Transfer effects in the acquisition of English as an additional language by bilingual children in Germany
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Peter Siemund
Abstract
In this paper, we investigate the language development of children with migration backgrounds who live in Hamburg and are currently learning English as a foreign language in school. With data collected from bilingual Russian-German, Turkish-German, and Vietnamese-German children, we evaluate both the quality and the quantity of transfer effects. The investigated linguistic features are subject-verb-agreement and the use of articles. We interviewed 160 12- and 16-year old test subjects, distributed equally according to language cluster and age, comparing the results to test subjects’ developmental levels in their heritage language and German, which were investigated independently. In addition to the main cohorts, additional cohorts of L1 speakers of Turkish, Russian, and Vietnamese with English as an L2 as well as adult bilinguals in Germany were interviewed. After factoring out language external phenomena, we can observe that both L1 and L2 have an influence on the acquisition of English, but that these effects depend on the phenomenon investigated and the language pairs involved. Our findings suggest a model of language transfer in which the grammatical status of a phenomenon interacts with the learner’s developmental level yielding qualitatively different transfer effects.
Abstract
In this paper, we investigate the language development of children with migration backgrounds who live in Hamburg and are currently learning English as a foreign language in school. With data collected from bilingual Russian-German, Turkish-German, and Vietnamese-German children, we evaluate both the quality and the quantity of transfer effects. The investigated linguistic features are subject-verb-agreement and the use of articles. We interviewed 160 12- and 16-year old test subjects, distributed equally according to language cluster and age, comparing the results to test subjects’ developmental levels in their heritage language and German, which were investigated independently. In addition to the main cohorts, additional cohorts of L1 speakers of Turkish, Russian, and Vietnamese with English as an L2 as well as adult bilinguals in Germany were interviewed. After factoring out language external phenomena, we can observe that both L1 and L2 have an influence on the acquisition of English, but that these effects depend on the phenomenon investigated and the language pairs involved. Our findings suggest a model of language transfer in which the grammatical status of a phenomenon interacts with the learner’s developmental level yielding qualitatively different transfer effects.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- Transfer effects in multilingual language development 1
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Psycholinguistic Approaches to Language Transfer
- The relationship between L3 transfer and structural similarity across development 21
- Segmental targets versus lexical interference 53
- Foreign accent in heritage speakers of Turkish in Germany 87
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Transfer in Language Learning and Language Contact
- Lexical cross-linguistic influence in third language development 111
- Effects of cross-linguistic influence in word formation 129
- Transfer effects in the acquisition of English as an additional language by bilingual children in Germany 147
- Let’s fix it? Cross-linguistic influence in word order patterns of Russian heritage speakers in Germany 161
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Transfer in Applied Linguistics
- Assessing foreign language speech rhythm in multilingual learners 191
- Cross-linguistic transfer of academic language in multilingual adolescents 221
- Bilingual resources and school context 249
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Methodology on Transfer
- Do immigrant children profit from heritage language proficiencies? 277
- Automated L1 identification in English learner essays and its implications for language transfer 297
- The nature of the initial state of child L2 grammar 323
- List of Indices 345
- Name Index 349
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents vii
- Acknowledgements ix
- Transfer effects in multilingual language development 1
-
Psycholinguistic Approaches to Language Transfer
- The relationship between L3 transfer and structural similarity across development 21
- Segmental targets versus lexical interference 53
- Foreign accent in heritage speakers of Turkish in Germany 87
-
Transfer in Language Learning and Language Contact
- Lexical cross-linguistic influence in third language development 111
- Effects of cross-linguistic influence in word formation 129
- Transfer effects in the acquisition of English as an additional language by bilingual children in Germany 147
- Let’s fix it? Cross-linguistic influence in word order patterns of Russian heritage speakers in Germany 161
-
Transfer in Applied Linguistics
- Assessing foreign language speech rhythm in multilingual learners 191
- Cross-linguistic transfer of academic language in multilingual adolescents 221
- Bilingual resources and school context 249
-
Methodology on Transfer
- Do immigrant children profit from heritage language proficiencies? 277
- Automated L1 identification in English learner essays and its implications for language transfer 297
- The nature of the initial state of child L2 grammar 323
- List of Indices 345
- Name Index 349
