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Acquiring Knowledge for L2 Use - Coggle Diagram
Acquiring Knowledge for L2 Use
Communicative Competence:
Knowledge about the language itself and how to use it appropriately in different contexts
Curricula
for L2 learning should be
differentiated
according to the relevant
goals of learning
Speaking (Productive)
Needed in all situation (tourists asking for directions, immigrants searching for housing, etc)
Bottom-Up processes: vocabulary, pronunciations, syntax, discourse and non verbal structures to convey meaning
Top down: prior knowledge about topic and cultural knowledge (what must be said, may be said, should not be said)
Reciprocal (requires listening and speaking) and non reciprocal (delivering lectures)
Functionalism: L motivated by language use. Psychological: degree of automaticity.
Writing (Productive)
Beginning Level
Some Ls have to learn orthographic system
Must acquire basic structural knowledge of L2 before L can transfer knowledge about writing process from L1 to L2
Provide a model to follow
Adv. Academic Level
Requires extensive knowledge of all the components of language
Command of formal register
Ability to write research papers and reports
Listening (Receptive)
Advanced Academic Level
Attainment of advanced proficiency requires continued and extensive exposure
Large recognition of vocabulary (basic and subject-specific, complex sentence struture, and organizational features at sentence and discourse level
Beginning Level
Comprehension affected by: poor sound quality, background noise, distractions, anxiety
Comprehension of input facilitated if: know topic in advance, knows key words or phrases, speaker pauses frequently, provides visuals, and speaker can seek clarification, tape recording lectures
Segmenting stream of speech into meaningful units: sounds, words, phrases, clauses/sentences
Reading (Receptive)
Advanced Academic Level
complex sentence structure
Large recognition of vocabulary (basic and subject-specific)
organizational feastures at sentence and discourse level
Beginning Level
Use Bottom-Up (knowledge of language) and Top-Down (using context clues and prior knowledge) to comprehend text
Transfer of skill from L1 to L2
Beginning Level: Recognize symbols and new conventions of punctuation, rate of progress varies depending on L1 literacy
Ability to read signs, labels, emails and text messages.
Components of L knowledge
Vocabulary (lexicon)
Most important level of knowledge
Core of high frequency words (modifiers, scientific and technological concepts + specific vocabulary (depending on L goals)
Everyday words different in unrelated Ls (rarely borrowed)
Collocations (multi word combinations that occur together), idioms, metaphors
Stages of acquisition: acquiring words they see and hear, producing them in limited contexts and then controlling their accurate and proper use.
Ability to "pick up" words depends on context and explicit instruction
Phonology (sound systems)
Received less attention in 2nd half of century because older learners retain foreign accent but there is renewed interest in teaching it
Required for listening and intelligible pronunciation but higher level of accuracy required for teaching.
Contrastive Analysis: Transfer of knowledge about sound system of L1 to L2 does not account for all learner errors.
Syntax (grammar)
Certain aspects of syntax are universal (all Ls have structures for making statements, asking questions, and all sentences consist of subject and predicate (verb), etc but order of elements and degree of flexibility in their order can differ.
Academic competency requires ability to process longer more complex sentences. In contrast, interpersonal communication uses shorter simpler sentences and even fragments
Nonverbal Structures
Facial expressions, eye gaze gestures, body position, and spatial orientation provide more clues to meaning
More common in L2 contexts (either NNS uses gestures to help L2 learner or L2 learner uses gestures to compensate for lack of proficiency
Some are universal but others are language-specific
Discourse: ways to connect sentences and organize information
The use of words and phrases to show how ideas connect to each other in a speech or writing (however, first, next, because)
Morphology (word structure)
Academic: words are longer and require knowledge about internal structure of words and how to attach affixes to roots.
Using morphemes related to gender and number is problematic for L2 learners because its redundant in certain contexts but its needed for advanced use in Romance Languages