second online class

I am very happy to take this online class because now I am so confident and my all confusions were solved.This class is very interesting because all friends are very good and knowledgeable.I am very clear in each of points of the text.The texts are also well written with simple and clear English.even if there is any problems those are clear in group discussion with the help of cooperative professor.Thus my experience of this second class is brilliant.

Sound system of language: Phonology

Sound system of language: Phonology
Phonology is the systematic structure of sound systems. This is a study of the relationship between how sounds are pronounced and how they are stored in the mind. It shows how the sounds are organized within the words. In phonology a phoneme, means structural elements and allophones are realizations of single structural elements in the system of language. In phonology there is a study of minimal pairs which means two words that differ by only a single sound and distinction depends on sounds not in spellings.
Natural classes of sounds contain all the sounds that share a particular set of features. This chapter also talks about the syllables and its structure. Syllable is a phonological unit consisting of one or more sounds.
This study gives me a kind of base for learning language. Back home, In Nepal though I study English for many years but I never took any linguistic classes which makes me able to understand English from the surface level. I am using all four skills of English but without knowing its structure. Now When I am reading the text of linguistic and grammar I am feeling as if I am being able to make sense what is the structure behind the language and I think this is very important to teach English everywhere.

The sounds of language: Phonetics

Chapter 3
The sounds of language: Phonetics
The written English has many origins with different spelling conventions. Due to the different conception there are varieties of pronunciation with the same spelling structure. This chapter talks about the study of sound as phonetics. This study is very new for me and my country, so it is really enthusiastic for me to take it back home to teach the phonetics. It is so exciting to know and study about human vocal apparatus. It is bit confusing as a non native speaker to know and feel the sound producing from different places of mouth but very curious to study about. I think Acoustic phonetics gives more sense to understand. We study British English thus there some differences with IPA.
There is not a big deal to find out the voice and voiceless sounds as it is related with the vocal cords and vibration. If the sound is vibrating then it is voiced and if not then voiceless. I think to find place and manner of articulation is bit difficult and takes more practice. It will help more if we make it flash cards and practice it. Consonants sound produced by partially or completely blocking air in its passage from the lungs through the vocal tract, on the other hand vowel sounds are produced by passing air through different shapes of the mouth with different positions of the tongue and of the lips. There different featured of vowel sound such as tenseness, rounding, length, nasalization, tone.
As a teacher learner, though phonetics is a dry subject and it is not a fun to read but I think it should teach as an essential part of language learning. I think reading phonetics give base to student to produce correct sound.

Experience with online learning

Hi,
I was so excited and nervous about online class. But I love to take risk.In fact I always dare to do that. So I did that.All my nervousness turns to the confidence because of my instructor. Whenever I get confused i sent her email and she solved all my dilemma so quickly.It makes me very confident that I could definitely do well in this online class. In short my experience is really good. Bit difficulty is there because i am not used to with all these online learning courses but by the grace of god and supports of my professor and classmate, I think I will certainly rock!
Binki

Written and Second Language Acquisition

Though there are some debates, most researchers agree that children acquire their first language, without formal instruction but it is different with the written language. Written language has different vocabulary and different grammatical structures that the oral language. There is different view about the written language. Some think it is not natural language, but a secondary representation of language that the brain is not prepared to acquire but others it could acquired as oral language.
Regarding reading there are two views, word recognition, and sociopsycholinguistic, of reading correspond to the distinction between learning and acquisition. As per word recognition view, the main task during reading is to identify words and their goal is to help students learn to identify words. There are some methods like learning phonics rules to achieve the goal. They belief reading leads them to instructional practices. On the other hand, sociopsycholinguistic view emphasizes that reading is a process of constructing meaning and their goal is to construct the meaning of the words. The method of this should be to use all available information, including background knowledge. According to Krashen, people acquire the ability to read and write in the same way they acquire a first or second language by receiving message they understand.
As similar to reading there are two views for writing too. From an acquisition perspective writing is a form of output that reflects the language competence an individual has acquired. On the other hand, from learning point of view, writing must be taught.
Similarly there are two views of second or foreign language development. The first is second language is learned which is followed by traditional method. Their goal is to produce students who speak and understand the language. Second view is acquired and it is related with the current methods. Their goal is to enable students to use language for a variety of purposes.
As per the Krashen’s theory of second language acquisition, there are five interrelated hypothesis which were used by many ESL/EFL teachers as they form the basis for much of the teaching methodology. Regarding Schumann’s theory of second language acquisition there are several factors in learning languages. I think both learning and acquisition takes places in learning languages, however current research supports the view of acquisition than learning

First language acquisition

Teachers are always teaching languages to their students in almost all the grades based upon the requirement of their standards. This chapter presents the research on language acquisition that comes from different fields of study. There are different theories upon the first language acquisition of a child. The early views of first language acquisition are behaviorism. According to the behaviorists, language learning happened as a process of stimulus and response, thus positive reinforcements makes to full adult language proficiency. They believed that language can be learned like anything else and they also believed language can be learned through the imitation. Later on, Chomsky did review on Skinner’s verbal behavior theory which signaled the replacement of cognitive theory on behavioral theory. Regarding cognitive theory humans are born with the cognitive abilities, thus learning language is the result of the child acting on the environment much like a scientist making and testing hypotheses. This theory comes up with arising many problems and its explanation on behaviorist theory. Later on, there comes many other theories to justify language acquisition such as developmental psychology, sociology, anthropology, education and linguistic.
As per the view of developmental psychology language development is related with the way children learn, their ability to perceive, conceptualize, store and access information and their motivation. Their research is based on the early language that produces by the child since the researcher could not ask with the one or two years baby about how they produce the sound. Thus their research is based upon the children’s linguistic output. However they have come up with an ideas that cognition and language develop are related but independent with each other.
Regarding to sociology, anthropology, and education, children could produce language because language is essential for social interaction. Thus, social setting helps them to learn the grammar and vocabulary. They also develop communicative competence. The meaning of the utterances is depends upon the context. Children invented different words in different context; they modify their invention in light of the responses they receive from the community.
As per the linguistic view, they have focused upon the nature of language, on what it is that children acquire. Linguist Noam Chomsky developed a theory referred to as Generative Grammar, and he defines language in terms of a set of rules that could be applied to generate all the sentences of a particular language. He says children acquire this knowledge of language on relatively slight exposure and without specific training. According to Chomsky, humans are born with the basic structures of all human languages already presents in the brain and he named this innate knowledge of language Universal Grammar, thus children learn the language that surround them and Chomsky calls it as parameter setting.
The studies of child language show that develop the rules of language quickly without much correction on it. Chomsky’s claim of universal grammar can be proved with the fact that children never make certain kinds of mistakes. The children have implicit knowledge which allows them to understand and produce sentences, but doesn’t allow them to explain how they do it. Children quickly acquire linguistic knowledge but for metalinguistic knowledge, they should study it.
All these studies have been contributed to the new understanding of the process of first language acquisition. Study supports that children must have some built in linguistic knowledge. Thus, children come to the school with some linguistic knowledge but they need to develop proficiency in the academic language of school and the conventions of the standard written language.

hi

blog checking!