Through this course, I have come to learn that second language acquisition is more than just learning how to speak another language. Second language acquisition (SLA) “ is the scholarly field of inquiry that investigates the human capacity to learn languages other than the first, during late childhood, adolescence or adulthood, and once the first language or languages have been acquired” (Ortega, 2011, p. 1). It is composed of concepts such as cross linguistic influence, motivation, and cognition, and how topics such as these affect a second language learner. This course has helped explain how certain factors affect how, and in what ways, a learner’s new language is acquired.
This course will impact my professional practice by giving me the tools necessary to understand how second language learners acquire a new language. It has taught me that many factors affect the rate of acquisition, and because of this I will be mindful of their progress. Students should receive patience when learning, and learning a second language is no exception. This class will also impact my teaching through the feedback I give to English language learners. The types of feedback I will give to students will be those of which will help them advance. For example, I will do this by asking for clarifications and helping correct them when necessary.
With this being said, the information I learned regarding interaction and crosslinguistic influences are some of the topics I found most interesting. Interaction is “composed of negotiation, recasts, and feedback” (Gass, 2013, p. 317), and within each are even more components. Of interaction, I was most interested in the negotiation aspect in which two interlocutors tried to comprehend one another. Seeing as English language learners will not all be native Spanish speakers, I look forward to seeing such instances between other non-native speakers. Similarly, I would like to see different cross linguistic effects in my students, because I have learned that a person’s first language has an effect on their second language (Ortega, 2011).
This course, besides providing useful information on second language acquisition, has taught me how to create a virtual blog (vblog) to share my thoughts on what has been discussed in our readings. While it may not have contributed much to learning the content of the class, it came in handy for interactions with other classmates in order to receive their opinions and ideas. Because of the vblog, as a class we were able to each share our own ideas and comment with more information, as well as respond back. This interaction portion of the vblogs helped me expand my view on some topics more than others, and allowed me to see them differently. Through the many interactions that I have communicated, my writing skills have improved into more formal and research-based statements, and it has inspired me to learn more about the study of second language acquisition so as to better understand what researchers have found. As stated before, whilst the vblog did not directly help me learn the content of the class, it allowed me to gain more insight into topics and think about certain topics differently.
References:
Gass, S. (2013). Second language acquisition: An introductory course. New York: Routledge.
Ortega, L. (2011). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Routledge.
Yazmin, I am glad to be the first to comment on your final reflection for this short semester, as your comments and replies have always given me much to think about. You always take Ortega's points - either on motivation, L2 skill building, development, or assessments and implementation of L2 learning strategies - and make them feel fresh and inspiring (2013). I also feel that my skills with communication and writing have drastically improved thanks to the online conversations brought about from these blogs.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment Ila! Ortega just so happened to be one of the most important authors from the readings we were assigned, as it gave so much insight into second language acquisition. It included chapters regarding age, cross linguistic influences, and cognition (Ortega, 2011) just to name a few. Seeing as we are students and not researchers in the field of SLA, it was difficult to give my own take on certain subjects, nevertheless I always made the effort.
DeleteReferences:
Ortega, L. (2011). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Routledge.
I also found that crosslinguistic influences was an interesting topic covered in this course. Language transfer itself is such a complex subject and it is something that happens differently for each person. According to Ortega, “the influence of the mother tongue cannot explain all phenomena in interlanguage development” because there are many other influences occurring simultaneously that can also affect the learning of an additional language. You also mentioned the use of appropriate feedback when working with ELLs, which is something that I find important as well. Ortega tells us that by providing effective feedback to our ELLs can result in better performance across all subject areas.
ReplyDeleteOrtega, L. (2015). Understanding second language acquisition. Routledge.
To add on to your statement, another one of the factors that affects the learning of an additional language is age. Ortega (2011) states that “In terms of L2 ultimate attainment, most learners who begin acquiring the L2 before a certain age, typically before puberty, will develop levels of morphosyntactic and phonological competence that are very close to those of native speakers of that language” (p. 28). In other words, the earlier someone learns a language, the more native-like their competency level will be. The factor of age, as well as other factors, all pose some type of effect on a student’s language learning, and as future teachers it is essential that we keep these in mind.
DeleteReferences:
Ortega, L. (2011). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Routledge.
The most interesting aspect, in my opinion, of age influences on the learning of an L2 is the notion of a critial period. Ortega tells us that many researchers believe that, “it is biologically impossible for the human brain to use the same processes that were involved in learning the L1. Instead, other processes, such as reasoning and problema solving, are summonded during post-pubertal L2 learning” (2013, p.29). This is why teachers need to be aware of the developmental stages of children so that they know how to teach according to the age of their students. For example, at a later age, children will be able to look for patterns in language that a toddler or a younger child may not pick up on.
DeleteOrtega, L. (2013). Understanding second language acquisition. Routledge.
Hi Yazmin! I also found the crosslinguistic influence on second language learning to be interesting. I noticed this to be true due to my own experiences learning a little bit of French in high school as I was able to connect some of the grammatical format of sentences formation across Spanish, English and French. For example when you say "Elle est" it's the same to "she is" and "ella es". I also found this to correlate to what Dr. Genesee had to say about a learner's first language influencing their second language learning since the almost the same rules apply based on phonetic awareness, and grammar (2014).
ReplyDeleteReferences:
W. (2014, April 24). Teaching English Language Learners to Read. Retrieved July 4, 2018, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0pc7kQAQrw
Thank you for your comment Nancy! Although what you said is true, I find it interesting how it does not always have to be the first language being the influence on the third language. Ortega (2011) states that “both the L1 and the L2 influenced the L3, but the functional roles played by the each language in L3 production were not interchangeable, and their presence gradually receded over time, as the L3 developed” (p. 50). Essentially, both English and Spanish played a role in how you learned French. The language you are more proficient in, however, will have the greatest transfer when acquiring your L3 (Ortega, 2011), and in your case I believe that would be English.
DeleteReferences:
Ortega, L. (2011). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Routledge.
Yazmin, I too feel that my understanding and compassion for English Language Learners has grown tremendously and I am certain my newfound respect and appreciation for this population will reflect in my teaching. I plan to consider their needs prior to presenting mathematical objectives in front of the room by creating specialized lesson plans that will engage all learners, and accommodate them along the way. In addition to being introduced to this population of learners, I learned a few difficulties I will have to face being a middle-school teacher. Such as, the likelihood of performing in the native range after puberty is significantly lower than younger children (Ortega, 2013). Instead of letting this statistic intimidate me, I plan to use it to intrinsically motivate me.
ReplyDeleteOrtega, L. (2011). Understanding second language acquisition. London: Routledge.