Level of Grammatical Proficiency and Acquisition of Functional Projections: The case of Iranian learners of English language

Subject Areas :

Fariba Khorvash ¹ , Ahmadreza Lotfi ² , Ahmad Ameri-Golestan ³

1 - Department of English, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, Islamic Azad University, Isfahan, Iran
2 - Department of English, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, Islamic Azad University, Isfahan, Iran
3 - Department of English, Isfahan (Khorasgan) Branch, Islamic Azad University, Isfahan, Iran

Received: 2020-07-23 Accepted : 2020-11-14 Published : 2021-04-01

Keywords: Second Language Acquisition, Picture Description Task, grammaticality judgment task, Functional Projections, L2 learner,

Abstract :

Unlike Lexical Projections, Functional Projections (Extended Projections) are more of an ‘abstract’ in nature. Therefore, Functional Projections seem to be acquired later than Lexical Projections by the L2 learners. The present study investigates Iranian L2 learners’ acquisition of English Extended Projections taking into account their level of grammatical proficiency. Specifically, the aim is to identify the level of grammatical proficiency at which the acquisition of Extended Projections could occur in the process of learning English by the Iranian students. Two hundred and seventy Iranian female L2 learners of English participated in this study. Participants were administered three tests with a ten-day interval between each test. First, an Oxford Placement Test (OPT) was used to classify the participants’ level of grammatical proficiency. Second, a Grammaticality Judgment Task (GJT) was administered in order to assess the learners’ ability to recognize grammatical problems in Extended Projections. Finally, a picture description task (PDT) was administered to examine the learners’ ability to produce grammatical Extended Projections. The results indicated that the learners are able to recognize and produce English Extended Projections even at lower levels of grammatical proficiency. The results also showed that the learner’s recognition and production of English Extended Projection improves with their increased level of grammatical proficiency.

References:

Allan, D. (2004). Oxford Placement Test. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Aryanik, A., & Lotfi, A.R. (2015). Complementiser projections in English (L1=Persian) interlanguage: A generative study of second language acquisition. Salmagundi-A Quarterly of The Humanities and Social Sciences, 6(1S), 132-140.
Brown, H.D. (2014). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching: A Course in Second Language Acquisition. White Plains, NY: Pearson Education, Inc.
Corver, N. (2013). Lexical categories and Extended Projections. In M. Den Dikken (Ed.). The Cambridge Handbook of Generative Syntax (pp. 353-424). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Ellis, R. (1985). Understanding second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ellis, R. (1990). Instructed second language acquisition. Oxford: Blackwell.
Eptatein, S., Flynn, S. & Martohardjono, G. (1996). Second Language acquisition: theoretical and empirical issues in contemporary research. Brain and behavioral sciences,19, 677-714.
Gass, S. M., & Selinker, L. (2001). Second language acquisition: An introductory course (2nd ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Hawkins, R. (2001). Second language syntax: A generative introduction. Blackwell Publishing, MA.
Hawkins, R., Al-Eid, S., Almahboob, I., Athanasopoulos,P., Chaengchenkit, R., Hu, J., … Velasco-Zarate, K. (2006). Accounting for English article interpretation by L2 speakers. In Foster-Cohen, S. H., Marta Medved rajnovic and Jelena Mihal evi D igunovi (Eds.), EUROSLA Yearbook (Vol.6, pp.7 – 25). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Hernández, T. (2011). Re-examining the role of explicit instruction and input flood on the acquisition of Spanish discourse markers. Language Teaching Research, 15(2), 159–182.
Hopp, H. (2017). The processing of English wh-questions in adult L2 learners: Effects of L1 transfer and proficiency. eitsc ri t r Sprac issensc a t, 36(1), 107–134.
Ionin, T., Zubizarreta,M. L., & Philippov, V. (2009). Acquisition of article semantics by child and adult L2-English learners. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 12(3), 337- 361.
Jabbari, A., & Pourhashemi, M.R. (2011). The Acquisition of English Negation as a Foreign Language by Persian Speakers. Journal of Literature and Language, (27), 46-69.
Jara, L.P. (2015). The Acquisition of the 3rd person singular –s in English: Exploring its use by L2 learners of English in written and oral register. Bachelor’s dissertation, Retrieved from https://core.ac.uk
Khorvash, F., & Lotfi, A.R. (2019). Grammatical proficiency and access to Extended Projections in Iranian learners of English as a second language. Cogent Education, 6 (1), 1-11.
Krashen, S. (1977). The monitor model for adult second language performance. In M. Burt, H. Dulay, & M. Finocchiraro (Eds.), Viewpoints on English as a Second Language. NewYork: Regents.
Krashen, S. (1981). Second language acquisition and second language learning. Oxford: Pergamon Press.
Lingli, D., & Wannaruk, A. (2010). The effects of explicit and implicit instruction in English refusals. Chinese Journal of Applied Linguistics, 33(3), 93–109.
Long, M. (1983). Does second language instruction make a difference? A review on the research. TESOL Quarterly 17, 359-82
Long, M. (1991). Focus on form: A design feature in language teaching methodology. In de Bot, K., Ginsberg, R., Kramsch, C.(Eds.), Foreign language research in cross-cultural perspective. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
McLaughlin, B. (1978). The monitor model: Some methodological considerations. Language Learning, 28,309-332.
McLaughlin, B. (1990) . “Conscious” versus “ unconscious” learning. TESOL Quarterly, 24, 617-634.
O’grady, W. (2006). The problem of verbal inflection in second language acquisition. Invited talk to the Pan-Pacific Association of Applied Linguistics, to appear in the proceedings.
Parviz, M., & Gorjian, B. (2013). The effect of form-focused instruction (FFI) on teaching English grammar to Iranian students at the intermediate level. International Journal of Language Learning and Applied Linguistics World, 4(4), 450–462.
Plauen, E. O. (2014). Vater und Sohn - Zwei, dei sich lieb haben S dverlag GmbH.
Rizzi, L. & Cinque, G. (2016). Functional categories and Syntactic Theory. The Annual Review of Linguistics, 2, 139-63.
Roux, C. L. (1996). Linguistic theory and second language acquisition! How not to lose sight of the wood for the trees. Stellenbosch Papers in Linguistics, Vol. 30, 43-63
Schulz, B. (2006). Wh-scope marking in English interlanguage grammars: Transfer and processing effects on the second language acquisition of complex wh-questions. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Hawaii, HI , USA.
Schulz, B. (2011). Syntactic creativity in second language English: Wh-scope marking in Japanese-English interlanguage. Second Language Research, 27(3). 313–41.
Schwartz, B. & Sprouse, R. (1994). Word order and nominative case in non-native language acquisition: a longitudinal study of (L1 Turkish) German interlanguage. In T. Hoekstra
& B. Schwartz (Eds.), Acquisition studies in generative grammar: Papers in honor of Kenneth Wexler from the 1991 GLOW workshops, (pp. 317- 368). Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Schwartz, B. & Sprouse, R. (1996). L2 cognitive states and the ‘full transfer/full access’ model. Second Language Research, 12, 40-72.
Spada, N., Jessop, L., Tomita, Y., Suzuki, W., & Valeo, A. (2014). Isolated and integrated form-focused instruction: Effects on different types of L2 knowledge. Language Teaching Research, 18(4), 453–473.
Spinner, P. & Juffs, A. (2008). L2 grammatical gender in a complex morphological system: The case of German. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 46, 315–348.
Swain, M. (2005). The output hypothesis: Theory and research. In E. Hinkel (Ed.), Handbook of research in second language teaching and learning, (pp. 471-483). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Tasseva-Kurktchieva, M. (2015). Can production precede comprehension in L2 acquisition? Second Language Research, 31(4), 493-522.
White, L. (2003). Second Language Acquisition and Universal Grammar: New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
White, L. (2008). Definiteness effects in the L2 English of Mandarin and Turkish speakers. In Chan. H, Jacob. H, & Kapia E. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 32nd Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development (BUCLD), (pp.550-56). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.
Yoshimura, N., & Nakayama, M. (2009). L1 effects in the acquisition of inflectional morphology by Japanese EFL Learners. Retrieved from: http://www2.fcsh.unl.pt/ clunl/pl2/pdfs/Noriko_Yoshimura_%26_Mineharu_Nak yama.pdf.