Notes on Language Acquisition, Early Literacy, & Phonetics | EDRG 4010, Study notes of Business Management and Analysis

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2 Written and Second Language Acquisition © Is written language acquired naturally or learned consciously? * Can people acquire a second language? Fven though researchers debate whether language 1s innate or whether humans have a special cognitive capacity for language, most rescarchers agree that chil- dren acquire their first language. They do this rapidly and without formal instruction. It appears that children don't have to be taught language the way they are taught to button a shirt. But what about written language? Can children acquire written language in che same way they acquire oral language? There are clear differences between oral language and written language. As Halliday and Hassan (1989) have shown, what appears in a bovk is not simply oral language written down. Writcen language contains a different kind of vocabulary and dif- ferent grammatical structures than oral language. Questions also arise over whether second languages can be acquired, espe- cially by older students. Once a person has developed une language, can that person develop a second language in the same way as the first? Older second language learners often struggle, especially with pronunciation. Most students who study a second or foreign language in high schoul ot college fail to develop a high degree of proficiency in the language. Is that because of the methods used to teach language. or is ic because people acquire a first language and thea learn subsequent languages in the same way they learn other subjects in school? In this chapter we address these questions. Insights from linguistics sug gest chat both written and second languages can be acquired cather than learned. This has important implications for teaching because the role of the teacher is quite different in an acquisition classroom than in a learning classroom. fo oS