ok at the diagram above task 1.1 (figure 1.1) in your study materials.

What do you think the

symbols LM, LX and LE stand for?

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LM: Lengua Materna or Lingua Mater = mother tongue or L1

LX: Language x, the unknown language in the acquisition equation, the midpoint language,
Lingua Exaedifico, Lingua Examina = the interlanguage

LE: Lengua extranjera, Lingua Exemplar = the target language or L2

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Think of three grammatical structures that are almost the same in spanish and english, and
that you could encourage your students to use positive transfer with.

Also, think of three grammatical structures that are different in spanish and english, but which
learners often transfer, and that you could make your students aware of, so as to hopefully
avoid this negative transfer.

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The answers to this task are many. The following are thus only an example of what you could
have written. If you do not find your particular examples and you would like to check them with
your tutor please e-mail him/her separately about this and/or post a message on the
appropriate bulletin board discussion list.

Grammatical structures that are similar in spanish and in english:

• This/that: corresponds to the use of este-a /ese-a to denote objects that are closer or further
away from the observer.

• Present perfect: the construction of the present perfect is very similar in spanish and english
and the use of the present perfect for past experience can be encouraged to be transferred in
order to aid understanding. However, it is only really this use that can be useful to transfer as
other uses are not the same in the two languages.

• Forming continuous tenses in present and past using the verb ‘to be’: once students are
aware that forming the present and past continuous is similar to spanish in that they use one of
their forms of ‘to be’, i.e. ‘Estar’ and that ‘ing’ equates to ‘ando’ or ‘iendo’ they appear to have
no significant problems in forming the structure and using it fairly appropriately. However, one
could add the reservation that the question of the time period in which one is doing something
can cause transference problems, as in when a spanish speaker may say “¿Qué haces?” an
english speaker may say “What are you doing?”. This does not appear to present considerable
problems however, as a spanish speaker could equally say “¿Qué estás haciendo?”

• The Plural‘s’. Both english and spanish add an‘s’ to nouns to make them plural. Although in
the case of spanish, nouns which end in a consonant will need either ‘es’ or ‘as’ this rule never
seems to be negatively transferred to english. One rarely hears a learner say “cupboardes” for
example.

Grammatical structures that may cause negative transfer:

• Question formation: the difference between a question and a statement in spanish is most
often made by a simple change of intonation. Although grammatically speaking the verb and
the subject should be inverted, since the subject is hardly ever used this inversion is not
noticed. It would appear that the vast majority of spanish speaking learners of english use the
same method when asking questions in english, i.e. they merely raise their intonation whether
they are aware it is wrong or not. It would seem to be automatic almost instinctive. Therefore, a
spanish speaker will normally say, “You want a glass of water?” not “Do you want a glass of
water?”, or “You have been to Mexico?” not “Have you been to Mexico?”

• The use of possessive‘s: many students transfer “El coche de Clare” directly to “The car of
Clare” rather than “Clare’s car”. It may be that the idea of a grammatical concept so alien to
their L1 is difficult to incorporate fluidly into their spoken output despite frequent awareness
raising. In fact a student may use the form correctly at times (specifically when concentrating
on accuracy) but when focusing on fluency he/she will transfer it negatively.

• The third person ‘s’: this is a construction (or conjugation) which spanish speakers often omit
both in spoken and written output. Despite being one of the first things taught in formal
instruction it would appear that the students’ ILs are not ready to acquire that item until a much
later stage. This may appear strange when one considers that every ‘person’ has a different
conjugation in spanish whereas in english it is only the third person which differs. What exactly
is being transferred here therefore, is difficult to say, as spanish speakers do not appear to
transfer other conjugation endings to english. However, it may be that as in spanish the third
person ending is usually the most basic version of the verb (Hablar-habla, Vender-vende) and
as such learners with spanish as their L1 may subconsciously expect the same to be true of
english.

• Pronouns and proper nouns cannot be left out before the verb in english while this is common
practice in spanish. Thus knowing that a verb cannot “float” around on its own can help a
learner to avoid transferring this practice.

• In comparative and superlative structures in english the adjective takes an ending (-er and –
est rather than a preceding more or most) if it is a one syllable word or a two syllable word
ending in “y”, while in spanish the structure does not change according to word length. This
can thus result in a spanish learner putting more and most in front of short words as well as
long ones. An awareness of the rules governing the comparative and superlative in english can
thus avoid negative transfer.

