A cognitive approach to language acquisition

SYLLABUSCourse: Theoretical Foundations of ESL 二语习得与教学研究Instructor: Dr Xiaoguang ChengTime: Fall of 2011Course Materials:Brown, H. D. 2007 (Fifth Edition). Principles of language learning and teaching.NY: Pearson..Mitchell, R. and F. Myles. 2004. (Second Edition). Second language learning theories.London: Arnold.Order of Presentations:1. B. Chap 1. Language, learning, and teaching2. M & M. Chap 1. Second language learning: key concepts and issues3. M & M. Chap 2. The recent history of second language learning research4. B. Chap 2. First language acquisition （biological）5. B. Chap 3. Age and acquisition （biological）6. B. Chap 4. Human learning （cognitive）7. B. Chap 5. Styles and strategies （cognitive）8. B. Chap 6. Personality factors （affective）9. B. Chap 7 Sociocultural factors （sociocultural）10. B. Chap 8. Communicative competence （pragmatic）11. B. Chap 9. Cross-linguistic influence and learner language （linguistic）12. B. Chap 10. Toward a theory of second language acquisition13. M & M. Chap 3. Linguistics and language learning: the Universal Grammar approach14. M & M. Chap 4. Cognitive approaches to second language learning15. M & M. Chap 5. Functional/pragmatic perspectives on second language learning16. M & M. Chap 6. Input and interaction in second language learning17. M & M. Chap 7. Sociocultural perspectives on second language learning18. M & M. Chap 8. Sociolinguistic perspectives19. M & M. Chap 9. ConclusionDescription of the Course:Teaching is the most complicated human undertaking, and teaching ESL is more so because it involves almost all the disciplines of human study that one can think of—linguistics, pragmatics, philosophy, psychology, cognition, culture, sociology, communication, education, and so on. Therefore, English teachers and English graduate students must assume a rational approach, secure a solid foundation in the rationales of all related theoretical models, and study and research the nature and characteristics of English learning and teaching so as to eliminate all irrationality, intuition, and recklessness in their teaching practices. (英语教学专业的研究生和英语教师必须具有这些相关学科和英语教学的理论知识，研究、了解和掌握英语教与学的性质、特点和规律，从而避免非理性、直觉性和盲目性，科学地指导英语教与学的实践。

外语教学法自考题-10(总分100,考试时间90分钟)Ⅰ.Multipe ChoiceDirections: In this section, you are given 20 questions, beneath each of which are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You are to make the best choice either to complete the incomplete statement or to answer the question. One point is given to each correct choice.1. The goal of foreign language teaching is to help the learner master ______ in the shortest possible time.A. the target languageB. his native languageC. vocabulary of the languageD. pronunciation of the language2. American structuralism was very popular and influential in the 1930s and 1940s throughout the world. The two forerunners were ______.A. Bloomfield and ChomskyB. Malinowski and FirthC. Franz Boas and Edward SapirD. Halliday and Edward Sapir3. Chomsky has made the distinction between **petence and ______.A. linguistic performanceB. **petenceC. reading performanceD. universal grammar4. ______ and ______ are distinguished by whether the learner of a second language pays conscious attention to the rules of the target language.A. Learning, acculturationB. Learning, acquisitionC. Acculturation, accommodationD. Acquisition, accommodation5. According to ______, the appropriate goal of psychology is to understand the environmental conditions that would cause an animal or human to behave in a particular way.A. behaviourist psychologyB. cognitive psychologyC. psychoanalysisD. Gestalt psychology6. The revolution in linguistic theory in the 1960s refers to the arrival of the ______.A. Structuralist theoryB. Communicative linguisticsC. Transformational-Generative linguisticsD. Habit-formation theory7. In the Grammar-Translation Method, the teaching materials are arranged according to a ______ system.A. languageB. contentC. logicD. grammar8. A Direct Method teacher is usually found using techniques such as ______.A. direct association and conversation practiceB. question and answer exercisesC. error correction and dictationD. all of the above9. Which of the following is forbidden in a Direct Method classroom?A. Using gestures.B. Sketch drawing.C. The first language.D. Writing.10. The first dictionary for students of English as a foreign language ______, into which the classification of sentence patterns was incorporated, was published in 1953.A. Guide to Patterns and Usage in EnglishB. The Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current EnglishC. A Handbook of English GrammarD. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English11. The syllabus used in the Direct Method is arranged semantically according to ______.A. situations or topicsB. textbooks or materialsC. ideas or conceptsD. students or learners12. The neogrammarians, represented by ______, formed the main linguistic basis of the Direct Method.A. W.M.WundtB. eniusC. F.GouinD. Hermann Paul13. Of the nine fundamental principles of good language teaching and learning proposed by Palmer, ______ is the first and most important.A. vocabulary build-upB. phonetic practiceC. habit formationD. grammar acquisition14. The Audiolingual Method is a method of foreign or second language teaching which emphasizes the ______.A. listening and reading before speaking and writingB. listening and speaking before reading and writingC. listening and speaking before translating and writingD. reading and writing before listening and speaking15. In a typical audiolingual lesson the procedures are followed in the order of ______.A. imitation, recognition and repetition, pattern drills and follow-up activitiesB. recognition, imitation and pattern drills, repetition and follow-up activitiesC. imitation, recognition, pattern drills and repetition, and follow-up activitiesD. recognition, imitation and repetition, pattern drills and follow-up activities16. American structuralism started in ______.A. the early 20th centuryB. the late 20th centuryC. the early 19th centuryD. the late 1930s and 19d0s17. In order to perform the monitor function, language learners have to satisfy at least three conditions: sufficient time to monitor his production, focus on form and a clean knowledge of ______.A. mother languageB. vocabularyC. phoneticsD. the rule of the target language18. Which of the following is NOT the factors that have helped to set up the cognitive psychology?A. The development of computer technology.B. Jean Piaget's research work on the reasoning abilities of children.C. The study of Barry Mclaughlin.D. The work of the American linguist Chomsky.19. The generative-transformational school of linguistics emerged through the influence of ______.A. Noam ChomskyB. J.PiagetC. D.Ausubel D. J.B.Brunner20. The phrase "context of situation" was created by ______.A. ChomskyB. BloomfieldC. FirthD. MalinowskiⅡ.Filling BlanksDirections: In this section there are 20 statements with 20 blanks. You are to fill each blank with ONE appropriate word. One point is given to each blank.21. In the fifth century B.C., the ancient Greeks began to make a serious study of language in the realm of ______.22. ______ is a theory of the mind put forward by Sigmund Freud.23. The most important factor that made cognitive psychology dominant in the world is the development of the ______ technology.24. Traditional linguistics was ______ in nature.25. The Grammar-Translation Method proved to be an effective means in studying foreign ______ through literary works.26. According to some functional linguists, some utterance has no meaning at all if it is out of the context of ______.27. The teacher uses the ______ language of the students as the main medium in teaching in a Grammar-Translation classroom.28. According to Gestalt psychology, people tend to perceive objects and scenes as organized ______ first and then **ponent parts.29. The generative linguist is interested not only in ______ language but also in explaining language. In other words, they attempt to find the what as well as the why in the study oflanguage.30. In 1882, Wilhelm Vietor published a pamphlet entitled Language Teaching Must Start Afresh! and a movement of reform started all of a sudden. The principles of the movement were the primacy of ______, the centrality of the connected text as the kernel of the teaching-learning process, and the absolute priority of an oral methodology in the classroom.31. In the Grammar-Translation Method, reading passages are planned around the sequenced grammatical ______ and vocabulary to be studied.32. The ______ Approach emphasizes on oral skills: use of only the target language in the classroom.33. Palmer worked as a teacher of English in Japan for many years, working towards **plementary ______ in English language teaching.34. Second language acquisition, as a complex cognitive skill, involves the processes of ______ and restructuring.35. Direct association of language with ______ and persons of the immediate environment is emphasized in the Direct Method.36. In Functional Linguistics, the ______ meaning of a linguistic item is its operation in the network of formal relations.37. In the Oral Approach, material is taught ______ before it is presented in the written form.38. The Oral Approach believes that language learning in real life is for the acquisition of spoken language while language learning in the classroom is for the ______ of literacy.39. According to ______, verbal expression is intimately linked with thought about real events.40. The Audiolingual Method develops the separation of the language ______ into a pedagogicaldevice, that is, listening, speaking, reading and writing.Ⅲ.MatchingDirections: This section consists of two groups of pairs listed in two columns, A and B. You are to match the one marked ①, ②, ③, ④or ⑤ in Column A with the one marked a, b, c, d or e in Column B. One point is given to each pair you match correctly.41. Column A: linguist or psychologist①Noam Chomsky②M.A.K.Halliday③Sigmund Freud④John B.Watson⑤Leonard BloomfieldColumn B: the theory he advocatesa. American structuralismb. Transformational generative linguisticsc. Functional linguisticsd. Psychoanalysise. Behaviourism42. Column A①the theory of language underlying the grammar-translation method②the theory of learning underlying the grammar-translation method③the objective of the grammar-translation method④one of the techniques of the grammar-translation method⑤one of the main features of the grammar-translation methodColumn Ba. translationb. the emphasis on the teaching of the second language grammarc. superiority of the written form over the spoken form of the languaged. the faculty psychologye. enabling the learners to read and translate the literature of the target languageⅣ.Questions for Brief AnswersDirections: This section has six questions. You are to answer them briefly. Five points are given to each question.43. What is the most important aspect of language according to the Grammar-Translation Method?44. How does the discourse theory explain the second language acquisition process?45. What areas of language are emphasized by Oral Approach? What language skills are emphasized?46. What are the principles and consequences of the Reform Movement?47. What techniques of the Direct Method do you think are useful in modern language teaching?48. What are the textbooks like in the Oral Approach?