Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education Commons^™

An Evaluation Of English Spoken Fluency Of Thai Graduate Students In The United States, Sugunya Ruangjaroon

Dissertations and Theses

Fluency is generally recognized as speaking with a high rate of speech. This study provides a greater understanding of the notion of fluency that speech rate is not the only measure to determine the fluency level of a speaker. Particularly in a second language (L2), fluency involves other features and it can reflect non-native speakers' capacity in using L2. Fluency is comprised of the continuity and the smoothness of speech without a high occurrence of hesitation phenomena and repair mechanisms.

The purpose of the present study was to analyze English spoken fluency of Thai graduate students. This study sought to …

Japanese Students' Perception Of Their Language Learning Strategies, Michiyo Ozawa

Dissertations and Theses

Students' use of language learning strategies (LLSs) is affected by their educational backgrounds and academic requirements, and so are their attitudes toward language learning. This study investigates Japanese students' perception of their English LLSs in different language environments: Japan and the United States.

A group of 43 Japanese students from Otemae College participated in a cultural study program at Portland State University. The group consisted of 28 students who studied for two terms (ST Group) and 15 students who studied for three terms (LT Group).

In this study, a combination of a self-assessment questionnaire, dialogue journals, and a card-ranking activity …

An Assessment Of The Needs Of International Students For Student Services At Southern Oregon State College, Molly K. Emmons

Dissertations and Theses

International students at our institutions of higher education have educational and personal needs which extend beyond the classroom. These needs are supposedly provided for by student personnel services, but little data has been collected which examines how international students use student services, and if their use differs significantly from use by American students. If their perceptions of students services and use of these resources does differ, what does that signify? This study measures the use and perceptions of student services by international and American students at Southern Oregon State College. Twenty-one philosophical objectives were examined for levels of importance, effectiveness, …

An Analysis Of Japanese Learners' Comprehension Of Intonation In English, Misako Okubo

Dissertations and Theses

Typically, most native speakers of Japanese, who have been taught English in Japan, have had limited exposure to prosodic features of English. Consequently, their ability to understand the meaning of different intonation patterns is limited as well. Though it is generally accepted that intonation plays a crucial role in English communication, comprehensive pedagogical materials for teaching English intonation to native speakers of Japanese are not widely available or used in Japan. This is, in part, due to the complexity of English prosodic features and their abstractness. A better understanding of these barriers requires that the extent and the nature of …

Study Abroad And Self-Perceptions Of Cross-Cultural Adaptability, Heidi C. King

Dissertations and Theses

With growing recognition of the duality of language and culture, the TESOL profession is placing increasing emphasis on the importance of understanding intercultural dynamics in the second language classroom. Currently, however, there is a lack of empirical information and measurement instruments to aid understanding within the field of cross-cultural communication. In response to this lack of instrumentation, Kelley and Meyers (1993) recently created the Cross-Cultural Adaptability Inventory (CCAI), a 5 0-item, self-perception inventory designed to measure cross-cultural adaptability through a total score and four contributing dimensions: Emotional Resilience, Flexibility/Openness, Perceptual Acuity and Personal Autonomy. The two primary purposes of this …

A Cross-Cultural Study Of The Speech Act Of Refusing In English And German, Charla Margaret Teufel

Dissertations and Theses

Language students must learn to communicate effectively in cross-cultural settings, avoiding unwitting violations of culturally determined norms of behavior. This study compares German learners of English (GEs) with native speakers of English (AEs) and German (GGs), studying pragmatic transfer associated with the face-threatening speech act of refusal.

Data elicitation involved a written role-play questionnaire composed of twelve refusal situations, including four refusal stimulus types (requests, invitations, offers, and suggestions) and interlocutors of higher, lower, and equal status. Response strategies were identified and classified, and the three groups were compared in terms of frequency and content of strategies chosen.

Overall, the …

A Prolog Lexical Phrase Computer Assisted Language Learning Module, Yuji Gene Hirayama

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis presents the design of a computer assisted language learning (CALL) program written in the computer language, PROLOG. It will provide a practice exercise to teach "lexical phrases" to second language learning students of English. Lexical phrases are lexico-grammatical "chunks" of words, which possess specific pragmatic functions within spoken discourse (Nattinger and DeCarrico, 1992). These form/function composites of varying length aid conversational fluency. The program presents a scenario where the participants are college students who pass one another in the hallway. After they exchange initial greetings, the first participant (i.e., the computer) informs the other student that a test, …

American Students' Expectations Of Teachers In The Japanese Language Classroom, Nariyo Kono

Dissertations and Theses

The Japanese as a foreign language classroom in the United States is full of information about the target culture and cross-cultural interaction between American students and Japanese instructors. This cross-cultural interaction promotes culture learning but sometimes produces potential conflicts due to American students and Japanese instructors having different expectations of each other.