• English uses a possessive pronoun to refer to parts of the body, i.e. My head hurts, He
combs his hair, Raise your arm to answer..., while spanish uses the definite article thus giving
rise to sentences such as: Henry hurt the hand.
• Adjectives: in english adjectives precede the noun while in spanish the opposite is usually
true and a change in this order usually also brings about a change in meaning. Thus for a
learner with spanish as their L1 it is fairly common to keep using the spanish construction and
thus give rise to sentences such as “the man tall” or “the cat black”.

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Draw two simple conceptual maps: one showing the learning/acquisition distinction proposed
by Krashen and one showing the interface position proposed by Bialystok in her Model of
Second Language Learning. Please note that you will not be able to copy and paste a map into
the VC. You will need to submit this task as an attachment via VC mail, or by fax, to your tutor.

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This could have been rendered as conceptual maps or as a summary of the main points and/or
differences. What is important to note is the fact that for Krashen the Learning/acquisition
processes are entirely separate and that one cannot lead to the other where as in Bialystoke’s
model implicit knowledge can become explicit knowledge and vice versa.

Krashen’s distinction between learning/acquisition as proposed in his Monitor Model:

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Look at the two texts in Appendix 2.1 and the tasks which accompany them in your study
materials. What are they designed to teach? Which of the two is more likely to promote
noticing? Why?

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Both activities are designed to teach the future form ‘going to’.

According to the material (point 2.3) the conditions for noticing are as follows:

- the item needs to be significant for the learner;

- it should be salient or noticeable;
- it should occur with a certain frequency;
- it should make the student pay attention to its form;
- it should also require the student to process meaning;
- there should be enough time to notice the item.

If we consider the two texts in Appendix 2.1 we can thus observe the following:

In extract 1 the structure “going to” is highlighted by italics and a box. Exercise 1 makes the
student think about when the structure is used in terms of tense. Ex. 2 makes the learner
consciously listen to the structure in the text and then produce it in controlled practice.

This is then followed by an exercise on pronunciation focusing on word stress in a question

where the structure is present which in turn is followed by an awareness raising exercise
involving the schwa and finally a controlled production exercise responding to the structure
“going to” without having to actively produce the item. It can thus be said that the extract
complies with most of the above points.

If we consider extract 2 there is a passage for reading in dialogue form aided by a visual
prompt to help understanding. This is then followed by a series of tasks where the item “going
to” is made salient by using italics followed by controlled practice where the student has to go
back to the text to notice the item. There is fairly high frequency of occurrence and a fair
amount of controlled practice occurring immediately after the reading without any real focus in
form. However in order to decide which extract promotes more noticing there are more aspects
to keep in mind.

Van Patten (1990) for instance argues that due to Limited Capacity Processing, learners
cannot process both content and form at the same time and that therefore activities should be
designed to focus the learners’ attention on a grammatical form without forcing the learner to
practice it. Furthermore, as argued by Schmidt and Frota (1986), learners should be
consciously aware of the grammatical form. In other words, the gap between the input they are
receiving and their IL should be something that they ‘notice’ consciously, not subconsciously as
previously put forward by Krashen. Therefore, the distinction between Krashen’s (1984)
learning and acquiring is narrowed considerably if not erased altogether.

A well designed task therefore, according to the criteria above, would force the students to
focus on the grammar or language point but would not force them either to produce it, or to
focus on anything else at the same time such as content. In light of this Ellis (1993) “advocates
a comprehensive approach to the structural syllabus”, an approach which forces the learner
towards the grammar and away from any interference from lexical issues.

If the two activities in question are focused upon, the first thing that one can notice is that
extract 1 is a listening comprehension exercise and extract 2 is a reading exercise which may
arguably contain lexis which could divert the learner’s attention away from the grammatical
issue at hand. Furthermore, extract 1 deals with the content of the activity first and separately,
whilst extract 2, being based on a text which the students have to read, mixes both content and
form.

In extract 1 the listening exercise is arguably designed to allow students to familiarise

themselves with the context of what is going on. It should be noted that none of the questions
for this section contain the form ‘going to’ and therefore do not require the students to
concentrate on both form and meaning.

