A Critical Examination of the Beliefs about Learning a Foreign Language at Primary School

and whether all aspects of a language are learned in the same way by all
learners is still open to debate. As Van Patten argued:

"How and why people acquire languages is a question which is still
unanswered and will probably go unanswered for some time."
(Van Patten, 1989:19)

Despite this lack of consensus it would seem reasonable to assume that the
task of the foreign language learner in the classroom is an enormously complex
one involving biological, psychological, social and affective, personal as well as
pedagogical variables. Larsen-Freeman lists some of the many interacting
factors at play which are likely to determine the degree of success in learning a
language:

"...the source language, the target language, the markedness of the L1, the
markedness of the L2, the amount and type of input, the amount and type of
interaction, the amount and type of feedback received...age, aptitude,
Sociopsychological factors such as motivation and attitude, personality factors,
cognitive style, hemisphericity, learning strategies, sex, birth order, interests
etc..." (Larsen-Freeman, 1997: 151)

Those factors which might play no role or only a limited role in spoken first
language development, such as the nature of language being acquired,
differences between children’s background and their abilities, quality and
quantity of language input, are likely to play a more important role in a learning
context which is characterised by restrictions in learning and teaching time,

202

<<   199   200   201   202   203   204   205   >>

More intriguing information