Working Papers (1982-2000)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10125/37635

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Performance Assessment of ESL and EFL Students
(2000) Brown, James Dean; Hudson, Thom; Norris, John M.; Bonk, William; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of Second Language Studies.
Thirteen prototypical performance tasks were selected from over 100 based on their generic appropriateness for the target population and on posited difficulty levels (associated with plus or niinus values for linguistic code command, cognitive operations, and communicative adaptation, as discussed in Norris, Brown, Hudson, & Yoshioka, 1998, after Skehan, 1996, 1998). These l3 tasks were used to create three test forms (with one anchor task common to all forms), two for use in an ESL setting at the University of Hawai'i, and one for use in an EFL setting at Kanda University of International Studies in Japan. In addition, two sets ofrating scales were created based on task-dependent and task-independent categories. For each individual task, the criteria for the task-dependent categories were created in consultation with an advanced language learner, a language teacher, and a non-ESL teacher, all ofwhom were well-acquainted with the target population and the prototype tasks. These criteria for success were allowed to differ from task to task depending on the input ofour consultants. The task-independent categories were created for each of three theoretically motivated components of task difficulty in terms of the adequacy of: (linguistic) code command, cognitive operations, and communicative adaptation. A third rating scale was developed for examinees to rate their own performance in terms of their familiarity with the task, their performance on the task, and the difficulty of the task. Pilot data were gathered from ESL and EFL students at a wide range of proficiency levels. Their performances were scored by raters using the task dependent and task-independent criteria. Analyses included descriptive statistics, reliability estimates (interrater, Cronbach alpha, etc.), correlational analysis, and implicational scale analysis. The results are interpreted and discussed in terms of: (a) the distributions ofscores for the task-dependent and task-independent ratings, (b) test reliability and ways to improve the consistency of measurement, and (c) test validify and the relationship of our task-based test to theory.
Reading Reluctant Readers
(2000) Day, Richard R.; Bamford, Julian; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of Second Language Studies.
Yet it is possible for students to discover the benefits and pleaiures of being able to read in English. This can happen if extensive reading is incorporated into the EFL curriculum. This article introduces extensive reading as a way of improving students' attitude and motivation toward EFL reading as well as improving their proficiency in reading and their English language ability. we begin by explaining that easy and interesting reading material is the key factor in extensive reading. we discuss how to gather a library of suitable reading materials and how to encourage students to read them' Finally, we propose several ways of fitting extensive reading into the EFL curriculum.
Negotiating the L2 Linguistics Environment
(2000) Doughty, Catherine; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of Second Language Studies.
Increasingly, the interests of L2 teachers and social interactionist SLA researchers have converged upon the aim of understanding language leaming processes that are engaged as a consequence of the kinds of tasks and participation patterns that teachers (or researchers) choose to use in order to promote SLA. This convergence of practical and empirical interests is well represented in a line of classroom-oriented SLA research known as negotiation studies. In contrast to the increasingly frequent use of negotiation to describe pedagogical constructs such as the negotiated syllabus or the negotiated curriculum, in which the notion of negotiation is more akin to the everyday sense of (teachers and learners) reaching explicitly stated agleement on language leaming (and other) goals, in second Language Acquisition (SLA) research, negotiation has, thus far, referred particularly to the negotiation of meaning, which is an incidental, discourselevel language acquisition process that occurs typically during communicative language leaming tasks. This paper presents the negotiation model and discusses a number of empirical studies in order to convey the unique perspective which SLA brings to the notion ofnegotiation and to assess its relevance for language teaching practice. To this end, the aims are (a) to present the social interactionist perspective on SLA in a historical fashion, tracing its early tendency to emphasize the importance of meaning and communication to SLA through to its increasingly sophisticated recognition that SLA involves the continual mapping by leamers of L2 forms, meanings, and communicative function; (b) to review critically the negotiation studies which sought empirically to establish a connection between interaction and SLA, and (c) to show how the shortcomings ofthe empirical research on negotiation has been the impetus for the promising line ofclassroom SLA research known as focus on form.
Perspective and Narrative Structure Structure–A Cognitive Perspective
(2000) Jacobs, Roderick A.; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of Second Language Studies.
