Why the input we give our learners must be 95-98% comprehensible in order to enhance language acquisition – the theory and the research evidence

February 27, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized education, language-learning, reading, teaching, writing

Introduction

Second language acquisition (SLA) research strongly indicates that learners need to understand the vast majority (around 90–98%) of the language input they receive for optimal learning. This high level of comprehensible input ensures that learners can focus on gradually absorbing new elements (the i+1 content) without being overwhelmed. Below, we explore key research-backed reasons why 90–98% comprehensible input is considered ideal, with supporting studies from prominent SLA scholars like Stephen Krashen, Paul Nation, Norbert Schmitt, Batia Laufer, and others.

The Research evidence

There is plenty of research evidence to support the notion that students need 95 to 98% comprehensible input in order to grow linguistically. Table 1 below summarizes ten key studies which put this assumption to the test.

Cognitive Load and Processing Capacity

Cognitive load theory (Sweller, 1988) suggests that the brain has a limited capacity for processing new information at any given time. When learners are exposed to language that is too difficult (e.g., less than 90% comprehensible), the cognitive load becomes too high. This makes it difficult for learners to process and internalize new language structures and vocabulary because too much effort is spent trying to understand the meaning. On the other hand, when 90% to 98% of the input is comprehensible, learners can process new vocabulary and structures while still understanding the overall meaning, which facilitates automaticity—the ability to process language quickly and accurately.

Bill VanPatten (1990) demonstrated that second-language learners are limited-capacity processors who naturally pay attention to meaning before form; if they must struggle to decode too many unknown words or complex structures, their brains have little bandwidth left for learning new language features. In other words, when input is 90–98% familiar, learners can devote cognitive resources to noticing and acquiring the small amount of new language (the remaining 2–10%) without being overwhelmed. VanPatten’s findings (Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 1990) showed that splitting attention between understanding meaning and analyzing form led to lower comprehension when input was too difficult, underscoring the need for mostly comprehensible input to keep cognitive load manageable.

This aligns with Cognitive Load Theory (Sweller, 1988) in that excessive unfamiliar material in input imposes extraneous load, impeding efficient learning. Thus, a high percentage of known input ensures learners can process language meaningfully and transfer new items from working memory to long-term memory.

The Optimal Zone of Challenge (i+1)

Stephen Krashen’s Input Hypothesis (Krashen, 1985) famously asserts that we acquire language by understanding input that contains a bit beyond our current level – he labeled this ideal input as “i+1”, meaning our current interlanguage state plus one level. Crucially, Krashen emphasizes that input must be comprehensible for that one step beyond to be absorbed: “We acquire by understanding language that contains structure a bit beyond our current level of competence (i+1). This is done with the help of context or extra-linguistic information.” (Krashen, 1985, The Input Hypothesis).

In practice, this means learners should already know 90%+ of the words and structures in a message so that the few new items (the +1) are supported by context and understood in meaning. If the input is too far beyond (i+2, i+3, etc.), it ceases to be comprehensible and acquisition stalls. Effective input, according to Krashen, “need not contain only i+1” as long as it is largely understood; when communication is successful, the necessary i+1 is provided automatically by context and negotiation of meaning.

This concept mirrors Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development in that the ideal challenge level is just above the current ability. Paul Nation (2013) likewise notes that “quality input” for learning should be at a level where only a small percentage of vocabulary is unknown, ensuring the text or speech is in an optimal zone of difficulty that promotes growth without causing frustration. In sum, research supports that 90–98% known input hits the sweet spot: it contains enough familiar language to be understood and just enough new language to push development. This i+1 zone maximizes acquisition by providing a manageable challenge.

Vocabulary Acquisition

Perhaps the most compelling evidence for needing ~95–98% comprehensible input comes from vocabulary studies. In order for learners to acquire new words incidentally (through reading or listening) and understand the overall content, they must know the large majority of the words in the input.

Batia Laufer (1989) found that learners generally need to understand at least 95% of the words in a text to adequately grasp its meaning. At about 95% lexical coverage (i.e. only 1 unknown word in 20), readers could get “adequate” comprehension, whereas below that threshold comprehension dropped dramatically. More recent research has pushed the target higher: Hu and Nation (2000) concluded that around 98% vocabulary coverage may be necessary for full, unassisted comprehension. In a controlled study, Hu & Nation presented learners texts with varying percentages of known words; the learners generally needed to know 98–99% of the words to answer comprehension questions satisfactorily, whereas at 95% many struggled. Norbert Schmitt et al. (2011) reinforced these findings in a large-scale experiment with 661 learners, noting a nearly linear relationship between vocabulary coverage and reading comprehension – as the percentage of known words rose, comprehension scores rose in tandem. They found no sudden “cliff” but did argue that 98% coverage is a more reasonable target for comfortable reading of academic texts.

In practical terms, Paul Nation (2006) calculated that achieving 98% coverage in typical written texts requires a vocabulary size on the order of 8,000–9,000 word families (for reference, 95% coverage might require ~3,000 word families).Nation’s analysis (“How Large a Vocabulary Is Needed for Reading and Listening?”, CMLR, 2006) underscores that the last few percent of coverage (from 95% up to 98%) have a big impact on comprehension. If only 80–90% of words are known (so 10–20% unknown), comprehension plummets and guessing meaning becomes unreliable.

Thus, vocabulary research supports providing learners with input (such as graded readers or leveled listening) where they know almost all the words, so that they can pick up the remaining few new words through context with relative ease. High coverage input not only aids immediate understanding but is also far more effective for incidental vocabulary acquisition. For example, Nagy, Herman, and Anderson (1985) found that each encounter with an unfamiliar word in a meaningful, comprehensible context can yield a small gain (5–10% of the word’s meaning on average). While 5–10% may seem minor, they noted that with enough comprehensible input, such incremental gains account for a large portion of vocabulary growth

In sum, numerous studies (Laufer, 1989; Nation, 2006; Schmitt et al., 2011, among others) point to 95% as a minimal lexical coverage for basic comprehension and 98% as optimal for substantial comprehension and vocabulary learning. This is why extensive reading and listening programs emphasize that texts should be 95–98% understandable to facilitate word learning.

Grammatical Structures and Syntax

Comprehensible input helps learners not only acquire vocabulary but also internalize grammatical structures. If too many grammatical structures are beyond their current understanding (less than 90% comprehensible), learners are likely to focus on trying to understand the meaning at the expense of learning the syntax (sentence structure) and morphology (word forms) of the language.

Input at the 90% to 98% level allows learners to make hypotheses about grammatical rules by encountering sentences that are just challenging enough for them to test their understanding. This kind of input supports both implicit learning (learning without conscious effort) and explicit learning (conscious awareness of language rules).

Contextual Clues and Inferencing

Comprehensible input provides the necessary backdrop for learners to make use of contextual clues and inference strategies to learn new language elements. If most of a sentence or discourse is understood, a learner can often guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word or deduce a grammatical function from context. However, this process only works when the proportion of unknown elements is low. Liu & Nation (1985) found that guessing unknown word meanings from context is rarely successful unless about 95% of the surrounding words are already familiar.

.At lower levels of comprehension, learners’ inferencing often fails or leads to misunderstanding. For example, if a learner knows only 80% of the words in a text, the unknown 20% provide very little reliable clue to each other, akin to solving a puzzle with too many missing pieces. By contrast, at 95–98% known-word coverage, the context is rich enough to support educated guessing: the known parts of the sentence constrain the possible meanings of the unknown item. Nation (2001) notes that with high coverage, learners can use cues like redundancy, prior knowledge, and linguistic context to fill in gaps, gradually building their vocabulary through inference. Indeed, Nagy et al. (1985) estimated that when context is fully understood, learners gain a partial understanding of new words (a small percentage of meaning) with each encounters.

Multiple encounters in varied contexts then refine and solidify the word’s meaning. This means that incremental vocabulary learning through context is feasible only when input is comprehensible enough to make those first guesses. Paul Nation (2013) has pointed out that to infer word meaning from context, learners not only need a high percentage of known words, but also familiarity with the subject matter and discourse pattern. For example, a student reading a simplified story (with 98% known words) can often infer the remaining 2% (say, a new adjective or an unknown idiom) because the storyline and surrounding text make the meaning clear. If that same student tried a text with only 80% known words, they would likely resort to dictionary look-ups or simply not understand enough to infer anything useful. Research has also shown that incorrect inferences are common when coverage is low, which can mislead learners. Thus, maintaining 90–98% comprehensibility is key to leveraging context: it allows learners to use the known language to learn the unknown. Over time, this process contributes significantly to vocabulary expansion and comprehension skills. In short, comprehensible input provides a supportive context that permits effective inference and hypothesis-testing by the learner, whereas input with too many unknowns offers a poor context that can lead to frustration or false guesses. This is one reason extensive reading proponents like Nation and Norbert Schmitt advocate using reading materials at an appropriate level of difficulty (often defined by that 95–98% coverage ratio). With adequately comprehensible input, learners become adept at “learning to learn” from context, an essential skill for autonomous language growth.

Affective Considerations

Learners’ emotional and psychological states can influence how much they benefit from input. When input is too difficult (e.g., below the 90% comprehension threshold), learners may experience frustration, anxiety, and reduced motivation, leading to a high affective filter that blocks language acquisition. Evelyn Hurwitz and Dolly Young’s studies on foreign language anxiety (Horwitz et al., 1986) showed that anxious students comprehend and retain less of the L2 input in classroom settings. They essentially have a “mental block” – Krashen’s metaphorical affective filter – that makes input go “in one ear and out the other.

Conversely, when input is mostly understandable (90-98%), learners are more likely to experience engagement and positive emotional responses, which lowers the affective filter and enhances learning.

Incremental Learning and Transfer (Transfer Appropriate Processing)

Language acquisition is a gradual, cumulative process, and the principle of incremental learning holds that learners build proficiency step by step through repeated exposure and practice. Comprehensible input at the right level facilitates this incremental learning by ensuring each new encounter reinforces existing knowledge and adds a small layer of new information. For example, a learner might first understand a sentence globally, then notice a new word in it, then later encounter that word in another sentence and refine their understanding, and so on. If input is too difficult, this incremental build-up cannot happen because the learner isn’t even sure what is being communicated.

The incremental nature of learning is supported by comprehensible input because it allows repeated exposures. A word or structure that is initially new (the +1) in one input will appear again in subsequent inputs, each time with the learner understanding more of it – this spaced, contextual repetition solidifies learning and aligns with principles of memory (e.g. spaced repetition, contextual encoding).

In sum, comprehensible input enables a cycle of incremental learning: each understandable encounter adds a bit to the learner’s competence, and because these encounters are in meaningful contexts, the learning is “tuned” to real communication (transfer-appropriate). As Lightbown (2008) notes, when instruction and practice mirror the desired use (e.g. understanding stories to improve listening comprehension skill), learners show better retention and ability to apply their knowledge beyond the classroom.

This justifies methodologies like extensive reading, task-based learning, and story listening, which provide iterative, contextualized input at the right level. They ensure that knowledge is acquired in the same way it is needed for later use, making the transfer from learning to real-world communication as seamless as possible.

Conclusion

The research consistently underscores the critical importance of providing second language learners with comprehensible input that is 90–98% familiar in order to maximize their acquisition of both vocabulary and grammar. This input, which is just beyond their current level (i+1), allows learners to engage in meaningful, context-rich language use while still being challenged by a manageable amount of new material. Whether it’s through managing cognitive load, fostering incidental vocabulary acquisition, or supporting implicit grammar learning, comprehensible input lays the foundation for effective language development.

Moreover, the role of context and affective factors further emphasizes that language learning is not just a cognitive exercise but a holistic experience. The Affective Filter Hypothesis reminds us that learners must be in a supportive, low-anxiety environment for input to be absorbed efficiently. High levels of comprehension and emotional comfort together create the optimal conditions for second language acquisition.

In practice, this means that language instructors should focus on providing students with abundant, comprehensible input, through activities such as extensive reading, conversation, and content-based learning. By ensuring that the majority of the input is understood while still introducing small challenges, teachers can help learners gradually expand their language abilities. As research suggests, comprehensible input not only promotes effective learning but also ensures that students are equipped to transfer their newly acquired knowledge to real-world language use.