In activity 1 the students are then provided with an example question and asked to decide
whether it relates to the past, present or future. They are therefore being asked to consciously
concentrate on or notice the gap. In other words they are made aware of the grammatical
function of the form. They are not however asked to produce anything or manipulate the
language. Next the students are asked to complete some questions from the cassette. Again,
they are not asked to produce anything actively as they are merely asked to copy what they
hear. The students are then asked to listen and copy the production of a ‘going to’ question
and then practice asking a ‘going to’ question in pairs, in both cases the model is provided and
there is no need for the students to independently produce anything. Even in their answers to
the final question they are not asked to produce the structure but rather respond to it thus
providing a certain focus on meaning.

If we consider extract 2 it could be said that there is no explicit explanation of the function of
the form, nor is the form itself even identified as being the issue at hand. Both form and content
are mixed in that the form is part of the story that is read. The students are immediately
required to produce the form through the four exercises without any analysis of the structure in
question. In fact, it could be argued that the only clue in the whole activity that ‘going to’ relates
to the future is the word ‘tomorrow’ at the beginning of the text which students may not even
pick up on. In other words, it could be said that extract 2 does not ask students to focus on the
grammatical meaning of the item but merely to reproduce its form rote style.

In light of the analysis of the two extracts it could thus be argued that extract 1 is more likely to
produce ‘noticing’ as it concentrates on the idea or meaning of the form, without forcing
students to think about either content or production simultaneously.

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Put the following stages in the acquisition of the past tense form of buy in a possible order and
justify your answer. The order represents the U-shaped development which typifies
restructuring and has been adapted from Ellis (1997). The first stage in the process has been
marked 1.

Feedback
According to the idea of U-shaped development (in Ellis 1997:23) the most probable
progression is:

Stage 1: the learner uses an un-marked form of the verb.

Stage 2: some frequently used irregular verbs are learnt early on as lexical chunks.
Stage 3: the learner has acquired the regular past simple ending –ed, and thus over-
generalises this rule.

Stage 4: the regular past simple ending –ed is over-generalised to irregular past too resulting in
hybrid forms.

Stage 5: finally the over-generalisation is corrected and both regular and irregular past tense
verbs are “put in place” in the learner’s mind.

The original use of the correct irregular form may not necessarily reflect the fact that the
student has actually acquired the correct form. The student’s IL would be in a state of
transformation. The student’s IL would learn that past regular forms were formed using ‘ed’ and
the learner may therefore overgeneralise the ‘ed’ usage adding ‘ed’ to the present form ‘buyed’.
The student may then realise that the verb ‘to buy’ has an irregular form ‘bought’ but still
decides to add an ‘ed’ ending forming a hybrid structured ‘boughted’. Eventually the learner will
restructure and reorganise the IL in such a way as to realise that the verb ‘to buy’ is irregular
and has only one past form ‘bought’. As such, the learner has progressed through a process of
analysis learning and testing of their own internal personalised hypotheses.

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Consider the main differences between the learning that takes place in a formal (classroom)
context and a natural context. Use the grid below as a template for your answer. Please note
that you will not be able to reproduce the grid in the VC - use point form for your answers
instead.

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Question 7
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What do you think the effects of IRF exchanges on SLA are? Briefly consider each of the
following areas in your answer:

• Input
• Output
• Negotiation
• The effectiveness of the feedback stage in IRF

Feedback
Effects of IRF on SLA:

• Input: the input is restricted to mechanical, formulaic chunks usually consisting of questions.
The input is delivered mainly by the teacher in the form of transferring knowledge to the
student. It is not related to the learner’s IL agenda.

• Output: the output a learner can produce is basically a response to the Teacher- initiated
question, or a repetition of corrected use of language. The IRF exchange thus teaches the
student how to reply, but not how to initiate discourse him/herself. The role of the learner is
essentially passive.

• Negotiation: there is no real negotiation of meaning since the teacher usually knows the
answer to the display question that has initiated the exchange or alternatively focuses more on
form than meaning, using the IRF exchange as a check on understanding of the structure dealt
with. The learner merely replies and then the teacher provides follow-up in the form of an
acceptance of the response, an evaluation, a correction or a comment. The teacher has the
central role and takes control over the discourse thus not allowing for any negotiation of
meaning.

