Uppsala University

Department of English
Christine.Johansson@engelska.uu.se
018–471 12 55; Visiting hours: Thursdays 1–2 pm

Second Language Acquisition

Course material
Contents
Preliminary course plan and course literature
Topics for lectures and the seminar
Information on how to work
Study Questions and terminology + additional
readings
Selected Reference Books
Chapter 3 from Analysing Learner Language
“Do you believe in ghosts?” Corpus material (ULEC)
Second Language Acquisition (SLA)

Preliminary course plan

Course Literature: Ellis, R: Second Language Acquisition

Chapters in Ellis:
Ch. 1. Explaining and describing L2 acquisition: read as course introduction
Ch. 2. The nature of learner language
Ch. 3. Interlanguage

Choose one of the following chapters as self-study (discuss them in the exam)
Ch. 4. Social aspects of interlanguage
Ch. 5. Psycholinguistic aspects of interlanguage
Ch. 6. Discourse aspects of interlanguage

Ch. 7. Linguistic aspects of interlanguage

Ch. 8. Individual differences in L2 acquisition
Ch. 9. Instruction and L2 acquisition

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Lectures and seminar:

Lecture 1: 23 November
What is Second Language Acquisition?
How is L2 acquisition described and explained?
Error analysis

 Study chapters 1-2 in Ellis

 Do study questions 1-8

Lecture 2: 28 November
Learner language and interlaguage
Typology and markedness
Universal grammar (UG)
Learnability

 Study chapters 3 and 7 in Ellis

 Do study questions 9-17

Lecture 3: 30 November
Individual differences and instruction in L2 Acquisition
Learning strategies

 Study chapters 8-9 in Ellis

 Do study questions 18-25

Seminars: 1 December, 8 December (T2); 1 December: (B)

 Study the chapters in Ellis, go through and prepare all the study questions
Check the exams

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Study Questions

What is Second Language Acquisition?

1. Discuss what second language acquisition consists of.

2. Explain (see also the Glossary):

Target language
Learner language
Input
Overuse
Developmental pattern
Variability in learner language
Form-function mapping

3. What exactly is an error?

4. What is a case study? What methods could be applied?

5. How does the case study of the adult learner differ from the case studies of the two child
learners?

6. What is the difference between an error and a mistake?

7. Describe the different steps of an error analysis.

8. Which is the most important: to describe, explain or evaluate an error?

What is the purpose of an error analysis? Can it be used in a wrong way?

Learner Language and Interlanguage

9. Perform an error analysis on 10 ULEC papers.

Consider the following points:
Spelling
The use of the ’s genitive (apostrophe)
Subject-verb agreement
Verb forms (tense)
Prepositions
Vocabulary (Swenglish)

10. Determining how serious the errors are can be difficult. Use a scale from 1 – 5.

11. Describe the acquisition order for the past tense for L2 learners.

12. Compare morpheme acquisition orders in L1 and L2.

13. What is the difference between learner language and interlanguage?

14. Describe the mentalist theory of language learning.

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15. Explain (see also the Glossary):
LAD
Language typology
Language universals
Universal grammar (UG)
The Accessibility Hierarchy (for the acquisition of relative clauses)
Learnability
Markedness

16. What role does markedness (marked items in language) play in the L2?
Think about e.g. subject-verb agreement.

17. Ellis, Section 2: The nature of learner language (text 3) and Interlanguage (text 7): p. 93-
94, 98-99. Please read the passages and answer the questions.

Individual differences and instruction in L2 acquisition

18. Which factor/s/ is/are most important in L2 acquisition?

Aptitude
Motivation
Instruction

19. What is a learning strategy?

20. Individual learner differences are very important to consider for future teachers of
English. Explain why and mention particularly the part motivation plays.

21. What is instrumental motivation?

22. Discuss in some detail what impact teaching has on L2 learning. Include the teaching of
grammar, individual learner differences and strategy training.

23. What is form-focused instruction. Does it work?

24. Explain (see also the Glossary)

Production-based instruction
Input-based instruction
Consciousness-raising
The critical period hypothesis
The teachability hypothesis
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)

25. Ellis, Section 2: Individual differences in L2 acquisition (text 21) and Instruction and L2
acquisition (text 22): pp. 115-118. Please read the passages and answer the questions.

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Selected References and Additional Reading
Archibald, J. (Ed.). 2000. Second language acquisition and linguistic theory. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Bachman, L. F., & Palmer A. S. 1996. Language testing in practice. Oxford: OUP.
Casanave-Pearson, C. 1994. Language development in students’ journals. Journal of
second language writing, 3, 179–201.
Dean Brown, J. & Rogers, T. 2002. Doing second language research. Oxford: OUP.
Doff, A. 1988. Teach English. Cambridge: CUP.
Doughty, C. J. & Long, M. H. (Eds). 2005. The handbook of second language acquisition.
Oxford: Blackwell.
Doughty, C. J. & Long, M. H. (Eds). 2008. The handbook of language teaching. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Doughty, C. & Williams, J. (Eds). (1998). Focus on form in classroom second language
acquisition. Cambridge: CUP.
Ellis, N. C. 2001. Memory for language. In Robinson, P. (Ed.). Cognition and second
language acquisition. Cambridge: CUP.
Ellis, R. 1997. SLA research and language teaching. Oxford: OUP.
Ellis, R. 1998. Teaching and research: options in grammar teaching. TESOL Quarterly 32,
1, 39-60.
Ellis, R. (Ed). 2001. Form-focused instruction and second language learning. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Ellis, R. 2002. Does form-focused instruction affect the acquisition of implicit knowledge? –
A review of the research. Studies in second language acquisition, 24, 223-236.
Ellis, R. & Barkhuizen, G. 2005. Analysing learner language. Oxford: OUP.
Ellis, R. 2006. Current issues in the teaching of grammar. TESOL quarterly 40, 1, 83-107.
Ellis, R. 2008. [1994]. The study of second language acquisition. Second edition. Oxford:
OUP.
Eckert, P. 2003. Language and gender in adolescence. In Holmes, J. and Meyerhoff,
M. (eds.), The handbook of language and gender, 381–400. Oxford: Blackwell.
Ehrlich, S. 1997. Gender as a social practice: implications for second language acquisition
SSLA, 19, 421–446.
Elwood, J. 1998. Gender and performance in the GCE A-level: gender equity and the
gold standard. University of London: Institute of Education.
Johansson, C. & Geisler, C. 2009. The Uppsala Learner English Corpus. A
new corpus of Swedish high school students’ writing. In Saxena, A. and
Viberg, Å. (eds.), Multilingualism. Proceedings of the 23rd Scandinavian
Conference of Linguistics, 181–190. Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia
Linguistica Upsaliensia 8.
Johansson, C. & Geisler, C. (2011). Syntactic aspects of the writing of Swedish L2
learners of English. In Newman, J., Baayen, H. and Rice, S. (eds.), Corpus-
based studies in language use, language learning, and language documentation,
139–155. Amsterdam: Rodopi
Larsen-Freeman, D. 2001. Teaching language. From grammar ro grammaring. Boston:
Heinle & Heinle.
Larsen-Freeman, D. 2011. Teaching and testing grammar. In: Long, M. H. & Doughty, C.
J. (Eds). The handbook of language teaching. Oxford: Blackwell.
Larsen-Freeman, D. 2012. Teaching grammar. In: Celce-Murcia, M.
Teaching English as a second or foreign language. Boston: Heinle &
Heinle.
Lightbown, P.M. & Spada , N. (2006). How languages are learned. Oxford: OUP.

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Mitchell, R. & Myles, F. (2004). Second language learning theories. London: Hodder Arnold.
Murphy, P. & Ellwood, J. (1998). Gendered learning outside and inside school:
influences on achievement. In Epstein, D., Elwood, J., Hey, .V. and Maw, J. (eds.),
Failing boys? Issues in gender and achievement, 162–181. Buckingham: Open
UniversityPress.
Nassaji, H. & Fotos, S. (2012). Teaching Grammar in Second Language Classrooms:
Integrating Form-focused Instruction in Communicative Context. New York:
Taylor & Francis.
Norris, J. M. & Ortega, L. (2000). Effectiveness of L2 instruction: A research synthesis and
quantitative meta-analysis. Language Learning, 50, 3, 417-528.
Spada, N. & Lightbown, P. M. (1999). Instruction, first language influence, and
developmentalreadiness in second language acquisition. The modern language
journal, 83, 1-22.
Thornbury, S. (1999). How to teach grammar. London: Longman/Pearson Education.
Thornbury, S. (2002). How to teach vocabulary. London: Longman/Pearson Education.
Wallace, M. J. (1998). Action research for language teachers. Cambridge: CUP.

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