Ⅴ.Questions for Long AnswersDirections: The two questions in this section are to be answered on the basis of your own teaching experience as well as the theoretical knowledge you've learned. Ten points are given to each question.49. According to the Audiolingual Method, should dialogues be memorized through mimicry of the teacher's model? Why or why not?50. Do you think the Direct Method could be used by all foreign language teachers at all levels? Why or why not?。

Alternative approachesto language acquisitionLanguage Acquisition80640272Yang XiaoluReadings for this week*Goldberg, A. 2003. Constructions: a new theoretical approach to language. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7(5):219-224.Lieven, E., Pine, J., and Baldwin, G. 1997. Lexically-based learning and early grammatical development. Journal of Child Language24:187-219.*Tomasello, M. 2000. Do young children have adult syntactic competence? Cognition, 74, 209-253.*Tomasello, M. and Brooks, P. J. 1998. Young children’s earliest transitive and intransitive constructions. Cognitive Linguistics9(4):379-395.the Chomskyan view of languageacquisitionmentalismthe logical problem of language acquisitionuniversal grammarmodularityInnatenessthe debate between nativism vs. empiricism; generative linguistics vs. cognitive-functional linguisticsCommon ground between generativelinguistics and cognitive functional linguistics (Goldberg 2003)Language is a cognitive (mental) system: (as opposed to the behaviorist view of language) Structures are combined in a certain way to create novel utterances.A non-trivial theory of language learning is needed.Some basic concepts in the debatecore vs. peripherymodular vs. non-modulardomain-specificity vs. domain-generalityautonomy vs. interactionrule-based learning vs. item-based/lexically-based learning/usage-based-complexity-productivity“In other ways, constructionist approaches contrast sharply with the mainstream generative approach. The latter has held that the nature of language can best be revealed by studying formal structures independently of their semantic or discourse functions. Ever increasing layers of abstractness have characterized the formal representations. Meaning is claimed to derive from the mental dictionary of words, with functional differences between formal patterns being largely ignored. Semiregular patterns and unusual patterns are viewed as ‘peripheral,’with a narrow band of data seen as relevant to the ‘core’of language. Mainstream generative theory argues further that the complexity of core language cannot be learned inductively by general cognitive mechanisms and therefore learners must be hard-wired with principles that are specific to language (‘universal grammar’).”(Goldberg 2003:219)Explaining language acquisition in terms of general cognitive principlesMcNamara 1972 “Cognitive basis of language learning in infants”Slobin1973 “Cognitive prerequisites for the development of grammar”Tomasello2000 The Cultural Origins of Human CognitionLanguage is interactive: language development is not simply a development of mental grammar internalized by the child, but is a product of complex interactions of linguistic, cognitive, perceptual systems with the environment.Cognitive development precedes linguistic development. The child uses the cognitive ability s/he has developed (e.g. the ability to detect intentional behavior in others, the capacity for joint attention and reference, understanding of the structure of action in social interaction, understanding of the speech acts of others), as well as other cognitive principles and mechanisms, as guides to discovering the linguistic system of the target language.Explaining language acquisition in terms of general cognitive principles: connectionism Elman, J. et al. 1996. Rethinking Innateness: A Connectionist Perspective on Development.Elman, J. (2001). Connectionism and language acquisition. In M. Tomasello& E. Bates (Eds.), Essential Readings in Language Development. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Bates, E. Elman, J., Johnson, M., Karmiloff-Smith, A., Parisi, D., & Plunkett, K. (1998). Innateness and emergentism. In W. Bechtel and G. Graham (Eds.) A Companion to Cognitive Science.Oxford: Basil Blackwood.cf. 