The purpose of this study was to investigate student expectations of their Japanese teachers and to explore similarities and differences among Japanese and American expectations. The research questions addressed were 1) What do American students expect of their Japanese teachers in the Japanese language classroom? Do their expectations …

The Use Of The First Language (L1) And The Target Language (Tl) In The Foreign Language Classroom, Jeanine L. Huber

Dissertations and Theses

Oftentimes it is the foreign language classroom that provides the basic foundation for language exposure and acquisition. In the context of the foreign language classroom there is not much exposure to the TL outside of this setting. This being the case, the quantity of the TL should be relatively high as it is an essential requisite for language acquisition. In addition, most recent research tends to suggest that high quantities of TL from the instructor is ideal. The main purpose of this study has been to focus on university-level foreign language classrooms to explore the issue of language choice, Ll …

Russian-Speaking Pentecostal Refugees And Adult Esl Programs: Barriers To Participation, Elena Valerijevna Zaitseva

Dissertations and Theses

Pentecostals from the former Soviet Union are the most recent and fastest growing refugee group in Oregon. Because the refugee population's low English skills may increase their dependence upon welfare assistance, their nonparticipation in ESL programs is treated as a social issue. Efforts to increase the English literacy levels of Russian-speaking Pentecostal refugees are limited by lack of empirical data regarding forces that affect this population's decision to participate or not to participate in educational activities. The purpose of this study was to gather information about barriers to participation in ESL programs by adult Russian-speaking Pentecostal refugees. To this end …

American Deaf Students In Ennl Classes: A Case Study, Janice Elisabeth Ruhl

Dissertations and Theses

Many deaf students who seek post secondary education need some sort of developmental education in reading and writing to ensure success in college. These students often end up in college preparatory or remedial classes that are designed for native speakers of English. For many of the deaf students entering college, English is a second language or a first language that they have failed to achieve fluency in.

This study describes the experience of two deaf students enrolled in English as a Non-Native Language classes for the first time at an Oregon community college. The Office of Students with Disabilities and …

Use Of Language Learning Strategies By Proficient And Less Proficient Learners, Charlene Frances Mills

Dissertations and Theses

Recent research has found that the use of good language learning strategies can affect students' chances of gaining proficiency in a second language. The purpose of this study was to see if there is a relationship between strategy use and language learning proficiency. It sought to answer these questions: (1) Does a successful learner use different strategies on specific tasks than does a less successful learner? and (2) Will the successful learner use more metacognitive and affective strategies while doing tasks than will a less successful learner? For the first part of the study, 17 students in an ESL program …

Making The Transition From East To West: Evangelical Christian High School Students From The Former Soviet Union, Sharon Kay Link

Dissertations and Theses

This study documents the educational and cultural experiences of Soviet Evangelical high school students, the most recent refugee population to the Portland-Vancouver school districts.

Soviet Evangelical high school students have experienced a slow and difficult transition to the American classroom. The students were often negatively characterized by their ESL teachers and other school personnel as "difficult" due to their classroom behaviors. Many times, these behaviors did not meet the ESL teacher's expectations, resulting in a culture clash between the teacher and the Soviet Evangelical students.

The study found that Soviet Evangelical high school students came to the United States with …

English-Speaking Three-Year-Olds In A Spanish Language Immersion Program, Alice Golstein

Dissertations and Theses

Foreign language immersion programs, wherein the regular school curriculum is taught through the foreign language, have become increasingly widespread in recent years. Although there have been a plethora of studies reporting on second language immersion programs involving school-age programs, there is a dearth of information describing such programs for preschoolers. The purpose of this study was to observe and describe an immersion program for three-year-olds, particularly with respect to specific features of early stages of the language acquisition process.

