General ESL acquisition

1. General ESL acquisition Krashen 1977 - comprehensible input needed; slightly beyond learner's understanding ITO linguistic form similar to Vygotsky’s (1978) concept of “zone of proximal development” (ZPD)

2. General ESL acquisition theories non-interface position - L2 learning - implicit activity - Krashen monitor input theory strong interface position - L2 explicit activity (DeKeyser, 1997; Ellis, 1993); many studies to support this view weak interface position - LSA primarily implicit activity, but can be built up through explicit instruction; many studies to support this position

3. General ESL acquisition theories - EBP Gass & Schenker Second Language Acquisition: An Introductory Course 3rd edition Data Analysis section - focus on qualitative studies; little mention of standardised tests; e.g. Typology section - question forms - 14 subjects One good study – Dulay & Burt 1974 - Brown's morphemes and SLA 60 Spanish and 55 Chinese students AX with standardised test (BSM) - minimal differences in devt. of morphemes - evidence for universality of devt. factors

4. Arabski (1979) Errors as Indicators of the Development of Interlanguage Method: 3 groups – Group A - beginners - 55 subjects - 2/3 years of English at high school - 3 classes pw (Arabski pp. 26 - 27) Group B - intermediate group 57 subjects - extended program in English - entrance exam, 28 3rd grade and 29 4th grade - Arabski p. 27 Group C - advanced 29 1st year English philology students 29 second year filology students Arabski p.27 Polish speakers acquisition of English

5. Arabski (1979) Errors as Indicators of the Development of Interlanguage Results: Group A - difficult to understand due to errors and use of Polish words; major errors - omission of prepositions and ending, replacement of zero morphemes by -ed and -ing morphemes, sentence length - 10 words. Limited vocabulary length of composition or translation - 85 words (Arabski p. 28) Group B - understandable - faulty grammar, occasional use of Polish words; occasional grammatical errors. sentences longer, more sophisticated vocab, length of composition or translation - 120 words (Arabski p. 28) Group C - very few grammar mistakes, no use of Polish words; sentences longer, more sophisticated vocab, length of composition or translation - 234 words (Arabski p.28) Polish speakers acquisition of English

6. Arabski - Error analysis Polish speakers acquisition of English Arabski (1979) p. 99

7. Arabski - strengths and weaknesses (MacKinnon, 1981) Conclusions in the last chapter provide the Polish classroom teacher with invaluable data for curriculum development and lesson planning. Arabski’s use of statistics is questionable. He classifies errors according to their source, and tabulates the frequency of errors from different sources. Such a quantification of source frequency is misleading, since there is no satisfactory procedure for determining the exact source of each error. Polish speakers acquisition of English

8. Polish speakers acquisition of English Other studies - Ekiert (2005) Acquisition of the English Article System by Polish speakers in ESL and EFL settings Method: 25 learners participated in the study. 10 adult Polish learners of ESL, 10 adult Polish learners of EFL, and 5 native English speakers serving as a control group. Each group of Poles (ages ranging from early twenties to late thirties) included three low-ability, three intermediate-ability, and four high-ability level learners. Levels of proficiency were determined by the means of a grammar placement test used by the Community English Program at Teachers College, Columbia University

9. Polish speakers acquisition of English Other studies - Ekiert (2007) The Acquisition of Grammatical Marking of Indefiniteness with the Indefinite Article a in L2 English Results: The ordering of semantic article types for low-ability level learners is the following (starting with the lowest levels of accuracy): referential definites (Type 2), referential indefinites (Type 3), idioms (Type 5), generics (Type 1), and non-referentials (Type 4). For high-ability learners the ordering is the following (starting with the lowest levels of accuracy): idioms (Type 5), generics (Type 1), referential definites (Type 2), referential indefinites (Type 3), and non-referentials (Type 4).

10. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage The Polish national school curriculum for foreign languages (PNSC-FL) (Podstawa programowa z komentarzami, Tom 3. Języki obce w szkole podstawowej, gimnazjum i liceum) states that students at junior high school level can learn languages at stage III.0 (beginner) and stage III.1 (continuing) - stage III.0 and III.1 correspond to Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) level A2 (PSNC-FL , p. 42) “Na III etapie edukacyjnym okreœślono dwa poziomy nauczania języków obcych nowożytnych: poziom III.0 – dla poczśtkujścych i poziom III.1 – dla kontynuujących naukę, który ma wymagania zbliżone do poziomu A2” (PSNC-FL , p. 42)

11. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage Both the PSNC-FL and the CEFR documents are vague about the specific oral language skills needed at each level. CEFR refers to general competences of which one is common linguistic competences (CEFR, pp. 108 – 118) CEFR mentions grammatical concepts such as definite/indefinite articles (CEFR p. 111) but does not relate them to the levels which written in positive broad statements such as Grammatical Accuracy – A2: “Uses simple structures correctly, but still systematically makes basic mistakes – for example tends to mix up tenses and forget to mark agreement; nevertheless, it is usually clear what he/she is trying to say“(CEFR . p. 114)

12. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage PNSC-FL refers to outcome based skills for each stage e.g. “Uczeń tworzy krótkie, proste i zrozumiałe wypowiedzi ustne: 1) opisuje ludzi, przedmioty, miejsca, zjawiska i czynnoœci; 2) opowiada o wydarzeniach życia codziennego;” PSNC-FL, p. 39 The PSNC-FL refers the reader to the CEFR for more details on each stage Both documents do not provide evidence for the oral developmental norms of learning English or Polish; they are assumed to be similar

13. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage Both the PSNC-FL and the CEFR documents are vague about the specific written language skills needed at each level. CEFR mentions written language concepts such as punctuation (CEFR p. 117) but does not relate them to the levels which written in positive broad statements such as Orthographic Control – A2: “Can copy short sentences on everyday subjects – e.g. directions how to get somewhere. Can write with reasonable phonetic accuracy (but not necessarily full standard spelling) short words that are in his/her oral vocabulary “(CEFR . p. 118)

14. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage Both the PSNC-FL and the CEFR documents are vague about the specific skills needed at each level. PNSC-FL again refers to outcome based skills for each stage e.g. “Uczeń tworzy bardzo krótkie, proste i zrozumiałe wypowiedzi pisemne w formie prostych wyrażeń i zdań (np. wiadomoœć, e-mail, krótki opis, notatka, ogłoszenie, zaproszenie, ankieta, pocztówka, prosty list prywatny)” PSNC-FL, p. 39 The PSNC-FL refers the reader to the CEFR for more details on each stage Both documents do not provide evidence for the written developmental norms of learning English or Polish; they are assumed to be similar

15. Polish teaching practices – curriculum documents – usage Polish teachers are reported and observed to use texts from publishers such as OUP and Cambridge University Press and teach the specific oral and written language skills written in these books Textbooks refer to CEFR levels and inside refer to specific oral and written language skills to be learnt with each unit. However, these texts do not give explanations and/or evidence about how they decided specific oral and written language skills are within a CEFR level

16. Method Subjects 40 subjects – between ages 9 and 14 2 high schools in Gorzów Wlkp. 1 high school – students from higher socio-economic background 1 high school – students from lower socio-economic background and higher incidence of learning disabilities

17. Apparatus: • Web based virtual tutor (options for English and Polish) • – including: • e-corpora of sentence examples of chosen grammatical structures • Modules explaining basic grammatical terms: subject; verb, nouns – countable/uncountable, adjectives and complex adjective phrases • Semantic concepts involving articles – first time mentioned, specificity, primary purpose, nouns used to refer to groups, primary purpose • Visual and auditory presentation of instructions and examples from the corpora • Provision of procedural feedback (Put the subject before the auxiliaryverb), and explanatory feedback

18. Apparatus contd: Program structure: Model to increase and maintain student interest Subservient Chicken http://www.subservientchicken.com/pre_bk_skinned.swf Subservient Chicken commands Subservient Chicken commands.docx Tippex – Hunter shoots a bear http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ba1BqJ4S2M Multimodal learning –involves 3 senses – visual, auditory, motor, and kinaesthetic – Total Physical Response - Asher(1966), Richards & Rogers (1987)

19. Apparatus contd: Platform: HTML 5: Code samples Playing video: http://www.w3schools.com/html/tryit.asp?filename=tryhtml_video_html5_4 Text input: http://www.w3schools.com/html/showit.asp?filename=tryhtml_textarea Text input with submit button: http://www.w3schools.com/html/tryit.asp?filename=tryhtml_form_submit XML file access: http://www.w3schools.com/xml/tryit.asp?filename=tryxml_app_first HTML file API access http://return-true.com/2010/10/html-5-file-api-features/

20. Apparatus contd: Animations goal – to make the software have the appearance of a video game Background Characters

21. Apparatus contd: • Animations – goal – to make the software have the appearance of a video game • Many packages available: • Blender http://www.blender.org/ • Hippo studios http://www.hippostudios.co.uk/ • Unreal http://www.unrealengine.com/ • Game studio http://www.3dgamestudio.com/ • Dimensione X http://www.dimensionex.net/en/default.htm • Other packages HTML opensource animation packages.doc • virtual world environments such as v-lang.eu, Second Life, OpenSimulator

22. Design Assessment: Pre and Post Testing using standardised assessments (Welch’s t-test or P-hat statistical test (test of 2 proportions) could be used to assess pre- and –post-test results) There would be 3 followup assessment phases to determine the stability of the acquired skills – immediately post intervention, 3 months post intervention, 6 months post intervention Selected subtests of the: Oral and Written Language Scales – 3rd Edition (OWLS – III)

23. Design Intervention: The intervention with the virtualtutor software would be of 20 minutes duration 3 days per week for 1semester. The intervention would occur at school and possibly at home Question to consider: how to ensure that the control group is learning inversion 20 min x 3 days a week - with the Virtual tutor you can measure the time spent on the platform - with traditional pen to paper method - more difficult to control, especially home practice.

24. Thank you