Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on authors
- Acknowledgments
- Note to the reader
- Part I Learning
- Part II Language
- 6 Verbal language
- 7 Sociolinguistics: the right expression
- 8 Unspoken communication
- Part III Independence
- Epilogue: from here to there: attaining near-native proficiency
- Appendix A Answers to “practicing what you have learned”
- Appendix B Learning strategies taxonomies
- References
- Index
6 - Verbal language
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 November 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on authors
- Acknowledgments
- Note to the reader
- Part I Learning
- Part II Language
- 6 Verbal language
- 7 Sociolinguistics: the right expression
- 8 Unspoken communication
- Part III Independence
- Epilogue: from here to there: attaining near-native proficiency
- Appendix A Answers to “practicing what you have learned”
- Appendix B Learning strategies taxonomies
- References
- Index
Summary
Preview
This chapter introduces you to verbal language. Topics that this chapter will address include:
Structure: parts of speech; finding meaning through word order, word changes, or particle use
Pronunciation: sounds, word stress, word boundaries, sentence stress, pitch, tone, intonation
Vocabulary: word building, using cognates, using context, using memory strategies, extensive reading
This chapter is written for those learners who have not had any previous opportunity to learn the terminology associated with talking about language – grammar and vocabulary. If you have had a good grounding in English grammar, this will be a review for you, but it might be interesting to learn about aspects of the grammatical systems of some other languages. In studying a foreign language, you may frequently find yourself in the position of comparing the structure of your foreign language to that of English. Knowing the English system well will help you. (We cannot present the entire overview of English grammar here; if you find that this is an area of weakness for you, you might seek out a reference book on English grammar to use as a guide. Some are listed at the end of this chapter.)
Structure
Parts of speech
All languages differentiate among kinds, or classes, of words, or, rather the functions that words have. These different kinds of words are classified into parts of speech. In English, we have eight parts of speech: nouns, pronouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, conjunctions, prepositions, and exclamations.
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- Information
- Achieving Success in Second Language Acquisition , pp. 147 - 171Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005