The primary area of interest was to determine the existence of and features of a silent period for these children. Secondary …

Student Attitudes Toward Word Processing And Writing In The English As A Second Or Other Language Classroom, Greg Lynn Buchan

Dissertations and Theses

This study examined the attitudes of English as a second or other language (ESOL) students who used computers/word processors to develop skills in writing English. Two primary questions were investigated: what are students' attitudes toward using computers to write English and what are students' attitudes toward learning computer and word processing skills? The subjects were 40 ESOL students enrolled at South Seattle Community College (SSCC) in technical programs and were required to complete a transitional English class that included business and technical writing . Students received 10 weeks of writing instruction on word processors. A 38-item attitude inventory created by …

Teaching English Grapheme-Phoneme Correspondences To Chinese Students, Li-Ching Lin

Dissertations and Theses

This study investigates whether or not instruction of English graphophonic correspondences, i.e., the link between letters and sounds, will help Chinese students in learning English vocabulary. Following other related research, I assume that Chinese students can benefit from instruction of English grapheme-phoneme correspondences in learning English words. If this assumption is true, there should be a statistically significant difference between students who have instruction of English graphophonic correspondences for learning English words and students who do not. 1. Chinese students who have been given lessons in both pronunciation and grapheme-phoneme correspondences will recall more English words on a short-term vocabulary …

Functional Uses Of Language In The Conversational Discourse Of A Person With Alzheimer's Disease, Julie Anne Haun

Dissertations and Theses

Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia, is estimated to occur in up to sixteen percent of people between the ages of 75 and 84. Deficits in linguistic skills that effect communication are a hallmark of the disease and have been the primary focus of past Alzheimer's research. Among other deficits, researchers have found that people with Alzheimer's often use indexical expressions without clear referents and convey less information that is relevant to the task they have been asked to perform than healthy subjects. Relatively little research has examined how Alzheimer's subjects use their linguistic knowledge to communicate with …

Empowering Esl Students For Out Of Classroom Learning, Jay Stanley Neuharth

Dissertations and Theses

ESL students virtually swim in an environment rich in opportunities to learn English. Every billboard, newspaper, TV show, and person on the street provides new language. However, many ESL students do not take full advantage of this English environment. Often, English learning is viewed primarily as a classroom experience, when much more could be gained if students were learners outside the classroom, as well. That is the problem addressed in this thesis.

This problem was investigated through action research with the teacher/researcher's high intermediate level writing class at PSU. The teacher/researcher implemented a strategy to motivate students to learn outside …

English In The Workplace: Case Study Of A Pilot Program, Kim Roth Franklin

Dissertations and Theses

This study is participant observational research focused on a description of an United States Department of Education grant-funded English in the Workplace pilot program. The survey of the literature shows that there is an increasing need to provide educational opportunities for workers who, for various reasons, are not currently being served by traditional education providers. The study presented here describes a pilot program and asks "How is an English in the Workplace program developed and implemented? What do those characteristics of workplace education programs, as identified in the literature, 'look like' once such a program has been implemented?" The researcher …

The Effect Of A Physician's Pronunciation On Nurses' Perceptions Of The Physician's Medical Competency, Laura Anne Horani

Dissertations and Theses

Although many researchers have studied language attitudes in the last three decades, none of the studies have been conducted in the hospital setting, where there are more serious consequences for those working with patients being labeled linguistically "incompetent," as charges of incompetence in language are apt to lead to charges of incompetence in other areas of mastery as well (e.g., Ryan, 1983). This study examines the attitudes of a sample of nurses from three Portland-area hospitals towards nonnative English speaking physicians. The subjects, 156 medical-surgical nurses, listened to three anonymous audiotaped physicians who were from three different ethnic backgrounds: American, …

An Examination Of The English Vocabulary Knowledge Of Adult English-For-Academic-Purposes Students: Correlation With English Second-Language Proficiency And The Validity Of Yes/No Vocabulary Tests, Robert Scott Fetter

Dissertations and Theses

The importance given to vocabulary in second language instruction and in theories of second language acquisition has increased greatly in the last fifteen years. It is thus important for second language teachers/researchers to have valid, useful methods of assessing the vocabulary needs and vocabulary knowledge of their students as well as valid and useful methods of assessing the efficacy of various methods and techniques of teaching and learning vocabulary.

This study examines the usefulness and validity of a relatively new type of checklist vocabulary test method known as the 'YES/NO' method. In the YES/NO method, nonsense words are listed together …

An Exploration Of The Value Of Future Tesol Teachers Reflecting On Their Pasts As Language Learners, Sarah Elizabeth Lawrence

Dissertations and Theses

Virtually all future teachers of ESL/EFL have been foreign- or second-language learners themselves. However, reflection on their own past language-learning experiences is usually not integrated into the coursework of professional TESOL preparation programs and there has been little published research in TESOL in which students in professional TESOL preparation programs reflect on their past language learning experiences. The purpose of this research was to explore the effects on TESOL Methods students of revisiting a past language-learning experience.

