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Second-language acquisition via immersion in daycare*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Rachel Karniol
Rachel Karniol*
Affiliation:
Tel Aviv University
*
Department of Psychology, Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv, Israel
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Abstract

This paper presents a case study of second-language acquisition of Hebrew via immersion in daycare between 1;10 and 3;0. A period of silence was followed by rapid onset of L2 production simultaneously with many references to language itself. Eight types of language awareness were identified, and of these, several types may be prerequisites for starting L2 production. The nature of L2 speech during the first stages of production suggests that to crack the sematic code of L2, the child relies on identifiable contingencies between utterances and subsequent behaviours by speakers and listeners. As a result there are many more imperatives and interrogatives in L2 than are evident in L1 speech, and these appear to be learned by rote in an unanalysed manner. The transition to complex constructions occurs via the juxtaposition of known but syntactically unanalysed chunks, and results in patterns of syntactic errors similar to those of adult second-language learners. Reliance on L1 as a fall-back strategy was also evident. Several implications of these data for cognitive development in general are discussed.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , February 1990 , pp. 147 - 170
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Ruth Berman for her helpful suggestions and comments during various stages of this research.

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