• The effectiveness of the feedback stage in IRF: since the feedback usually consists of an
acceptation, an evaluation or a comment with a similar meaning in this type of exchange, it can
be seen as effective in providing direct feedback in response to the correct or wrong answer.
This would have the function of letting the learner know whether his/her response is the one
the teacher wanted or not, and if not then it allows him/her to modify it, usually with the teacher
having given a model to follow. However, the feedback is limiting for SLA in the way that it
does not usually take into consideration student creativeness, but instead concentrates on the
answer required and the structure at hand. This means that the learner may in fact have
produced the correct answer but does not necessarily know why, or may not be able to use the
structures in another context. Similarly the learner may answer the question in another way
than that required by the teacher, and may in fact get negative feedback when the answer may
be valid in another context thus causing confusion. The feedback stage of IRF also tends to be
ineffective in getting learners to restructure their IL hypotheses as they may not be ready to
acquire the corrected structure and also as a result of the exchange taking place in non-
meaningful discourse.

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Imagine that you need to write some advice for a new EFL teacher, telling him/her what he/she
should do in the classroom in order to improve his/her students' SLA through input and
interaction.

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The answers to this task are many and varied depending on your own particular experience
and context, but they should be along the following lines:

Advice for a new EFL teacher in Spain:

• Keep in mind that the learners do not have ready access to the TL outside the classroom. In
fact the only place where they will hear the TL and are able to practice using it may well be the
language classroom. It is thus important to make good use of time and use it effectively both
for input and practice.

• Not having access to the TL outside the classroom also means that there is no natural
environment where the learners will come into contact with different styles and language uses.
These aspects will thus have to be brought into the classroom if for nothing else at least for
awareness raising.

• There are some marked differences between spanish and the TL which need to be kept in
mind when choosing materials and when presenting language. The input has to be
comprehensible to the level the students have, and not to the level they should have. It is
therefore important to observe the class in question and decide on which modifications in the
teacher talk and in the materials that have to be done in order to reach Krashen’s i-1 input level
and not exceed this.

• The learners’ output is just as important as the input they receive. Care must however be
taken to cater for individual learner differences since not everybody are ready to speak at the
same time and at the same rate. Some effort must however be made on the learner’s part to
practice in class time since there is little opportunity for him/her to do so outside the classroom.
Pair and groupwork can enhance this aspect of output since learners may feel less threatened
when speaking to peers, as long as the TL is used during these activities and not only the L1.

• The learning context is one that is very different from an ESL context and as a result some
published material may need to be brought closer to the learners’ own environment in order to
stimulate assimilation and intake.

• The language should when possible be personalised and relevant to the student(s) in
question.

• The learning environment is an important aspect of the learning process and needs to be
made into a positive and safe place for the learners. This can be done by encouraging co-
operation among students by pair and group work, projects and by letting the learners know
that they count. Since there is a big difference between spanish and english pronunciation and
spelling, care must be taken to not expect perfection in these fields (especially not in
pronunciation) but instead support and help should be given to the student in ways which
increase awareness and understanding of important areas where misunderstandings can arise
as a result.

• It is important to keep in mind that just because a student does not appear to participate in
the classroom interaction he/she is not stupid but may in fact be internalising the information
he/she is receiving in order to open up at a later date.

• Debates and class/group discussions in the TL concerning issues which are important for the
learners are some ideas as to how interaction and TL practice can be obtained in a more
genuine manner.

• When choosing realistic and genuine ways to use the language in the classroom it is
important to note that what is realistic and genuine in a country where the TL is spoken may
not be particularly realistic and genuine in the learners’ opinion. Care should thus be taken to
try and use the language in a variety of ways including those present in the learners’ immediate
environment.

• Since there are limited opportunities to hear the TL used outside the classroom, care should
also be taken in the use of formulaic chunks of language. The use of formula can aid memory
and acquisition as long as the learners understand that the components making up the chunk
can also be used in other structures and do have their own meaning.

• The teacher talk should always be appropriate in terms of grammar and register so that
important aspects of language use are not lost due to the simplification of language.

• Engage in some classroom research to find out more about your specific class, your teaching
and how effective what goes on in the classroom is for language acquisition in this particular
context.

• Interaction and negotiation of meaning is an important aspect in promoting SLA and since the
learners have limited access to interactions in the TL outside the classroom where such
features would be part of natural phenomena, information-gap and problem-solving tasks
should not be forgotten about.

• If possible, some content teaching involving subjects which the learners enjoy or are good at
could be included in order to shift the emphasis from the language itself to a more meaning-
focused approach and at the same time draw on other knowledge that the learners’ have.