(SLA) MID-TERM TEST

Name    : Safitri Dyah Utami

SRN        : 2201411058

Class      : 103-104

MID-TERM TEST

1.       What is second language acquisition?

Second language acquisition is the study of how people learn any language after getting their first language (mother tongue), it involves the language system and learning process.

2.       What is the difference between ‘second’ and ‘foreign’ language?

The defining factor between second language and foreign language is the language environment outside of the classroom.

Second language means that the language learner is exposed to the target language outside of the classroom in a variety of settings. They can use the second language in daily communication. For example, students who come from Indonesia to New York to learn English are learning in a second language environment.

Foreign language means that the learner will rarely have opportunity for use the target language outside of the classroom. For example, a student who is studying English while living in Indonesia would be studying a foreign language.

3.       What are the goals of SLA?

The goals of SLA are to describe how second language are acquired by learners and to explain the process which make a learner different in mastering second language better than other learners.

4.       Give an example of a ‘naturalistic’ learner. Why?

Naturalistic learner acquires second language naturally as a result of living in environment which the language is differ from their mother tongue. They learn second language because they get input from their environment, not from taking any language course before. They are very in tune with the environment so that they acquire second language by using it as the communication tool in their daily life.

5.       What is the difference between ‘mistakes’ and ‘errors’?

Mistakes reflect occasional lapses in performance. It happens when learners fail to perform the correct structure/knowledge that they know. For example, when someone wants to tell about his/her past experience, he/she has to use verbs in past form. However, he/she is not consistent use the past form, sometimes he/she still uses the present form. So, it can be called as mistakes.

While, errors reflect gaps in a learner’s knowledge. It happens because learners do not really know what the correct structure. For example, someone uses the present form consistently when telling past experience. It happens because he/she do not know any knowledge about it (do not know the past form of the verbs). So, it can be called as errors.

6.       Explain and give one example of ‘overgeneralization’.

Overgeneralization is errors which made by learners because they influence by the easy form of language to learn and process. They have learned a general concept, but do not yet understand its exceptions. For example, learners tend to use “eated” as past form in place of “ate”. Another example is learners tend to use “thinked” in place of “thought”.

7.       Explain two learning theories: Behaviorist and Mentalist. What are the implications of these learning theories for language teachers?

Behaviorist is proposed by B.F. Skinner, says that we acquire language through external stimuli and experience. So we can say that language learning involves habit formation (stimulus-response connection). While, mentalist is a theory associated with Noam Chomsky, says that language is innate. We are born with the mental capacity to work out the grammar and syntax of a language.

The implications of these learning theories for language teachers are: behaviorist learning theory cannot adequately account for language teachers to teach L2 learners, because learning is not just a response to the external stimuli. While in the mentalist learning theory teachers can use this theory for making their students acquire the second language by maximally using the human’s ability in predisposition.

8.       Consider the following data:

A: I like your shoes (expressing compliments)

B: Thank you

How can you explain the B’s response in terms of the acquisition of discourse rules?

Social factors effect second language acquisition but not directly. When we learn a language we don’t only learn it but we also learn its culture, social life, history. However there are social rules which native speakers obey when they communicate but L2 learner sometimes speak by taking into consideration the rules of his native language and he or she can change grammar rules, he or she can understand his speech because the meaning is convenient, but he or she can see that he makes an error because his speech doesn’t obey the grammar rules. These discourse rules can be transferred from L1 to L2 by communication.