Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Introduction To Volume 55

Russian Language Journal

The present issue of RLJ reflects the new editorial board’s view of the state of Russian study in the U.S. and the world today in the context of globalization, internationalization of curriculum, and increased expectations regarding the outcomes of language study everywhere. (Verbitskaya) While more modest than the bold Soviet-era policy assertions concerning Russian as a “primary language of mass international communication,” Kostomarov addresses the new role of Russian as mother tongue, second language, or major foreign language for more than 300 million speakers in the world, nearly 3 million of whom are now resident in the United States, and …

Learners And Teachers: The Application Of Psychology To Second-Language Acquisition, Madeline Ehrman

Russian Language Journal

The successful acquisition of second languages depends as much on good psychology as it does on sound linguistics. Both teaching and learning can be enriched by understanding and applying basic psychological principles.

The speaking and reading performance of second-language learners has received a great deal of attention in areas of applied linguistics such as conversation analysis, speech production analysis, oral testing research, classroom interaction analysis, and task-based learning research.(Ellis, 1994). In addition to linguistic variables, researchers have examined psychological determinants of learner achievement in speech performance, among them “individual difference variables.” These relatively stable learner characteristics—including language aptitude, motivation, and …

Individual Difference Theory In Faculty Development: What Faculty Developers Should Know About Style, Betty Lou Leaver, Rebecca L. Oxford

Russian Language Journal

Over the past three decades and more, growing attention has been paid to the need to tailor instruction to meet the differing learning and affective styles of students. However, little has been written about doing the same for faculty.

Typically, the purpose of faculty development is to empower new and experienced teachers by providing information, enhancing self-confidence, and developing attitudes and beliefs favorable to effective teaching. Such empowerment usually requires teachers to change their teaching behaviors— and change does not come automatically or identically to all teachers. Rather, “teachers change in areas [in which] they are already primed to change, …

The Online Language Learning Environment: New Roles For The Humanist, James S. Noblitt

Russian Language Journal

Thomas Edison played an important role in improving the technologies needed for the telephone. He was said to have been excited about the educational potential of the new instrument and speculated that it would soon be found in every classroom.

Well, he was right about the educational potential of information and communication technology, but he was wrong about the form the new technology would take.

This chapter raises questions concerning the role humanists will play in determining the development and implementation of information and communication technologies for educational purposes.

Articulation: Challenges And Solutions, Martha G. Abbott

Russian Language Journal

Providing students with a seamless progression of language development within the K-12 school curriculum remains a challenge for the foreign-language profession as we enter the new century. As national standards are developed for foreign-language education in the K-12 continuum and school districts throughout the country consider implementing foreign-language programs earlier in the curriculum, we have an opportunity to confront that challenge with renewed vigor.

Full Issue

Russian Language Journal

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Globalization, Internationalization, And Language Learning In Russia, Liudmila Verbitskaya

Russian Language Journal

In reviewing international trends over the last few decades, two words— globalization and internationalization—inevitably come to mind. Thinkers around the world are pondering these processes, which are rooted in the technological and social changes of the last quarter of the twentieth century.

The notions of globalization and internationalization are obviously related, but exactly what do they mean? In The Globalization of Higher Education, Peter Scott (1998a) concludes that not only are the words not synonyms, but the processes they denote are radically different and even dialectically opposed.

The Concept Of “World Language”, V. G. Kostomarov

Russian Language Journal

Although the United Nations has declared that its working languages—English, Russian, French, Spanish, Chinese, and, more recently, Japanese and Arabic— are “world languages,” there is no strictly linguistic basis for such a claim. Indeed, many linguists reject the term, and many of those who do accept it believe that it denotes—roughly—an artificial global language. Moreover, many find in it an unpleasant hint of the pseudoscientific idea that one language can be superior to another.

Change Agents And Change Agencies In Language Education: Implications For Langnet, Richard D. Brecht

Russian Language Journal

Educational innovation is a richly satisfying enterprise, particularly in an age of rising demands and expanding technology. But unless the innovators have an explicit strategic plan and a dedicated system for diffusing their work, innovation is destined to have little or no impact on the teachers and learners for whom it is intended. That truth lies at the heart of the literature on the diffusion of innovation.

Perspectives On Curriculum Construction At The Postsecondary Level: Contexts, Approaches, Principles, Heidi Byrnes

Russian Language Journal

A curriculum is an attempt, wrote Stenhouse three decades ago (1975, 4), to communicate the essential principles and features of an educational proposal in such a form that it is open to critical scrutiny and capable of effective translation into practice.

If one applies that notion of curriculum to the foreign language field in general, and to second- or foreign-language learning in U.S. colleges and universities in particular, one is immediately confronted with a dilemma: how can we speak of a foreign-language curriculum at the college level when a principled approach that is open to scrutiny and that builds on …

The State Of The Art In Language Assessment: Notes For The Third Millennium, Bernard Spolsky

Russian Language Journal

In the 2000 years during which human abilities have been assessed formally, tests and examinations have grown more powerful. A century ago, critics launched a strong attack on examinations, citing their “inevitable uncertainty,” but a growing testing industry and governmental cries for “accountability” have managed a stubborn defense. More recently, appreciation of the complexity of notions such as “language proficiency” and acceptance of the resulting impossibility of finding a single measure of those notions have led testing experts to a realization that assessing language knowledge is multipart and intricate—and more likely to be served by profiles than by simple scores.

A Longitudinal Survey Of The Language Learning Careers Of Actr Advanced Students Of Russian: 1976-2000, Dan E. Davidson, Susan Goodrich Lehmann

Russian Language Journal

In 1976, the American Council of Teachers of Russian (ACTR) began sending American college students to Russia for advanced training in Russian language and literature. The original ACTR program was open to qualified students from any U. S. institution and represented one of the very few opportunities available to American students, graduate students, or faculty to pursue advanced language training in Russia, in this case, the newly established A. S. Pushkin Institute of the Russian Language in Moscow. Admission to the program was competitive, and, in practice, the ACTR program accepted for the most part graduate students and immediate-post BA …