Written narrative discourse demands sophisticated tracking of mental spaces (Fauconnier, 1994). Such tracking requires readers to construct complex mental models incorporating much that is inexplicit h the prose. These models interact in subtle and intricate ways. The construal task involves more than the evocation of sequential scenarios, since particular stages in a narrative may arise from the blendrng of two or more mental models drawing on subsets of features of the source models. During this process of creative construal, readers construct, activate, and adiust a spatio-temporal focus enabling them to integrate the interpretation of indiyidual sentences into more global interpretations. This focus, referred to as the "deictic center" (Rapaport et.al, 1999), shifts constantly as the narrative Progresses. Characters in a narrative shift in and out of this center over the coutse of the narrative. Although such linguistic phenomena as anaphora, motion verbs, tense-marking, relative clause structures, and nominalizations may matk the ever-shifting deictic center, it is also true that readers must also draw on complex inferential skills to intelptet the narrative flow, i.e., to construct a coherent model of the narrative events, incorporating unexpressed information. The mental spaces evoked are interrelated, even blended, in complex and sometimes subde ways illustrated here in an examination of narrative segments from novels by Philippa Pearce, John Grisham, and Ann Tyler, and a Blake lyric.
Application of Markedness Theory to Japanese Learners' Acquisition of Discourse Factors in the Dative Alternation
(2000) Katsufuji, Kazuko Shimabukuro; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of Second Language Studies.
Transfer is an important element in second language acquisition, and researchers have sought to identify the conditions that promote and inhibit transfer. One of the most rigorous claims in research on transfer is that the degree of transferability of different features depends on their degree of markedness. Eckman (1977 , 1981 , 1996) has advanced the Markedness Differential Hypothesis (MDH) to account for "(1) why some NL-TL differences do not cause diffrculty, and (2) why some differences are associated with degrees of difficulty and others are not (Eckman, 1996, p.199)." Eckman claims that the transfer effects surface when the area of L1 is unmarked and the area of L2 marked, but does not exist when the area of L1 is marked and the L2 unmarked. In this paper, data from native language (NL), interlanguage (IL), and target language (TL) are analyzed to examine how discourse factors of English dative alternation are acquired by Japanese adult learners of English, then the results are interpreted within the framework of Eckman's MDH. The first section of this paper briefly reviews the concept of markedness in general and in MDH. In the second section, what is known about discourse constraints on the dative alternation in English is discussed. In the third section, a brief review of research on Japanese dative structures is provided, since the MDH makes predictions dependent on the universal principles and the native language of the learner. The subsequent sections outline the research hypotheses, describe the experiment, and interpret the results, which are in general consistent with the hypothesis. Finally, suggestions are made for additional research.
From May You? To Do you Mind? A Case Study of ILP Development in Requests
(1999) Li, Xiaoxia; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
This is a case study about interlanguage pragmatic (ILP) development in speech acts of request based on natural as well as elicited data from a 12-year-old chinese girl (Amy) over the period of her seven-month stay in tlawai'i. The two research questions are: (a) To what extent did Amy's performance in requests change over time with regard to request realization strategies and modification (b) How was Amy's request development identical with or different from the participants in previous studies? The analysis and results of the data show that in request strategres there is a shift from conventional indirectness to directness and nonconventional indirectness in accordance with the degree of request imposition and obligation/right of the interlocutors, but no variation is observed with respect to the social distance between the interlocutors. For request modification the politeness marker please is consistently the primary internal modification device, and there is a decrease in the use of grounders in external modification over the time. Amy's early reliance on speech formulas, the overwhelming use of conventional indirect strategies ard the politeness marker please, the improvernent in strategies prior to that in realizational linguistic means, the imitation learning strategy, and the function of conscious noticing are consistent with the findings in previous studies. However, the acquisitional sequence of requestive strategies the sensitivity of some situational factors, and the decrease in the use of grounders are aspects different from previous studies.
Data Collection in Pragmatics Research
(1999) Kasper, Gabriele; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
Authentic discourse, elicited conversation, and roleplay are types of spoken interaction; production questionnaires, multiple-choice, and scaled response instuments are survey methods and thus obtain written responses when self-administered; interviews are a specific type of spoken interaction that may or may not be structured by a questionnaire; in its less structured forms, interviews produce narrative self-reports and axethusakintodiariesasastory-tellinggenre.Think aloud protocols can be related to interviews and diaries in that they, too, produce narrative self-reports; however, in their classic fornu they are on-line verbalizations of thought processes rather than stories. Verbal protocol shave their home in experimental psychology and are thus furthest removed from the conversational interaction in authentic talk activities that opened the list of data collection procedures in pragmatics. I shall now consider each procedure in tum.
