Finding Articles for your Research Study

A. To find (the title of) a good article:

1st Search the Literature Review &/or Reference sections of articles that you already have

2nd Search online (Google Scholar) and Google

3rd Search Linguistic articles/books (学内)

4th Search Japanese Journals

5th Search other online journals (links below*)


-If you can't find good articles, change or add more search terms. Try using words like proficiency, competence, EFL or ESL, L2, second language learning (or aquisition), evaluation, comparison, analysis, influence, efficacy, factors, causes, effects, results


B. When you find an good article/book title that you want:

1st View it online, if possible: check Google Scholar

2nd Get it from the Ferris library, if possible: search OPAC
-Check below for a list of TESOL Journals at Ferris**

3rd Get it from another Japanese university library: search Web Cat
-Then have your friends get it or order it from Ferris Library.



*Online Journals
JALT (Japan Association of Language Teachers) Journal
(password required – ask Caleb for current one)
Language Teacher (shorter, less academic - from JALT)
(password required – ask Caleb for current one)
Journal of Asia TEFL
(password "required" – but just click enter)
Asian EFL Journal

Korea TESOL Journal
TESOL-EJ
The Internet TESL Journal (shorter, less academic)

Specific topics:

JALT Teaching Children

JALT Bilingualism
JALT CALL (computer assisted language learning)
Language Learning & Technology

Reading in a Foreign Language
Reading Matrix

**TESOL Journals in the Library (More academic, but longer and more difficult)
TESOL Quarterly
Language Learning

Modern Language Journal
Studies in Second Language Acquisition

Possible test questions

I will ask 3 or 4 and you need to exaplain in a paragraph

What is comprehensible input?

What is the difference between active& passive vocabulary?

What are 4 vocabulary strategies?

Why is listening important (3 reason)?

What is the definition of communicative competence?

Communicative competence has 3 branches. What are they? Describe?

What is the process for teaching grammar?

How many words do we need to know? Why?

Why are structure practice/drills important?

For listening activities in class, when should we listen to perfect, clear English
and when should we listen to natural impect English?

Should we learn American English?

What are key speaking skills that affect our ability to communicate?

What does it mean to know a word?

When should we teach 1+0. i+1, i+5?

What is a communicative activity?

What are listening skills we need to learn?

What are the 3 main speaking skills?

What is the silent period,critical period, and the fossilization>

What are ways to organize a conversation class?

Active v. Passive

Active words are words that you use. There are less active words compared to passive words.
Passive words are words that you understand, but doesn't use. There are many passive words. Passive words are words you learn by listening/reading, and Active words are words that you learn by writing/speaking.

Mari

Vocabulary Strategies★

There are totally four major vocabulary strategies for students to get worked on as they can be able to have confidence and ease. To be a successful reader, students need to guess the meaning of words that are unknown from context cludes.However guessing might be slow and difficult at first, the goal of doing this is to reach a level of skill where guessing corresponds to what actually meant in the text. What you want to do next is making your original word cards about 1.5 inches by 1.2 inches, because learning from word cards strategy is the first meeting with the words and you will bw able to read and write naturally and successfully as you work on it. As English words are mixed with parts that are very useful to use as a kind of mnemonic and keyword technique when have unknown words, using word parts is effective way of learning neew vocabulary. While the guessing the meaning from a given context is one that provide access to the meaning, using a dictionary helps students to aquire new vocabulary.



Maiko Osawa

How many words and which ones we need to learn

There are milions of words in English.
So, effective strategy is require.
We need to learn the 3,000 most flequent words first.

the most common words cover wide range of sentences.
2,000words=80~87%
3,000words=90~95%
Low frequency=2%

If we know these 3,000words completely, rest of words in the article can be guess by meaning.

Then, students should learn the word they're interested in.
For example, university students must know academic words, Caleb needs to get many words of baby and so on.

05AA020 Narumi Ota

Ideal Learner

Rubin defined charactaristics of ideal learner.

The person who is motivated and free is good learner, and also he should continue studying happily and seeing own and other person's speech.

Stern's list was similer, but he also mensioned that knowing strategy to get the target langage is significant.

05AA020 Narumi Ota

Theories of language acquisitions

To learn a new language, there are three stages to go though: the silent period,critical period, and the fossilization. The silent period is when the students doesn't feel comfortable to talk, therefore they just be quiet and listen (Quantitiy of intake). The critical period is when the student start to use (output) the language but the first language interferes the second language(They make therir own language:first and second language mixed;interlanguage). After they get use to the second language, the last stage fossilization comes. Fossilization is when the student reach a certain point were you can't really improve much even if you study very very hard since there are many words in English that you don't really use in daily lives.

Mari

The ideal language class

According to the studies by Long(1976), small group communicative tasks are important for the ideal language class because students get a greater quantity of talk in group tasks when you compare the language produced by student in group tasks with that produced in teacher-fronted activities. Small group tasks are more likely to facilitate acquisition and two-way tasks (all the students in a group discussion have unique information to share)stimulated significantly more modified interactions than one-way tasks(only one student has the relevant information to share). What was also founded by Doughty and Pica(1986)was that required information exchange tasks generated and stimulated significantly more modified interaction than task in which the information exchange is optional. Porter(1983) found that students get a greater quantity of talk when they get to work with other learners than with native speakers and learners do not learn errors they have because they pick up bad lingistic habits from one another.

