Input to Output

1. Input to Output Rakesh M. Bhatt University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

2. Five givens in SLA: #1 • SLA involves the creation of an implicit (unconscious) linguistic system • Compare: • Mujhko ghar jaanaa hai • ?maine ghar jaanaa hai • *mai ghar jaanaa hai

3. #2 • SLA is • Complex • Linguistic competence • Lexicon/Morphology/Syntax • Communicative competence • Pragmatics/Discourse • Different processes • Input processing • Change —accommodation, restructuring • Output processing

4. #3 • SLA is dynamic but slow • Developmental stages • Acquisition orders • sequential acquisition

5. #4 • Most L2 learners fall short of native like competence • Critical Period Hypothesis • Ultimate attainment: rare, exception =>Nonnativeness is natural and typical

6. #5 • Skill acquisition is different from the creation of the implicit system • Knowledge, yes • Articulation, no

7. Input • Language that a learner hears (reads) that has some kind of communicative intent • This input must be processed (made comprehensible) for acquisition to take place =>Input => processing=>intake

8. Input processing: Principles • Learners process input for meaning before anything else • Process content words • Process meaningful grammatical forms • Learners process content/propositional message with minimal cost to attentional sources

9. Principles contd. • Utterance initial position is the most salient, followed by final position • Learners interpret first noun/noun phrase as the subject of the sentence

10. Output • Language that has communicative purpose • Language that learners produce to express some kind of meaning • 2 important (related) elements of output • Fluency: speed and accuracy • Automatization: speaking w/out much conscious effort