Cognitive Underpinnings of Focus on Form
(1999) Doughty, Catherine; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
The purpose of this paper is to examine focus on form in cognitive processing terms by postulating plausible, psychologically real, cognitive correlates for a range of L2 learning processes that have become prevalent in the instructed second language acquisition (SLA) literature. Progress in adult SLA is thought often to depend crucially upon cognitive processes such as paying attention to features of target input' noticing interlocutor reactions to interlanguage output' and making insightful comparisons involving differences between input and output utterance details- To be effective' these cognitive comparisons must be carried out under certain conditions of processing meaning, forms, and function, i.e., conditions which promoteprocessingfor language learning. Whereas pedagogically oriented discussions of issues-such as noticing the gap and L2 processing-abound, psycholinguistically motivated rationales for pedagogical recommendations are still rare.
Tailoring Cloze: Three Ways to Improve Cloze Tests
(1999) Brown, James Dean; Yamashiro, Amy D.; Ogane, Ethel; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
The purpose of the present study was to explore how the hit-and-miss, modification, and tailored-cloze methods can be used to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of cloze tests. To help organize the results of the present study, tle following research questions were posed: (1) What is the effect on the mean and standard deviation for a cloze test when applying the hit-or-miss. modification, and tailored-cloze methods? (2) To what degree are the item facilities and dissimination indices changed by applyng the hit-or-miss, modification, and tailored-cloze methods? (3) What is the effect on reliability of applying the hit-or-miss, modification, and tailored-cloze methods? A much fuller description of the steps involved in using the hit-or-miss, modification, and tailored-cloze methods will be provided later in this paper.
Word Associations in L2 Vocabulary
(1999) Kudo, Yoshimitsu; Thagard, Devon; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
L1 word association research findings indicating that there may be a shift in response types from syntagmatic to paradigmatic responses as a function of age led L2 researchers to study whether or not there is a similar shift as a function of proficiency mong L2 leamers. Using the Kent-Rosanoff Iist, a lis of 100-word stimuli, to elicit leaners' written responses, Soderman (1993) observed a trend towards such a shift and took it as evidence that L2 eamers and children acquiring their L1 go through similar proceses of lexical orgaization. This study elicited responses via an aural-oral version of the Kent-Rosanoff list from 25 Japanese participats using the TOEFL as a measue of proficiency. We found nosyntagmatic-paragmatic shift: Across the proficiency levels all leaners produced more pandigmatic than syntagmatic resposes, and few clang responses. We attributed this finding to be problematic categorization of response types: the broad definition of pradigmatic responses and narrow definition of syntagmatic responses led to a natural dominance of paradigmatic responses accross all levels. Word association research shows promise for exmining the orgnization of mental lexicons, but the syntagnatic-paradigmatic categories are too simplified to offer an indepth insight into the complexity of lexical organization. Futher research is necessary with different L1 backgorunds using different lists and operationalizations of leanrers' proficiency.
Rethinking Needs in an English Language Program: Three Case Studies in English for Academic Purposes
(1999) Narita, Yoneko Z.; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
lndividual case studies were undertaken to investigate the English listening and speaking needs of three international students at an American university. The purpose ofthis research was to determine how well the English language program at the university is meeting the needs of its ESL students' Ethnographic methods were used to document the experiences of the participants -graduate students in Engineering, Japanese, and Business-as they successfully adapted to the discourses of their majors during the course of a semester. Predictably, highly variable uses of language were found in the three very different disciplines. It is suggested that a more effective approach to teaching English for Academic Purposes (EAP) is to focus on the leaming processes ofthe students, rather than the diverse range of products they are required to generate. valious factors that facilitate these leaming processes are discussed, as well as suggestions for incorporating them into pedagogy.
"Come Si Dice in Italiano?": A Case Study of L1 Attrition
(1999) Stanzani, Mouna Elena; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
This paper describes a case study of Italian Ll attrition. Several areas of the participant's Ll are examined, with a focus on lexical attrition and the consequent use of communication strategies to prevent communication breakdowns. Particular attention is given to the manner in which the redundancy reduction, markedness, and salience principles may affect production. The participant's Ll competence is tested as well to examine whether certain areas of it are at all affected by attrition. From the data collected, there are reasons to believe that attrition affects mainly production, in the form of diminished accessibilitY.
SLA: Breaking the Siege
(1998) Long, Michael H.; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
After 30 years of steady growth and reasonable productivity, the field of SLA has recently come under attack from several quarters. Critics allege that, among other things, too many SLA researchers (a) focus overly narrowly on learner-internal, cognitive processes, ignoring social context; (b) inhabit an outdated modernist world, oblivious to the post-modernist "enlightenment;" and (c) believe their work has relevance for language teaching, when it has none. While few of the criticisms survive even cursory examination, the fact that they receive so much attention in the literature, including in some supposedly scholarly journals, suggests a number of structural problems in the field, which need to be addressed.
Critical Pedagogy in an Academic ESL Writing Classroom
(1998) Knapp, Gina Clymer; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
In an attempt to find out more about these issues, this study provides an ethnographic investigation ofan academic ESL writing classroom. I explore how students' understanding of what it means to write and leam to write interacts with the teacher's perception of these processes. I also examine how a critical approach might be used in a way that is appropriate for intemational students in an academically oriented classroom. In the review of the literature that precedes the discussion of the study, I examine several philosophies of writing, then discuss what has been written about the place of a critical approach in the academic ESL writing classroom.
The Role of HCE in a Political Statirist's Mock Campaign for Governor
(1998) Fontanilla, Elizabeth; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
The state of Hawai'i is unique because no single ethnic group constitutes a majority (Sato, 1994). However, the population is far fiom being a 'hannonious melting pot' with racial tensions even considered a problem in the schools (Watson-Gegeo, 1990). Kawamoto (1993) describes the residents as reflecting a "mosaic" of ethnic integration with identities being investigated, preserved, and celebrated. Nevertheless, the people of Hawai'i do share a common language, Hawai'i Creole English (HCE), which is spoken by just under half of the state's population of over one million residents (Romaine, 1994). As a descendant of the Hawai'i Pidgin English (HPE) developed by immigrant sugarcane plantation workers from about 1890-1910 (Reineke, 1969; Sato, 19S5), HCE serves as a marker of "local" identity that unites the otherwise diverse population (Kawamoto, 1993; Sato, 1991; Watson-Gegeo, 1990). This solidarity function is thought to be associated with a pride in belonging to the group and would be extended to positive attitudes toward the language ofthe group (HCE), but this is not the case. ln this paper, I will first explore the history of language in the islands, the domains and functions of HCE use, the specific linguistic structures and features that characterize it apart from Standard English (SE), and the research on attitudes toward HCE. This framework will then be applied to ananalysis ofone speaker's use of the language.
The Acquisition of Multiple wh-questions by High-proficiency Non-native Speakers of EnglishThe Acquisition of Multiple wh-questions by High-proficiency Non-native Speakers of English
(1998) Bley-Vroman, Robert; Yoshinaga, Naoko; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
This paper investigates the knowledge of multiple wh-questions such as who ate what? by highproficiency non-native speakers of English whose first language is Japanese. Japanese grammar is known to license a wider range of such questions than English-who came why, for example– although the precise theoretical account is not yet clear. Acceptability judgmenb were obtained on six different types of such questions. Acceptability of English examples was rated by native speakers ofEnglish; Japanese examples were judged by native speakers of Japanese, and the English examples were judged by high-proficiency Japanese speakers of English. The results for native speakers judging their own language were generally in accord with expecrations. The high-level non-native speakers of English were significantly different from native speakers in their ratings ofthese sentences. However, the ratings were clearly not simply the result oftransfer. The consequences of this finding for theories of Universal Grammar in second language acquisition are discussed.This paper investigates the knowledge of multiple wh-questions such as who ate what? by highproficiency non-native speakers of English whose first language is Japanese. Japanese grammar is known to license a wider range of such questions than English-who came why, for example– although the precise theoretical account is not yet clear. Acceptability judgmenb were obtained on six different types of such questions. Acceptability of English examples was rated by native speakers ofEnglish; Japanese examples were judged by native speakers of Japanese, and the English examples were judged by high-proficiency Japanese speakers of English. The results for native speakers judging their own language were generally in accord with expecrations. The high-level non-native speakers of English were significantly different from native speakers in their ratings ofthese sentences. However, the ratings were clearly not simply the result oftransfer. The consequences of this finding for theories of Universal Grammar in second language acquisition are discussed.