References:

Krashen, S. (1982). Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition. Pergamon Press. (See especially the Input Hypothesis and Affective Filter Hypothesis for the role of comprehensible input and emotional factors in SLA.)
Krashen, S. (1985). The Input Hypothesis: Issues and Implications. Longman. (Introduces the i+1 concept, arguing that acquisition occurs with input just beyond the current level, in low-anxiety environments.)
Laufer, B. (1989). “What percentage of text-lexis is essential for comprehension?” Ceben (In: Special Language: From Humans to Thinking Machines, ed. by C. Lauren & M. Nordman). (Pioneer study suggesting ~95% of words need to be known for adequate text comprehension.)
Hu, M. & Nation, P. (2000). “Unknown Word Density and Reading Comprehension.” Reading in a Foreign Language, 13(1), 403–430. (Found learners needed 98% lexical coverage for satisfactory reading comprehension
Nation, I.S.P. (2006). “How Large a Vocabulary Is Needed For Reading and Listening?” Canadian Modern Language Review, 63(1), 59–82. (Vocabulary size estimates for 95% vs. 98% coverage; ~8,000–9,000 word families for 98% coverage
Schmitt, N., Jiang, X., & Grabe, W. (2011). “The Percentage of Words Known in a Text and Reading Comprehension.” Modern Language Journal, 95(1), 26–43. (Empirical study showing a near-linear increase of comprehension with higher known-word percentages; supports 98% coverage target.)
Liu, N. & Nation, P. (1985). “Factors Affecting Guessing Vocabulary in Context.” RELC Journal, 16(1), 33–42. (Concluded learners need around 95% familiar words in a text to guess unknown words with reasonable success.)
VanPatten, B. (1990). “Attending to Form and Content in the Input: An Experiment in Consciousness.” Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 12(3), 287–301. (Demonstrated that learners process input for meaning before form; too much new information can hinder form acquisition.)
VanPatten, B., Keating, G., & Leeser, M. (2012). “The Eye-Tracking Study of Attention to Form in Spanish L2 Learners.” (As referenced in VanPatten’s work – showed that morphological details are acquired via input, not by isolated practice.)
Bardovi-Harlig, K. (2000). Tense and Aspect in Second Language Acquisition: Form, Meaning, and Use. Blackwell. (Provided evidence that learners acquire complex grammatical systems like tense/aspect gradually and in piecemeal fashion, often independent of explicit instruction.)
Lightbown, P. M. (2008). “Transfer Appropriate Processing as a Model for Classroom Second Language Acquisition.” In Z. Han (Ed.), Understanding Second Language Process (pp. 27–44). Multilingual Matters. (Argues that practice/learning conditions should match target use conditions for best retention and transfer – supporting use of meaningful, contextualized input in class.)
Nagy, W., Herman, P., & Anderson, R. (1985). “Learning Words from Context.” Reading Research Quarterly, 20(2), 233–253. (Found that incidental exposure in context leads to small incremental gains in word knowledge, which accumulate given sufficient reading.)
Dulay, H. & Burt, M. (1977). “Remarks on Creativity in Language Acquisition.” In M. Burt, H. Dulay, & M. Finocchiaro (Eds.), Viewpoints on English as a Second Language (pp. 95–126). Regents. (Originated the concept of the affective filter, later incorporated by Krashen, noting how negative emotion can impede language uptake.)
Horwitz, E., Horwitz, M., & Cope, J. (1986). “Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety.” Modern Language Journal, 70(2), 125–132. (Detailed how anxiety can negatively affect learners’ classroom performance and presumably their processing of input.)
Morris, C., Bransford, J., & Franks, J. (1977). “Levels of Processing versus Transfer Appropriate Processing.” Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 16(5), 519–533. (Classic psychology study proposing TAP: memory success depends on the match between learning and retrieval conditions, a concept applied to SLA by Lightbown 2008 and others.)

Why sound is so KEY to Second Language Acquisition – Phonological memory and why so much vocabulary learning is ineffective

February 25, 2025February 26, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized

Introduction – What is Phonological Memory?

Phonological memory, often referred to as phonological working memory, is the ability to temporarily store and manipulate sound-based information. One of the most influential models of working memory, Alan Baddeley’s, conceives of Phonological Memory as an articulatory loop responsible for holding and rehearsing verbal information. Consider how you hold a word or phrase in your head as you make sense of it or prepare to say it; or how you say words in your head as you read from a book; or how you try to make sense of some spoken language. This would be impossible without phonological memory.

Figure 1: Phonological memory

Based on the above, it is obvious that this cognitive function is crucial in vocabulary acquisition for both first and second languages. The Phonological Loop interacts with long-term memory, playing a vital role in the long term retention of the phonological form (i.e. the sound) of new words and phrases. As new phonological forms are held in the phonological store during rehearsal, so more permanent memory representations are constructed. This is one reason why it’s so important to allow students to hear and repeat new language as often as possible. They need to have a phonological representation of words, not merely know what they mean or look like. This makes it easier for them to recognise words and chunks in the continuous stream of speech and to retrieve them in their oral form as they speak.

Research has consistently demonstrated a strong link between phonological memory and the ability to learn new words, evidencing that children with robust phonological memory tend to have larger vocabularies. This relationship suggests that the capacity to retain phonological information facilitates the learning of new words. In fact, individuals with stronger phonological memory capacities often exhibit more rapid and efficient L2 vocabulary learning. Neuroimaging studies have identified specific brain regions associated with phonological processing and vocabulary learning. The anterior surfaces of the supramarginal gyrus, for example, are closely related to phonological abilities, underscoring the neurological basis for the connection between phonological memory and vocabulary acquisition.

What is very interesting and extremely important for our learners is that when we read silently we tend to automatically activate the sound of the word in our heads (subvocalization). This means that the more fluent the students become in reading words and chunks of words aloud, the more efficient they will become at reading. It also means that if students do not have a correct phonological representation of a word, successful vocabulary and grammar learning will be impaired.

Vocabulary learning is mediated by sound

In other words, in language learning, memory for words is mediated by sound. Hence, with your beginner students, investing a lot of time and effort into learning the correct oral form of words is a must. This doesn’t mean merely focusing on phonics, as today’s trend goes, but also and more importantly, to learn vocabulary through listening.

The tragedy is that in many L2 classrooms, vocabulary learning does not occur mostly through listening and speaking as it should, but rather through reading and writing tasks on worksheets or Apps. Fortunately, deliberate training in phonological processing is becoming more frequent in many UK MFL classrooms through reading aloud and dictations, thanks to the washback effect of the new GCSE examination. However, more work needs to be done.

Even language gurus with doctoral degrees seem not to be in the loop when it comes to the importance of Phonological Memory training. In a CPD event not long ago, a prominent English language ‘guru’ asserted that Sentence Stealer (a chunking-aloud game designed to develop fluent phonological processing) was only a motivational gimmick with zero benefits for language learning. Based on the above and the below, though, it is obvious how Sentence stealer or any other chunking-aloud game or reading-aloud task can only be beneficial to phonological memory enhancement and, consequently, to vocabulary acquisition.

Implications for language pedagogy

The most consequential implication for our students is that we need to help them make their phonological memory work as fast and accurately as possible. Those of you who are familiar with EPI will know how the approach tackles this issue through the following techniques:

Phonological awareness activities such as, ‘Faulty echo’, ‘Write it as you hear it’, Rhyming pairs’ etc.
Scripted listening games such as ‘Spot the Intruder’, ‘Break the flow’, ‘Sentence bingo’, etc.
Aural (L2 to L1) sentence and word recognition tasks such ‘Faulty translation’, ‘Gapped Translation’, ‘Tick or cross’, etc.
Chunking aloud games such as ‘Sentence Stealer’, ‘Mind reading’, ‘Lie detector’, etc.
Shadow reading
Dictations
Oral (L1 to L2) retrieval practice games such as ‘Oral ping-pong’, ‘No snakes no ladders’, ‘Translation face-off’ , etc.
The vocab trainer, the Listening trainer and the audio-boxing game on www.language-gym.com or any other internet-based resource teaching vocabulary aurally
Role plays, Information-gap activities and any other communicative task

Understanding the role of Phonological memory: the research evidence

Understanding the role of phonological memory in vocabulary learning is key in view of its centrality to second language acquisition. Teaching methods and remedial interventions aimed at enhancing phonological memory, such as phonological awareness training and specific aural and oral tasks , can lead, as we have just discussed, to improved vocabulary acquisition, particularly in language learners and individuals with language impairments.

Here is how phonological memory affects language acquisition:

1. Vocabulary Acquisition and Retention:

Phonological memory enables temporary storage of sound sequences, which is essential when learning new words in a foreign language.
It helps in mapping unfamiliar sounds to meanings, facilitating the initial stages of vocabulary learning.
Research Evidence:
- Gathercole and Baddeley (1990) found a strong correlation between phonological memory capacity and vocabulary size in children learning a second language.
- Papagno & Vallar (1995) demonstrated that individuals with better phonological memory acquired foreign words more efficiently.

2. Pronunciation and Phonetic Learning:

Phonological memory aids in retaining unfamiliar phonetic patterns, which is crucial for accurate pronunciation and intonation.
It supports the repetition and rehearsal of new sounds, leading to better pronunciation and phonological awareness.
Research Evidence:
- Speciale, Ellis, and Bywater (2004) found that learners with stronger phonological memory produced more accurate pronunciation in L2.
- Service (1992) showed that phonological memory predicted L2 pronunciation skills among Finnish students learning English.

3. Grammar and Syntax Acquisition:

Phonological memory allows learners to temporarily hold and manipulate language structures, facilitating the understanding of complex grammatical rules.
It helps in processing and recalling sentence patterns, contributing to syntactic development in L2.
Research Evidence:
- Williams and Lovatt (2003) found that phonological memory capacity was linked to better acquisition of grammatical rules in artificial language learning tasks.
- Ellis and Sinclair (1996) demonstrated that learners with stronger phonological memory showed superior performance in learning L2 syntax.

4. Listening Comprehension and Fluency:

Phonological memory enables learners to retain spoken information long enough to comprehend and process meaning.
It contributes to speech segmentation, allowing learners to distinguish words and phrases in continuous speech.
Research Evidence:
- Masoura and Gathercole (1999) showed that phonological memory predicted listening comprehension skills in Greek students learning English.
- Service and Kohonen (1995) found that students with better phonological memory were more fluent and accurate in spoken L2.

5. Reading and Writing in L2:

Phonological memory supports phoneme-grapheme mapping, aiding in reading new words.
It helps in spelling and writing by maintaining the phonological structure of words during transcription.
Research Evidence:
- Dufva and Voeten (1999) found that phonological memory predicted reading comprehension in L2 learners.
- O’Brien, Segalowitz, Freed, and Collentine (2006) showed that strong phonological memory correlated with better writing performance in L2.

6. Overall Cognitive Load Management:

Learning an L2 involves increased cognitive load due to unfamiliar vocabulary and grammar structures.
Phonological memory reduces cognitive load by temporarily storing information, allowing for more complex language processing.
Research Evidence:
- Baddeley, Gathercole, and Papagno (1998) illustrated that phonological memory helps in reducing cognitive overload, thus supporting more efficient L2 learning.

Concluding remarks

Phonological memory plays a fundamental role in second language (L2) acquisition, influencing virtually every aspect of language learning, from vocabulary acquisition to pronunciation, grammar, listening comprehension, and even cognitive load management. Its importance stems from its capacity to temporarily store and process sound-based information, allowing learners to map new phonological forms to meanings, rehearse unfamiliar sounds, and build accurate phonological representations. Without this cognitive mechanism, it would be challenging for learners to retain new words, accurately pronounce sounds, or comprehend spoken language.

The evidence is compelling: research consistently demonstrates that stronger phonological memory is associated with larger vocabularies, better pronunciation, enhanced grammatical understanding, and improved listening and reading comprehension. Studies by Gathercole and Baddeley (1990), Papagno & Vallar (1995), and Service (1992), among others, highlight the positive correlation between phonological memory and successful L2 learning outcomes.

