Psycholinguistics

1
Psycholinguistics

• Second language acquisition

2
Acquisition and learning

• Acquisition
• Gradual development
• Communicative situations
• Learning
• Conscious process of accumulating knowledge
• Babies acquire language
• Long-term residents of a country acquire language

3
Language proficiency

• Acquisition usually leads to greater proficiency
• Some parts of the language are more difficult to
  acquire than others
• Conrad effect
• Think about linguistic strata
• Lateralization
• Teenagers are quicker at learning language (and
  math) than young children
• Cognitive skills are important too

4
Affective (?emotional) filter

• A term used by Stephen Krashen
• A barrier to acquisition
• What activates the filter?
• Teenage self-consciousness
• Embarrassment about making funny sounds
• No empathy with the foreign culture or its
  speakers
• Boring textbooks
• No interesting activities
• Bad classroom environment
• Exhausting schedule

5
Teaching methods (1) Grammar translation

• Like learning any other subject
• Students learn vocabulary and (prescriptive)
  grammar rules