DEVELOPMENTAL SEQUENCES IN LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

Bethany LeFloreCoralia Sanchez

EDBE5653

Definition of Developmental Sequence

All learners of a language will pass through the same order of acquisition regardless of their backgrounds and different learning environment (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 82).

Stages of Developmental Sequences Gramatical Morphemes –Studied and researched

by Stephen Krashen, are the smallest unit that expresses a distinct meaning. Examples: independent or free unit: jump, dog, or happy.

prefix or suffix attached to another morpheme to modify its meaning: –ed or –ing for verbs, plural –s or possessive –s for nouns or –ly or –ness added to adjectives to turn them into adverbs or nouns.

(Fillmore and Snow (2000) p. 14)

Stages of Developmental SequencesNegation- Researched by John Schumann and Henning Wode, the use of a negative in a sentence to express a thought. In L2 developmental sequence, although the path is similar to L1 developmental sequences, the L1 language background may influence the stages.Stage 1 - the use of “no” before the verb or noun. “No cookie”

Stage 2 - using “don’t” compound negative.

‘He don’t want a cookie’

Stages of Developmental SequencesStages of Negation continue…

Stage 3 – placing the negative element after auxiliary verbs. using ‘are’, ‘is’, and ‘can’ with ‘not’.“You can not have a cookie”

Stage 4- using auxiliary verb with ‘not’ in agreement with person, tense, and number.“He doesn’t want a cookie”

(Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 85)

Stages of Developmental Sequences

Stages of Developmental SequencesQuestions – Researched by Pienemann, Johnston and Brindley, is the development of asking questions. In L2 developmental sequence, although the path is similar to L1 developmental sequences, the L1 language background may influence the stages.

Stages of Developmental SequencesQuestion Stages:Stage 1 – single words or sentence

fragmentsCookie?

Stage 2 – declarative word order(no fronting and no inversion) The girl eat the cookie?

Stage 3 – fronting with ‘do’ or ‘wh-’ but no inversion. Do you have a cookie in your hand?

Stages of Developmental SequencesQuestion stages continue…Stage 4 -inversion in ‘wh’+copula and

yes/no questions. Where is the cookie?Stage 5 – inversion in ‘wh’ quesitons. Why does he like the cookie?Stage 6 – complex questions. The cookie is good, isn’t it?(Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 86-87)

Stages of Developmental Sequences

Possessive Determiners- researched by Helmut Zobl, and adapted by Joanna White, deals with the use of the possessive forms his and her (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 89).

Stages of Developmental SequencesPossessive determiners stages:Stage 1- pre emergence- no use of his

and her. The little boy ate the cookie.

Stage 2- emergence – strong preference to use ‘his’ and/or ‘her.

The little boy got the cookie. He put her icing on the cookie and drank her milk.

Stages of Developmental SequencesPossessive determiners stages continue…Stage 3 – “post emergence- differentiated

use of ‘his’ and ‘her’, but not when the object possess has natural gender” (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 89).

The little boy ate his cookie. Her mother wanted one too.

Stage 4- error free use of ‘his’ and ‘her’. The little boy ate his cookie. His mother wanted one too.

Stages of Developmental Sequences Relative Clauses – Studied by Keenan,

Comrie, & Gass, is a subordinate clause that modifies a noun phrase, most commonly a noun (Wikipedia). Pattern of acquisition for relative clauses:

Subject – The boy who ate the cookie was happy.Direct object – The cookie that I ate was good.

Stages of Developmental SequencesRelative clauses continue…Indirect object – The boy who(m) I

gave the cookie to was happy.Object of preposition – I found the

recipe that Mary was talking about.Possessive - I know the woman whose

recipe we used. Object of comparison – The recipe

that I used is better than Johnny’s.

Stages of Developmental Sequences

Reference to the past – Studied by Meisel and Bardovi-Harling, they refer to events of the past (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 91).

