5. Measuring Grammatical Knowledge and Abilities in Bilinguals: Implications for Assessment and Testing

Author(s):  
Rocío Pérez-Tattam ◽  
Virginia C. Mueller Gathercole ◽  
Feryal Yavas ◽  
Hans Stadthagen-González
2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (7) ◽  
pp. 2319-2324
Author(s):  
Rina Muka ◽  
Irida Hoti

The language acquired from the childhood is the language spoken in the family and in the place of living. This language is different from one pupil to another, because of their social, economical conditions. By starting the school the pupil faces first the ABC book and then in the second grade Albanian language learning through the Albanian language textbook. By learning Albanian language step by step focused on Reading, Writing, Speaking and Grammar the pupil is able to start learning the second language on the next years of schooling. So, the second language learning in Albanian schools is related to the first language learning (mother tongue), since the early years in primary school. In our schools, the second language (English, Italian) starts in the third grade of the elementary class. On the third grade isn’t taught grammar but the pupil is directed toward the correct usage of the language. The textbooks are structured in developing the pupil’s critical thinking. The textbooks are fully illustrated and with attractive and educative lessons adequate to the age of the pupils. This comparative study will reflect some important aspects of language learning in Albanian schools (focused on Albanian language - first language and English language - second language), grade 3-6. Our point of view in this paper will show not only the diversity of the themes, the lines and the sub-lines but also the level of language knowledge acquired at each level of education. First, the study will focus on some important issues in comparing Albanian and English language texts as well as those which make them different: chronology and topics retaken from one level of education to another, so by conception of linear and chronological order will be shown comparatively two learned languages (mother tongue and second language). By knowing and learning well mother tongue will be easier for the pupil the foreign language learning. The foreign language (as a learning curriculum) aims to provide students with the skills of using foreign language written and spoken to enable the literature to recognize the achievements of advanced world science and technology that are in the interest of developing our technique. Secondly, the study will be based on the extent of grammatical knowledge, their integration with 'Listening, Reading, Speaking and Writing' as well as the inclusion of language games and their role in language learning. The first and second language learning in Albanian schools (grade III-VI) is based on similar principles for the linearity and chronology of grammatical knowledge integrated with listening, reading, writing and speaking. The different structure of both books help the pupils integrate and use correctly both languages. In the end of the sixth grade, the pupils have good knowledge of mother tongue and the second language and are able to write and speak well both languages.


2017 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Min Wook Ok ◽  
Kavita Rao

Secondary students with learning disabilities (LD) can benefit from using assistive and instructional technologies to support content and skill acquisition. Digital pens have features that can be beneficial for students who struggle with comprehension, note taking, and organization. Livescribe pens, in particular, provide a variety features that teachers and students can use as a support for note taking, content review and test preparation, formative assessment, and testing accommodations and as a math calculator for secondary students with LD. This article describes several ways that teachers can integrate digital pens to support secondary students with LD and discusses potential benefits and challenges regarding the use of these pens.


Author(s):  
Joana Batalha ◽  
Ana Luísa Costa

The academic year 2019/20 is marked by the arrival at university of students born in the new millennium. When this generation of students began to ‘learn grammar’ at school, teachers and other specialists were debating the terminology for basic and secondary education and the place of grammar in the curriculum was changing. In this article, we propose to contribute to a description of the knowledge about language to which millennials had access, more than a decade after the Terminological Dictionary (DT) became official (DGE, 2008). Assuming that there is a prescribed curriculum and a real curriculum, we start from the question what is the place of grammar in the curriculum to offer a comparative analysis of the discourse prescribed for the teaching of grammar in official curricular documents approved between 2000/01 and 2019/20. From this analysis, we present an empirical study assessing the grammatical knowledge in European Portuguese of 65 students entering higher education in 2019/20. For this study, we used a diagnostic instrument, assessing knowledge of different grammatical topics, mainly in the domains of morphology and syntax. The results obtained, which update data from previous studies on students’ difficulties in grammar learning, suggest that terminological standardization and changes in the prescribed curriculum have not solved all the problems in the teaching of grammar.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Manouilidou ◽  
Michaela Nerantzini ◽  
Brianne M. Chiappetta ◽  
M. Marsel Mesulam ◽  
Cynthia K. Thompson

We addressed an understudied topic in the literature of language disorders, that is, processing of derivational morphology, a domain which requires integration of semantic and syntactic knowledge. Current psycholinguistic literature suggests that word processing involves morpheme recognition, which occurs immediately upon encountering a complex word. Subsequent processes take place in order to interpret the combination of stem and affix. We investigated the abilities of individuals with agrammatic (PPA-G) and logopenic (PPA-L) variants of primary progressive aphasia (PPA) and individuals with stroke-induced agrammatic aphasia (StrAg) to process pseudowords which violate either the syntactic (word class) rules (*reheavy) or the semantic compatibility (argument structure specifications of the base form) rules (*reswim). To this end, we quantified aspects of word knowledge and explored how the distinct deficits of the populations under investigation affect their performance. Thirty brain-damaged individuals and 10 healthy controls participated in a lexical decision task. We hypothesized that the two agrammatic groups (PPA-G and StrAg) would have difficulties detecting syntactic violations, while no difficulties were expected for PPA-L. Accuracy and Reaction Time (RT) patterns indicated: the PPA-L group made fewer errors but yielded slower RTs compared to the two agrammatic groups which did not differ from one another. Accuracy rates suggest that individuals with PPA-L distinguish *reheavy from *reswim, reflecting access to and differential processing of syntactic vs. semantic violations. In contrast, the two agrammatic groups do not distinguish between *reheavy and *reswim. The lack of difference stems from a particularly impaired performance in detecting syntactic violations, as they were equally unsuccessful at detecting *reheavy and *reswim. Reduced grammatical abilities assessed through language measures are a significant predictor for this performance, suggesting that the “hardware” to process syntactic information is impaired. Therefore, they can only judge violations semantically where both *reheavy and *reswim fail to pass as semantically ill-formed. This finding further suggests that impaired grammatical knowledge can affect word level processing as well. Results are in line with the psycholinguistic literature which postulates the existence of various stages in accessing complex pseudowords, highlighting the contribution of syntactic/grammatical knowledge. Further, it points to the worth of studying impaired language performance for informing normal language processes.


2020 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 502-506
Author(s):  
A. Rauandina ◽  
◽  
Z. Babazhanova ◽  

The article considers the problem of teaching the native language. The main factors affecting the effectiveness of teaching the Kazakh language are identified. One of them is teacher training, and the second is the effective coordination of students' activities depending on the purpose of the lesson, especially the content of knowledge offered for teaching. The article also emphasizes the importance of identifying teaching methods that are consistent with the content of students' knowledge and skills. Thus, the authors of the article argue that "new knowledge must be associated with old knowledge." And also the article discusses the assimilation of grammatical knowledge, including the study of tenses of the verb. The verb is one of the most complex aspects of morphology. The article shows the modern methods of teaching the tenses of the verb. The revealed methods show that the accumulated language rules are not only knowledge, but also contribute to the development of cognitive abilities.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document