PICTURES ABOUT UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR AND INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS

WRITTEN ABOUT UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR AND INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS

Universal Grammar vs Interaction Hypothesis

Human language is unique; it is one of the communication systems of the natural world. The structure of this communication system is a consequence of the evolution of the humanity, as well as, from biological evolution, individual learning, and the cultural evolution of language itself. Thus, there are many theories and authors that have tried to define how acquisition of languages actually occurs. As we have said before, we will just focus on two principal theories Universal Grammar hypothesized by Noam Chomsky and Interaction Hypothesis.

The aspects that language may be innate in humans, and the universal features underlying the human languages, have been debated throughout the history by several authors. The innateness hypothesis or Universal Grammar hypothesis postulates the existence in the human brain of a Language Acquisition Device:” system of principles that children are born with that helps them learn language, and accounts for the order in which children learn structures, and the mistakes they make as they learn“.¹ That means, children equipped from birth with the set of linguistic rules that form the “Universal Grammar”, grammatical rules which are common and general in  all languages. Universal grammar specifies the mechanism of language acquisition. That is, the patters and universal structures that every single language has, and how the children during the process of language learning, they use it for evaluating their input.

However, language acquisition is socially learned too and offers open and unlimited communicative potential. This process dependent upon, the child’s development in other areas, (social development). Therefore we argue that second language acquisition involves the role for social contexts and our understanding of the biological evolution of the language faculty. In few words, interaction hypothesis concerns that input alone is not enough; the role of the environment in learning process is essential matter of discourse. We show that cultural transmission can improve linguistic universals, undermining one of the arguments for strong innate constraints on language learning. Certainly, people need a specific context where they can increase their input and output, as well as the adequate spaces to perform and develop their pragmatic competence. 

The contribution made by internal and external factors to second language acquisition involved mental elements that learners use to input into knowledge, that is, strategies to internalize second language knowledge and social situations in which learning takes place and how the learners are exposed into them, entailing to construct an interlanguage (intermediate system located somewhere between the native language and the target language). Hence people need to be exposed, to be in a context where everyone can interact with others, to share ideas, clarifying doubts and learning to improve skills every day. It implies a combination of several different components interrelated with internal and external factors. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

1.     British Council, Teaching English, Language Acquisition Device.  

    http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/knowledge-database/language-acquisition-device 
2.    Stephen Krashen's Theory of Second Language Acquisition. 

   http://www.sk.com.br/sk-krash.html

VIDEOS ABOUT OUR TOPICS BLOG

 NATURAL SETTING - NATURAL LEARNING

Language learners should demand natural learning

 

 

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Noam Chomsky on Universal Grammar and the genetics of language

 Universal grammar and if chomsky’s view has changed through the time ...

INPUT VERSUS INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS

Theoretical considerations have examined in an extended view the definition of second language acquisition. Krashen’s Monitor Model, is one of them. Stephen Krashen claimed that people acquire languages by the exposure to Comprehensible Input. In other words, significant input is the source of acquisition. Also he classified learners in two different categories: High Input Generators, who are often generating input with their teacher’s help and Low Input Generators, who are rarely generating input (passive learners). But if there is not the proper environment to achieve a comprehensible input because nobody uses the target language. It makes difficult the communication between students provoking low levels of proficiency and a null output (production).

COMPARATIVE CHART BETWEEN INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS AND UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR

Universal Grammar vs Interaction Hypothesis

CHAPELLE'S MODEL OF INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS

Chapelle's Model of Interaction Hypothesis (1998)

 According to the interaction hypothesis (Long,Gass), second language acquisition occurs when learners    

 interact in conversation with native speakers and/or each other.

 

 Interactionist models can be represented thus:

Aspects of the input are noticed (apperception), comprehended and become intake to be integrated into interlanguage and available for production (output).

