Many second language learners notice similarities between their spoken language and learner language. This often makes language learning easier, for instance if you speak English, you will find it easier to pick up Italian than you might Mandarin. The reason behind this is that many languages belong to a language group; Indo-European languages.Indo-European Languages are spoken globally by over three billion people, just under one thousand languages make up this group. There are ten major sub categories of languages that fall under this heading. The earliest is Sanskrit, with documented use of language dating from the third millennium BC. Other major categories include Germanic languages including English, Italic languages including Latin and Italian and the Indo-Iranian languages.

Similarities between Indian and European languages were first documented by missionaries in the 16th century who noticed the similarity between Indian with Greek and Latin. By the 17th century a theory evolved among scholars that a primitive universal language was spoken hundreds of years ago, from which modern languages are derived.

Linguists have devised what is known as a tree model. This is where the evolution of a language is traced back to its original, known as a proto-language, which is placed at the top of the tree. From here, languages which are derived from the proto-language are known as daughter languages. At one time, all languages from the indo-European group would likely have evolved form one common proto-language. Some of these daughter languages are also identified as proto-languages for further daughter languages.

Linguists have made many attempts over the last hundred years to reconstruct the proto-indo-european language, which is known within linguistics as PIE. Although there are many reconstructions, linguists have not reached a consensus over what such a language might look and sound like; opinions on this matter are diverse within the field. Some linguists have gone as far as to reconstruct stories and fables in PIE, you can find these easily on the internet. The King and The God is one such attempt.

It is proposed that native speakers of Indo-European languages have a genetic link, that is a common ancestor somewhere along the line from whence these languages started developing.

Of the twenty most spoken languages in the world, twelve of these belong to the Indo-European Languages. They include; Spanish, English, Hindi, Portugese, Bengali, Russian, German, Marathi, French, Italian, Punjabi and Urdu.

There are four levels and stages of language development that helps anyone to learn a second language.

In level one, this is the silent stage where there is not much comprehending and production at this stage is nonverbal. The student is listening to the language to try and make sense of it.

This is the first level stage where there is a lot more imitation than anything else. There is a pretense in how much the student comprehends. A lot of gestures and body language take precedence.

Level two is the early stage of production with limited comprehending in which responses are only through one or two words. This is the survival stage where the student feels that they need to learn enough for basic functioning. There is a lot of uncertainty at this time in this stage.

The last two stages

Level three gives the student an opportunity to emerge from nonverbal to verbal interaction. Comprehending the language becomes much easier by using simple sentences. You will find that in this stage there are more mistakes committed in verbal communication.

Plural and past tense are not important at this stage. The student may understand the concepts of the language, but is trying to become comfortable with the new language. Grammatical errors don’t’ concern the student at this point. Words are used, but not necessarily appropriately.

Level four is the final stage that consists of excellent comprehension of language. The student is able to use more complicated sentences and language fluency is more noticed. A lot more generalization is used in this stage of the game.

In this stage, it is helpful if students ask the teacher to define words and concepts in the language by indicating if they do or do not understand. An experiment with words and phrase among peers is usually the result of this stage.

These stages are noticed specifically in young children two years old who are just beginning to form their new language. They usually start off by using a vocabulary of fifty words that are recognizable.

Their sentences consist of two or more words. They respond quickly to one word or short phrase instructions such as “get me the toy,” or “come.” The toddler will often do some self talk and takes time to name things and repeat what these things do. These are similar to the stages of language development.

Conclusion

In the first stage, the teacher should never force the student to speak unless they are ready. It is quite feasible to learn silently. The second stage is the production of words and phrases that highlight the answers to what, where and who questions.

The third stage enhances the student’s dialogue and they are able to ask simple questions, but with grammatical mistakes, which is quite normal. The fourth stage is the actual intermediate stage of learning where the vocabulary has grown so that the student can share their thoughts more clearly.

There is a fifth and final stage, but this is more advanced and may take up to seven years to acquire language proficiency.

During the 1960s, Canada experimented with the French Immersion Program to allow students to understand their French culture, tradition and its language; both French and English.

Immersion programs can be either a full or partial instruction of a second language. A full immersion is more effective because of the intensive curriculum. The second language is the medium used to teach students and more time is spent on this especially in the early years of a student’s schooling. This includes both reading and the language arts.

Partial immersion cuts the time spent in half learning a second language. Language arts and reading are partially taught in English and the other half in the second language.

