scholarly journals A case study in the acquisition of three types of morphemes in english by a bilingual child

2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Allen Quesada Pacheco

This case study looks closely at the bilingual first language acquisition of a Costa Rican child who was raised through OPOL (One Parent One Language) and Minority Language at Home (mL@H).The subject, Itzel, was raised in a Spanish-speaking environment and her dad is the only person that has spoken to her in English since her birth up to the present. It is explained throughout the study that the use of several native English resources complemented the acquisition of the English language. For this study, a descriptive method was used. The Wug test was applied to the subject to determine the level of acquisition of the plural morphemes, third person singular morphemes, and past tense morphemes of regular verbs. Finally a comparison of 2011 Wug test and 2014 test is made to determine mastery of these morphemes in a period of three (3) years. The results proved that the subject did acquire naturally the studied morphemes and the Wug test shows some aspects of the interlanguage development related to the acquisition of morphemes done by the subject of the study.

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 12-16
Author(s):  
Fatima Elnaeem Mohammed

This study aims at identifying the problems that face Sudanese university students in forming questions for communicative purposes in the English language; It is an investigation of the difficulties the students find in constructing questions correctly and accurately. Types of errors were analyzed on different linguistic levels. The results have shown that the area of confusion includes the use of the verb ‘be’, present and past tense, parts of speech and word order. The methodology used in this study was based on the students' feedback; linguistic analysis of the questions they formed. The main findings proved that the students face difficulties in forming questions resulting from the fact that their first language has a significant influence on learning English as a foreign language in general and forming questions in particular.   


Author(s):  
Najah Ahmad Khamis ◽  
Rohaiza Jupri

<p>Achieving a near-native speaker’s pronunciation is so essential for EFL learners. However, many factors contribute to the challenges faced by EFL learners, mainly due to the difference in the sound system of English Language and that of their first language. For this reason, Arab learners of English Language may mispronounce some English sounds. This paper analyzed one of the few problematic sounds to the Arab Yemeni EFL learners - the pronunciation of the English voiceless postalveolar affricate /ʧ/. The study which has a quantitative case study design uses four Yemeni EFL postgraduate students as its participants. The participants’ pronunciations of /tʃ/ sound in the initial, middle and final word-positions were analyzed using Praat phonetic software. The findings of the study showed that Yemeni EFL learners have difficulties in producing the /tʃ/ sound, especially in the initial and final positions, and deaffrication of /tʃ/  occurred in the  pronunciation of the four participants. The current study is expected to be of value, particularly for EFL learners, teachers, as well as material writers.</p><p> </p>


Author(s):  
Tri Mahajani, Ruyatul Hilal Muhtar

<p>Abstract. The present study aims to examine a description of language acquisition and its usage by pupils in their daily conversations. This study employed a longitudinal case study and applieda descriptive method, while it used a content analysis for the research technique. The resultrevealed a finding upon the young learner language acquisition and its usage, the language acquisition included Bahasa Indonesia, Javanese language, Sundanese language and English language. The uses of language for a system, a personal expression, and an interpersonal expression were broad good enough and were uttered structurally, however, mistakes were founded on applying structures and making meaning to language in use. To pupils whom are at elementary school level, they have acquired a range of language structure and its use for perfection. Their parents, teachers, and their society have any real and valuable<br />influence over them in the way language is structured and is used for exemplifying examples ofthe perfect language acquisition.</p>


2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Yang Wang

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] This qualitative case study explored five college ELLs' reading processes in their native Mandarin language and the English language. The purpose of this case study is 1) to discover the reading process of five native-Mandarin-speaking adult ELLs at a large Midwestern university; 2) to learn their perceptions of reading; and 3) to learn about their strategy use in reading the selected materials in both Mandarin and English. I met with each participant individually. In the beginning I did the reading interests inventory and the Burke Reading Interview in Mandarin and in English to learn about their beliefs in the two languages. I surveyed their reading metacognition in both languages. Then I selected four pieces of texts (two in Mandarin and two in English) for RMI and RMA with each reader. At the end, I did post-interviews and post-surveys. Through the study, I kept a double entry journal. Then I conducted within-case analysis and cross-case analysis. This study found 1) by the end the participants believed reading was to know the meaning in both languages and helping them to examine their reading in their first language makes them more successful in their second language; 2) the readers used all linguistic and pragmatic language cueing systems to construct meaning in both languages, and they relied more on linguistic cueing systems in English; 3) they used all natural reading strategies and other similar strategies in both languages, and applied unique strategies to construct meaning in English; 4) the RMA sessions helped the participants build their confidence and revalue their reading, especially in English; 5) the participants became more metacognitive through the RMA sessions, and highly proficient readers may not be the most metacognitive ones. This study suggests RMI is an effective reading evaluation tool for the reading process of the first language as well as the second language. Reading teachers and ELL teachers could use RMI to understand their students' reading process and re-evaluate their students' reading comprehension. This study also suggests RMA is an effective instructional tool. The RMA sessions could build the students' confidence, focus more on meaning, and uncover their reading strategies, as well as their strengths and weaknesses. ELLs need to read actively and closely for meaning; use their successful native language reading strategies and unique strategies in their English reading; experience aesthetic reading for pleasure and read various genres and different topics; and read aloud as long as it is meaningful. ELL teachers need to help the learners establish their belief about reading; use RMI as an evaluation tool; use RMA as an instructional tool and help readers embrace their good reading strategies; encourage them to use their successful native language reading strategies and unique English language reading strategies; and encourage readers to read widely outside of classroom.


