners' needs, existing resources for Spanish language teaching, and a further perspective for promoting Spanish studies in Latvia. It proves a lack of institutional cooperation to provide the constant Spanish language acquisition from the first till the tertiary educational level that would improve the general recognition of Spanish and its need in Latvian society as a part of the European Union.

Sensory Chunking and the Like: Testing a Pedagogical Treatment Applied to the Strengthening of the Third-Person Singular-s

Research into foreign language acquisition reports that learners of English as a foreign language are inconsistent with the suppliance of verbal morphology and tend to omit morphemes such as the third-person singular -s even at advanced instructional stages. Researchers rely on Generative linguistics and models such as the Minimalist Programme (Chomsky, 2000, 2015/1995) and the Feature Assembly Hypothesis (Lardiere, 2005, 2007, 2009) to account for such variability. The present study attempted to increase the accuracy rates of the -s. The author designed a treatment (©2018, 2019, Verónica Mendoza Fernández) that centered around sensory chunking (teaching with chunked sentences). Sixty-four learners of English as a foreign language from three different rural schools of primary education in Northern Spain participated in a classroom experiment that followed a pretest-postest procedure. Participants from school 1 constituted the control group and participants from schools 2 and 3, the experimental groups. The results of a grammaticality judgement task indicated a statistically significant increase in the accuracy rates of the -s for one of the experimental groups and a trend towards significance for the other experimental group. The treatment could promote the learning of linguistic items contained within blocks of language, as well as the learning of such blocks, and thus foster language automatisation.