Second Language Acquisition

Second Language Acquisition

1. The Critical Period Hypothesis

   • Proposed by Eric Lenneberg
   • Second language is best learned between age 2 and puberty
   • Ability to learn language is negatively affected by lateralization
     • Lateralization - when each side of the brain develops its own specialized functions.

2. Proficiency

   • includes grammatical, sociolinguistic, discourse and strategic competence
     • Age appropriate competence should be reached in each of these areas in order to be considered proficient in a second language

3. Noam Chomsky

   • Pioneered the idea of Universal Grammar
     • States that all human language rests on innate building blocks of expression

4. Comprehensible Input

   • As stated by Stephen Krashen, "We acquire language in one way and only one way--when we understand messages...We acquire language when we understand what people tell us. Not how they say it, but what they say. Or when we understand what we read."

5. Ferdinand de Saussure

   • Founding father of modern linguistics
     • The field of language acquisition is included in linguistics
   • Proposed the idea of Structuralism
     • Structuralism - a method of interpretation and analysis of aspects of human cognition, behavior, culture, and experience that focuses on relationships of contrast between elements in a conceptual system that reflect patterns underlying a superficial diversity.

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