Language Instruction

Writing is, at times, neglected by both teachers and students. Far too often, courses involve an emphasis on speaking skills and direct grammar instruction. These courses, however, pay little attention to writing skills and, most specifically, academic writing. In fact, while addressing writing, teachers may have different approaches, one of which is process writing. The current study explores the implementation of process writing as a tool for developing students’ writing skills in the context of paragraph writing. Students went through four lessons, and a pretest-posttest format was used to conduct research and evaluate data. Action Research was the paradigm used to structure this study. Lastly, the researchers concluded that process writing is conducive to stronger writing skills resulting in more organized and structured paragraphs.

This manuscript reports on a study carried out at a public university in southeast Mexico aimed to determine whether changes in the instructional design of an online English course benefit students' oral communicative competence. The research followed a quantitative quasi-experimental design that involved two groups of students. One of them took a modified version of an online English ii course that provided contextualized instruction of the syllabus language topics. This group's communicative competence was assessed online, which represented a major shift from the face-to-face assessments typically delivered to online groups. The results showed that online assessment is possible, and also that students' communicative competence improved and was directly related to the intervention.

The current study considered effects of PI (explicit information and practice) in two populations: older (age 60+) and young adults (age 19-27), all of whom were late English/Spanish bilinguals. We focused on bilinguals because their heightened metalinguistic abilities favors development under explicit conditions (Cox, 2013a). Twenty-one participants completed a computer-based lesson on Latin morphosyntax, namely the assignment of the thematic roles agent and patient. Treatment consisted of a vocabulary lesson, an interactive pre-practice grammar explanation, and input-based task-essential practice  (Loschky & Bley-Vroman, 1993) that followed PI principles. Interpretation, production, and grammaticality judgment tests were used as pre, immediate post, and delayed posttests. Additionally, a grammar test was administered immediately following the grammar lesson (but before practice).  Results show that young adults benefit more than older adults from explicit instruction alone and maintain this advantage in interpretation tasks after practice. Crucially, though, practice eliminated some age effects, as the younger adults’ original advantage was not present on immediate posttests of grammaticality judgment or production, nor was it maintained on any delayed posttest, largely due to a decrease in accuracy in young adults from immediate to delayed posttest. Results are discussed in terms of pedagogical implications of PI practice for different populations and the idea of the flipped classroom

Il saggio si interroga sulla possibilità di definire ciò che è bene, e quindi eticamente sostenibile, nell’educazione linguistica. Ovvero, vaglia su quali dimensioni e con quali modalità si debba procedere per una valutazione etica dell’approccio, il metodo e la pratica dell’insegnamento/apprendimento delle lingue. Tale valutazione passerà attraverso la disamina di quel settore di studi che in Italia prende il nome, con sfumature e riferimenti spesso profondamente diversi, di educazione linguistica. Identificare una chiara definizione di questo ambito interdisciplinare di ricerca e del concetto stesso di educazione linguistica, dei suoi elementi cardine e dei suoi specifici oggetti di studio sembra essere un’operazione necessaria e un presupposto indispensabile per una riflessione etica sulle azioni dell’educazione linguistica anche in termini di sostenibilità del sistema glottodidattica.


This paper explores the possibility of defining what is good and thus ethically sustainable in language instruction. That is, it analyzes to what extent and how one would engage in an ethical evaluation of approaches, methods, and practices of teaching and learning languages. This evaluation is carried out via the field of study known in Italy--albeit with nuances and meanings that are at times very different--as "educazione linguistica," roughly “language instruction.” To undertake an ethical reflection on the actions of language instruction and the sustainability of systems of language teaching methodology, it is first necessary to clearly define language instruction as an interdisciplinary research area and concept, and to identify its key elements and their specific objects of study.


Este ensayo plantea la posibilidad de definir lo que es bueno –y, por tanto, éticamente sostenible– en la educación lingüística. Esto es, analiza en qué medida y de qué forma habría que actuar para una evaluación ética del planteamiento, del método y la práctica de la enseñanza/aprendizaje de idiomas. Dicha evaluación se examinará por aquel campo de estudios que en Italia se denomina, con matices y referencias a veces muy diferentes, educación lingüística. La identificación de una definición clara de este ámbito de investigación interdisciplinario y del mismo concepto de educación lingüística, así como de sus elementos clave y de sus objetos de estudio específicos, parece que es una operación necesaria y un requisito imprescindible para una reflexión ética acerca de las acciones de la educación lingüística, incluso en términos de sostenibilidad del sistema glotodidáctica.

L'article présente les erreurs fossilisables que les étudiants de Licence en Langues Modernes de l'Université Pontificale Javeriana font en phonétique et phonologie dans les niveaux intermédiaires (B2) de français.

À partir des concepts clés (phonétique, phonologie, fossilisation et erreur fossilisable), nous analyserons un corpus de productions orales, les réponses à un questionnaire adressé aux étudiants et des entretiens semi-directifs réalisés avec les enseignants des cours.

Nous démontrons que les erreurs caractéristiques des hispanophones persistent dans ces niveaux et risqueraient de ne pas être corrigées à moins que des stratégies pédagogiques soient mises en place à fin d'empêcher leur fossilisation.