Second language acquisition of the English interrogatives : the effect of different learning contexts on the SLA of three groups of Chinese learners of English
This study is an attempt to investigate the interlanguage (IL) development of Cantonese learners of English whose exposure to the target language (TL) is mainly from the classroom context and with little or no informal exposure outside the classroom. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research to date suggests that naturalistic SL learners largely follow a universal route of development. The issue of concern of the present research is whether acquiring the TL in a classroom context involves the same or different processes of SLA and how the learning context shapes the qualitative development in terms of the degree of analyticity and automaticity of IL knowledge. An equally important issue in relation to SLA in the classroom situation is the development of metalinguistic knowledge and in what principled way this type of knowledge assists or hinders the learner's development. Within this framework of investigation, an empirical distinction is drawn between the learner's development of IL knowledge and the extent to which he is able to retrieve this knowledge in production. In the present study, three groups of learners were identified. Two groups of subjects were sampled from the Hong Kong learning context, where
Tang, Gladys W. L.
Linguistics
Second language acquisition of the English interrogatives : the effect of different learning contexts on the SLA of three groups of Chinese learners of English. This study is an attempt to investigate the interlanguage (IL) development of Cantonese learners of English whose exposure to the target language (TL) is mainly from the classroom context and with little or no informal exposure outside the classroom. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research to date suggests that naturalistic SL learners largely follow a universal route of development. The issue of concern of the present research is whether acquiring the TL in a classroom context involves the same or different processes of SLA and how the learning context shapes the qualitative development in terms of the degree of analyticity and automaticity of IL knowledge. An equally important issue in relation to SLA in the classroom situation is the development of metalinguistic knowledge and in what principled way this type of knowledge assists or hinders the learner's development. Within this framework of investigation, an empirical distinction is drawn between the learner's development of IL knowledge and the extent to which he is able to retrieve this knowledge in production. In the present study, three groups of learners were identified. Two groups of subjects were sampled from the Hong Kong learning context, where
second_language acquisition_english interrogative effect_different learn context sla three_group chinese learner_english study_attempt investigate interlanguage_development cantonese learner_english whose exposure target_language mainly classroom context little informal exposure outside_classroom second_language_acquisition_sla date suggest naturalistic learner largely follow universal route development issue_concern present whether acquire classroom context involve different process sla learn context shape qualitative development term degree analyticity knowledge equally_important issue relation sla classroom situation development metalinguistic knowledge principled way type knowledge assist hinders learner development within_framework investigation empirical distinction_drawn learner development knowledge extent able retrieve knowledge production present_study three_group learner identify two_group subject sample hong_kong learn context