Stages of Developmental SequencesInitially referring to the events in the

order that occurred. We sat in the kitchen. We ate cookies. We liked them.

Attachment of grammatical morphemes to verb to mark past tense (-ed, -ing).

We eated cookies. Now all gone.

Stages of Developmental SequencesPast tense is marked more on action verbs

than on state verbs (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 91).

We ate cookies everyday.Past tense is marked when referring to

completed events more than extended events with out clear end-point (Lightbown & Spada, 2006, p. 91).

We eated cookies everyday.We ate cookies yesterday.

Stages of Developmental Sequences Current ResearchLarsen-Freeman’s review article discussing L2 morpheme processing and acquisition allow us to understand that it is more difficult to learn morphology than to study how they are acquired, making it so interesting to researchers. Her strongest point in this review is that the frequency of using morphemes is critical for their acquisition. On the other hand, she suggests more study to be conducted due to the variety of language learner’s L1 who are learning an L2.

Stages of Developmental Sequences Current Research Continued

Dyson (2008) studied two Chinese students learning English as a second language in Australia. He concentrates his study in the developmental stage of questions and suggests tests such as the TOEFL and the IELTS assume and not tests questioning abilities. On page 24, Dyson states “if stages research is compatible with meaning-oriented, communicative assessment, it could supplement current approaches to ESL testing in several ways.” His study showed that the stages of SLA are not acquired during the early months of learning a second language as commonly understood. Finally, He provides suggestions to teachers on how to assist students in question development, as for example, encouraging student’s questions by creating situations for students to formulate them.

Stages of Developmental Sequences Current Research ContinuedThe role of type and token frequency in using past tense morphemes correctly by Elena Nicoladis, Andrea Palmer and Paula Marentette, examined how children, both bilingual and monolingual learned past tense morphology. The study that was conducted examined how English speaking, French speaking and Bilingual English / French speaking children retold a story of a short cartoon that they watched. both bilingual children and monolingual children follow the same developmental sequence when learning language. children that are learning language as bilinguals often exhibit a small difference in language development which can be “categorized as cross-linguistic effects and delay” (Nicoladis et al., 2007). The study found that while the number of words used to describe the story differed, the number of past-tense words spoken tended to average out among all the children, although the accuracy rate of the words used in producing past tense morphology was lower in bilingual children. “These differences are likely due to less frequent exposure to either language than monolinguals” (Nicoladis et al., 2007).

Stages of Developmental SequencesActivity

Talking with PuppetsAppropriate for Ages 5 years - 9 years old

Stages of Developmental SequencesActivity continue…Student Objective: Students will be able to

ask and answer questions of the puppet that are relatable to subject topic.

Lesson Goal: To provide a fun atmosphere for students to practice using their second language to communicate.

Stages of Developmental SequencesActivity continue…Activity: Prior to the puppet show, students will

make and assemble the puppets and the stage.

Throughout the activity students will take turns playing the role of the puppet. Other students will then ask the puppet questions in English that are related to content area. The student that is playing the role of the puppet will then be given the opportunity to answer the question in English.

*Once the puppets and the stage have been made, this activity can be used throughout the year as part of many different lessons.

ReferencesEllis, R. (2009). Second language acquisition,

teacher education, and language pedagogy. Language Teaching 43:2, 182-201

Fillmore, L. W., & Snow, C. E. (2000). “What teachers need to know about language.” [on-line]. Available:

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.93.91117&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Lightbown, P.M. (2000). Anniversary article classroom SLA research and second language teaching. Applied Linguistics, 21(4), 431-462.

ReferencesLightbown, P. & Spada, N. (2006). How languages

are learned, Third Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nicoladis, E., Palmer, A., and Marentette, P. (2007). The role of type and token frequency in using past tense morphemes correctly. Developmental Science, 10 (2), 237-254.

Video URL -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_LOBBLmgYc&feature=player_detailpage

Wikipedia, T. F. E. (2011, October 12). Relative clause. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_clause