The purpose of this paper is to examine pertinent research concerned with teaching English as a second language (ESL) to speakers of Spanish, to analyze fundamental problems Spanish speakers may experience when taught to read and learn in the target language English, and to suggest practices for teachers of ESL to assist Spanish-English bilingual…

The oral communication skills of bilingual students in Wales were examined in a study reported in this paper. Oral facility was treated according to five indices: quantity and quality of words in the oral response, time taken to complete the response, length of pauses and number of corrections and repetitions. Pictorial frames provided a visual…

This paper attempts to clarify some of the issues raised in the author's earlier paper, "A Theoretical Perspective on the Relationship between Bilingualism and Thought" (Working Papers on Bilingualism, No. 1), as a response to Gerald Neufeld's critique, which appeared in No. 2 of the same series. The present paper argues that Neufeld mistakenly…

The Toledo, Ohio, study of 72 Mexican American students was conducted to find whether bilingualism is a factor affecting aspirations and attitudes toward school and the educational process, and to determine attitudes of Mexican American students as a group. Students were equally divided into bilinguals and monolinguals, and responded to 3…

This book is about the prospect of a social turn in the field of second language acquisition (SLA), in particular, that part of SLA that is devoted to the input-interaction-output (IIO) model. The book is intended to critically examine some of the basic notions and assumptions that underpin this model and to suggest a more interdisciplinary and…

Describes an experiment comparing the monolingual and bilingual approaches to foreign language teaching. Two 6th grade classes in English were taught for nine class periods, one by the monolingual and one by the bilingual method. A slight advantage in favor of the monolingual method is reported. (IFS/WGA)

This study describes and analyzes differences in student output across ethnicity and gender in a mixed monolingual English and bilingual Spanish/English class in order to understand how second-language oral skills are developed in a mixed classroom. Participant observation, informal interviews, and audiotaped classroom and tutorial interaction…

Compared self-deprecation, self-confidence, and fatalistic belief among 1,034 Mexican American eighth graders who reported themselves a biliterate, English monoliterate, Spanish monoliterate, or oral bilingual. Found that Mexican American children who identified themselves as biliterate had higher self-confidence than the other groups. (Contains…

The hypothesis that access to two languages in the preschool period might promote metalinguistic development was subjected to empirical verification. The method of parallel groups with paired equalization procedure was used to test the hypothesis. (25 references) (JL)

Investigates the academic success of bilingual primary school children from various language backgrounds in a monolingual Greek Cypriot-speaking school environment and their mastery of modern Greek by comparison with their monolingual counterparts. Examines whether these children face any problems of socialization, adjustment, and cultural…

Adult and child L2 acquisition of syntax-semantics interface phenomena must be compared with monolingual L1 acquisition of the same phenomena in order to assess the possible effects of interference and transfer. However, this "L1A touchstone" can also be misleading because non-grammatical mechanisms that interact with such interface phenomena may…

Vocabulary acquisition is a critical component of academic language. This aspect of the school curriculum seems to be more difficult for language learners to acquire. This study therefore examines the language arts conceptual framework and the instructional activities for vocabulary development in a second grade mixed classroom with a view to…

Since the cessation of Soviet hegemony the Baltic Republics have endured drastic changes in their political, economic, social and linguistic situation. The official reinstatement of the respective state languages has been a key feature in the establishment of their newly regained national independence. Consequently, large sections of the…

Thirty middle- to upper middle-class monolingual Dutch speaking families consisting of at least a mother and a father completed the Infant Form "Words and Gestures" of the Dutch adaptation of the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory for the same child at 1;1. Considerable inter- and intrafamily variation emerged in how two (or three)…

Although the acquisition of the English plural morpheme by monolingual English-speaking children (L1 learners) has been studied extensively, little is known about the processes through which native speakers of other languages (L2 speakers) acquire the English plural morpheme. To understand the similarities and differences between L1 and L2 English…