For language educators, the implications are clear: teaching strategies must prioritize activities that stimulate and strengthen phonological memory. This includes phonological awareness exercises, chunking aloud games, oral retrieval practice, scripted listening tasks, and interactive role plays that encourage repetitive hearing and production of language. By focusing on the auditory and articulatory aspects of language learning, teachers can help students internalize the phonological structures needed for fluent and accurate communication.

Moreover, understanding that vocabulary learning is mediated by sound underscores the need to balance listening and speaking activities with traditional reading and writing tasks. Ensuring that students not only understand the meaning of words but also possess a clear phonological representation of them enhances both recognition and recall, fostering greater fluency in both spoken and written forms.

Ultimately, phonological memory is not merely a supportive component of language learning but a driving force that shapes the way learners perceive, process, and produce language. By leveraging this knowledge, educators can create more effective and cognitively aligned learning environments, maximizing their students’ potential to acquire a second language efficiently and proficiently.

Ten tried-and-tested instructional strategies that WILL enhance your students’ listening skills and GCSE grades

February 21, 2025February 27, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized education, learning, literacy, reading, teaching

Introduction

Listening is widely recognized as one of the most challenging yet crucial skills in second language acquisition. Despite its importance, traditional listening instruction in many language classrooms remains product-oriented, focusing primarily on testing comprehension through questions and answers, rather than teaching students how to listen effectively. This approach often leaves learners feeling frustrated and demotivated, as they struggle to make sense of spoken language without the necessary strategies or skills to decode it. To address these challenges, a process-based approach to listening instruction has emerged, emphasizing the development of aural micro-skills, strategic listening, and metacognitive awareness.

In this context, effective listening instruction involves more than just exposing students to spoken language; it requires a systematic approach that empowers learners to actively engage in the listening process. This includes teaching vocabulary aurally in context, rather than through isolated word lists or digital flashcards, to enhance word recognition and retention. Furthermore, successful listening hinges on mastering a range of micro-skills, such as phoneme recognition, word segmentation, lexical retrieval, parsing, chunking, and meaning-building. These skills enable learners to process spoken input efficiently and accurately, paving the way for improved comprehension and fluency.

Moreover, motivating learners through engaging and interactive tasks is essential for sustained listening practice. Research consistently shows that motivation and self-efficacy are powerful predictors of success in listening. Therefore, this article advocates for a motivational framework that incorporates gamification, relevant input, and the PIRCO sequence—a structured approach that guides learners through pre-listening, while-listening, and post-listening phases to maximize comprehension and retention.

This article explores how a process-based approach, grounded in cognitive and metacognitive strategy instruction, can transform listening instruction from a passive activity into an active, strategic, and enjoyable learning experience. By shifting the focus from merely testing comprehension to teaching the process of listening, educators can better equip students to navigate the complexities of spoken language, ultimately leading to greater language proficiency and confidence.

Ten tips that will enhance your listening outcomes

Here are ten key tried-and-tested instructional strategies that will definitely enhance your listening oucomes.

1. Teach vocabulary through listening in the context of highly comprehensible input– Success at listening hinges largely on word recognition (72 % !). However, in order to be useful for listening tasks, words need to be acquired through listening. This often doesn’t happen in the typical MFL classroom, where words are typically learnr through worksheets or apps like Quizlet, which do not provide much listening practice.

Note that learning vocabulary aurally requires more exposures than learning it through reading, so you need to factor in 10 to 15 meaningful exposure in context, not in isolation, at least. Practising words aurally, in isolation, is not very useful and totally unauthentic. Teaching vocabulary aurally ought to involve an initial phase involving listening-while-reading (see my previous post on this) with or without pictures followed by listening without a script.

Highly comprehensible input is key, of course, due to the very high cognitive that listening poses on language learners and the anxiety that exposure to a lot of unknown vocabulary can cause. Listening-specific anxiety is a phenomenon that has been widely documented by researchers and one which significantly hinder performance.

2. Develop the micro-skills of listening using a process-based approach (Field, 2009) – Too much listening instruction has traditionally been about top-down processing, i.e. asking students to predict the content of an aural text, to guess intelligently using content and critical thinking and other higher order cognitive skills which, whilst useful, should not dominate listening instruction, especially not at the early stages of second language instruction and not with low-ability L2 learners. The Pearson textbooks are notoriously bad in this respect.

To understand how difficult listening is: in the space of 2 seconds, your students must decode every sentence they hear executing the following skills:

– phonemes recognition

– recognition of syllables and intonation patterns

– word segmentation (identification of words boundaries)

– lexical retrieval (recognition of content words and lexical phrases)

– parsing (grammar, syntax, function words, etc.)

– chunking (as they do the above, the learners need to keep each sentence they hear firmly and comfortably in their phonological memory for as long as it takes for them to decode it)

If the execution of the above skills is successful, they will likely understand the meaning of each sentence they hear (the meaning building phase). If they are listening to a text longer then a sentence, they will use the information gathered from the sentence just decoded and mix it with the information in every new incoming sentence to gather a global understanding of the whole text (discourse building).

Due to the severe demands of the listening process, it is key that the students become fluent in the execution of the above micro-skills. Hence, in each listening lessons, you will stage tasks which engage the students in practice with above micro-skills. Here are some examples of mostly SCRIPTED LISTENING activities which practise the micro-skills of listening:

Aural micro-skills	Aural activities
Phoneme recognition	Faulty echo, Write it as you hear it, Spot the silent letters, Track the sound, Listen and correct, Musical chairs
Syllable and intonation patterns recognition	Syllable building blocks, Syllable bingo, Spot the stressed syllable, Cross out the intruder
Word segmentation	Break the flow, Spot the intruder, Spot the liaison, Faulty transcript, Word grab
Lexical retrieval	Sentence bingo, Faulty translation, Spot the nonsense, Tangled translation, Tick or cross
Parsing	Sentence puzzle, Fixy echo, Track the structure, Faulty echo, Rhyming pairs, Sorting tasks, Guess the next word
Chunking	Delayed repetition, Delayed dictation
Meaning building	Spot the nonsense, Sentence translation,
Discourse building	True, false not mentioned, Comprehension questions, Content reordering, Jigsaw listening, Vandergrift pedagogical cycle

You will start using this approach from the early stages of secondary, gradually transitioning to more challenging texts, where you may implement the above activities as part of the PIRCO sequence (see below) both in the Pre-listening and in the Consolidation phases. This approach has been laid out in my best-selling book with Steve Smith, Breaking the sound barrier, teaching language learners how to listen.

3. Make it motivational by building self-efficacy, making it enjoyable and choosing interesting input – Motivation and Self-efficacy (one of the most important catalysts of motivation) are the strongest predictors of success at listening (Macaro, 2001).

Here are some important tips if you want to generate and maintain the motivation to listen:

– Make it as interactive as possible using mini-whiteboards. Most of the activities in the table above are interactive or can be made interactive with the use of mini-whiteboards. The teacher reads aloud a sentence with an intruder, for example, and the students need to spot it and write it on her miniwhiteboard

– Gamify it whilst keeping it meaningful and evidence-based (See activities in the the table above)

– Make it accessible to most of your learners (a meaty pre-listening vocab teaching phase is key with mixed ability classes)

– Make sure your students arrive at a text prepared and leave with the feeling that they have learnt something. Never let the students leave the task with very little learning and a meaningless grade (the ‘Empty hands’ + ‘I can’t do listening’ effect) as too often happens! To prevent this, you should embed listening within a carefully designed Input-to-Output sequence (see Rost, 2002; Conti and Smith, 2019) which aims at recycling the target vocabulary around 40 times across all four skills (that’s the minimal amount of exposure we need to commit a word to long-term memory across all four skills). Please note that for the vocabulary you will want your students to learn only receptively, you will need 6-10 exposures through reading and 10-15 through listening. Here’s an example of my favourite input-to-output sequence:

(1) a very substantive pre-listening phase where you teach key vocabulary, grammar and sound patterns. This should be longer than the one or two vocab-building activities usually done, and should include a mix of listening (including Scripted Listening ones) and reading activities.

(2) a while-listening phase in which the students gradually move to listening comprehension tasks – These should include very simple tasks allowing most students to succeed, e.g. word grab, and/or a set of very simple comprehension questions that most children can answer and then move to more challenging activities.

(3) a review phase where the transcripts are examined and the obstacles to comprehension are identified;

(4) a consolidation phase where (a) the reading-whilst-listening tasks are performed on the transcript (this should be as gamified as possible and target the key linguistic features in the text) and (b) the vocabulary in the text is solidified;

(5) a pushed-output phase where the key linguistic items are used by the students to translate and to communicate more creatively (role plays, interviews, monologues). This sequence, that I call PIRCO (see figure 1 below), is the most powerful I have ever implemented with my GCSE classes.

Do note that the post-listening phases, i.e. (3), (4) and (5) are key. As professor Rost, in his seminal 2002 article states: the “post-listening” stage of listening occurs in the few minutes following the actual attending to the text. This is probably the most important part of listening instruction because it allows the learner to build mental representations and develop short-term L2 memory, and increase motivation for listening a second time.

MPORTANT – When you stage the pre-listening phase, make sure that you do not give away the answers to the questions in the subsequent aural comprehension phase.

Figure 1: the PIRCO sequence

– Avoid ‘death by past-paper’ practice until you get closer to the exam, and even then, bearing in mind that cognitive fatigue sets in when we listen after barely 90 seconds of continuous listening, stage only specific tasks in the exam papers that you deem more useful.

– Make the input relevant. Students are keener to listen to something they are interested in. Before playing a text about a celebrity, play a song, video or film trailer to enhance their interest and curiosity

– Avoid grading every task – which brings me to the next point

(4) Delay awarding grades until is truly necessary. Focus on improving listening skills (listening to learn) not grades (listening to test), until you are close to the exams – Prioritizing a focus on the process of listening over a focus on the product of listening is essential in listening instruction, especially when transitioning from lower to upper school. Listening being the most challenging of the four skills and the one that causes the most anxiety amongst children, it is key to refrain from grading the students’ work every time you stage a listening activity. Remember the ‘empty hands’ effect, so common after a listening activity; do you really want to compound its negative effect on self-efficacy and motivation with a poor grade? Why would that student ever want to listen to another aural text again? By investing your efforts, instead, into working on improving student self-efficacy and listening skills you are more likely to forge more motivated and competent listeners who are not afraid to listen.

How about the exams? Remember the PIRCO sequence above? You will gradually phase it out as you draw close to the exam and move to PIR (pre-listening, in-listening and review) where the pre-listening phase will be mostly about imparting listening strategies. Bear in mind that according to research listening strategies need to taught regularly for a period of over three months. So, starting with PIR one term before the listening exams would work. Remember that teaching listening strategies when the students have a modest vocabulary repertoire can be counterproductive, according to some researchers (e.g. Renandya, 2022). Strategies cannot be a substitute for vocabulary and syntactic knowledge.

(5) Stage a Needs’ analysis when you first meet the students – At the beginning of year 10, I recommend a quick survey carried out using google forms aimed at finding out what the students experiences with listening were at KS3, what their attitude to listening is, as well as other data to do with their self-efficacy and self-confidence as listeners. This is imperative in departments where learner motivation to listen is low, the team have heterogenous/inconsistent approaches to listening instruction and/or use the listening materials and tasks in textbooks (which are horrendously designed and sequenced) and/or where listening is the ‘cinderella’ skill.

(6) Use Narrow Listening (possibly in combination with Narrow Reading) – Narrow listening, where two or three near-identical aural texts are used in an instructional sequence involving connected texts, is a powerful way to practise and reinforce vocabulary. With ChatGpT or other AI powered tools, this is very easy to accomplish in a matter of seconds; just ask the software to produce an identical text by changing an X number of words. Then copy and paste in a text-to-speech online tool and the job is done! Staging narrow reading prior to narrow listening with very similar texts to the ones that they will be listening to will, of course, be a great way to prime the students for the subsequent aural tasks.

(7) Before your students do any silent reading comprehension work, stage some Scripted Listening (aka reading-whilst-listening) activities – Activities such as Spot the intruder, Spot the missing detail, Faulty transcript, Spot the pronunciation mistakes, Add the missing endings, Track the sound, Spot the wrong word order, Disappearing text, etc. can easily be staged prior to reading tasks injecting some fun in what are often pretty dry tasks. The pedagogical rationale for this approach is two-fold: firstly, when students read silently they subvocalize automatically converting every written symbol they process into their dominant language – so you may want to prevent that; secondly, you have an extra chance to practise listening!

