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Title: Beyond L2 grammar instruction

 

Vol. 6, 2019, pp. 79-86.

DOI: 10.46687/SILC.2019.v06.006

 

Author: Miroslava Tsvetkova

About the author: Associate Professor Miroslava Tsvetkova, PhD is a full-time lecturer in the Department of English studies at Konstantin Preslavsky University of Shumen, Bulgaria. The theoretical and practical contributions of her scientific production are in the field of Cognitive linguistics and Methodology of English language teaching. She was awarded a doctoral degree in the scientific specialty 05.07.03 after successfully defending a dissertation on some aspects of the acquisition of the present progressive by 1st-4th grade students. A continuation and upgrade of her dissertation is her habilitation work entitled “Taxonomy of the English constructions with “be” (Bulgarian learners’ acquisition, use and errors). She is an Associate professor in the area of 1. Pedagogical sciences, professional field 1.3. Pedagogy of education in… (Methodology of teaching English).

e-mail: m.tsvetkova@shu.bg

ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6774-8177

 

Citation (APA style): Tsvetkova, M. (2019). Beyond L2 grammar instruction. Studies in Linguistics, Culture, and FLT, 6, 79-86. doi: 10.46687/SILC.2019.v06.006

 

Link: https://silc.fhn-shu.com/images/issues/2019/vol6/SILC_2019_Vol%206_079-086_8.pdf

 

Abstract: Language acquisition is an ontogenetic, hierarchical, and complex process. In 1957, the psychologist B. F. Skinner, as a pioneer of behaviourism, described linguistics through human behavior in his book Verbal Behaviour and explained the learning of a language. Two years later, in 1959, Noam Chomsky criticized his proposal and the learnability of a language. He believed that language is an innate ability and for this reason he established the term “acquisition” to substitute “learning”.The constructivists, on the other hand, suggested that children were sensitive to patterns in the target language which enabled the acquisition process.

Recent language acquisition trends include the cognitive approach that can foster grammar acquisition. The article has tutorial nature, addressing recent advances in cognitive perception. The analysis of Bulgarian students’ questionnaires reveals the tendency in the students’ expectations to shift language acquisition to the cognitive constructivist approach, based on the work of Jean Piaget (2001) who argues that cognitive development precedes language. The article aims at investigating the barriers the students face while acquiring second language grammar structures rather than studying what they will learn. Besides their cognitive perception, students rely on their internal constructions of knowledge. They themselves construct their knowledge through experience as well as through communication. As Vygotsky (1978) states thought and language become linked through communication.

Key words: acquisition, learning, cognition, cognitive constructivist approach

 

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