Effects of written language use and learner’s literacy on interaction in communicative activities for speaking skills

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 205-228
Author(s):  
Seungmin Lee ◽  
Jinyeong Kim
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Communicative Activities ◽  
Speaking Skills

scholarly journals Passive voice should be avoided – or should it?

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (49) ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie Meyer Ingemansson ◽  
Torben Juel Jensen
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Experimental Design ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Public Employees ◽  
Limited Effect ◽  
Passive Voice ◽  
The Public ◽  
Subject Design ◽  
Good Advice

Numerous language campaigns in Denmark have tried to regulate the written language use of public employees, and the focus has generally been on certain pieces of ‘good advice’, such as ‘avoid passives’. However, the effect of these recommendations on the receivers of administrative texts produced by public employees has never been assessed empirically in any satisfactory way. This article presents a method to investigate the effect (or lack thereof) of passives on readers’ comprehension of and attitudes towards letters from the public sector. In a between-subject design, two groups of 10 participants read the same letters in two versions: a version with many passives and a version without passives. The results suggest that passives have no effect on the degree of comprehension of the letters, and only a limited effect on the readers’ attitudes towards the text, with perceived ‘personalness’ as an exception. The results also show that people without higher education have a lower degree of comprehension of the letters than people who have attended higher education. The article is concluded by an assessment of the experimental design and a discussion of factors that might influence the results, such as the type of passive used, the context and subject matter of the texts. We argue that the method is valid and can be used to establish an empirical basis from which it is possible to provide advice on language use that takes the receiver’s perspective into consideration. In particular, we argue that the recommendation commonly found in language campaigns that passives should be avoided is not a particularly relevant piece of advice, or at least one that needs to be presented in a considerably more nuanced way than it usually is.

scholarly journals LANGUAGE VARIATIONS IN DEPOK: A STUDY OF LINGUISTIC LANDSCAPE AND DIALECTOLOGY

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sri Munawarah ◽  
Frans Asisi Datang
Keyword(s):  
Local Government ◽  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Regional Variation ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Linguistic Landscape ◽  
Language Varieties ◽  
Language Variety ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Public Landscapes

Written languages are present in various media in public landscapes, such as notice boards, banners, or bumper stickers. Studying these simple signs is the starting point in observing how a language variety exists and interacts with other languages. It is interesting to study how the instances of written texts found in public landscapes can be an indicator of what language variety is actually used by the inhabitants of Depok. Based on its history and its geography, a hypothesis states that many speakers of Betawi language and Sundanese reside in Depok. The study is aimed at demonstrating the written language varieties found in Depok public landscapes based on written evidence which are compared with language varieties based on the regional variation (dialectology). This qualitative study used the sociogeolinguistic approach combining sociolinguistics, linguistic landscape, and dialectology (geolinguistics). The results show there are two language use distributions in Depok, the Sundanese and the Betawi language. From the landscapes, Betawi language is used in billboards, restaurant signboards, and local government banners. The study is useful for the local government in their efforts to confirm the identity of Depok people.

The Implementation of Total Physical Response (TPR) Method in Improving Arabic Speaking Skills

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 63-72
Author(s):  
P. Pahri
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Method ◽  
Boarding Schools ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Written Texts ◽  
Physical Response ◽  
Descriptive Approach ◽  
Arabic Speaking ◽  
Speaking Skills

Students in Islamic boarding schools have difficulty expressing their thoughts verbally using Arabic. Meanwhile, in terms of understanding written texts and reading written language, they have pretty good skills. This study aimed to describe the implementation of the TPR method to improve the speaking skills. This study used a qualitative method with a descriptive approach. The data were obtained through observation, interviews, and documentation studies. The subjects of this study were Arabic teachers and selected students using the snowball technique. Based on the results, the TPR method can break the ice of communicating in Arabic among students, their difficulties in expressing their thoughts can be minimized by getting used to responding to those around them.

Oral and written language abilities in young Spanish/English bilinguals

2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 296-312 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfredo Ardila ◽  
Mónica Rosselli ◽  
Alexandra Ortega ◽  
Merike Lang ◽  
Valeria L Torres
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Language Abilities ◽  
Writing Ability ◽  
Language Knowledge ◽  
Linguistic Ability ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Grammar Tests

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare oral and written language abilities in English and Spanish of young bilinguals residing in the USA. Methodology: Sixty-two participants (mean age = 23.7; SD = 3.50), consisting of 42 bilinguals (born of Spanish-speaking parents) and 20 English monolinguals, were administered a battery of 15 language tasks. Analysis: Bilinguals were divided into two groups: (a) US-born (simultaneous bilinguals who had been exposed to English and Spanish since birth and educated primarily in English) and (b) Latin American-born (early sequential bilinguals who were educated in Spanish and English, although exposed to Spanish at birth and to English before the age of 10). Findings: Higher lexical ability was demonstrated in English compared to Spanish in bilinguals. Performance in grammar tests of the two languages was inconsistent. Reading/writing ability in English was similar for participants born in the USA and in Latin America; however, participants who were born in Latin America had significantly higher scores for Spanish reading/writing tasks. When comparing performance in English tests, it was found that scores for bilingual participants were similar to those of English monolinguals. Originality: The current study directly compares oral and written language abilities in two subgroups of young Spanish/English bilinguals. Three language dimensions are studied: lexicon/grammar; oral/written language; and language knowledge/language use. Implications: Our results suggest that bilingualism does not interfere with normal linguistic ability in English. Limitations: The current study was carried out in a specific bilingual context. Generalization of these results should be done with caution.