Teachers that use these immersion programs expect to accomplish one or all of the items listed below on a long term basis:

1.    To develop the student’s level of proficiency
2.    To create a positive attitude toward the native language speakers and their cultures
3.    Develop the student’s English Language skills dependent on their age and expected abilities.
4.    Acquiring skills and content knowledge according to the curriculum and the objectives of the school board

The success of an immersion program has to do with how much administrative support is offered. The support of the community and parents are also helpful. Teachers have to be qualified and must have the right teaching materials for the second language. Developmental staff training and time given to teachers for preparation of instructional materials are very important.

Total immersion programs give the students more exposure to the language to make them more proficient. Some students may find it too much and so teachers will make recommendations to move students to a less intense program. It is not easy to find a total immersion teacher and so schools will usually promote the partial immersion classes. Some parents don’t think that students can learn a second language just as well as their own.

Partial immersion programs does not need as much special teachers. Schools can utilize the services of one teacher for two partial immersion programs for two half-days. In some cases, it makes the parents feel more at ease that their children are not spending all day learning a curriculum in a second language other than English. The proficiency level, however, of part time immersion students is far less than those for students in the total immersion programs.

Conclusion

In an immersion program, the second language is not the subject matter, but only a tool used to teach students how to become proficient in another language other than their own.

Morphology examines and studies how words are structured internally. It also looks at the way words are formed and the rules that go along with them.

Morphology spans three primary approaches that embrace the difference of each model in different ways. These three approaches are:

1.    The item and arrangement approach - Morpheme
2.    The item and process approach - Lexeme
3.    The word and paradigm approach – Word-based

These are strongly associated, but do have their differences and are not unlimited in how they are applied to the new language. According to the morphology model, a student will have knowledge of a word when they become familiar with:

1.    The spelling of the word
2.    The pronunciation of the word
3.    The definition of the word
4.    The part of speech of the word
5.    The history of the word
6.    If the word is improper
7.    If the word out of date
8.    Examples of the word
9.    Any slang associated with the word
10.    The root and stem of the word

With morphology, students who can analyze and identify a word in a second language; would have mastered the language to some degree. Rules in most languages determine how closely related words are.

For example in the English language, native speakers may be able to relate to the words, cats, cat, and cat food. They intuitively make inference to the fact that cat is to cats as bird is to birds. In a similar instance, cat is to cat food as bird is to bird feed.

The way that a student identifies both words; cat and cats as being related or similar is known as lexeme. On the other hand, bird and bird cage are different lexemes because they fall into different categories of word form.

The student understands the rules in terms of precise patterns in which the word is formed in a sentence or phrase.

Conclusion

So it is conclusive to say that morphology is an area of linguistics that is the study of the pattern in which words are formed within any language. It tries to form rules that are a representation of the knowledge of the students that speak the languages.

The maintenance bilingual program is specifically created to maintain and improve a student’s native language as the student tries to learn a second language.

In 1997, the National Research Council wrote a report that signifies the fact that students who are fully developed in their native language are more than likely to develop proficiently in a second language than those who do not have that benefit.

When a student can understand instruction in their native language, they are able to use those same abilities to acquire a second language. However, the maintenance program puts more emphasis on how fluent those children speak in both languages while they are in school. It should also be evident in how they maintain their academic skills.

Maintenance programs enrich and add stability to how students learn a new language. They are better able to engage and become participants of instructional work given and not just for exposure to it.

Becoming Organized

Usually maintenance bilingual programs are organized in groups of students who have the same native language. This will help them to use their native language instructions to articulate in the new language learned. The primary goal for a maintenance bilingual program is to keep the student’s skills intact while they learn a new language. It helps to develop and continue the enrichment of both languages. The student’s culture is also important to maintain so the student can feel comfortable learning a new language.

There are so much more benefits to speaking two languages. However, having a proficiency in both is an added advantage to the student. The teacher should never let the student feel as if they are giving up their native language. The student will learn faster if they can identify with the new language learned and incorporate what they know from their native language into learning the new language.

The maintenance bilingual program helps students to be more competent in English while still maintaining their own language and culture. The idea of biliteracy is encouraged. Biliteracy is when the teacher accommodates the student and allows them to learn two languages using the same curriculum.

Conclusion

The student is able to develop their cognitive and academic skills in both their native and second language. This would help the student to become more successful because they would be prepared both academically and cognitively.

Pragmatics is the study of how language is used naturally to communicate. It is how individuals would study language literally and nonliterally according to the meaning, which leans on the rules that draw reference from the physical or social situation in which the language is utilized. Considering these aspects, it is safe to determine that it implicates the conversation of the speaker.

