Digital Commons Network^™

Generation Gap: Explaining New And Emerging Word-Order Phenomena In Mayan-Spanish Bilinguals, Teresa Satterfield, Rusty Barrett

Linguistics Presentations

We investigate asymmetries in the behavior of NP subjects and objects in Sipakapense (Maya) across three generations of Sipakapense-Spanish bilingual speakers. Often, the two languages are typologically classified into separate groups, with SVO word order assumed as the traditional sequence in Spanish, and VSO in Sipakapense. We illustrate that this typological partition is artificial: in Spanish, as in Mayan, VSO can serve as the basic, declarative word order, where the subject maintains its internal-VP position with a neutral interpretation. Both Spanish and Sipakapense obtain the SVO configuration via subject topicalization. Thus, the key factor in the shift from VSO to …

Certainty Categorization Model, Elizabeth D. Liddy, Noriko Kando, Victoria L. Rubin

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We present a theoretical framework and preliminary results for manual categorization of explicit certainty information in 32 English newspaper articles. The explicit certainty markers were identified and categorized according to the four hypothesized dimensions – perspective, focus, timeline, and level of certainty. One hundred twenty one sentences from sample news stories contained a significantly lower frequency of markers per sentence (M=0.46, SD =0.04) than 564 sentences from sample editorials (M=0.6, SD =0.23), p= 0.0056, two-tailed heteroscedastic t-test. Within each dimension, editorials had most numerous markers per sentence in high level of certainty, writer’s point of view, and future and present …

Discerning Emotions In Texts, Victoria L. Rubin, Jeffrey M. Stanton, Elizabeth D. Liddy

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We present an empirically verified model of discernable emotions, Watson and Tellegen’s Circumplex Theory of Affect from social and personality psychology, and suggest its usefulness in NLP as a potential model for an automation of an eight-fold categorization of emotions in written English texts. We developed a data collection tool based on the model, collected 287 responses from 110 non-expert informants based on 50 emotional excerpts (min=12, max=348, average=86 words), and analyzed the inter-coder agreement per category and per strength of ratings per sub-category. The respondents achieved an average 70.7% agreement in the most commonly identified emotion categories per text. …

Context-Based Question-Answering Evaluation, Elizabeth D. Liddy, Anne R. Diekema, Ozgur Yilmazel

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

In this poster, we will present the results of efforts we have undertaken to conduct evaluations of a QA system in a real world environment and to understand the nature of the dimensions on which users evaluate QA systems when given full reign to comment on whatever dimensions they deem important.

National Stereotypes In Teaching English As A Foreign Language, Radmila Popovic

MA TESOL Collection

This thesis explores how to deal with lexically encoded national stereotypes in the second language classroom. I address this question starting with previous research on stereotypes, and discussing a principled approach to interrelating insights from a variety of paradigms and disciplines. Then I shift to the linguistic analysis of nationality words in English - phrases, idioms and proverbs, as well as connotations which these lexical items are capable of developing in certain contexts. Finally, I consider the implication of the findings for foreign language teaching, and suggest a pedagogical model for dealing with stereotypes in the language classroom.

A Teacher’S Journal: An Account Of My Choice And Implementation Of Total Physical Response Storytelling As An Approach To Teaching Beginning Level French, Melinda Heins

MA TESOL Collection

This paper is about choosing an approach to teaching a foreign language that is appropriate for me in my teaching context – public high school French classes – and my attempts to become as proficient as possible in the approach I chose called Total Physical Response Storytelling (TPRS). For eighteen weeks I taught French I grades nine through twelve and kept a detailed teacher’s journal of the experience.

Reflections On My Nepali Language Learning Experience While In The American Peace Corps In Nepal, 2001 - 2003, Eloy Guzman

MA TESOL Collection

This paper examines my experience during my two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Nepal (2001-2003) learning the Nepali language. I reflect on my process of learning Nepali, which involved drawing on connections between this language and the two other languages I speak – Spanish and English. I also examine the social aspects of my learning this language while living and working as an ESL teacher in a small rural mountain village in Eastern Nepal. This self-reflection on my language learning experience has informed my understanding of how the language learning process is inextricably connected to one’s primary language …

Integrating The Six Skills In Every Esl/ Efl Class, Monica M. Catramado

MA TESOL Collection

The main purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of integrating listening, speaking, reading, writing, grammaring and vocabulary in the ESL/EFL classroom.

Through this paper, not only will the reader gain an understanding of how to design a theme or content-based syllabus, which integrates all six skills, but also he/she will find numerous activities that will help develop those skills in every student.

