Sociocultural Theory Of Second Language Acquisition

1. Vygotsky was focused on how children come to understand their social world. He believed cultural learning is acquired through a gradual process of social interactions between children and parents, teachers, and other members of society. These social interactions provide children with the knowledge they need to face the challenges and meet the demands placed on them by their culture. So, basically according to Vygotsky the adults are the experts and the children are the novice.

The first example that shows the socialization of Vygotsky’s theory is learning to ride a bike. Most children in our neighborhood ride their bicycles without training wheels. However, my son who is five was still using his bike that had the training wheels but wanted to take them off to be like the other kids. This is connected to the cognitive theory by my child knowing the motor skills to use to ride a bike but having to still use the training wheels to ride his bike. For him to accomplish his goal he needed the zone of proximal development approach and the use of the scaffolding technique. As his father, I have experience riding bikes and know that he and the basic understanding of how to ride a bike but need more information and tools to move more toward independency when riding his bicycle. I provided my son with more knowledge that would help him ride his “big boy” by telling him to always keep pedaling and to keep the handles straight so he avoids

Many second language acquisition theories have been developed over the years. These theories examine the avenues in which second language is acquired and the avenues in which they are learned. The avenue of socialization is crucial in learning a second language. When natural conversations occur with native and non-native speakers, a natural

Two theories of primary language acquisition emerged from 1950s psychological research: B.F. Skinner’s behaviorist theory and Noam Chomsky’s biological theory of language development. Primary language acquisition addresses specifically the way in which an infant’s native language is beginning to form, starting at birth. Primary language acquisition continues to develop throughout the rest of childhood within the critical period.

Vygotsky’s main Theory is the Social Development Theory. He was known for his Sociocultural Theory. With this theory, he talks about how children’s behaviors, as well as their thoughts, can differ because of cultures and how they are raised. The children’s interactions change according to their cultures and teachings.His theory suggests that the children’s development is according to their cultures and how they are raised, the children have their own view of their world depending on their way they are taught and the tools that they are given as they grow up. Vygotsky talks about imitative learning, instructed learning, and collaborative learning. Imitative learning is where the child learns from watching

As opposed to Piaget’s theory, Vygotsky strongly believes that it is through social interaction that learning occurs. As per Fogarty (1999), Vygotsky’s theory believes that learning is first present through face-to-face interactions. Once the fundamentals are achieved, then only a child could go through an internalization process for deeper learning. A prime example that can be illustrated from an everyday classroom are the instructions given by an educator. This example also relates to Vygotsky’s theory of “3 types of speech” – Social; Private; and Internal.

A basic concept of Vygotsky’s socio-cultural theory is its claim that the human mind is the go-between and plays a significant role for what he calls tools‟ in humans‟ understanding of the world and themselves (Cole.1978). Vygotsky defends the theory that people do not act directly on the physical world without the intermediary of tools. Vygotsky describes cognitive development first occurs in a social context amongst people as "inter" and within the individual, as "intra." Thus meaning, according to Vygotsky as, "Every function in the child's cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first between people (inter-psychological) and then inside the child (intra- psychological) (Cole.1978).”

Language carries the beauty and persona of our thought process and the study of Linguistics helps us develop insights, appreciate and analyze many aspects of this powerful medium of expression. My fascination with Second Language Acquisition (SLA) began with the course ‘Language Acquisition and Learning’ that I took while I was in the 4th year of my undergraduate program at the University of Dhaka. In that course, for the first time, I was introduced to various theories and hypotheses about how people acquire a second language, such as Stephen Krashen’s five main hypotheses on language acquisition (the acquisition-learning hypothesis, the monitor hypothesis, the natural order hypothesis, the input hypothesis, and the affective filter hypothesis), Larry Selinker’s Interlanguage theory, John Schumann’s Acculturation model, and Howard Giles’s Accommodation theory. These theories helped me realize the robustness and richness of SLA research and made a permanent impression on my mind about this field. Besides SLA, I was also acquainted with Psycholinguistics through this course. I have learned about several theories of first language acquisition, e.g. the Behaviorist theory, the Innatist theory, the Cognitive theory, and the Maturational theory. It is worth mentioning here that this course really helped me set my dream to become an academic as well as a researcher in the field of language acquisition and learning.

Judie Haynes’ article, “Stages of Second Language Acquisition”, clearly states five stages that a new learner of English may go through. In Haynes’ theory, there are five stages in total, and they are pre-production, early production, speech emergence, intermediate fluency, and advanced fluency. According to Haynes, new learners of English acquire language by going through the same stages. However, how much time each student spends at a particular stage may be different. Despite the different time length, the stages of people acquiring new language are worth discussing.

Vygotsky also introduced his theory of internalisation, one of the main concepts that differentiated from that of Jean Piaget (Duchesne, S., & McMaugh, A. 2016. P.103). The theory of internalisation put forward by Vygotsky is an idea that suggests an individual is able to observe and internalise the ideas and processes of their surroundings as they partake in social interaction defined as, “new ways of thinking” (Duchesne, S., & McMaugh, A.,2016p.103). During social interaction the individuals thinking is successively transformed by interaction with others, similarly to the concept developed by Piaget, Vygotsky also characterised children as “active agents in their development”. (Duchesne, S., & McMaugh, A.,2016p.103). As explained by

Vygotsky believed that social interaction is the catalyst for student learning. Students learn from each other and the adults in their lives. The first learning that takes place is person to person and individually when the person internalizes the information in an attempt to understand something more completely. The first type of social interaction involves social speech in which adults give instructions. Another type of speech is private speech in which children process information and try to apply what they have heard through their experiences with similar situations in an effort to demonstrate self-control. Finally, internal speech is the silent conversation one has within one’s self. This speech leads to higher order thinking.

Children acquire language since they were born. They communicate with their parents. Furthermore, children and parents interact with each other using a language that we often call the first language or mother tongue. At an early age, children are only learning one language that is the mother tongue. By age and speech development, children improve to acquire a second language from the school or the environment around them. In terms of speed of langgauge acquisition, children are factorized by both the child and the child’s learning environment. Therefore, it is important to understand how children acquire second language. This paper is provided

Vygotsky emphasized more on social factors contributing to cognitive development. He defined “Every function in the child's cultural development appears twice: first, on the social level, and later, on the individual level; first, between people, and then inside the child” (Vygotsky, 1978, p-57). Example: When I taught my students regarding the basic electronics devices then we discussed in class the general devices that are used in their social life like mobile charger, traffic lights, and water level indicators and then they easily understood the types of devices and their uses.

Abstract: In second language acquisition, age factors has always been the study focus and one of the most controversial issues of linguistics. Based on the Brain Plasticity Theory and the Critical Period Hypothesis, the purpose is to prove such a hypothesis that the younger the leaner who begins to learn an second language,the greater the probability that he or she will achieve a native-like command of it.

Numerous theories try to explain the process of language acquisition. These theories fall into one of two camps. The environmentalist (or connectionist) theory of language acquisition asserts that language is acquired through environmental factors (Halvaei et al. 811). Theorists in this camp believe that a child learns language by gaining information from the outside world and then forming associations between words and objects. The nativist (or rationalist) approach, on the other hand, asserts that it is innate factors that determine language acquisition. Noam Chomsky, often described as “the father of modern linguistics”, falls into this camp as he believes that speech is the result of hidden rules of language that are hidden somewhere in the brain (Rahmani and Abdolmanafi 2111). Steven Pinker, a colleague of Chomsky, is a renowned psychologist, cognitive scientist and linguist who discusses his own theories on language acquisition in his book Words and Rules.