(8) Teach listening strategies when the students are ready – Listening strategies (see table below) can be useful, but are no substitute for vocabulary, grammar and phonological competence. Hence, teaching your students listening strategies ought to be done in the later stages of KS4, when the students have accrued a substantive vocabulary (between 1,000 and 2,000 high-frequency words) . The training should involve regular practice with the strategies, at least 15 minutes per week for 3 months, according to some research. Do remember that the research evidence on the effectiveness of listening strategy instruction is very scant and inconclusive and most studies have been carried out with older students, most at university or pre-university level.

(9) Develop their metacognition – Make them aware of the listening process since the very early stages of their language learning journey. Show they how we listen, what skills are involved in the process. Starting in year 7 do reading whilst listening games with the transcript of the aural texts they have just listened to, to inject some fun in the process and to make them aware of the obstacles they encountered whilst listening. In pre-examination times, make them aware of their most common affective and cognitive problems as they listen and provide them with tips on how to overcome or mitigate them.

(10) Do regular surveys of student self-efficacy – If in your Department there is a history of poor achievement in listening, do carry out regular surveys to find out whether the students (1) are enjoying listening; (2) feel they are learning from it (self-efficacy) ; (3) what concerns them the most; (4) what they suggest you could do to help them and (5) make it more fun. Do them every half-term with ‘at risk’ classes and use a 1(lowest) to 4 (highest) scale for them to rate each item, so that nobody sits on the fence. If you see lots of 1s and 2s very early on in the process, then you know it-s time to intervene drastically.

Concluding Remarks

In conclusion, effective listening instruction hinges on a process-based approach that goes beyond mere comprehension checks and emphasizes the development of essential aural micro-skills, vocabulary acquisition, and metacognitive awareness. This article underscores the necessity of teaching vocabulary aurally in context, recognizing that listening is primarily about word recognition and requires multiple exposures within meaningful contexts to ensure retention and application. By integrating vocabulary teaching with listening tasks, learners will be better equipped not only to handle GCSE exam tasks but also authentic listening scenarios, thereby enhancing their overall comprehension and confidence.

Furthermore, the process-based approach advocated here emphasizes the importance of developing the micro-skills of listening, including phoneme recognition, word segmentation, lexical retrieval, parsing, chunking, and meaning-building. These foundational skills are crucial for accurate decoding and meaning-making, ensuring that learners can efficiently process spoken language. This structured practice, combined with scripted listening activities tailored to each micro-skill, provides the necessary scaffolding for learners to build fluency and accuracy in real-time listening.

Additionally, this posts emphasizes the need to build motivation and self-efficacy by creating enjoyable and meaningful listening experiences. By using interactive tasks, gamification, relevant input, and the PIRCO sequence, teachers can foster a positive learning environment that encourages persistence and reduces anxiety associated with listening tasks. This motivational approach not only sustains learners’ interest but also cultivates a sense of achievement and progress, essential for long-term language acquisition.

Finally, this article emphasizes the key role of listening-to-learn, a methodology laid out in Conti and Smith (2019), where it is called LAM (or Listening As Modelling), whose key staples are summarised below:

Principle	Description
Prioritize Listening in Language Instruction	Listening is fundamental to language learning and should be emphasized in teaching.
Integrate Listening with Other Language Skills	Listening should be combined with speaking, reading, and writing to create a holistic learning experience.
Provide Comprehensible and Patterned Input	Use input that is understandable and follows predictable patterns to aid learning.
Focus on Process-Oriented Listening Instruction	Teach students how to listen effectively, rather than just testing their comprehension.
Develop Micro-Skills of Listening	Train students in specific listening skills, such as phonemic processing and segmenting.
Reduce Listening Anxiety and Build Self-Efficacy	Create a supportive environment to lower anxiety and boost students’ confidence in listening.
Use Teacher-Led Modeling	Teachers should actively model listening skills, rather than relying solely on audio recordings.
Implement Structured and Scaffolded Listening Activities	Design activities that gradually increase in complexity, providing appropriate support at each stage.
Encourage Active and Reflective Listening Practices	Promote strategies that engage students actively and encourage reflection on their listening processes.
Input Flood	Expose learners to a high frequency of target language forms (e.g., specific grammatical structures or vocabulary) within meaningful contexts to increase familiarity and recognition.
Input Enhancement	Make specific language features more noticeable through visual or auditory cues (e.g., highlighting, repetition, or changes in tone) to draw learners’ attention to them.
Repeated Processing	Encourage multiple exposures to the same input material through varied activities (e.g., listening for gist, detailed comprehension, or inferring meaning) to deepen understanding and retention.
Thorough Processing	Consists of techniques that force students to process the texts in detail, ensuring a deeper understanding of language structures, vocabulary, and meanings.

Please note that a new Language Gym GCSE workbook based on these and other effective instructional strategies will be out in March. It will implement the PIRCO sequence as applied to the new GCSE word lists. In addition to listening-to-learn tasks, it will also include listenint-to-test tasks based on the new GCSE exam papers.

Why using Scripted Listening (reading- whilst- listening) is so powerful for vocabulary acquisition

February 20, 2025February 20, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized

Reading while listening is a highly effective strategy for vocabulary acquisition and one that plays a massive role in the first phases of EPI’s MARS EARS sequence, namely in the Modelling and Receptive phases of the pedagogical cycle. In EPI we call Reading whilst listening Scripted Listening, and it is implemented first at sentence level and subsequently at connected text level with highly comprehensible input through a wide range of highly engaging activities such as ‘Spot the nonsense’, ‘Spot the intruders’, ‘Track the word/phrase/structure/ sound’, ‘Likely or Unlikely’, ‘Break the flow’, ‘Positive or Negative’, ‘One of three’, ‘Faulty transcript’, ‘Spot the missing details’, ‘Gapped dictation’, etc. Most of these activities involve high-pace interaction between the teacher ans the students, which makes the process more dynamic and enjoyable and, if it is done well and by the right person, usually prevents students from misbehaving.

This approach provides multiple benefits supported by research. Here are the key ones:

1. Multi-Sensory Learning Enhances Memory Retention

Key Finding: Engaging both visual (reading) and auditory (listening) senses leads to stronger memory retention. This dual modality reinforces neural connections, facilitating deeper cognitive processing.
Research Evidence:
- Mathias, B., Andrae, C., Schwager, A., Macedonia, M., & von Kriegstein, K. (2021) demonstrated that enriching novel words with sensorimotor information enhances memory outcomes compared to reading alone.
- Source: Mathias et al., 2021

2. Contextual Vocabulary Acquisition

Key Finding: Encountering new words in context helps learners infer meanings and understand correct usage.
Research Evidence:
- Rapaport, W. J. (2005) emphasized that contextual vocabulary acquisition involves deliberate reasoning from textual clues and prior knowledge, facilitating deeper understanding and retention of word meanings.
- Source: Rapaport, 2005

3. Improved Pronunciation and Phonological Awareness

Key Finding: Listening to correct pronunciation while reading aids in internalizing sounds and linking them to written words, enhancing phonological awareness. This is extremely beneficial when dealing with opaque languages like French, where the sound-to-spelling correspondence poses enormous challenges to many learners.
Research Evidence:
- Perfetti, C. (1985) indicated that integrating auditory and visual stimuli during word learning improves pronunciation and listening fluency, contributing to more effective vocabulary acquisition.
- Source: Perfetti, 1985

4. Reinforcement Through Repetition

Key Finding: Simultaneous reading and listening provide repeated exposure to new vocabulary in varied contexts, reinforcing learning and aiding retention.
Research Evidence:
- Studies have shown that repeated exposure to words across different modes leads to better vocabulary acquisition and retention.
- Source: PMC Article, 2022

5. Enhanced Comprehension and Fluency

Key Finding: Auditory input offers natural pacing and intonation cues, aiding comprehension and reading fluency.
Research Evidence:
- Research indicates that learners acquire vocabulary incidentally through listening to various input sources, such as songs and movies, which contributes to improved comprehension.
- Source: PMC Article, 2022

6. Increased Motivation and Engagement

Key Finding: The combination of reading and listening creates an immersive and enjoyable learning experience, boosting motivation and engagement.
Research Evidence:
- This multimodal approach can make language learning more appealing, leading to sustained practice and exposure.

7. Real-Life Language Exposure (when using audiobooks, podcasts, etc.)

Key Finding: Audiobooks and podcasts expose learners to authentic language use, enhancing listening skills and cultural understanding.
Research Evidence:
- This exposure to natural language use in various contexts aids in developing a more nuanced understanding of the language.
- No specific citation found; based on general linguistic theory.

8. Faster Vocabulary Retention and Recall

Key Finding: Words learned through dual modalities (reading and listening) are remembered more quickly and accurately.
Research Evidence:
- This approach leads to more efficient vocabulary retention and recall compared to single-modality learning.
- No specific citation found; supported by cognitive science principles.

Summary

Integrating reading and listening in language learning leverages multi-sensory engagement, contextual understanding, and repetition, making it a powerful method for vocabulary acquisition. This strategy is supported by extensive research showing its effectiveness for memory retention, comprehension, and overall language fluency. EPI teachers know this all too well, as in our approach the initial phases of the MARSEARS sequence are all about Scripted Listening, a technique which, through a combination of highly patterned and comprehensible input, input flood, input enhancement, repeated processing and task-essentialness, makes language learning more effective and engaging.

Mapping out the second language writing process and implications for teaching

February 19, 2025February 20, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized, Writing skills ai, artificial-intelligence, education, teaching, writing

1. Introduction

In this article I take on the complex task of illustrating the cognitive processes that take place in the brain of a second language student writer as s/he produces an essay. Why? Because often, as teachers and target language experts, we forget how challenging it is for our students to write an essay in a foreign language. Gaining a better grasp of the thinking processes essay writing in a second language involves, may help teachers become more cognitively empathetic towards their students; moreover, they may reconsider the way they teach writing and treat student errors.

A caveat before we proceed: this article is quite a challenging read which may require some background in applied linguistics and/or cognitive psychology. However, if you want to avoid the complex stuff and concentrate on writing at lower proficiency levels (KS2 to KS4) you can go straight to section 3 below.

2. A Cognitive account of the writing processes: the Flower and Hayes (1981) model

The Flower and Hayes (1981) model of essay writing in a first language is regarded as one of the most effective accounts of writing available to-date (Eysenck and Keane, 2010). As Figure 1 below shows, it posits three major components:

Task-environment,

Writer’s Long-Term Memory,

Writing process.

Figure 1: The Flower and Hayes model (click to expand)

The Task-environment includes: (1) the Writing Assignment (the topic, the target audience, and motivational factors) and the text; (2) the Writer’s Long-term memory, which provides factual knowledge and skill/genre specific procedures; (3) the Writing Process, which consists of the three sub-processes of Planning, Translating and Reviewing.

The Planning process sets goals based on information drawn from the Task-environment and Long-Term Memory (LTM). Once these have been established, a writing plan is developed to achieve those goals. More specifically, the Generating sub-process retrieves information from LTM through an associative chain in which each item of information or concept retrieved functions as a cue to retrieve the next item of information and so forth.The Organising sub-process selects the most relevant items of information retrieved and organizes them into a coherent writing plan. Finally, the Goal-setting sub-process sets rules (e.g. ‘keep it simple’) that will be applied in the Editing process. The second process, Translating, transforms the information retrieved from LTM into language. This is necessary, since concepts are stored in LTM in the form of Propositions (‘concepts’/ ‘imagery’), not words. Flower and Hayes (1980) provide the following examples of what propositions involve:

[(Concept A) (Relation B) (Concept C)]

{Concept D) (Attribute E)], etc.

Finally, the Reviewing processes of Reading and Editing have the function of enhancing the quality of the output. The Editing process checks that grammar rules and discourse conventions are not being flouted, looks for semantic inaccuracies and evaluates the text in the light of the writing goals. Editing has the form of a Production system with two IF- THEN conditions:

The first part specifies the kind of language to which the editing production

applies, e.g. formal sentences, notes, etc. The second is a fault detector for

such problems as grammatical errors, incorrect words, and missing context.

