2009-10-30

Language Acquisition and Development: Studies of Learners of First and Other Languages            by B. Tomlinson (ed.)

Continuum 2007       ISBN 082649269 X

My comments:

This paper is about language acquisition and development, aiming to investigate and connect those aspects of L1 and L2 language acquisition which might be of interest to the target audience, and to relate theories of language acquisition and development to its practice.

Firstly, the author makes an important distinction between ‘acquisition’ and ‘development’. The previous one is defined as ‘the initial stage of gaining basic competence’ and the other ‘the subsequent stage of gaining the ability’.

Part 1, casts a critical eye on language acquisition of literature and provides insights for language learning.

In Chapter 2, Agatha van Ginkel explores the issues involved when people first learnt to read in the language before they transfer their L2 reading skills to their L1.

In Chapter 3, processing of past tense verbs for L1 learners of English using two competing theories has been explained.

The following chapters mainly discuss presentation of meaning of utterances, imitation and affect and cognition, etc.

Part 2 consists of eight chapters, each of which reports on a research study, including the value of repeated and varied recasts, influence of story-based instruction on young L2 learner’s written expression, etc.

The paper ends with the conclusions, where principles and procedures for language learning derived from previous chapters are formulated.

In my opinion, the paper is, however, not without weaknesses. Firstly, the important distinction between ‘acquisition’ and ‘development’, drawn in the introduction, is not developed or even referred to in the rest of the book. Second, the writing of certain parts of the paper can be more concise. A more succinct presentation would be useful.