Interaction is thought to improve intake and integration by creating the need to negotiate meaning at points of communicative breakdown, and through various types of feedback (recasts, reformulations) which may be integrated into learner production (uptake).

This hypothesis suggests that feedback obtained during conversational interaction promotes interlanguage (IL) development because it:

Connects input, internal learner capacities, particularly selective attention, and output in productive ways. (Long, 1996)

In this view, classroom interaction is important not just to provide practice opportunities, but because interaction actually triggers acquisitional processes:

Conversational interaction in a second language forms the basis for the development of language rather than being only a forum for practice of specific language features.

PRESENTATION ABOUT INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS

Interaction Hypothesis

SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION "POINTS OF VIEW"

Over the past three decades a number of different theories of second language acquisition have been formed in an effort to provide explanations as to how language learning takes place, to identify the variables responsible for second language acquisition and to offer guidance to second language teachers. Each theory accounts for language acquisition from a different perspective so some criteria are needed in order to classify and evaluate each theory.

 Learning is a formal process, a conscious study in which students can accumulate information and transform it into knowledge due to intellectual effort. On the other hand, acquiring has to do with natural exposure, developing aptitudes through natural, unconscious and intuitive assimilation. This way, acquiring is much more related to children than learning, once proficiency is not linked to the knowledge we have internalized, it is so to the abilities we develop in practice in consequence of the concrete experiences he have.

In fact, Second Language Acquisition (SLA) is the kind of object that is related to many others and because of this I do not have complete domain about it. To be sincere, even the oldest researches and researchers are not a hundred per cent sure about this process once it is related to human beings and it is in constant modifications.

Nowadays it is clear that the differences and similarities can not be seen in a so reduced way. Learners can transfer from a language to another in order to increase vocabulary, grammar constructions and spontaneous speaking even when these connections lead them to errors.

A second language acquisition is not a uniform or predictable phenomenon. There is no single way in which learners can acquire knowledge of a second language, just it is a product of many factors.

These factors are all about the learner and also their learning, a universe full of complexity and diversity. 

In order to understand a little more about this topic, you can see the following link. This is a comparative diagram about some theories in relationship with a second language acquisition:
 

http://mroyers.edu.glogster.com/chapter-1-diagram/

INNATE HYPOTHESIS

Noam Chomsky's Innate Hypothesis (1)


http://www.docstoc.com/docs/55458508/Noam-Chomskys-Innate-Hypothesis-(1)

UNIVERSAL GRAMMAR INTRODUCTION

INTERACTION HYPOTHESIS SUMARY

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION

 

The main purpose of this blog is to examine two different theories relating to the meaning of the term “second language acquisition”. We will look at these theories that have been proposed to explain in the best way the process of second language acquisition. One of them is Universal Grammar which gives primary importance to learners’ innate characteristics and another one is Interaction hypotheses emphasizing the essential role of the environment in learning.

Therefore, these theoretical considerations have examined in an extended view the definition of second language acquisition. On the one hand, there is a research which argues that many properties of language are purely formal in nature. On the other, a research emphasizes the importance of studying the performance of language. Both researchers have to do to characterize learners’ underlying knowledge of the second language describing and explaining their competence.

The distinction is between linguistic competence and performance. It is possible that there will be fundamental differences in both as what is learnt and how it is learnt. According to Chomsky and his Universal Grammar theory “competence consists of the mental representations of linguistic rules that constitute the speaker- hearer’s internal grammar”. However, the interactionist Hatch considers “one learns how to do conversation, one learns how to interact verbally, and out of this interaction synthetic structures are developed”. In few words, learners’ mental knowledge is not open to direct inspection; it can only be inferred by examining samples of their performance. A distinction as a sociolinguistic one.  

Finally, we just want to compare these theories, to know the differences between them and their particular features. In order to integrate learner characteristics and environmental factors in an explanation for how second language acquisition takes place, and broad the understanding of second language process as a complex, multifaceted phenomenon that can mean different things to different people.