(Flower and Hayes, 1981: 17)

In other words, when the conditions of a Production are met, e.g. a wrong word ending is detected, an action is triggered for fixing the problem. For example:

CONDITION 1: (formal sentence) first letter of sentence lower case

CONDITION 2: change first letter to upper case

(Flower and Hayes, 1981: 17)

Two important features of the Editing process are: (1) it is triggered automatically whenever the conditions of an Editing Production are met; (2) it may interrupt any other ongoing process. Editing is regulated by an attentional system called The Monitor. Hayes and Flower do not provide a detailed account of how it operates. Differently from Krashen’s (1977) Monitor, a control system used solely for editing, Hayes and Flower’s (1980) device operates at all levels of production orchestrating the activation of the various sub-processes. This allows Hayes and Flower to account for two phenomena they observed. Firstly, the Editing and the Generating processes can cut across other processes. Secondly, the existence of the Monitor enables the system to be flexible in the application of goal-setting rules, in that through the Monitor any other processes can be triggered. This flexibility allows for the recursiveness of the writing process.

Hayes and Flower’s model is useful in providing teachers with a framework for understanding the many demands that essay writing poses on students. In particular, it helps teachers understand how the recursiveness of the writing process may cause those demands to interfere with each other causing cognitive overload and error.

Furthermore, by conceptualising editing as a process that can interrupt writing at any moment, the model has a very important implication for a theory of error: self-correctable errors occurring at any level of written production are not always the result of a retrieval failure; they may also be interpreted as caused by detection failure (failure to ‘spot’ a mistake).

One limitation of the model for a theory of error is that its description of the Translating and Editing sub-processes is too general. I shall therefore supplement it with Cooper and Matsuhashi’s (1983) list of writing plans and decisions along with findings from other L1-writing Cognitive research, which will provide the reader with a more detailed account. I shall also briefly discuss some findings from proofreading research which may help explain some of the problems encountered by L2-student writers during the Editing process.

3. The translating sub-processes

Cooper and Matsuhashi (1983) posit four stages, which correspond to Flower and Hayes’ (1981) conceptualization of the Translating process: Wording, Presenting, Storing and Transcribing (see picture 2 below)

Figure 2 – The Translating sub-processes (Click to expand)

WORDING THE PROPOSITION (Lexical selection) – In this first stage, the brain transforms the propositional content into lexis. Although at this stage the pre-lexical decisions the writer made at earlier stages and the preceding discourse limit lexical choice, Wording the proposition is still a complex task: ‘the choice seems infinite, especially when we begin considering all the possibilities for modifying or qualifying the main verb and the agentive and affected nouns’ (Cooper and Matsuhashi, 1983: 32). Once s/he has selected the lexical items, the writer has to tackle the task of Presenting the proposition in standard written language.
PRESENTING THE PROPOSITION (Grammatical encoding) – This involves making a series of decisions in the areas of genre, grammar and syntax. In the area of grammar, Agreement, Word-order and Tense will be the main issues for L1_English learners of languages like French, German, Italian or Spanish. Functional processing, i.e. assigning a functional role (e.g. subject, verb, direct or indirect object) to every word in a sentence, precedes Positional processing, i.e. arranging the words in the correct syntactic order. This is the stage where grammatical mistakes are made, mostly due, in second language writing, to processing inefficiency (e.g. mistakes caused by cognitive overload), carelessness (i.e. superficial self-monitoring) and, of course, L1/L3 negative transfer (i.e. the influence of the first language or other languages).
STORING THE PROPOSITION (Phonological and Orthographic encoding) – The proposition, as planned so far, is then temporarily stored in Working Short Term Memory (henceforth WSTM) while Transcribing takes place, first in form of sound (phonological encoding). Phonological encoding is crucial for internal speech monitoring and for preparing the sentence for written output Propositions longer than just a few words will have to be rehearsed and re-rehearsed in WSTM for parts of it not to be lost before the transcription is complete. The limitations of WSTM create serious disadvantages for unpractised writers. Until they gain some confidence and fluency with spelling, their WSTM may have to be loaded up with letter sequences of single words or with only 2 or 3 words (Hotopf, 1980). This not only slows down the writing process, but it also means that all other planning must be suspended during the transcriptions of short letter or word sequences. This is where many spelling mistakes occur, especially with younger L2 learners (who have a much more limited working memory capacity than older learners) or less able older learners. This problem will be exacerbated in the case of children having to learn a completely different writing system (i.e. an English native learning to write in Mandarin).
TRANSCRIBING THE PROPOSITION (Motor planning and execution) – The physical act of transcribing the fully formed proposition begins once the graphic image of the output has been stored in WSTM. In L1-writing, transcription occupies subsidiary awareness, enabling the writer to use focal awareness for other plans and decisions. In practised writers, transcription of certain words and sentences can be so automatic as to permit planning the next proposition while one is still transcribing the previous one. An interesting finding with regards to these final stages of written production comes from Bereiter, Fire and Gartshore (1979) who investigated L1-writers aged 10-12. They identified several discrepancies between learners’ forecasts in think-aloud and their actual writing. 78 % of such discrepancies involved stylistic variations. Notably, in 17% of the forecasts, significant words were uttered in forecasts which did not appear in the writing. In about half of these cases the result was a syntactic flaw (e.g. the forecasted phrase ‘on the way to school’ was written ‘on the to school’). Bereiter and Scardamalia (1987) believe that lapses of this kind indicate that language is lost somewhere between storage in WSTM and grapho-motor execution. These lapses, they also assert, cannot be described as ‘forgetting what one was going to say’ since almost every omission was reported on recall: in the case of ‘on the to school’, for example, the author not only intended to write ‘on the way’ but claimed later to have written it. In their view, this is caused by interference from the attentional demands of the mechanics of writing (spelling, capitalization, etc.), the underlying psychological premise being that a writer has a limited amount of attention to allocate and that whatever is taken up with the lower level demands of written language must be taken from something else.

In sum, Cooper and Matsuhashi (1983) posit four main stages in the conversion of the preverbal message into a speech plan: (1) the selection of the right lexical units (2) the application of grammatical and syntactic rules. (3) The unit of language is then deposited in WSTM in phonological and orthographic form, awaiting translation into grapho-motor execution (the physical act of writing). (4) grapho-motor execution

The temporary storage in stage (3) raises the possibility that lower level demands affect production as follows: (1) causing the writer to omit material during grapho-motor execution; (2) leading to forgetting higher-level decisions already made. Interference resulting in WSTM loss can also be caused by lack of monitoring of the written output due to devoting conscious attention entirely to planning ahead, while leaving the process of transcription to run ‘on automatic’.

Picture 2 (repeated)

Implications for teaching

The implications of the above for second language instruction are obvious: the implementation of a process-based approach to writing instruction in which the teachers stages sequences of activities which explicitly address the micro-skills of writing. This entails engaging students, consistently, in tasks which practise said micro-skills. See picture 2 above, Picture 3 below, provides examples of activities that could be implemented for each micro-skill.

Imagine, after exploiting 90-95% comprehensible-input texts intensively through a range of activities, engaging the students in micro-writing tasks addressing all of the micro-skills of writing prior to staging more unstructured and creative activities. Would your students not perform better? Would you not be more inclusive?

4. How about editing? Some insights from proofreading research

Proofreading theories and research provide us with the following important insights in the mechanisms that regulate essay editing. Firstly, proofreading involves different processes from reading: when one proofreads a passage, one is generally looking for misspellings, words that might have been omitted or repeated, typographical mistakes, etc., and as a result, comprehension is not the goal. When one is reading a text, on the other hand, one’s primary goal is comprehension. Thus, reading involves construction of meaning, while proofreading involves visual search. For this reason, in reading, short function words, not being semantically salient, are not fixated (Paap, Newsome, McDonald and Schvaneveldt, 1982). Consequently, errors on such words are less likely to be spotted when one is editing a text concentrating mostly on its meaning than when one is focusing one’s attention on the text as part of a proofreading task (Haber and Schindler, 1981). Errors are likely to decrease even further when the proofreader is forced to fixate on every single function word in isolation (Haber and Schindler, 1981).

It should also be noted that some proofreader’s errors appear to be due to acoustic coding. This refers to the phenomenon whereby the way a proofreader pronounces a word/diphthong/letter influences his/her detection of an error. For example, if an English learner of L2-Italian pronounces the ‘e’ in the singular noun ‘stazione’ (= train station) as [i] instead of [e], s/he will find it difficult to differentiate it from the plural ‘stazioni’ (= train stations). This may impinge on her/his ability to spot errors with that word involving the use of the singular for the plural and vice versa.

Implications for teaching

The implications for language learning are that learners may have to be trained to edit their essays at least once focusing exclusively on form. Ideally, with beginner learners, the teacher should encourage several rounds of editing, each focusing on a different potential problem areas, gradually moving from easier to more challenging items.

Secondly, they should be told to pay particular attention to those words (e.g. function words) and parts of words (e.g. verb endings) which are not semantically and perceptually salient and are therefore less likely to be noticed.

Thirdly, dictations should feature regularly in language lessons from very early on in the L2 learning process, beginning with micro-dictation focusing on single letters or syllables, then moving on to gapped sentences and finally to longer texts with more cognitive challenging tasks such as dictogloss.

5. Bilingual written production: adapting the first language model

Writing, although slower than speaking, is still processed at enormous speed in mature native speakers’ WSTM. The processing time required by a writer will be greater in the L2 than in the L1 and will increase at lower levels of proficiency: at the Wording stage, more time will be needed to match non-proceduralized lexical materials to propositions; at the Presenting stage, more time will be needed to select and retrieve the right grammatical form. Furthermore, more attentional effort will be required in rehearsing the sentence plans in WSTM; in fact, just like Hotopf’s (1980) young L1-writers, non- proficient L2-learners may be able to store in WSTM only two or three words at a time. This has implications for Agreement in Italian, French or Spanish in view of the fact that words more than three-four words distant from one another may still have to agree in gender and number. Finally, in the Transcribing phase, the retrieval of spelling and other aspects of the writing mechanics will take up more WSTM focal awareness.

Monitoring too will require more conscious effort, increasing the chances of Short-term Memory loss. This is more likely to happen with less expert learners: the attentional system having to monitor levels of language that in the mature L1-speaker are normally automatized, it will not have enough channel capacity available, at the point of utterance, to cope with lexical/grammatical items that have not yet been proceduralised. This also implies that Editing is likely to be more recursive than in L1-writing, interrupting other writing processes more often, with consequences for the higher meta-components. In view of the attentional demands posed by L2-writing, the interference caused by planning ahead will also be more likely to occur, giving rise to processing failure. Processing failure/WSTM loss may also be caused by the L2-writer pausing to consult dictionaries or other resources to fill gaps in their L2-knowledge while rehearsing the incomplete sentence plan in WSTM. In fact, research indicates that although, in general terms, composing patterns (sequences of writing behaviours) are similar in L1s and L2s there are some important differences.

In his seminal review of the L1/L2-writing literature, Silva (1993) identified a number of discrepancies between L1- and L2-composing. Firstly, L2-composing was clearly more difficult. More specifically, the Transcribing phase was more laborious, less fluent, and less productive. Also, L2-writers spent more time referring back to an outline or prompt and consulting dictionaries. They also experienced more problems in selecting the appropriate vocabulary. Furthermore, L2-writers paused more frequently and for longer time, which resulted in L2-writing occurring at a slower rate. As far as Reviewing is concerned, Silva (1993) found evidence in the literature that in L2-writing there is usually less re-reading of and reflecting on written texts. He also reported evidence suggesting that L2-writers revise more, before and while drafting, and in between drafts. However, this revision was more problematic and more of a preoccupation. There also appears to be less auditory monitoring in the L2 and L2-revision seems to focus more on grammar and less on mechanics, particularly spelling. Finally, the text features of L2-written texts provide strong evidence suggesting that L2-writing is a less fluent process involving more errors and producing – at least in terms of the judgements of native English speakers – less effective texts.