Communicative Competence

Communicative Competence is ability/skills to communicate. There are 3 categories in it. Language is what you learn in Japanese Junior High Schools, which is memorization. Strategy is developed at University Intensive English Program, and they are basically training from qualified professionals. Fluency can be developed at Conversation Schools. You need to practice and experience using the language to develop it.

Shiho

The process of learning, teaching

Useful things for leaning are ①instruction, ②input by Krashen (reading and listening), and ③output by Swain (writing and speaking). They should be done in this order. All of them are needed for strategy training, language acquisition, and fluency development.
PPP shows good order for teaching, and it means ①presentation by teacher, ②practice input/output, such as structured drills and games which have one answer, and ③productive output, such as free communicative activities which have many answers including games and discussion. It's also good to introduce main points of the day naturally through discussion at the beginning.

０５AA００２ Shizuka Ainai

Learning grammer :form,meaning,use

Reserch has shown that teachers who focus on communicative interactions are more effective than who only do so just in order (Old style).
In teaching or learning grammer, 3 things are important, form, meaning, and use.
The meaningless drills don't help so much.
We can easy remember if we connect the form and meaning,and choose the proper one at the time.

~preposition~
FORM:on,off,in,out,,,,,
MEANING:a function word that typically combines with a noun phrase to form a phrase which usually expresses a modification or predication.
USE:You put it before a noun.

05AA024 Atsuko Okuda

Natural Grammar Sequence

English is learned in the same order even if learners have different 1st languages. It was determined by the research that there is no difference between children and adults. Also, instruction doesn't change the natural grammer sequence.
Narumi, Shizuka

Comprehensible Input

Language acquisition takes place through comprehension which is far more important than 'instruction'. In fact student will understand the message is one step up of their level, they will learn the language naturally. Maiko Mari

Comprehensible Output

To learn English, there is program called "Immersion Program". According to the study of Swain in 1985, only listening and reading is developedin Immersion program, so it is not helpful to learn language. To learn language, we need to receive the instruction and also use their language.

Atsuko & Shiho

Thesis Examples

Survey & Interview
What are the qualities & experiences of speakers who scored 500+ on TOEFL?
What was the most necessary language needed for NZ study abroad students?
Why do students give up on learning language?

Analysis
Analyze textbooks to see if it using current methodologies.
Analyze a conversation to determine how polite students are when making requests.
Analyze students’ writing to determine which it the most frequent error.

Research
Compare the reading scores before and after using a certain teaching method.
Compare TOEFL test scores of men and women.
Compare how many people are commenting on students’ blogs versus their email.

TESOL Issues to be Covered This Semester

TESOL Issues to be Covered This Semester
(You are responsible for learning them. You may choose one topic for your thesis.)

Language acquisition
*Language: communicative competence
-language competence, strategic competence, psychomotor skills
*Theories of language acquisition
-the silent period, critical period hypothesis, teachability hypothesis,
comprehensible input, fossilization…
-the most successful learners and teaching/learning methods
-grammar translation, audio-lingual, communicative language learning
Grammar
-review of natural order and error analysis
-form, meaning, use
Vocabulary
-corpus research
-How many & which words do we need learn?
Speaking
-pronunciation, conversation (functions, situations, topics, etc.), discussion,
presentation
-accuracy v. fluency
-discourse analysis
Listening
-schema, background knowledge
-I+1
-rate of speech
-listening skills (non-verbal, guessing, intination)
Reading
-schema, background knowledge
-I+1, dictionary use
-critical reading, reading for pleasure, skimming, scanning
Writing
-Writing types
-phonics v. ….
Special topics (spring 07 or 08)
-English for kids
-World Englishes
-CALL
-Culture & language

Syllabus

Objective：
This seminar will introduce students to theories and research into learning languages. The main objective is to help students understand the most effective methods for acquiring languages.

Seminar Two Year Plan:
Each semester students will take steps towards developing and writing their 30-page senior thesis on a topic/research project of their choice.

Semester / Content Focus / Thesis Progression
Spring 2007
Introduction to TESOL Issues
Choose topic & write introduction (3 pgs.)

Fall 2007
TESOL Research Articles
Write summary of articles related to your topic (5 pgs.) & outline a plan for your research project (5 pgs.)

Spring 2008
Review of TESOL Issues
---Do research---

Fall 2008
Thesis Check
Write about the results (10 pgs.), discuss them (5 pgs.), and write a conclusion (2 pgs.)

Spring 2007 Overview：
We will cover theories, recent research, and methods of learning and teaching English in the following areas: second language acquisition, grammar, vocabulary, speaking, listening, reading, and writing.

Most units have the following: 1. pre-reading discussion 2. TESOL article (out of class) 3. mini-lectures 4. group activities.

There will be a final exam this semester only.

Grading:
Projects/Assignments, Final Test, Participation: 33% each

Materials:
To be provided. You may be responsible for copying materials, and you must keep all handouts and bring them to class each time.