Readers will also be shown how students can learn another language and develop these skills through practical every day topics and different materials, which depend on the students’ developmental stage of learning, stage of knowledge …

Promoting Language And Culture Learning In An Efl Context, Laura Anne Battles

MA TESOL Collection

This Independent Professional Paper (IPP) describes the intercultural communication project I undertook during my Interim Year Teaching Practicum (IYTP) in Granada, Spain. Throughout the academic year of 1998-1999, English-speaking students enrolled in the University of Granada’s Spanish Language and Culture Courses were invited to participate as volunteer language and culture exchange partners with my Spanish-speaking, intermediate-level English as a Foreign Language students. These classroom experiences, designed to enrich the course’s speaking, reading, writing, and listening curriculum, were intended to stimulate authentic communication and to heighten personal and intercultural awareness among the participants.

The argument presented in this paper is that …

The Din Theory Revealed: Theoretical, Professional, And Personal Reflections Concerning The Socialization Of Language, Dana Elise Arends

MA TESOL Collection

This paper is a written analysis of my personal experience with the "din in the head" theory proposed by Dr. Elizabeth Barber and Dr. Stephen Krashen (Barber 1980; Krashen 1981). I experienced this din firsthand during a three day trip to Montreal, Quebec in Canada and a subsequent three day trip to Roma, in Italia. I will propose that the language din suggested by professors Barber and Krashen does exist. Furthermore, I will show how the Spanish din with which I had become familiar with from my classes at the School for International Training hindered, and at times prohibited, my …

Teachable Articles: A Practical Approach To Teaching English Articles To Japanese Learners, Kayo Fujito

MA TESOL Collection

This dissertation is about English articles and specifically the difficulties that non-native speakers, particularly Japanese learners, face in mastering their use. In this dissertation, I will mainly focus on;

1. An investigation on teaching articles and the use of articles including a survey completed by teachers of English

2. Two charts for determining articles and categories with examples including my adaptation of the chart

3. Some ideas and practical suggestions for teaching articles

The findings from this study have led me to a belief that there are ways for Japanese learners to improve their ability to use articles and by …

Developing Metaphoric Competence Through Schemata-Building For English Learners In Japan, Kyoko Suda

Theses Digitization Project

The purpose of this project is to propose teaching methods that facilitate the development of English vocabulary knowledge and metaphorical concepts for students in Japan.

Building Literacy For Beginning English Learners, Amy Kathleen Anderson

Theses Digitization Project

This project is to help improve the instruction for English language learners (ELLs) in U.S. public elementary schools. Specifically, it explores research-based approaches for instructing students who enter upper-elementary classrooms speaking little to no English.

Anxiety And Motivation In Second Language Learning, Glenn Edward Moore

Theses Digitization Project

This study investigates student and instructor perceptions of the causes and effects of anxiety and motivation's effect on a student's ability to learn a second language. The study focused on the participant's perceptions of the causes and effects of anxiety, and relationships between anxiety and motivation, in both short-term and long-term learners.

Internationalizing The Japanese Classroom With Computer-Mediated Instruction, Hajime Kajiwara

Theses Digitization Project

The goal of this project is to design an effective way for Japanese high school students to improve their English communication skills through internationalized, computer-mediated instruction.

Authentic Materials In English As A Second Language Conversation Instruction, Xiangmei Zhang

Theses Digitization Project

Interviews with experienced ESL language instructors were held to aid in determining how these instructors choose and design authentic materials and make them authentic to second language learners.

A Corpus-Based Investigation Of Collocational Errors In Efl Taiwanese High School Students' Compositions, Yi-Chin Chen

Theses Digitization Project

Many language instructors focus on vocabulary word by word, neglecting common phrases. The result is that English as a Second Language students do not learn to speak idiomatic English (i.e. they make collocation errors). This study of the English compositions of National Tainan Second Senior High School students in Taiwan examined collocation errors, categorizing them according to Benson, Benson and Ilson's Collocation Classification System. An examination was then made of the error types as correlated with general English proficiency.

Taiwanese Cultural Content In English-As-A-Foreign-Language Elementary Education, Yi-Ting Wang

Theses Digitization Project

Teaching culture is an essential part of teaching language. This project focuses on cross-cultural teaching, comparing Taiwanese and Western cultural content such as folktales. This comparison is based on presenting Taiwanese cultural content.

What Is Selective Mutism?, Angela Briz-Garcia

Theses Digitization Project

The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics of Selective Mutism, its possible causes, the strong impact it creates in English learner students, and what teachers could do to help the students who suffer from Selective Mutism.

Piero Chiara E La Tradizione, Stefano Giannini

Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics - All Scholarship

Piero Chiara (Luino 1913- Varese 1986) wrote many novels and short stories that immediately met great public success. Critics devoted mixed attention to him but his works deserve a new critical assessment to analyze the rich and sophisticated web of cultural and literary references that permeate them. Through readings of Il piatto piange, “L’uovo al cianuro” and other novels and short stories, this paper analyses the complex textual relations Chiara entertains with Pirandello’s Il fu Mattia Pascal. Chiara investigates the themes of identity and the double. His narrative depicts an apparently lighthearted reality that in fact reveals despair. …

"Conscience" In The New Testament, Edwin Cook

Journal of the Adventist Theological Society

No abstract provided.