Implications for teaching

Firstly, the process of writing being much more challenging in the second language, teachers must scaffold writing much more carefully. This starts with staging an intensive reading-to-learn phase prior to engaging the students in writing tasks, which unfortunately doesn’t happen with textbooks, because the latter only include reading-to-comprehend activities. After this intensive receptive phase, teachers should engage the students in a series of micro-writing tasks which gradually phase out support and increase in cognitive load. This means beginning writing practice with basic SVO sentences and gradually moving to more complex SVOCA sentence structures and subordination.

6. Conclusions

Essay writing is a very complex process which poses a huge cognitive load onto the average second language learner’s brain, especially at lower levels of proficiency. The cognitive load is determined by the fact that the L2 student writer has to plan the essay whilst focusing on the act of translating ideas (propositions) into the foreign language. Converting propositions into L2 sentences, as I have tried to illustrate, is hugely challenging per se for a non-native speaker, let alone when the brain has to hold in Working Memory the ideas one intends to convey at the same time. Working Memory being limited in capacity it is easy to ‘lose’ one or the other in the process and equally easy to make mistakes, as the monitor (i.e. the error detecting system in our brain) receives less activation due to cognitive overload.

Hence, before plunging our students into essay writing teachers need to ensure that they provide lots of practice in the execution of the different sets of skills that writing involves (e.g. ideas generation, planning, organization, self-monitoring) separately. For instance, a writing lesson may involve sections where the students are focused on discrete sets of higher order skills (e.g. practising idea generation; evaluating relevance of the ideas generated to a given topic/essay title) and sections where lower order skills are drilled in ( application of grammar and syntax rules, lexical recall, spelling). Only when the students have reached a reasonable level of maturity across most of the key skills embedded in the models discussed above should students be asked to engage in extensive writing.

Consequently, an effective essay-writing instruction curriculum must identify the main skills involved in the writing process (as per the above model); allocate sufficient time for their extensive practice as contextualized within the themes and text genres relevant to the course under study; build in the higher order skill practice opportunities to embed practice in the lower order skills identified above (the mechanics of the language), whilst being mindful of potential cognitive overload issues.

In terms of editing, the above discussion has enormous implications as it suggests that teachers should train learners to become more effective editors through regular editing practice (e.g. ‘Error hunting’ activities). Such training may result in more rapid and effective application of editing skills in real operating conditions as the execution of Self-Monitoring will require less cognitive space in Working Memory. Training learners in editing should be a regular occurrence in lessons if we want it to actually work; also, it should be contextualized in a relevant linguistic environment as much as possible (e.g. if we are training the students to become better essay editors we ought to provide them with essay-editing practice, not just with random and uncontextualized sentences).

In conclusion, I firmly believe that the above model should be used by every language teacher, curriculum designer as a starting point for the planning of any writing instruction program. Not long ago I took part in a conference and a colleague was recommending to the attending teachers to give his Year 12 students exam-like discursive essays to write, week in week out for the very first week of the course. I am not ashamed to admit that I used to do the same in my first years of teaching A levels. The above discussion, however, would suggest that such an approach may be counterproductive; it may lead to errors, fossilization of those errors, and inhibit proficiency development whilst stifling the higher metacomponents of the writing process, idea-generation, essay organization and self-monitoring.

Why does training L2 learners in METACOGNITION often fail?

February 18, 2025February 27, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized ai, education, learning, teaching, technology

Introduction

In the 80s and 90s, metacognition – one’s awareness and regulation of one’s own thinking and learning processes – was a big deal in educational circles. L2 researchers like O’Malley and Chamot, Wenden, Cohen and, in England, Professors Macaro (my PhD supervisor) and Graham (my PhD internal examiner), advocated vehemently for the implementation of training in metacognitive strategies as a means to improve learning outcomes.

These advocates postulated, based on evidence from a handful of promising studies, that metacognition could be effectively taught following a principled framework (Explicit Strategy Training) which unfolded pretty much like the model in the picture below (ERSI = Explicit Reading Strategies Instruction), significantly enhancing L2 students performance across all four language skills.

Figure 1 – Explicit Strategy Training model

As often happens in our field, the interest fizzled out pretty soon, as language educators quickly realised that the time and effort they had to put in in order for metacognitive training (henceforth MT) to yield some substantive benefits was more than they could afford. There were other issues too, which I will explore below, to do with developmental readiness, teacher expertise and motivation, which deterred many language educators from buying into MT.

I experienced first-hand how time consuming, effortful and complex implementing an MT program is, during my PhD in Self-Monitoring strategies as applied to L2 essay writing. Mind you, the results were excellent: the training managed to significantly reduce a wide range of very stubborn errors in my students’ writing. However, the time and effort I invested in the process was something that I could have never been able to put in, had I been a teacher on a full timetable.

40 years on since its golden age, metacognition and MT are trending again in educational circles. Many schools are now implementing metacognition enhancement programs in the hope to increase learner planning, monitoring and self-evaluation skills. However, at least from what I have gleaned from my school visits, conversations with colleagues and other anecdotal data, many of these programs exhibit a number of flaws which seriously undermine their efficacy. Before delving into them, let me remind the reader of what metacognition and metacognitive strategies are about.

Metacognition and metacognitive strategies – what are they?

Having written about metacognition before, I will very briefly remind the reader of what metacognition entails.

Metacognition is the awareness and regulation of one’s own thinking and learning processes. It involves three key components:

(1) Metacognitive Knowledge—understanding how one learns best;

(2) Metacognitive Regulation—planning, monitoring, evaluating and adjusting learning strategies; and

(3) Metacognitive Experience—reflecting on past learning to improve future performance.

In language learning, metacognition helps learners set goals, choose effective strategies, and evaluate progress. It fosters independence, problem-solving, and long-term retention. Effective metacognitive strategy training enables learners to become more self-aware and adaptable, improving comprehension, speaking, and writing skills. Ultimately, metacognition transforms learners into active, strategic thinkers who optimize their own learning.

Metacognitive strategies include actions, mental operations and techniques that L2 learners undertake in order to improve their performance by planning, monitoring, self-evaluating and setting goals, Tables 1 and two below categorize metacognitive strategies into those that help with planning & monitoring and those that support self-regulation & reflection, making them easier to implement systematically.

Common shortcomings of metacognitive training programs

1️ Insufficient or Inconsistent Training Duration

Many programs do not provide enough time for learners to fully develop and internalize metacognitive strategies. Effective strategy use requires regular and long-term practice and reinforcement lasting 3 to 6 months or even longer, yet some programs last only a few weeks. This is the most common reason as to why MT programs fail according to the literature.

Example Issue:

🔹 A 4-week metacognitive training program may not show strong results because learners haven’t had enough exposure to develop automatic strategy use.

Solution:

✅ Longer programs with progressive scaffolding (e.g., training over an entire semester or year).
✅ Periodic strategy reinforcement instead of one-time instruction.

2. Lack of Explicit Training

Why It Matters

Some teachers assume that learners will naturally pick up metacognitive strategies just by being exposed to them. Implicit instruction (modeling, indirect feedback) can play an important role but on its own is often not enough—students need explicit training on how and when to use these strategies.

Example Issue:

🔹 A study where learners are simply given reading comprehension tasks but are not explicitly taught how to plan, monitor, and evaluate their reading may fail to show significant improvements.

Solution:

✅ Explicit strategy instruction with step-by-step guidance (e.g., teaching learners to pause, summarize, and predict while reading).
✅ Use of think-aloud protocols where instructors demonstrate metacognitive strategies.

3. Lack of Learner Awareness & Readiness

Why It Matters

Not all learners instinctively use metacognitive strategies. Beginners or low-proficiency learners may lack the cognitive capacity to focus on both language processing and strategy application at the same time.

Example Issue:

🔹 A program implementing high-level reflection strategies with beginner learners may find little impact because they struggle with basic comprehension, making strategy use overwhelming.

Solution:

✅ Gradual introduction of simple strategies first, then progression to more complex ones.
✅ Differentiated instruction based on learner proficiency.

4. Misalignment Between Metacognitive Strategies and Task Demands

Why It Matters

Some strategies may not be suitable for the specific language task the students are being training to perform. If the strategy does not align with the nature of the task, learners may misuse or underuse it.

Example Issue:

🔹 Testing metacognitive listening strategies (predicting, summarizing) on a phoneme discrimination task may not see much improvement because phoneme recognition relies more on cognitive than metacognitive skills.

Solution:

✅ Ensure the right strategies are taught for the right tasks (e.g., metacognitive strategies are most useful for reading, writing, and listening comprehension).
✅ Train students when to use which strategy effectively.

5. Limited Learner Motivation or Engagement

Why It Matters

Some students do not see the immediate value of metacognitive strategies and fail to engage with them actively. If students are not motivated, they are unlikely to consistently apply the strategies outside of training sessions.

Example Issue:

🔹 A study assumes that students will automatically use metacognitive strategies in their self-study time, but without motivation, many learners simply do not apply them.

Solution:

✅ Increase strategy relevance by linking them to real-world benefits (e.g., improving exam performance, fluency, or confidence).
✅ Use gamification and self-reflection exercises to keep learners engaged.

6. Failure to Account for Individual Differences

Why It Matters

Learners differ in cognitive styles, motivation, and prior strategy knowledge. Some learners naturally use metacognitive strategies, while others struggle even after training.

Example Issue:

🔹 A study may average the results across all learners without considering that some learners benefited while others did not.

Solution:

✅ Conduct pre-tests to determine baseline strategy use before training.
✅ Use personalized strategy training rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

✅ Use multiple assessment methods (e.g., think-aloud protocols, task-based assessments, real-time monitoring).
✅ Measure language proficiency gains alongside self-reports.

7. Teacher Expertise & Implementation Issues

Why It Matters

Some teachers may not be adequately trained in metacognitive instruction, leading to ineffective delivery.

Example Issue:

🔹 A program on listening strategy training fails to show strong results because teachers do not provide clear modeling or feedback.

Solution:

✅ Ensure teacher training in explicit strategy instruction.
✅ Use standardized instructional methods across all participants.

8. Short-Term vs. Long-Term Impact Measurement

Why It Matters

Some program measure effects immediately after training, missing potential long-term benefits. Metacognitive strategies often require time to internalize before showing clear benefits.

Example Issue:

🔹 A program finds no significant impact after 4 weeks, but if measured after 6 months, the results might be different.

Solution:

✅ Conduct longitudinal follow-ups to check delayed improvements.
✅ Use delayed post-tests to assess strategy retention.

Conclusion: Why do many metacognitive training programs fail?

Many MT programs fail to show strong effects because of:

Too short training duration – Not enough time for mastery.
The students may not be cognitively ready – MT does require the application of higher order skills
The students may simply not be interested – they are there to learn a language and may not see the long-term benefits or what you are trying to achieve
Lack of explicit strategy instruction – Students don’t know how to use the strategies effectively.
Poor alignment of strategies with tasks – Wrong strategies for the wrong skills.
The teachers simply do not have the know-how to teach metacognitive skills

Any Language educator wanting to teach metacognition should bear the above issues in mind before embarking on an MT program. Following a trend can be a very perilous endeavour, especially in a field like L2 acquisition, in which the research evidence that MT programs actually work is very fragmented and inconclusive.

If you want to know more about Metacognition and metacognitive training, you can attend any of my workshops organised by http://www.networkforlearning.org.uk

The most frequent words that MFL learners don’t learn; why and what you can do about it

February 15, 2025February 16, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized

Introduction

The words in any given language can be divided in content and function words. Content words include nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs, i.e. words that carry meaning. Function words, on the other hand, are grammatical words that serve structural purposes in a sentence rather than carrying lexical meaning. They help establish relationships between content words and provide grammatical cohesion.

Function words include: articles, prepositions, pronouns, conjunctions, auxiliary verbs, negation words, question words and particles. Table 2 below provides the full list of function words with examples from French and Spanish.

Why Are Function Words SO Important?

Function words are essential because they structure sentences, provide grammatical cohesion, and clarify meaning. Without function words, communication would be disjointed, ambiguous, or even incomprehensible. In other words, they are the glue that holds sentences together and in speech they improve our students’ communication and fluency. They are also very useful for comprehension, as they help language learners predict sentence meaning even if they don’t know all the content words in a sentence.

