As teachers implement performance-based assessments into their language classrooms, they must provide students with a clear, objective description of their performance and translate this performance into an objective grade. To make the judgment valid and more reliable, a scoring scale referred to as a rubric or scoring rubric can be used. Both…

Examined the influence of the social use and the history of acquisition of Euskera on comprehension and recall of two versions (Euskera-Castilian) of a scientific text read by bilingual high school and college students. Results suggested that both extensive social use and an active history of acquisition of a language improve the level of…

This study was conducted in the context of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) research to conceptually validate the roles of breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension in academic settings and to empirically evaluate a test measuring three elements of the depth dimension of vocabulary knowledge, including,…

This cross-sectional investigation focused on second language (L2) communication among students in a junior high French late immersion program. Effects of language, sex, and grade on willingness to communicate, anxiety, and perceived communication competence, on frequency of communication in French, and on attitudes and motivation variables were…

Computer keystroke-logging programs, which record all keystrokes and mouse actions, facilitate the collection of quantitative data about text creation during writing revision. Presents the LS graph, a novel way of graphically representing and summarizing the quantitative data collected when keystroke logging. (Author/VWL)

Proposes a research agenda that makes acquisitional research central to the study of comprehensible output (CO). Looks at the context in which the CO hypothesis was proposed--that of looking beyond comprehensible input as a condition for second language acquisition. (Author/VWL)

Examines the occurrence and use of recasts in adult native-speaker/nonnative-speaker interactions in a classroom setting. Focuses on native speaker recasts in three types of negotiations: one-signal negotiated interactions, extended negotiated interactions, and non-negotiated interactions, and on recasts in response to nonnative speaker levels of…

Two cross-sectional studies used a replication design to investigate the degree to which adult Francophone English-as-a-Second-Language learners' use of tense/aspect markers in past contexts supported the predictions of the aspect hypothesis and the degree to which it showed first language influence. (Author/VWL)

Examined how reading texts for different purposes affected amounts of incidental word learning. Grade 6 students were asked to read texts for fun, to learn about the topic of the text, and for text comprehension. Level of reading ability was a significant factor in all conditions. Low ability readers learned hardly any words incidentally;…

This longitudinal, classroom-based study investigated the nature of dyadic interaction in an adult English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) classroom. It examined the nature of interaction between 10 pairs of adult ESL students over a range of language tasks and over time. Four distinct patterns of dyadic interaction were found. (Author/VWL)

Identifies three areas of research relevant to examining literacy acquisition in bilinguals, explains the contributions of each, and associates each with a skill required by monolingual and bilingual children in the development of literacy acquisition skills. (Author/VWL)

Extends the line of research that has recently applied the savings paradigm from cognitive psychology to vocabulary relearning. Second language data from 3044 returnees from Japan and Korea provide evidence of the strongest savings effect yet reported in studies of lexical reactivation. (Author/VWL)

Data from three children learning Spanish are explored for the development of linguistic person in an inflectional language. Contrastive use of person, tense, and number and the presence of overt subjects and overt objects are examined. (Author/VWL)

Examines feasibility of an experimental computerized training for fluent lexical retrieval in the second language in a classroom setting, applying techniques previously restricted to laboratory use. Results on both a lexical decision task and written lexical retrieval task show students in each condition have higher accuracy scores and superior…

Reviews processing (PI) instruction, outlines a model of input processing, describes the nature of PI, and discusses research on it to date. (Author/VWL)