An example would be a sentence such as “Mary has five daughters.” This implicates conversationally that Mary only has five daughters and no more. Another example would be a sentence such as “The man was sick, but getting well.” This would conventionally implicate a comparison between sick and getting well that is not specific.

Pragmatics is more to deal with some aspects of reasoning than it is with semantics, which is more of a conventional rule on the meaning of expressions and how they are combined to portray their meaning.

Knowing how to use language socially is pretty much what pragmatics is all about. For example, let’s say you had a family dinner and invited a coworker and your five year old child happened to be there as well.

Your friend is overweight and loved to eat. After taking a third helping of the food, your child takes notice and says, “You better not take any more of that food or you will get even fatter.” Although, it is an embarrassing social situation for you, your child does not know how to use language in a social setting appropriately and did not mean to be rude. Pragmatics would be how to communicate your feelings in a social situation fittingly.

The rules of pragmatics in communicating effectively involve:

Language use for various purposes
- Saying hello, asking for information, demanding something, promising something or requesting something.

Language change that depends on what the listener needs or what the situation requires
- How you talk to a baby compared to how you talk to an adult, how you speak in a meeting compared to how you speak in a restaurant and providing information to a listener who is not familiar with that information.

Paying attention to conversational rules
- giving someone a chance to speak in a conversation and waiting your turn, staying on point, offering an explanation if misunderstood and how you should use nonverbal and verbal gestures and facial expressions.

Conclusion

Such pragmatic rules will vary depending on the culture and how conversation is perceived. It is best to learn about the culture when you are studying a new language.

English is one of the primary languages that is taught almost everywhere in the world.
It has a lot of extended reach and influence around the world. The United States especially have a tremendous amount of immigrants that need to learn English as a second language.

The public school system accommodates this learning model by creating a specific program to assist children to make that transition. Most schools have debated whether they should isolate these children and keep them from interacting with their peers or allow them to learn some of the language through their peers.

If the student has developed cognitively and academically in the native language, this can have a positive effect on how they learn a second language. All the skills learned in the first language transfer to the second language.

It is critical that schools provide a learning environment that will sustain and encourage the use of what the child learned in the first language. Research has shown that first language acquisition helps the student learn a second language.

Students who are learning English as a second language will approach the second language using the same tactics they learned in the first language. One difference to be noted is that the student not only has to understand the meaning, purpose and use of the language, but also how to communicate it in written and verbal form.

Phases of learning English

Students go through five different stages when learning to write and speak English as a second language. The same is true for any second language. The stages include:

1.    Pre-production
2.    Early production
3.    Speech Emergence
4.    Intermediate Fluency
5.    Advanced Fluency

The pre-production phase is considered to be the silent or mimicking phase. Their vocabulary is limited and they don’t feel comfortable with speaking the language yet.

The early production phase may last for six months as the vocabulary expands and students learn more words. They begin to speak using one or two word phrases.

The speech emergence phase carries an even more wide vocabulary where students are actually speaking in simple sentences, but more comfortably. They may ask uncomplicated questions of incorrect grammatically error.

As they emerge in the intermediate fluency phase, they are speaking and writing in more complex sentences and are not afraid to express thoughts and ideas.

The advanced fluency phase may take as much as ten years to attain academic proficiency in the second language.

Conclusion

Peer interaction is helpful for students who are trying to learn English as a second language and teachers should foster and encourage this in and out of the classroom.
Teachers should offer as much support as possible.

The Culture Adaptation and Culture Shock Cycle affect individuals who have come from another foreign country and are being introduced to a new cultural experience with the intention of returning to their own home culture. This means that they have to adapt to new language, new culture and new people.

These individuals have to go through seven different phases altogether with both the cultural adaptation and culture shock cycle combined. This will include:

1.    Pre-departure anxiety
2.    Honeymoon arrival
3.    Initial culture shock
4.    Adjustment period
5.    Mentally isolated
6.    Return anxiety
7.    Re-entry shock

There are some that will go through an acceptance phase where they feel welcomed and possibly will like some of the country’s customs and activities.

In the honeymoon arrival phase, there is some excitement of being in a new country, but also some anxiety and trepidation resulting from their pre-department anxiety and uncertainty.

If they are not satisfied with the culture of the new country, they will inherently reach a crisis period where the initial culture shock sets in. They are disappointed and feel mentally isolated. They may be experiencing problems with the adaptation process and start getting irritated, angry and sometimes outright rude.

If they are in a position to get their problems solved or feel like making the best of a bad situation, they will go into the adjustment phase and try to get rid of the negative thinking by accepting what they cannot change.