The following stats will give you an idea of how essential they are to communication and how important it is for our students to learn them:

although they constitute 1% of the entire lexicon of a language, they make up 55% of any text.
they dominate the most frequent 200 words in most languages (e.g. English, French and Spanish)
50% of the top 1,000 words in any language are function words

With the above statistics in mind it will be immediately clear how important these words are in the context of the new GCSE, whose core vocabulary is based on word-frequency lists: they will consitute a massive chunk of the vocabulary your GCSE students are expected to learn for the new GCSE. A telling example: the definite article ‘le’ is ranked n 1 in French, in terms of frequency, on those lists…

The least focused-on words in language curricula and the most lately acquired ones too!

Although they are so key to communication and fluency, these words are notoriously the most neglected and the least successfully taught words in most MFL curricula! It is not uncommon to find that even our A-level students struggle with these words. At GCSE, the vast majority of our students, including the more able, have problems recalling and using function words in spontaneous speech and writing. In fact, you may be surprised to learn that these words are acquired late in our native language too. But why is it?

The main reason why these words are the least successfully learnt by our students refer to five main issues summarised in the table below:

Points 1, 2 and 3 in Table 3 are key and compound one another. If a word is already not too important for meaning, is weakly stressed in speech and is abstract, it is obvious that the the average language learner is unlikely to notice and learn it. Add to this the fact that these words do not always have a straightforward translation in the students’ L1 and that often the translation varies (e.g. ‘en’ in French can mean in, at, to and whilst).

Many traditional instructional practices make the intrinsic challenges these words pose to the learner even greater. These are a few examples of such practices:

Most of the listening and reading activities staged by language teachers do focus the students on comprehension, but rarely do they explicitly target these words.
The speed of delivery of aural texts doesn’t often allow the learners, especially at lower levels of proficiency, to notice these words. In EPI, on the other hand, the teacher models the sentences using a slow to moderate pace and uses a number of techniques and tasks to make these words noticeable and learnable, e.g. (1) input enhancement (to make function words stand out), (2) input-flood (to induce repeated processing of these words), (3) gapped dictations or the ‘Spot the missing detail’ task ; (4) gapped and tangled translations (where the focus is on these words); (5) Faulty transcript/Spot the difference; (6) Listen and spot the error (where function words are used incorrectly); etc.
Many teachers and published instructional resources teach words in isolation. The Linguascope website is the most flagrant example of this, with lists of ten words to learn on their own completely decontextualised – which, according to research, is the most ineffective way of learning vocabulary for beginners. In EPI, the focus being on learning chunks of language, the students are introduced to and practise function words all the time and repeatedly, in context, and through masses of highly comprehensible input.
Teachers rarely deliberately plan for the regular recycling of these words overtime through distributed practice. This is a big shortcoming because function words, by virtue of their abstractness and low saliency, are harder to commit to memory, hence they may require even more recycling than content words.

Implications for teaching

First of all, language teachers may want to use sentence builders or any other modelling tools which present function words in context through highly comprehensible input.

Secondly, when modelling the use of function words orally, they should do so using input enhancement techniques. Modelling through listening-whilst-reading techniques (as we do in EPI) at a slow-to-moderate pace whilst emphasizing these words through vocal and visual input enhancement techniques is very effective in facilitating noticing, especially in the presence of the assimilation phenomenon which causes a function words to blend in with the first syllable in the next word (e.g. in ‘il y a beaucoup de gens’ where ‘de’ is hardly audible in naturalistic speech).

Thirdly, teachers should stage a number of receptive and productive retrieval practice activities which deliberately target function words (as per the examples provided in the previous paragraph). Sentence-combining tasks can also be powerful in practising these words meaningfully, especially when it comes to connectives.

Fourthly, the curriculum should deliberately recycle function words many times over, constantly engaging the students in retrieval practice episodes. Aim at 30 to 40 encounters overall across all four skills.

Fifthly, do raise your students’ awareness of the importance of these words and, by regularly drawing their attention to them when dealing with written and oral texts, sensitize them to their existence. Also, encourage them to experiment with the function words that will enhance their oral and written output, such high-frequency discourse markers, indirect or emphatic pronouns, etc.

Lastly, since these words are notoriously difficult to commit to long-term memory, besides tons of recycling, do endeavour to be as multimodal as possible, employing gestures, images, songs, rhymes, digital, miniwhiteboard as well as paper-based learning, mnemonics, etc. Table 4 below lists a number of possible techniques you could use.

In which order should we teach grammar structures based on SLA research?

February 12, 2025February 13, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized education, english, grammar, language, writing

Introduction

I was recently asked by a member of the Facebook group I co-founded with Dylan Vinales, Global Innovative Language teachers how grammar structures should be sequenced in a curriculum. The easy answer is: from easier to difficult, of course. But how do we establish which structures are more easily learnable than others?

A researcher by the name of Manfred Pienemann, attempted to answer this question with a landmark study Pienemann, M. (1984). “Psychological Constraints on the Teachability of Languages.” Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 6(2), 186-214. This study laid the groundwork for his later development of Processability Theory (1998), which further expanded on how learners acquire grammatical structures in a fixed sequence.

Manfred Pienemann’s Learnability Theory suggests that language acquisition follows a predictable sequence due to human working memory’s cognitive constraints. His Processability Theory (PT) builds on this by explaining how learners acquire grammatical structures step by step, as their cognitive processing abilities develop.

Key concepts of Learnability Theory

Developmental Stages: Language structures are acquired in a sequence, meaning some grammatical forms cannot be learned before others.
Teachability Hypothesis: Instruction can only be effective if it aligns with the learner’s current stage of acquisition. Trying to teach advanced structures too early is ineffective.
Processing Hierarchy: Learners process simpler linguistic structures before tackling more complex ones.

Stages of French Language Acquisition Based on Processability Theory

Pienemann’s theory outlines a six-stage sequence for second language acquisition. Below is how this sequence applies to French learners:

Stage 1: Single Words and Fixed Phrases (No Real Grammar Processing)

At this pre-syntactic stage, learners rely on memorized words and formulaic phrases without grammatical manipulation.

Bonjour ! (Hello!)
Merci ! (Thank you!)
Comment ça va ? (How’s it going?)
Moi, Marie. (Me, Marie.)

Key Characteristics:

Learners do not yet process word order or inflections.
Responses are often formulaic and learned as whole chunks.

Stage 2: Simple Word Order (Canonical Word Order – SVO)

At this stage, learners start forming simple Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) sentences.

Je mange une pomme. (I eat an apple.)
Il aime le chocolat. (He likes chocolate.)
Marie regarde la télé. (Marie watches TV.)

Key Characteristics:

Learners can construct basic declarative sentences.
No agreement processing yet (gender, number).
No word order variation (such as inversion for questions).

Stage 3: Morphological Inflections (Lexical Morphology)

Learners begin processing grammatical markers like plural (-s), gender agreement, and verb inflections.

Les pommes sont rouges. (The apples are red.) → (Plural agreement)
Un petit garçon / Une petite fille (A small boy / A small girl) → (Gender agreement)
Je finis mon travail. (I finish my work.) → (Present tense verb inflection)

Key Characteristics:

Learners begin applying regular inflections (e.g., plural -s, feminine -e).
Still inconsistent with irregular forms.
Errors in agreement (e.g., les grande maison instead of les grandes maisons).

Stage 4: Sentence Internal Reordering (Question Formation & Object Pronouns)

At this stage, learners acquire word order changes beyond the basic SVO structure. This includes:

1. Question Formation (Simple & Inversion)

Tu as un chien ? (You have a dog?) → (Rising intonation, no inversion)
Est-ce que tu as un chien ? (Do you have a dog?) → (Fixed structure)
As-tu un chien ? (Have you a dog?) → (Inversion – more advanced)

2. Object Pronoun Placement

Je vois Marie. (I see Marie.) → Basic SVO order
Je la vois. (I see her.) → (Pronoun before verb – first instance of reordering)
Je ne la vois pas. (I don’t see her.) → (More complex negative structure)

Key Characteristics:

Learners start reordering elements in sentences.
Questions evolve from declarative word order to inversion patterns.
Object pronouns begin appearing in correct positions.
Errors still common (e.g., Je vois la instead of Je la vois).

Stage 5: Subordinate Clauses & Complex Structures

Learners begin processing embedded clauses and subordinate structures.

Je pense qu’il viendra demain. (I think that he will come tomorrow.) → (Subordination)
Le livre que j’ai lu est intéressant. (The book that I read is interesting.) → (Relative clause)
Si j’avais le temps, je voyagerais. (If I had time, I would travel.) → (Conditional sentences)

Key Characteristics:

Learners can link ideas in longer sentences.

They produce relative clauses, conditionals, and reported speech.

Errors in conjugation and agreement still occur.

Stage 6: Full Processing of Advanced Structures

At this final stage, learners acquire full sentence reordering, advanced agreement, and complex clauses.

Le professeur dont je t’ai parlé est ici. (The teacher whom I told you about is here.) → (Relative pronoun “dont”)
Si j’avais su, je serais venu plus tôt. (If I had known, I would have come earlier.) → (Past conditional)
Il faut que tu viennes demain. (You must come tomorrow.) → (Subjunctive mood usage)

Key Characteristics:

Learners master subjunctive, advanced conditionals, and complex reordering.
Proficiency level approaches native-like fluency.
Errors become minor and infrequent.

How Learnability Theory Guides French Teaching

Teach in the right order:
- Start with simple sentences before introducing agreement rules.
- Teach basic questions (Tu as un chien ?) before inversion (As-tu un chien ?).
- Introduce object pronouns before relative clauses.
Respect processing constraints:
- How many cognitive steps does the execution of a specific grammar structure involve? If working memory can only process about 4-6 items in younger learners and 5 to 9 in 16+ learners, will they cope with the cognitive load posed by the target structure?

Example 1: the perfect tense with ETRE involves 6 or 7 mental operations/substeps. Are we sure that the target language learners can process all of them?

Example 2: A beginner won’t use the subjunctive correctly (Il faut que tu viennes) if they haven’t mastered basic verb conjugations first.

Trying to teach complex tenses (e.g., Si j’avais su, je serais venu) before learners are ready leads to confusion.
Provide appropriate input:
- At early stages, focus on high-frequency structures (e.g., present tense, SVO order).
- Gradually introduce complex grammar once learners can process simpler structures.

In considering the cognitive load posed by the target grammar structures in an attempt to sequence them in your curriculum in a easier to harder flow, it is key to consider the challenges posed by each of them, summarised in the table below, from my workshop on Grammar Instruction.

Why do younger learners find learning grammar challenging?

February 11, 2025February 12, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized education, grammar, language, language-learning, writing

Younger second language (L2) learners often struggle with grammar acquisition due to cognitive, linguistic, and developmental factors. Unlike vocabulary, which they can pick up more naturally, grammar rules require abstract thinking, memory, and metalinguistic awareness, which are still developing in young learners. Below are the key reasons why younger L2 learners find grammar learning challenging:

1. Limited Cognitive development

1.1 Abstract Thinking is Not Fully Developed

Grammar rules involve abstract concepts (e.g., verb conjugations, subject-verb agreement, and tenses).
Piaget’s (1954) Cognitive Development Theory states that children under 11 operate in the concrete operational stage, meaning they struggle with abstract rules.
Older learners (adolescents and adults) use formal operational thinking (age 12+), making them better at understanding syntactic structures

1.2 Working Memory Limitations

Younger children have smaller working memory capacity (Gathercole & Alloway, 2008), meaning they struggle to hold and process multiple grammar rules at once.Older learners can store and manipulate grammatical structures more efficiently.
Older learners can store and manipulate grammatical structures more efficiently.

2. Lack of Metalinguistic Awareness

2.1 Younger learners do not consciously analyze language

Metalinguistic awareness is the ability to think about and manipulate language structures, which develops with age.
Studies (Bialystok & Barac, 2012) show that younger L2 learners focus more on communication rather than explicit grammar rules.

2.2 Struggle with Error Correction

Because of their lack of metalinguistic awareness and limited levels of LAA* (language analytical ability), younger learners do not benefit much from error correction
Older learners can self-correct grammatical mistakes by applying rules.
Younger children often repeat mistakes without realizing why they are incorrect.

