Examines the characteristics of the teaching and learning of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in secondary schools. Seeks to define language awareness and its role in the context of EFL. Discusses what literature can offer to enhance language awareness. Offers examples of tasks that identify and illustrate aspects of language awareness in a…

Using a word order correction paradigm, this study assessed syntactic awareness skills in children with good and poor reading comprehension, matched for age, decoding skill, and nonverbal ability. Poor comprehenders performed less well than normal readers, and the performance of both groups was influenced by the syntactic complexity and semantic…

Demonstrates the willingness and ability of non-linguists to provide information about "what they know" about everyday speech activities in the form of their interpretive responses to various tape-recorded fragments of talk. Three types of information are identified from these responses, including overtly "available" information about a variety of…

Examines differences in metalinguistic development between monolingual and bilingual children in terms of three subcategories: word awareness, syntactic awareness, and phonological awareness. In each case, some studies have reported advantages for bilingual children, while others have found either no difference between the groups or monolingual…

Presents brief descriptions of 1999's list of Notable Children's Books in the Language Arts: 30 children's trade books published in 1998 chosen for their outstanding potential to enhance language awareness among students in grades K-8. (SR)

Looks at the strategies used by adult nonnative speakers (NNS) when performing pedagogic tasks. Repairs that make use of discourse markers such as "what I mean is," are identified as being effective in overcoming communication difficulties and completing tasks. Suggests that the ability to make use of such devices is evidence of…

According to a developmental model of figurative language acquisition--the "global elaboration model" (Levorato & Cacciari, 1995)--the metalinguistic awareness necessary to use figurative language in a creative way is acquired late, and is subsequent to the ability to comprehend and produce figurative expressions. One hundred and…

This article explores young children's facility in phonological awareness tasks requiring either the detection or the articulation of head, coda, onset, and rime subsyllabic units shared in word pairs. Data are reported from 70 nonreading children and 21 precocious readers attending preschools. Prereading children were able to articulate shared…

This paper explores the sociolinguistic awareness in English of tertiary level students in Hong Kong and Wuhan (Mainland China). The language data consisted of specific instances when a native speaker presenter made changes, in the course of oral delivery, to the written text of a conference paper that she had prepared in advance. Matched pairs of…

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relations between early bilingualism and phonological awareness in a sample of 75 Turkish-Dutch bilingual kindergarten children living in The Netherlands. In a longitudinal design, the children's first (L1) and second (L2) language abilities were measured at the beginning and end of…

This paper highlights a new approach to the topic of language consciousness. Although a good deal has already been learned about the topic in connection with such questions as: "When and among whom does language consciousness arise?"; "When is it stronger and when is it weaker?"; and "What does it lead its adherents to do…

Presents brief annotations of 30 children's trade books published in 1996 considered to be outstanding for their enhancement of language awareness among students in grades K-8. (SR)

Reviews issues presented in an earlier article on the potential of language awareness as a methodology in foreign language teaching and teacher training. The article reflects on the relationship between linguistic theory and language pedagogy and argues for the need for a collaborative rather than antagonistic rapport between linguists and…

Contrasts lay and "professional" metalinguistic knowledge from the viewpoint that linguistic issues concern all speakers of language. The article maintains that linguists firmly believe in a major difference between lay and theoretical metadiscursive remarks because linguists persist in believing in the objectivity of linguistic facts.…

This article was written interactively over an extended period of consultation and explores questions concerning the theory and practice of language awareness, its descriptive orientations, its relationship with critical social dimensions, and its connections with current theories of language teaching and learning. (Author/VWL)