New York College Learning Skills Association

RTDE Issue Contents

Research and Teaching
in Developmental Education

Volume 16, Issue 2, Spring 2000

A Comparison of Oral & Writing Development in a Second Language College Student
By Anna C. Kim, National-Louis University

Abstract

With the increasing number of second language students at the college level, further research into second language acquisition is required. Because more studies have been conducted in first language (L1) as opposed to second language (L2) acquisition, instructors have had to rely on the former studies for their teaching strategies on the assumption that they are acquired in the same way. However, are the stages in first and second language acquisition the same? Do speech and writing development occur simultaneously? What is the role of the monitor in second language speech writing?

How second language development is assessed has also been a question among ESL (English as a Second Language) faculty, since it has previously focused primarily on oral development. Both my case study's oral interviews and writing were compared for errors and syntactic maturity to see if any differences could be determined. The use of the monitor during second language speech and writing was also analyzed.