scholarly journals FinUgRevita: Developing Language Technology Tools for Udmurt and Mansi

2015 ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Veronika Vincze ◽  
Ágoston Nagy ◽  
Csilla Horváth ◽  
Norbert Szilágyi ◽  
István Kozmács ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Minority Languages ◽  
Digital Space ◽  
Digital World ◽  
Language Technology ◽  
Social Media Platforms ◽  
Digital Language

Nowadays, digital language use such as reading and writing e-mails, chats, messages, weblogs and comments on websites and social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter has increased the amount of written language production for most of the users. Thus, it is primarily important for speakers of minority languages to have the possibility of using their own languages in the digital world too. The FinUgRevita project aims at providing computational language tools for endangered indigenous Finno-Ugric languages in Russia, assisting the speakers of these languages in using the indigenous languages in the digital space. Currently, we are working on two Finno-Ugric minority languages, namely, Udmurt and Mansi. In the project, we have been developing electronic dictionaries for both languages, besides, we have been creating corpora with a substantial number of texts collected, among other sources like literature, newspaper articles and social media. We have been also implementing morphological analyzers for both languages, exploiting the lexical entries of our dictionaries. We believe that the results achieved by the FinUgRevita project will contribute to the revitalization of Udmurt and Mansi and the tools to be developed will help these languages establish their existence in the digital space as well.

scholarly journals Parents’ and school career counsellors’ evaluations of the occupational competence of children with dyslexia

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-61
Author(s):  
Kleopatra Diakogiorgi ◽  
Ermioni Tsiligirian
Keyword(s):  
Occupational Choice ◽  
Career Choices ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Language Skills ◽  
Parental Expectations ◽  
Job Security ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Opposite Trend ◽  
School Career ◽  
Good For

This article studies the cognitions of (a) parents of children with dyslexia and (b) school career counsellors about possible career choices for dyslexic children, by comparing their evaluations of occupational competence (EOCs) for dyslexic children, to those for children without dyslexia. For dyslexic children, 116 participants rated the suitability of 28 occupations, varying according to the required level of written-language use. For children without dyslexia, the same participants rated these same occupations according to if they estimated it might be a “good” occupational choice or not. Participants were free to take into account different criteria often used when considering a job (employability, remuneration, prestige, job security, career prospects). By the aforementioned differentiation of terms used (i.e. suitability vs “goodness”), it was indirectly solicited from the participants to also consider the impairment in their judgement. The results showed that occupations requiring high written-language skills were evaluated as “good” for children without dyslexia but less suitable for children with dyslexia. The exact opposite trend was observed for occupations having lower such requirements. Another noteworthy result is the discrepancy between the ratings obtained from counsellors and those from parents: while both groups provided similar ratings for children without dyslexia, substantial differences were recorded when rating the suitability of these same jobs for dyslexic children. This different pattern of cognitions is discussed herein, and their connection with parental expectations and aspirations is analysed, while contrasted with shifts due to counsellors’ stereotypical views.

Spreken En Schrijven Van Kinderen

2004 ◽  
Vol 72 ◽  
pp. 33-46
Author(s):  
Jan Berenst ◽  
Nynke Borst
Keyword(s):  
Oral Language ◽  
Literacy Development ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Important Variable ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Written Narratives ◽  
Group Design ◽  
Written Texts ◽  
Grade 5 ◽  
The Relationship

The relationship between children's oral and written language use may be considered as one of the main issues in the study of literacy development. In this paper, the focus is on how 10-year-old children (grade 5) create a textual context in oral and written narratives for their recipients. The first aim of this research was to find out what kind of practices children use to contextualize their stories. The second aim was to compare the practices in the oral and written mode, to determine to what extent children at this age still rely on oral language practices in their written texts. A dependent group design was used to make a comparison between the practices in both conditions possible, while in both conditions the same story was retold. Results show that the children were able to contextualize their stories in the oral as well as in the written mode, but that some contextualization practices (such as the avoidance of exophoric references, and the use of dialogue) were more frequently found in the written mode of the stories. Besides, it was found that the sequence of the oral and written task was an important variable, but not in the expected way. The oral texts were influenced by the written texts (greater length, more dialogue, but also more exophoric references); the written texts, however, did not show any influence from the oral texts. The conclusion might be that we have to reconsider the relationship between children's oral and written language use at this age.

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