The time may come for them to return to their home country. Some will go through the return anxiety phase and the fear of what will happen once they get back home.

The re-entry shock phase follows as they return home to their country. In this phase, readjustment may be difficult and they may feel unaccepted.

Culture Shock

The five specific stages of culture shock are:

1.    Excitement at first
2.    Crisis
3.    Adjustment
4.    Acceptance and Adjustment
5.    Re-entry shock

There is limited communication for individuals that have to experience these five phases. This is why it is important for them to accept, adjust and adapt to their new surroundings.

Things that natives take for granted are very difficult for these individuals. Such things would include, meeting a new person on the street, shopping, or accepting an invitation to go somewhere.

A lot of them rely on facial expressions and gestures, which can be quite frustrating.

The different phases last as much time as the individual adapts to their new surroundings.

For example:

Honeymoon phase – will last about two weeks and up to six months
The crisis stage may last for up to three months

Conclusion

Some of the symptoms which individuals use or display as their coping mechanisms could be drinking, homesickness, crying, anger, anxious, impatient, over eating, or disgust. Making the best of an unusual situation in unfamiliar territory can be quite a challenge for most people.

Research shows that students learn better when they are afforded the opportunity to practice the language that they are trying to learn. They also have to practice at the level that they are comfortable with. This is referred to as Comprehensible Output.

However, Comprehensible Input is much more complex. It has to do with how students hear and understand instructions that are above the level of language that they are learning.

Here is an example:

Someone who may be learning English as a second language could be told to “Pass the book to Emily,” and be able to understand quite alright.

If the teacher would change the sentence to reflect a slight variation such as “Open the book for Emily,” then this new information would be added to the student’s comprehension of the language.

The teacher would have to give the student the new material that will utilize any previous knowledge that the student had.

As long as the student understands the message, the teacher would have accomplished the task of equipping the student with what is needed to learn the new language.

Comprehensible Input, formerly known as the Input Hypothesis, was initiated by Stephen Krashen, who was a linguist and instructor. Krashen uses the equation i+1 to explain how people move from one point of understanding language to the next.

The “i” in the equation would refer to previous language competence and the additional knowledge of the language that we have that depends on situations and experiences. The “1” in the equation would be representative of newly acquired knowledge.

There are two levels of learning new language using the Comprehensible Input method. One is the beginning level and the other is the intermediate level.

In the beginning level, most of the time in class is used for verbal input that is comprehensible. Teachers have to make sure that their speech is modified so students can understand. Teachers should not force the student to speak at this level. Emphasis on grammar is only initiated for students who go to high school or are adults learning a new language.

In the intermediate level, it is more confined to mostly academic subjects for comprehensible input. More of the focus is on the meaning of the subject than the form of the subject.

Conclusion

Comprehensible input is a not based on the natural order of teacher, but students will be able to comprehend the natural order by receiving the input.

For a student who is trying to develop a second language, whether there are learning difficulties or not, Comprehensible Input is the solution. The way that this method will work is that the student has to understand what is being taught and be able to comprehend it.

The teacher does not have to only use words for the student to be able to understand. Sometimes, the student will know the words and yet the instructions cannot be comprehended. It is best that the teacher give the student the appropriate input.

The teacher can use visual aids, putting words into context, and clarifications to communicate to the student and make it more understandable. Giving some background knowledge of the content is reasonable enough for the student to learn the language better. The teacher should use different concepts with a little variation of the terms.

Comprehensible input has more to do with context than it is with the content of the curriculum and language development. There is an emphasis on context because the teachers can indulge the experiences of the students that have learning difficulties.

Although, culture is important to actively involving the student, the teacher does not have to know everything about the student’s culture.  However, it is important that the teacher understand the importance of culture and experience as it relates to learning a new language.

Other techniques

There are other tactics that teachers can use to get through to the students. Some of these include using language consistently and allowing students to be more expressive of their own ideas.

Some people learn better with visual aids, so teachers can incorporate this into the classroom to make learning a second language more comprehensible. To make the instructions more coherent and understandable, teachers can use objects for presentations and gestures to improve learning.

Openly Communicate

The teacher should openly engage the students by asking a lot of questions and encouraging the student to be more involved by expressing their own thoughts in the second language.

One way that the teacher can foster motivation in students to be eager to learn the language is to have them share their own experiences verbally in the new language. This will increase their language skills and give them a way to identify with the language.

Conclusion

Comprehensible input is a model to learn a new language, but it is also a real way that students can learn a second language well. It is certainly achievable.