李平, 2002, 《当代语言学》2002年第3期Language is not domain-specific and is processed by general mechanisms. Such mechanisms are connectionist networks that consist of numerous simple units.Language is analyzed through continuous connectionist computation and is distributed across neural systems. Linguistic competence can be obtained without innate linguistic rules.Language learning is not a process of deriving complex structures from more primitive or innate ones. Rather, new forms or structures emerge all the time in an unpredictable way in response to the linguistic input.Figure 1: A neural network that reads letters and recognizes words. When a letter is detected, the corresponding letter node activates all words that contain it (lines with arrows). Since only one word can be present at a time, word nodes compete with inhibitory connections (lines with filled circles).Accounting for early grammatical development: from two-word combinations tomulti-word combinationsAndrew’s Pivotal constructions(Braine 1963)airplane by siren by mail come mama come clock on there up on there milk in there light up thereother bread other milk other pants other part other piece other pocket other shoe boot off light offmore car more cereal more fish more high more hot more juice more walk hi Calico hi mamano bed no down no fix no home no mama no more no pee see baby see trainall broke all buttoned all clean all done all dry all fix all messy all shut all through all wetthe pivot grammarBraine (1963) The Ontogeny of English Phrase Structure: the First Phrasetwo word classes at this stage: pivot and openthe pivotal class: never stands alone and always occurs either in first position and final positiona three-rule pivot grammar1) P1 + O;2) O + P2;3) O + O (e.g ball table, mommy sock…)The semantic relations approachBrown (1973) A First Language: the Early StagesSemantic relations-recurrence (more)-location (up there, in there)-possession,-agent-actionThe child knows some things about the causal relations among agents, actions, and objects, and this knowledge might form the basis for structures like agent-action-object (and also for possessor-possessed, object-location, object-attribute, and so on)Problems with the pivot grammar and the semantic relations approachFail to account for all early word combinations Fail to account for how young children get frompivot grammar or semantically based categories to the more abstract syntactic categories of adultsthe nativist view of early syntaxthe Continuity Hypothesis“In the absence of compelling evidence to the contrary, the child’s grammatical rules should be drawn from the same basic rule types, and be composed of primitive symbols from the same class, as the grammatical rules attributed to adults in standard linguistic investigations.”(Pinker 1984:7)“Children’s developing grammars can differ from the target, the adult grammar, only in ways in which adult grammars can differ from each other.”(Crain and Thornton 1998:31)problems with the nativist viewFails to deal with the problems of cross-linguistic variation and developmental change:-how children could “link”an abstract and unchanging universal grammar to the structures of a particular language.Fails to give a satisfactory account of why children’s early language looks very little like adult language.the nativist view: why early child grammar different from adult grammarPerformance and pragmatic limitationscf. Valian’s(1991) account of early null subjectsMaturation-certain aspects of grammar ‘mature’-time constraintLexicalism-grammatical categories and rules attached to lexical entries-interaction between grammar and lexiconTomasello(1992, 2000a, b, 2003)The usage-based accountitem-based learningGeneral cognitive processes involved in language learning-intention reading and cultural learning-analogy making and structure-mapping-structure combiningthe usage-based approach-intention reading and social learning“…a large part of language acquisition must be accomplished by means of some form of social or imitative learning.”(Tomasello2000:238)InputImitationContexts: daily routinesthe usage-based approachAnalogy making and structure-mapping“…human beings are capable of discerning similarities not only among objects on the basis of perceptual or functional features, but also among relational and event situations on a basis of acommon relational structure abstracted across particular objects involved.”(2000:241)-the function of a structure is as important as its form-salient intentional, causal, or spatial relations acquired earlier: early sentences revolve around these relationse.g. transitive verbs like give, tell, show, send,all have a ‘transfer’meaning and occur in NP+V+NP+NPthe usage-based approach-item-based learning“…the child initially learns individual, item-based linguistic constructions…upon comprehension and production of specific items on specific occasions of use.”(Tomasello2000:237-38) “…young children do not yet possess abstract and verb-general argument structure constructions into which different verbs may be substituted for one another as needed, but rather they areworking more concretely with verbs as individual lexical items whose syntactic behavior must be learned one by one.”((2000a:210-11)the Verb Island Hypothesis (Tomasello1992)Different verbs develop along different paths. Verbs operate as “individual islands of organization.”(1992:257)the usage-based approach-structure combining“Children learn various kinds of constructions from early in development-varying in both complexity and abstractness-and so when they want to express some new meaning, one thing they can do is to juxtapose or integrate those existing structures in some way.”