Issues in Teaching Second Language Reading
(1998) Bamford, Julian; Day, Richard R.; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
Look through the window of any second or foreign language (L2) reading classroom and, invariably, you will see teacher and students seated with books open in front of them. This superficial similarity masks vast differences in teaching methodology, however. As the 20th century draws to a close, there are, around the world, at least four distinctive approaches to the teaching of L2 reading: grammar-translation, comprehension questions, skills and stategies, and extensive reading. After briei descriptions of the four approaches to teaching reading, this paper surveys a selection of recent articles and books that address important concems in L2 reading pedagogy. Finally, questions are raised about the relationship of theory, research, and teaching practice.
The Alternatives in Language Assessment: Advantages and Disadvantages
(1998) Brown, James Dean; Hudson, Thom; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
Language testing is different from testing in other content areas because language teachers have more choices to make than teachers of other subject matter. The purpose of this article is to help language teachers decide what types of language tests to use in their particular institutions and classrooms for their specific purposes. The various kinds of language assessments are categorized into three broad categories: (a) selected-response assessments (including tue-false, matching, and multiple' choice assessments), (b) constructed-response assessments (including fill-in, short-answer, and performance assessments), and (c) personal-response assessments (including conference, portfolio, and self/peer assessments). For each assessment type, we provide a clear definition and explore its advantages and disadvantages. We end the article with a discussion of how teachers can make rational choices among the various assessment options by thinking about (a) the consequences of the washback effect of assessment procedures on language teaching and learning, (b) the significance of feedback based on the assessment results, and (c) the importance of using multiple sources of information in making decisions based on assessment information.
The Acquisition of the Easy-to-V Structure by Korean Adult Learners of English: What Influences Their Interpretive Behavior?
(1998) Kim, Boram; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
Much research in second language acquisition has been carried out investigating a learner's linguistic system while focusing on only a single linguistic level without reference to the function of other linguistic elements. Considering how one acquires a language, we cannot fail to include semantics and pragmatics as well as syntax since all three simultaneously influence the learner's competence and performance in the new language. Gass (1989) claims that a composite picture of the nature of second language acquisition must include studies investigating the simultaneous acquisition of grammatical components. In this regard, the present study is intended to scrutinize the sentence-processing strategies of Korean adult learners of English emphasizing the ways in which they interpret the easy-to-V structure sentences. In order to broaden our understanding of the acquisition of the complex syntactical structure which appears to be a likely candidate for late acquisition, this study takes into consideration a semantic approach as well as a syntactic approach to language acquisition takirrg the competition model (Bates & MacWhinney, 1982; MacWhinney, 1987a; MacWhirrney & Bates, 1989) as its basis.
Focus on Form in Task-based Language Teaching
(1998) Long, Michael H.; Brown, James D.; University of Hawaii at Manoa. Department of English as a Second Language.
Given adequate opportunities, older children, adolescents, and adults can and do leam much of an L2 grammar incidentally, which focusing on meaning, or communication. Research shows, however, that a focus on meaning alone (a) is insufficient to achieve full native-like competence, and (b) can be improved upon, in terms of both rate and ultimate attainment, by periodic anention to language as object. ln crassroom settings, this is best achieved not by a retum to discrete-point grammar teaching, or what I call focus on forms, where classes spend most of their time working on isolated linguistic structures in a sequence predetermined externally by a syllabus designer or textbook writer. Rather during an otherwise meaning-focused lesson, and using a variety of pedagogic procedures, learnens' attention is briefly shifted to linguistic code features, in context, when students experience problems as they work on communicative task, i.e., in a sequence determined by their own internal syllabuses, current processing capacity, and learnability constraints. This is what I call focus on form. Focus on form is one of several methodological principles in Task-Based Language Teaching.

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