A longitudinal study of two boys’ experiences of acquiring Italian as a second language: the influence of age  

Oleh:

Pecenek, Dilek

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: International Journal of Bilingualism (Full Text) vol. 15 no. 3 (Sep. 2011), page 268-290.
Topik: age; children; code-mix; Italian; second language acquisition; Turkish
Fulltext: 268-290.pdf (1.02MB)

Isi artikel

This article presents a description of the acquisition process of Italian as a second language of two Turkish-speaking brothers, in an immersion context. The study intended to capture these boys’ language experiences and language behaviours, and their behavioural-linguistic changes in the second language acquisition process, focusing on age. Other factors such as role of the parents, amount of exposure to the two languages and cross-linguistic influences in relation to these children’s language experiences are also discussed. Longitudinal data for the second language acquisition progress of the boys were collected over four years. The ecological approach was used during the observation and assessment processes of the second language acquisition experiences and performances of the brothers. The information obtained from longitudinal data made it possible to highlight some descriptions, which may serve to explain the process. The children were exposed to the second language under the same conditions and for the same period. By the end of the data collection period some differences in the performance of the brothers’ first and second languages appeared. The elder child maintained his Turkish whereas the younger child displayed difficulties speaking fluently in Turkish and often code-mixed to Italian. The findings of this study indicate that especially age and consequently cognitive development, and also exposure time period, attitude of the parents and linguistic cultural environment might have had significant effects on the boys’ second language acquisition.

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