A test developed to assess alienation in sixth grade Spanish American students was administered to migrant students in Grades 4-8. Validity studies indicate that the test may have been too difficult for the grade levels and cultural characteristics of that group. Recommendations for further testing are included. (See TM 000 995 for a copy of the…

This paper presents a descriptive examination of the effects of high school learners of Spanish who complete a series of Internet-based assignments using a popular online Spanish tutorial. The study is designed to measure the knowledge acquired from the World Wide Web by administering and comparing a pretest and a posttest to both a sample and a…

Eight students taking English as a Second Language in a Puerto Rican university kept dialog journals in which they discussed English as a symbol of U.S. colonial domination of Puerto Rico and the erosion of Puerto Rican cultural identity, the relative importance of English and Spanish, and contradictions related to U.S. citizenship and the need…

An exploration of the effectivenes of college overseas study programs on improvement of foreign language skills addresses student motivation, academic expectations, curricular changes, language pledge requirements, communication with native speakers, and the purpose and image of study abroad programs. Suggestions are made for improving…

Analyzes data from a study conducted in Barcelona that examines one day in the life of an English class for MBA candidates. Fourteen points of view are presented: those of the classroom teacher and of an outside observer and those of 12 learners. Teachers and learners operate differently when attributing purpose to tasks. (nine references)…

This study investigated the role of students' motivation and attitudes in second language (L2) study within an online language course context (LOL). Students' attitudes and motivation were examined within a socioeducational framework (Gardner & MacIntyre, 1993) while learning contexts were examined based on Dorneyi's (1994) components of foreign…

A study investigated the relative effectiveness of two new teaching technologies, television and computers, as compared with traditional language laboratory instructional audiotapes in introductory Spanish. The dependent variables examined included the following: overall achievment level; reading, writing, and grammatical skills; and improved…

A study investigated the role of attitudes and motivation in second language learning by administering a semantic differential measure to college students studying Spanish in three different tracks (linguistic, cultural, and bilingual, or native-speaker). The student's track was determined by grades and language experience. Findings suggest that…

Interim results of the study conducted to determine the effectiveness of federally funded bilingual education projects are described. Objectives were (a) to determine the cognitive and affective impact of bilingual education on students in Spanish/English bilingual education projects funded through ESEA Title VII, (b) to describe the educational…

A bilingual, bicultural program in the Edgewood Independent School District in San Antonio, Texas, part of the Experimental Schools Program, was designed to reverse "negative self concept, motivation, and attitudes" of its Mexican American students, and by so doing, improve their academic achievement. Efforts were employed to: (1)…

Compares students in two English-as-a-Second-Language writing environments: a networked computer-assisted classroom and a traditional oral classroom. Results indicate that while the writing environment has no effect on attitudes toward writing with computers or writing apprehension, writing quality improves in the computer-assisted classroom and…

Graduating seniors (N=667) in a large high school were surveyed concerning their college plans and understandings of costs. Costs were largely determinant of college plans for children of Spanish-speaking parents, but these students had the most unrealistic estimates of college tuition. Implications for counseling are discussed. (SLD)

Describes a difficult sixth grade girl who spent her elementary school years fighting to feel happy. The article focuses on a teacher's efforts to raise the child's self-esteem by examining her home life then taking appropriate steps to encourage success (e.g., tutoring younger students). (SM)

This paper reports on a telecollaborative exchange between university language learners in Spain and the USA and analyses the effects of the different institutional and sociocultural contexts on its development. While the socioinstitutional dimension of German-American exchanges has already benefited from extensive study in the literature, this…

The major purpose of this study was to explore, in a phenomenological tradition, factors that lead some students to persist in foreign language study past the usual 2 years in high school. Factors that have been prevalent in the literature include language aptitude, motivation, grades, intellectual and cultural curiosity, language learning…