(Tomasello2000:245)symbolic integration (Tomasello1992)A diary study of an English-speaking girl’s (T) verbs during theperiod from 16 months to 24 months of ageSymbolic integration(Tomasello1992)“From the point of view of Cognitive Linguistics, constructing a sentence is an act performed by a particular person speaking a particular language on a particular occasion for a particular purpose. The mental operation involved in this process are the same as those used in other domains of creative activity, although the material worked with –the structures and categories involved –are obviously unique to language. The mental operations used in sentence construction are referred to as processes of symbolic integration.”(p.226)Symbolic integration(Tomasello1992)“…cognitive processes involved in language acquisition are symbolic integration operations, that is, the operations used toproduce, and perhaps to comprehend, larger structures in which items from the inventory (including categories) are combined and coordinated into sentences. In the simplest cases, these are fairly straightforward mental combinations, concatenating two words, for example. Established structures with their own internalcomplexity can also be conjoined, usually in ways that preserve the previous ordering patterns of elements within the constituent structure. Most complexity is added when the coordinationamong established structures involves substituting one to another in some way.”(p.259-60)Symbolic integration: Tomasello(1992) How T constructs “See Daddy’s car”?See _____See MariaSee DaddySee thisSee Daddy’s carDaddy’s _____Daddy’s breadDaddy’s ballDaddy’s saladSymbolic integration: Tomasello (1992) operations involved in symbolic integration in T’s dataSubstitution Expansion Addition Coordination Close this door Close this window previous use new use⇒Read paper Read this book ⇒Read this book outsideRead this book Cereal down rug __down +Down __⇒⇒Evidence for the item-based learningObservational studies: spontaneous production Experimental studies: controlled experiments the age range of subjects: before 3 years of ageEvidence for the item-based learning:Tomasello(1992)“…T composed her more complex sentences using materials she had previously used in less complex sentences.”(p.234)“…roughly 92% of T’s first 271 three-or-more-word sentences involved only a single simple change from previous sentences with that same verb.”(p.236)“In almost all cases, the ordering within the two constituents (e.g. see ___ and Daddy’s ____ )is preserved.”(p.237)Lieven et al. (1997)11 English-speaking children’s production of multi-word combinations; children observed 1;0 to 3;0Pronoun use (case-marking)\Randomly using me/my and I in subject positionVerb argument structures\the first 20 utterances with a subject-verb-objectstructure\No distinction between prototypical and non-prototypical verb structures“The children's early utterances with two arguments and a verb were as often nonprototypical as prototypical and seemed to have developed from previous verb and direct object patterns, based around speci®c verbs like do, get, want, see and make which ful®lled the criteria of constructed positional patterns in our coding scheme. Again the basis of organization and development seems to be more related to speci®c lexical items than to any more generally underlying systematicities.”(Lieven et al., p.208)“Many of the children in the present study had groups of utterances united by wh-frames such as wheres x and whats x doing, and structures such as its x, its a x, theres a x and theres the x but our approach would suggest that we are not likely to ®nd that individual children have a fully ¯exible grasp of whquestions or of copula construction. Instead, they are building up utterances around one particular frame while ignoring others which, on the grounds of syntactic theory, ought to be related.”(Lieven et al 1997, p.209)Tomasello&Brooks (1998)Verb-specificity and verb-generalitySubjects: 16 children at 2.0 and 16 children at 2.5Methodology-Novel verbs used MEEK, TAM to describe a novel action-the meeking situation: involving a puppet pulling a small object upa ramp; meek was used to describe either the action of the puppetor the action of the object moving up-the tamming situation: involving a puppet pushing a small object, causing it to swing back and forth-the transitive and intransitive contexts-Test sentences:The puppy is meeking the ball. /The ball is meeking.The bear tammed the carrot./ The carrot is tamming.ProcedureThe child is exposed to one verb in a transitive context and the other one in an intransitive context.Questions raised to the child:‘What is going to happen now’‘What’s happening with the (patient)?’‘What is the (actor) doing?’ResultsThe researchers found that 2-year-old children who heard a transitive or intransitive novel verb only used the verb in the way as they heard it used: i.e. when children heard an intransitive verb, they only reproduced a similar intransitive utterance, even when they were encouraged to produce a transitive utterance.Verb-specificity is supported.Next week:The Development of Words and Word Meanings*Barrett, M. 1995. Early lexical development. In P. Fletcher and B. MacWhinney(eds.), The Handbook of Child Language. Cambridge, MA.: Blackwell.*Golinkoff, M, Mervis, C., and Hirsh-Pasek, K. 1994. Early object labels: the case for a developmental lexical principles framework. Journal of Child Language21:125-155. (photocopy)*Tardiff, T. 1996. Nouns are not always learned before verbs: evidence from Mandarin speakers' early vocabularies. Developmental Psychology32:492-504. (E-copy)。