Volume 39, Issue 3

This study draws on usage-based approach to language learning and investigates the role of syntactical indeterminacy and token frequency in constructional acquisition, for which reflexive verb constructions were selected as the testing field. Syntactic structures of reflexive verbs are either by reflexive constructions or adjectival passive, which have a polysemous interrelationship within the verb. To examine whether syntactic indeterminacy and token frequency play a role in the acquisition of reflexive verb constructions, a test of reflexive verb constructions and a baseline test formed with transitive verbs were developed and administered to L2 learners of an intermediate proficiency level. The findings show: (1) L2 reflexive verb constructions were less acquired than transitive constructions, suggesting that syntactic indeterminacy had an impact upon sentence production; (2) no significant difference was found between the productions of reflexive constructions and adjectival passives, but descriptive statistics showed that learners were attracted to the adjectival passive for production; (3) production of both syntactic structures reflected token frequency trend from COCA, indicating the important role of frequency in complex constructional acquisition.

This present study attempts to conduct a comparison of the tripartite model of L2 Motivational Self System in two different learning contexts, Chinese EFL and ESL learning settings. It was designed using a mixed methods approach, with a primary questionnaire instrument being supported by secondary interview data. The quantitative data was submitted to Amos version 18.0 to evaluate proposed models. It was found that L2 learning experience was the most important predictive dimension of intended learning effort for both samples. However, the roles of the other two components, the ideal L2 self and the ought-to L2 self, appeared to be unstable, which concludes that Dörnyei’s tripartite model obtained partial support in both EFL and ESL contexts. The analysis of qualitative data offers strong evidence for the claim that the future self-guides do not necessarily result in intended effort unless some essential conditions are met.

This study described the functions of you know and I mean in contexts of academic seminar discussions by ELF speakers. The data used in the study consisted of the multicultural discussions in the corpus of English as a lingua franca in academic settings (ELFA). The approach of conversation analysis (CA) was used together with corpus techniques with the aim to provide quantitative support to function categorizations which were drawn from qualitative analysis. Results of the study not only demonstrated the multi-functionality of you know and I mean but also suggested that these two discourse markers played specific functions in academic seminar discussions under ELF contexts. In the context of cross-cultural and academic communication where problematic terms may occur, we found that you know was mainly used to achieve clarity, while I mean was primarily used to correct previous statements and dysfluencies. The findings of this study will help ELF speakers communicate more effectively in academic interactions by recognizing the functions of discourse markers and using them properly.

This paper reports the attempt to apply the functional approach to the translation teaching practice that guides students in their study of Chinese essays and their English translations. The famed modern Chinese essay Beiying and its three English translations were taken for case study from the perspective of Experiential Function in Systemic Functional Linguistics. A process type analysis of Beiying and its English translations was conducted, including analysis of texts, sample processes, distributions of process types in Beiying and analyses of similarities and differences in the distributions. Results are as follows: 1) The similarities between English and Chinese texts lie in the experiential world, which makes translation possible. The process types in the essay text are directly related to genre, and the material process predominates among the process types in essay texts. 2) The differences are that the percentage of the material process in the ST is higher than that in the three English translations, and this shows the characteristics of verb-prominence in Chinese and nominalization in English. 3) Cultural differences in translation are the root-cause of linguistic differences. These results from the case of practicing the functional approach to the teaching of translation can help students gain understanding of English translations of Beiying and can provide some inspiration for the teaching of Chinese-English essay translation and the related studies.

The existing literature has revealed that Problem-based Learning (PBL) can improve the cognitive competence of learners, but few studies focus on L2 learning from the perspective of students, or on the relationship between PBL and linguistic cognition. Based on students’ reflective journals, the researcher’s observation notes, and interviews with teachers and students, this case study describes the individual and collective self-negotiations during a Problem-Based L2 Learning (PBLL) practice of 157 non-English majors at three universities in Beijing. The current study makes a distinction between surface and deep self-negotiations, and confirms the conception of the self-negotiated L2 cognition of PBLL learners. The research results show (1) that the self-negotiation is a consistent feature of PBLL because the whole PBLL process comprises the cyclic intertwining of individual and collective self-negotiations, (2) that L2 learners manage to achieve individual and collective self-negotiations through cognitive mechanisms of linking, riffling and converging, and (3) that deep self-negotiations in PBLL are more dynamic, interactive, and generative. Pedagogical implications, research limitations, and future directions are also discussed.

Childhood is a critical period for language development, and it is of great importance to discover normal language development and any specific language impairment (SLI) in child language acquisition and then to give them timely diagnosis and treatment. Also it has been previously shown that the non-word repetition task is an efficient assessment tool to screen out those children suspected with SLI. Based on this premise, the present study examined whether the non-word repetition task can be a suitable screening tool to detect language disorders for preschool children in Mandarin Chinese in China. A non-word repetition task was adapted specifically for this purpose. This study examined differences in non-word repetition performance of Mandarin-speaking preschool children screened by a criterion-referenced diagnostic test of specific language impairment (SLI) (the value of Cronbach Alpha at 0.86). A sample of 282 children were administered the diagnostic test, and a total of 23 SLI suspects were screened out as their language ability measures deviated from the mean by 1.5 SDs. Results indicated that children with SLI made no error with respect to tone in Mandarin, but they showed great difficulty in non-word repetition skills compared to age-matched controls. The findings confirmed that the non-word repetition task is a culturally nonbiased index of language disorders, and that two syllable non-words can be used to identify language disorder.

Current SLA theories have delivered important language-learning notions. This paper will report the results of a study into 64 high school English teachers’ beliefs about language learning and their instructional practices, with a focus on two of them. A questionnaire was developed on the basis of major tenets of second language learning and administered to the 64 participants. In addition, classroom observations and interviews were employed to explore the two focal teachers’ beliefs and their actual classroom instruction practices. Results show both consistencies and inconsistencies between the participants’ beliefs and major SLA notions and between the two focal participants’ beliefs and their classroom practices.