The subjects were students in a TESOL Methods class. This study examined an assignment given to these students to write a short "language …

An Improved English Article System For Japanese Speakers, Dorothy Jean Frew

Dissertations and Theses

One aspect of the English language which has been overlooked by English-as-a-Second-Language educators is the article system, a, the, and 0. For students from articleless first languages such as Japanese, learning this complex system is a formidable challenge. Performance studies show an error rate among advanced Japanese students of approximately thirty percent. There may be several reasons for this high rate: 1) the differences between Japanese and English, 2) the unusually high degree of complexity/difficulty of the article system itself compared to other English morpheme systems and 3) inadequate treatments of the subject as revealed in this …

Language Learning Strategies Of Russian-Speaking Adult Esl Learners, Minerva E. Renee Kalenandi

Dissertations and Theses

In the ESL classroom, there are often cultural differences between learners and teachers. Sometimes these differences can lead to misunderstandings or even conflict. One area where differences between cultures can be seen is language learning strategies and styles. This study explores the possibility that awareness of differences, explicit teaching, and negotiation may help to resolve differences.

This study looks at differences between Russian-speaking adult ESL learners and American ESL teachers, with respect to strategy use and preferences. Three aspects are investigated. The first is to see whether there are statistically significant differences between these groups of learners and teachers. The …

Spectrographic Analysis Of Second Language Speech: Investigating The Effects Of L1, Troy D. Bailey

Dissertations and Theses

Technological advances in Digital Signal Processing over the last decade have provided applied linguists with a number of computerized applications for speech analysis which can be of benefit to both the researcher and the instructor. This research project explores the techniques of speech spectrography and implements methods of acoustic phonetics to current issues in Second Language Acquisition theory. Specifically, the effects of vowel production in one's native language on the targets in a second language are investigated. Acoustic measurements of English vowels spoken by Japanese students were compared with measurements of native Japanese vowels and American English vowels. In addition, …

An Examination Of The Occurrences Of Metaphor In Introductory Engineering Textbooks, Hartwell S. Francis

Dissertations and Theses

The aim of this study is to identify the use of metaphor in university-level introductory engineering textbooks. Engineering is an important field of study for foreign students in the United States. In order to determine the linguistic and cultural problems foreign students of this field may have, two introductory engineering textbooks are examined for occurrences of metaphors.

Two corpora of 20,000 words each drawn from introductory textbooks used at two four-year, public universities are examined for occurrences of metaphor. A combined semantic and pragmatic test for metaphor is applied to each word used in the corpora to determine if the …

Peer Correction By Non-Native Speakers Of English In Oral Group Work, Bill Stevenson

Dissertations and Theses

This research is observational and descriptive. Its primary purpose is to provide data on the extent to which, and how, Non-Native Speakers (NNSs) of English engage in error correction of their peers when participating in classroom oral group work. In addition, it shows to what extent these learners self-correct their own errors in the same situation. The over-arching focus of the study is to examine the role of second language learners to determine whether they possess the potential to play a more active and productive part in their own language learning. Nine beginning level adult university ESL students are the …

Computer Grammar Checkers And Esl Writers, Robert Lee Gaynor

Dissertations and Theses

The use of word processors has become common in writing instruction for students of English as a second language (ESL). Recent developments in microcomputer technology have increased the number of "tools" or writing aids that are incorporated into word processing programs. Among these are computer style and grammar checkers, programs that attempt to identify and diagnose stylistic, grammatical, and mechanical problems in writing.

This study examines the suitability of commercial grammar checking programs for use by ESL writers through descriptive analysis of program features and evaluation of accuracy. The programs evaluated are Grammatik 5, Microsoft Word 6.0 and Correct Grammar …

Case Study: How An East European Student Learns To Compose In English, Ruth Steinfeld Katon

Dissertations and Theses

Since the political climate in the former Soviet bloc has shifted, there is an influx of East Europeans to the United States. As these refugees enter the U.S. educational system in greater numbers, teachers must adapt to the special needs of this population. The intent of this study is to focus on the composing skills of a Polish student who enrolled in an English for Non-Native Residents (ENNR) program at an urban university. The investigation examines the contextual framework that supports the subject's literacy experiences by means of a longitudinal case study format Several ethnographic and experimental techniques are used …

"A Listening Child." The Language Life History Of An American Of Mexican Descent, Alexandra Guerra Alvarez

Dissertations and Theses

This case study presents the language life history of an American woman of Mexican descent. The informant describes the ways in which her two languages, English and Spanish, developed and have been used throughout her life. She narrates how living with two languages has affected her in each period of her life. The informant's language life history provides insight into the ways in which immigrants who come to the United States live and adapt to a new country, culture, and language. The informant's narrative is a testimony of a person divided between two languages and two cultures. The methods used …