Interpretation Of Slavic Multiple Wh-Questions, Lydia Grebenyova

Linguistics

This paper shows that the Relativized Minimality account is not sufficient to rule out SP readings in languages other than languages with overt syntactic wh-movement. My analysis of PL/SP readings distribution relies on the lexical properties of the Q-morpheme, specifically proposing that the absence of the SP reading can be the direct result of the absence of the Q-morpheme of a particular kind. This approach raises the degree of explanatory adequacy in that it explains crosslinguistic parameterization based on the properties of individual lexical items.

Cognitive-Affective Outcomes Of Classroom Writing Activities In Korean English As A Foreign Language, Soonja Ahn

Theses Digitization Project

This project addresses writing instruction by teaching journal writing, interactive writing, and poetry instruction to Koreans in the English-as-a-foreign language situation. Writing and indentity construction and writing conferences are also addressed. The curriculum is designed for EFL teachers in Korea at the target-teaching level grades 3-6.

Environmental Awareness And Sustainable Development Curriculum In English As A Second Language Adult Education, Ian Griffith

Theses Digitization Project

This project provides the tools and framework for an ESL (English as a second language) classroom experience that informs citizens about sustainable development and that emphasizes the connections between distinct subject areas. The project focuses on global concerns about the environment, pollution and sustainability to develop case studies and simulations that involve students and teach vocabulary, critical thinking, and techniques of negotiation.

Superiority¿Syntactic And Interpretive, Lydia Grebenyova

Linguistics

One of the major goals of linguistic theory is to understand the universal principles underlying the structure of linguistic expressions. Although it is best to provide the adequate empirical coverage using the smallest number of such principles, sometimes the theory can suffer from having too few principles. That is, certain contrasts in grammaticality judgments can be lost because of the great generality of the existing principles. For example, Lasnik and Saito (1992) discuss and account for such a contrast between pure Subjacency violations vs. Subjacency combined with Empty Category Principle (ECP) violations, which result in a higher degree of unacceptability. …

Design For High-Intensity Reading In English As A Foreign Language, Ting Zhang

Theses Digitization Project

The primary aim of this project is to address the demonstrated need for effective English reading training for advanced speakers of English as a second language (EFL).

Getting Complements On Your Mental State (Verbs), Jill De Villiers

Philosophy: Faculty Publications

There is a considerable body of theoretical and experimental work on how children develop a Theory of Mind. A recent meta-analysis by Wellman, Cross and Watson (2001) has revealed a consensus that children develop an awareness that other people might have false beliefs around the age of four years, give or take six months. Wellman and some other theorists believe that children undergo a conceptual change at this point, from a psychological theory based primarily on desire as the motivator of human action, to one that accords beliefs a causal role. Other theorists such as Leslie (1991; 1994) contend that …

A Natural Language Approach To Information Management: Tracking Scientific Advances Through The Structure Of Words, Andrew R. Hippisley, Chara Karavasili

Linguistics Faculty Publications

In scientific texts specialist words, or terms, express conceptual knowledge. We show that by looking at the use of a term and its family of derivatives over time we can have a tangible picture of how an underlying concept has evolved in scientific advances. This is because the structure of a word encases a core idea and how that idea has been extended in a particular direction. This paper is an outline of a research programme with some preliminary results from an analysis the term nucleus in a nine million word corpus of nuclear physics articles written over thirty-six years, …

Using Children's Literature With Young Learners, Eowyn Ferey

Intensive English Language Program Faculty Publications and Presentations

The biggest practical challenges in using English language children's literature rather than readers created specifically for EFL/ESL students are:

• choosing an appropriate book
• preparing to teach, from writing lesson plans to developing supporting teaching materials
• brainstorming creative teaching ideas

This paper will serve as a guide for those who would like to use literature in the classroom with their young students, but aren't sure how to begin.

Names Of Plants In Kalam Kohistani (Pakistan), Joan L.G. Baart, Esther L. Baart-Bremer, Muhammad Zaman Sagar

Work Papers of the Summer Institute of Linguistics, University of North Dakota Session

This paper presents a preliminary ethnobotanical lexicon of plant names in the Kalam Kohistani language, spoken in the mountainous north of Pakistan. The list includes 203 Kalam Kohistani plant lexemes, with their English and Urdu glosses; 137 of these are tentatively identified with their Latin scientific names. Many of the glosses include brief notes on the occurrence and local uses of the plants. The paper ends with an index of 116 English common plant names with their Kalam Kohistani equivalents, followed by an index of scientific names.