2000 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 173-191 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Juan-Garau ◽  
Carmen Pérez-Vidal

The present article reports on the findings of a case study of bilingual first language acquisition in Catalan and English. It first presents a general overview of a child's syntactic development from the age of 1;3 to 4;2 and then focuses on the question of subject realization in the two contrasting languages he is acquiring simultaneously. In this case, Catalan is a null subject language in opposition to the overt subject properties of English. Such data allow us to provide evidence on a key issue in bilingual acquisition research: the question of language separation in the early stages of acquisition. The data available suggest the absence of any major influence of one language on the other. In other words, our subject seems to be acquiring word order patterns which are different in the two adult systems in a language-dependent manner from the beginning of his production in both languages.


Author(s):  
Hilma Safitri ◽  
M. Nur Hakim

The process of language acquisition undergone by each child in the world is more and less similar. This is because language is universal in which it is acquired through all language components namely phonology, semantics, and pragmatics. The component of phonology is more related to human neuro-biology. The process of sound produced is genetic and human biological development is not similar. Hence, the language development of human beings is not exactly the same. This paper explores first language acquisition particularly on the phonological component of a three years old child named Andi. The data is the transcripts of dialog taken from causal chit chats with the participant. A qualitative method is used to analyze the data. The findings reveal that the participant acquired vocal sounds of /a/, /i/, /u/, /o/, /e/ and consonant sounds of /p/, /b/, /m/, /t/ more dominant compared to others. He never produced /k/ consonant, fricative [s] and [j]. However, he produced nasal consonants of [m], [n], and [ɳ]. The participant also substituted omitted a few sounds. This might happen because his speech articulation has not developed well yet or genetic factor does not allow him to do so.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 32
Author(s):  
Sihong Wang

This case study project explores the English language learning process of a student named Abby*(name changed for confdentiality), an adult beginning learner studied at Abram Friedman Occupational Center (AFOC). The paper focuses on analyzing under the theoretical concept of Common Underlying Profciency model (CUP), especially the language transfer with the data collected from ten weeks of observation, interview with the case study student and her teacher, the chat with her classmates, and the samples of the student’s work. Data is acquired from the community, school, and classroom, to include all related factor that may influence and reflect the relationship between the student’s first language (L1) - Spanish and her second language (L2) - English. The paper intends to analyze the L1 of the case study student plays a positive role during the process of learning English via three sub-claims. Finally, the paper provides recommendations to support the student to use her L1 to promote English learning comprehensively and end with reflections on the case study process.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Magdalena Kartikasari Tandy Rerung

<p>Strategies comes from Greek word “strategia” which means the art of planning and directing. Regarding to language learning, a strategy is used to achieve their goal depends on the skill they obtain. Specifically speaking skill is one of the productive skills that can be a challenging thing for university students who majored in English. Besides vocabulary, other element that support their language production is motivation. Avoiding in using Bahasa Indonesia can make them unmotivated sometimes. If this is the case, therefore the students might be passive learners in the classroom. Translanguaging  is a strategy in language learning that can motivate students keep learning the language by combining their first language with the foreign one. The following case study is intended to observe how do students use translanguaging. The study was a class observation involving four students majored in English Language and Culture Program at Bunda Mulia University. They were in fourth semester and enrolling in the Listening and Speaking Class. Apparently the result shows that students who use their first language in the speaking task help them in delivering information and telling stories.</p><p><em><br /></em></p><strong><em>Keywords: </em></strong><em>translanguaging strategies, speaking skill, language learning</em>


2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 120
Author(s):  
Enas Abdelwahab Eltom RahmtAllah

Writing is considered an essential learning tool for all content areas. However, to master and have excellent writing skills for EFL students of undergraduate programs is challenging. Cohesion and coherence are both crucial textual elements to master writing. The present study examined coherence in English essays written by 46 female Saudi EFL third year at Unaizah College of Sciences and Arts, Qassim University. Examination of essays by the subject group designed to answer the research question. 1.) To what extent are EFL students competent in achieving coherence in writing skills? Each student was asked to write two essays (a writing test that included two essay questions). The data were analyzed through SPSS. The study results demonstrated that learners are not competent in achieving coherence in their writing tasks. In light of these results, recommendations are presented. The results also recommend further studies to investigate coherence and action research to improve this crucial skill among undergraduate Saudi EFL learners.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document