3. Implicit vs. Explicit Learning Differences

Younger learners rely more on implicit learning (unconscious absorption of rules), while older learners benefit from explicit instruction. That is why using EPI, which relies heavily on structural priming (subconscious learning of grammar) is so powerful at primary.
Grammar requires explicit learning (Ellis, 2006), and young children struggle with rule-based learning since they primarily learn through exposure and repetition rather than conscious analysis.

4. Difficulty Generalizing Grammar Rules

4.1 Overgeneralization of rules

Younger L2 learners tend to overgeneralize grammatical patterns (e.g., saying “goed” instead of “went”).
This happens because they rely on patterns rather than understanding exceptions, which is common in early L1 and L2 learning (Pinker, 1999).Grammar Rules Change Based on Context

4.2 Grammar Rules Change Based on Context

Some grammatical structures vary depending on context (e.g., past tense in regular vs. irregular verbs).
Young learners struggle to apply rules flexibly in different contexts.

5. Limited Input and Reinforcement

5.1 Grammar exposure in early L2 learning is inconsistent

Young learners often hear simplified language (e.g., teachers and caregivers speaking in basic sentences).
Without frequent rich input, grammar structures take longer to acquire.

5.2 Grammar Rules Change Based on Context

Young learners struggle to apply rules flexibly in different contexts.
Some grammatical structures vary depending on context (e.g., past tense in regular vs. irregular verbs).

6.6. Pronunciation and Phonological Constraints Affect Grammar Learning

Syntax and morphology take longer to develop, especially in languages with complex word order (e.g., German, Russian).

Younger learners focus more on pronunciation and vocabulary, delaying grammar acquisition.

7. Limited Literacy Skills

Reading and writing skills support grammar acquisition

Older learners benefit from written reinforcement (e.g., textbooks, grammar exercises).
Younger learners, especially pre-literate children, lack exposure to written forms of grammar.

Conclusions

Younger L2 learners acquire vocabulary naturally but struggle with grammar because it requires abstract thinking, rule analysis, and memory capacity.

Older learners are better at learning grammar explicitly due to stronger cognitive abilities and metalinguistic awareness.

Young learners need repeated exposure, interactive learning, and implicit reinforcement rather than direct rule-based teaching. The exposure must be as multimodal as possible and .cognizant of the TAP (transfer appropriate processing) phenomenon, i.e. the context-dependency of memory (e.g. a grammar rule learnt through rehearsing a song many times over is not likely to be transferred to other contexts and tasks, but is going to sty confined to that song).

The grammar content needs to be light and informed by the learners’ readiness to acquire the target structures.

The students should not be asked to produce language too soon and in the contexts of tasks that challenge them beyond their current level of competence. This applies to learners of any age, but it is particularly true of primary-age students, as they are low monitors of grammar accuracy.

EPI (Extensive Processing Instruction) is very powerful in this respect as it capitalizes on subsconscious learning through syntactic priming, i.e. where exposure to a specific sentence structure increases the likelihood of using the same structure in subsequent speech or writing. It occurs in both first (L1) and second language (L2) learning, reinforcing grammatical patterns through repetition. For example, if someone hears “The cat was chased by the dog” (passive voice), they are more likely to later produce another passive sentence like “The book was read by the student.” Studies (Bock, 1986) show syntactic priming helps L2 learners internalize complex structures, aiding fluency and reducing cognitive load during sentence formation.

Here’s a summary of the above points:

*Language Analytical Ability (LAA) refers to the cognitive skill that enables learners to analyze, understand, and manipulate linguistic structures in a second language (L2). It is crucial for explicit grammar learning, problem-solving in language acquisition, and recognizing language patterns.

Why do primary children find it more difficult to learn and retain vocabulary than secondary students?

February 10, 2025February 10, 2025 Gianfranco Conti, Phd (Applied Linguistics), MA (TEFL), MA (English Lit.), PGCE (Modern Languages and P.E.) Uncategorized

Introduction

There is a myth whereby acquiring a new language for younger chidren is easier. Nothing could be further from the truth, in instructed second language acquisition settings, at least, especially with one hour or less a week. In fact, encoding in long-term memory (LTM) is slower for younger children due to biological, cognitive, and experiential factors that influence memory formation and retrieval. Tran Thi Tuyet, in her 2020 article “The Myth of ‘The Earlier the Better’ in Foreign Language Learning or the Optimal Age to Learn a Foreign Language,” contends that the assumption “the earlier, the better” in foreign language learning is often misleading. She suggests that investing too early in children’s foreign language education may lead to suboptimal outcomes if not appropriately aligned with effective teaching methodologies and the child’s developmental readiness.

Additionally, a publication by the Centre for Educational Neuroscience titled “Avoiding the Hype Over Early Foreign Language Teaching” emphasizes the lack of substantial evidence supporting the notion that early foreign language instruction guarantees superior language proficiency later in life. The paper advises education professionals to critically assess the evidence before implementing early language programs, suggesting that premature introduction without proper pedagogical support might not yield the desired benefits

Research indicates that students who begin foreign language study in secondary school can often catch up to, or even surpass, peers who started in primary school. This suggests that the advantages of early language learning might not be as significant as commonly believed.

A study by Muñoz (2006) examined the long-term proficiency of early, middle, and late starters in foreign language learning. The findings revealed that older learners often progress more rapidly than younger learners, leading to comparable or even superior proficiency levels over time. This challenges the assumption that an earlier start guarantees greater language proficiency

Why do younger learners struggle more than older learners when it comes to L2-word learning?

Here’s a detailed breakdown:

1. Brain Maturation & Neural Development

Hippocampal Immaturity:
- The hippocampus, which plays a central role in memory formation, is still developing in younger children (Gómez & Edgin, 2016).
- Studies using fMRI have shown that hippocampal connections strengthen with age, leading to more efficient encoding and retrieval of information in older children (Ghetti & Bunge, 2012).
Synaptic Pruning & Myelination:
- Younger children have a higher number of neural connections, but they are not as efficient as in older learners.
- Synaptic pruning (elimination of weaker neural connections) and myelination (fatty sheath around neurons improving transmission speed) increase memory efficiency with age (Paus et al., 2001).

2. Working Memory Limitations

Younger children have a lower working memory capacity, which affects how much information they can hold before transferring it to long-term storage (Gathercole & Alloway, 2008).
Miller’s Law (1956) suggests an average working memory span of 7±2 items in adults, while younger children may only retain half that – with great variation amongst children in the same class.
Reduced chunking ability: Older children and adults use chunking (grouping information into meaningful units), which improves memory retention, whereas younger children struggle with this strategy (Schneider et al., 2011).

3. Underdeveloped Memory Strategies

Lack of Rehearsal Techniques:
- Older children use active rehearsal (repeating words mentally) to strengthen memory storage, while younger children often fail to engage in spontaneous rehearsal (Flavell, 1970).
Limited Use of Mnemonics & Organization Strategies:
- Older children categorize words by meaning (e.g., grouping “apple, banana, orange” as “fruits”), making retrieval easier.
- Younger children lack this organizational ability, leading to weaker memory recall (Bjorklund & Jacobs, 1985).

4. Episodic Memory & Schema Development

Less Developed Episodic Memory:
- Episodic memory (memories of specific events) is less developed in younger children, making it harder for them to link new words to prior experiences (Nelson, 1993).
Lack of Established Schemas:
- Older children have more structured knowledge frameworks (schemas), allowing them to fit new vocabulary into existing memory networks.
- Younger children lack these schemas, making encoding slower and retrieval less efficient (Chi, 1978).

5. Slower Consolidation of Memories

Sleep & Memory Consolidation Differences:
- Deep sleep (slow-wave sleep) aids in memory consolidation, but research suggests memory-related sleep processes are less efficient in young children (Wilhelm et al., 2012).
- Older children and adults show better overnight retention of new information than younger children.

6. Less Exposure & Repetition Opportunities

Older children encounter more words in different contexts (reading, conversations, writing), reinforcing long-term retention.
Younger children need more repetitions to store words permanently in LTM (Webb, 2007).

Summary Table: Why retaining new vocabulary is slower in younger children

Factor	Younger Children (Ages 7-11)	Older Children (Ages 12+)
Brain Maturation	Hippocampus still developing	More mature hippocampal function
Neural Efficiency	Less myelination, weaker synaptic pruning	Faster neural transmission
Working Memory	Limited (4-6 items)	Stronger (7-9 items)
Rehearsal Strategies	Rarely use spontaneous rehearsal	Regularly use repetition
Mnemonics & Categorization	Struggle with categorization	Group and organize words for better recall
Episodic Memory	Less developed	Stronger recall of contextual experiences
Schema Development	Lack structured knowledge networks	Use existing schemas to reinforce learning
Sleep & Memory Consolidation	Weaker overnight memory retention	More efficient sleep-based memory strengthening
Exposure to Vocabulary	Limited real-world exposure	More frequent and varied word encounters

Key Takeaways & pedagogical implications

Younger children CAN encode words into long-term memory, but it takes more repetitions and contextual learning.
Older children process and store words more efficiently due to better neural pathways, stronger working memory, and more effective learning strategies.
Memory strategies like rehearsal, categorization, and spaced repetition can help younger learners retain words more effectively.
Younger children are led by the principle of pleasure more than older children are, hence, their motivation to learn is more dependant on fun
Multimodal learning is key with language learners based on what we know about their working memory limitations. The more ways a word gets encoded in their younger brain, the more neural associations are created, which leads to longer term retention
Training in memorization techniques – as long as you make it fun – pays enormous dividends

The Language Gym

Month: February 2025

Why the input we give our learners must be 95-98% comprehensible in order to enhance language acquisition – the theory and the research evidence

Why sound is so KEY to Second Language Acquisition – Phonological memory and why so much vocabulary learning is ineffective

Ten tried-and-tested instructional strategies that WILL enhance your students’ listening skills and GCSE grades

Introduction

Why using Scripted Listening (reading- whilst- listening) is so powerful for vocabulary acquisition

1. Multi-Sensory Learning Enhances Memory Retention

2. Contextual Vocabulary Acquisition

3. Improved Pronunciation and Phonological Awareness

4. Reinforcement Through Repetition

5. Enhanced Comprehension and Fluency

6. Increased Motivation and Engagement

7. Real-Life Language Exposure (when using audiobooks, podcasts, etc.)

8. Faster Vocabulary Retention and Recall

Summary

Mapping out the second language writing process and implications for teaching

Why does training L2 learners in METACOGNITION often fail?

The most frequent words that MFL learners don’t learn; why and what you can do about it

Introduction

Why Are Function Words SO Important?

In which order should we teach grammar structures based on SLA research?

Why do younger learners find learning grammar challenging?

3. Implicit vs. Explicit Learning Differences

4. Difficulty Generalizing Grammar Rules

5. Limited Input and Reinforcement

7. Limited Literacy Skills

Why do primary children find it more difficult to learn and retain vocabulary than secondary students?

Introduction

1. Brain Maturation & Neural Development

2. Working Memory Limitations

3. Underdeveloped Memory Strategies

4. Episodic Memory & Schema Development

5. Slower Consolidation of Memories

6. Less Exposure & Repetition Opportunities

Summary Table: Why retaining new vocabulary is slower in younger children

Key Takeaways & pedagogical implications

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Introduction

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1. Multi-Sensory Learning Enhances Memory Retention

2. Contextual Vocabulary Acquisition

3. Improved Pronunciation and Phonological Awareness

4. Reinforcement Through Repetition

5. Enhanced Comprehension and Fluency

6. Increased Motivation and Engagement

7. Real-Life Language Exposure (when using audiobooks, podcasts, etc.)

8. Faster Vocabulary Retention and Recall

Summary

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Share this:

Introduction

Why Are Function Words SO Important?

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3. Implicit vs. Explicit Learning Differences

4. Difficulty Generalizing Grammar Rules

5. Limited Input and Reinforcement

7. Limited Literacy Skills

Share this:

Introduction

1. Brain Maturation & Neural Development

2. Working Memory Limitations

3. Underdeveloped Memory Strategies

4. Episodic Memory & Schema Development

5. Slower Consolidation of Memories

6. Less Exposure & Repetition Opportunities

Summary Table: Why retaining new vocabulary is slower in younger children

Key Takeaways & pedagogical implications

Share this: