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OVERVIEW- HANDOUT

The document provides an overview of language acquisition and learning, distinguishing between language learning as the intellectual study of language and language acquisition as the natural, intuitive process of gaining language skills through interaction. It discusses key theories, including Skinner's behaviorist theory and Chomsky's nativist theory, which emphasizes innate structures in language development. Contemporary research challenges the concept of Universal Grammar, suggesting that traditional grammatical categories may not be biologically or psychologically plausible.

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John Kenneth Vidal
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6 views

OVERVIEW- HANDOUT

The document provides an overview of language acquisition and learning, distinguishing between language learning as the intellectual study of language and language acquisition as the natural, intuitive process of gaining language skills through interaction. It discusses key theories, including Skinner's behaviorist theory and Chomsky's nativist theory, which emphasizes innate structures in language development. Contemporary research challenges the concept of Universal Grammar, suggesting that traditional grammatical categories may not be biologically or psychologically plausible.

Uploaded by

John Kenneth Vidal
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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 Overview of Language Acquisition and Learning

 Language Learning and Acquisition


The term "language learning" covers two clearly distinct but rarely understood concepts:
Study

Refers to the receiving of information about the language, to transform it into knowledge through
intellectual effort and to accumulate this knowledge through the exercise of memory.
Assimilation

Refers to the development of the functional ability to interact with foreigners, understanding and
speaking their language.
In English, the first concept is called language learning, while for the second, the term language acquisition
is used, one of which is not a natural consequence of the other (Krashen, 1987).
Acquisition means the process of gaining or obtaining something. In language learning, "acquisition" refers
to naturally developing the ability to understand and use a language through exposure and interaction, rather
than through formal study or memorization.
 Language Acquisition
- Language Acquisition refers to the process of natural, intuitive, subconscious assimilation, the fruit
of interaction in real situation of human conviviality in environments of the language and foreign
culture, in which the learner participates as an active subject.
- It is similar to the process of assimilation of the mother tongue by children; process that produces
practical-functional skill over spoken language and not theoretical knowledge; develops familiarity
with the phonetic characteristic of the language, its structure and its vocabulary.

 Language Learning
- The concept of language learning is linked to the traditional approach to language teaching, as it is
still generally practiced today in high schools. Attention is drawn to the language in its written form
and the objective is the student’s understanding of grammatical structure and language rules, the
part of which are dissected and analyzed.
- It is a task that requires intellectual effort and deductive-logical ability. Form has equal or greater
importance than communication. Teaching and learning are seen as activities in a technical-didactic
plan guided and delimited by pre-established content (Crystal, 1997).

 Behaviorist Theory of Language Acquisition

- One of the earliest scientific explanations of language acquisition was provided by Skinner (1957) .
As one of the pioneers of behaviorism, he accounted for language development using environmental
influence, through imitation, reinforcement, and conditioning.

 Chomsky Theory of Language Development

- Naom Chomsky introduced the nativist theory of language development, emphasizing the role of
innate structures and mechanism in the human brain. Key points of Chomsky’s theory include:
1. Language Acquisition Device (LAD) – Chomsky proposed that humans have an inborn biological
capacity for language.

2. Universal Grammar – Human language share a deep structure rooted in a set of grammatical rules and
categories.

3. Poverty of the Stimulus – Chomsky argued that the linguistic input received by young children is often
insufficient (or “improvised”) for them to learn complexities of their native language, pointing to inherent
cognitive structures.

4. Critical Period – The brain particularly receptive to linguistic input, making language learning more
efficient.

 Universal Grammar

- It is an idea of innate, biological grammatical categories, such as a noun category and a verb
category, that facilitate the entire language development in children and overall language processing
in adults.

 Contemporary Research

- A decade or two later, some psycholinguists began to question the existence of Universal Grammar.
The argued that categories like nouns and verbs are biologically, evolutionarily, and psychologically
implausible and that the field called for an account that can explain the acquisition process without
innate categories.

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