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Paper Abstract: Examines negative effects on college students' learning & strategies for overcoming these effects. Paper Introduction: Introduction Academic Language, the distinct type of English used in classroom settings, has been fairly well-established as a variable that increases the learning difficulties of language minority students (Solomon & Rhodes, 1995). Several factors have been said to be associated with causing this interference with learning including the vocabulary, syntax, structure, content and cognitive demands of academic language (Solomon & Rhodes, 1995). While academic language poses difficulties for students at all levels of learning (elementary, secondary, college), the review of literature presented here specifically explores studies that have focused on dealing, at the college level, with the problems posed by academic language. Academic Language and College: Research Addressing The Problem Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. Velazquez de Alamo, G.E. (Doctoral Dissertation, New York University)Dissertation Abstracts International, 56(1-A) p. (1995). Creating a manual to facilitate thedevelopment of language learning strategies by adult English as a foreignlanguage college students. Dean (1988) states that her observances have indicated that theapproach is particularly useful for students who lack confidence or haveany degree of difficulty with academic language. Studies related to several means of overcomingthese difficulties were described and discussed. The theoretical underpinnings of the content-based ESL approach isthe theory that language acquisition is based on input that is meaningfuland understandable to the learner (Krashen, 1981, 1982). The process whereby nontraditional students (especiallyacademically underprepared adult students) acquire the language and valuesof the academic community was thus described as a transitional process, aform of acculturation. (1988). Yet another approach to the difficulties posed by academic languagein the college setting has been to restructure English as a Second Languagecourses based not only on the needs of limited English ability students ingeneral but upon their needs in relation to their ethnic group inparticular. These included studiesrelated to developing new curricula, providing foreign students withmanuals in how to overcome problematic aspects of academic language,restructuring ESL courses based on students academic and cultural needs,and conducting ongoing research into academic language in the college anduniversity setting. The data were analyzed qualitatively consistingof reports of several case studies and a descriptive account of theclassroom context and key incidents. Solving the chinese puzzle: ReconstructingEnglish as a second language writing programs in response to asianstudents' needs. Acculturation was also seen to be a two-way process,changing the students, on one hand, and the teacher and institution, on theother. (Microfilm Order No.AADAA-I95143 )----------------------- 6 It is assumed that such research standsa better chance of being widely applicable to college and universitystudents than does research conducted at lower levels of eduction. Second language acquisition and second languagelearning. They were asked to choose from thosestrategies that were not being practiced, or that they used lessfrequently. 487. AAD13-4 239) Reilly, T. Washington,D.C.: ERIC Clearinghouse on Languages and Linguistics (ERIC DocumentReproduction Service No. The study compared these demands and exposures towriting with those in students' native countries. & Rhodes, N.C. Thus, as utilized by Courage (199 ), academiclanguage learning was, at least in one sense, a new language learningexperience not only for limited English speakers but also for nativespeakers. (Masters Thesis, Northeast Missouri State University)Masters Abstracts, 28(4), p. This is a method that integrates English-as-a-second-languageinstruction with subject-matter instruction. With respect to the developed model, Heather (1993) states that: The adult making a transition from work to university is confronted with a schizophrenic situation in which maturity and experience are affirmed, but ability to understand and manipulate language is denigrated. Using participant observation, interviews, and document collection,Courage (199 ) explored students' interactions with their teacher, eachother, and their own texts. (Microfilm Order No. Based on findings, Courage(199 ) offered several strategies that could be used to overcome thisblurring effect and assist nontraditional students in general and languageminority students in particular to obtain more from basic writing courses. (1988). (199 ). The content-based ESL technique not only focuses on learning a secondlanguage, but also on using that language as a medium to learn any otheracademic subject. Krashen, S. A formative evaluation of the manual was conducted using differentinstruments: two individual interviews, two group interviews, the students'learning logs, the professor-researcher's learning log, a group survey, thelanguage learning strategy lessons, and teacher-made pre and post testsscores. ED 296 572) Solomon, J. Specifically, shefeels that the an expanded focus on the meaning of a literary text inresponse to gaps or indeterminancies, if applied to the two-year college inparticular, would assist teachers with helping students to discover themeaning of diverse kinds of English language use. Reading and writing about literature: Questionsand confidence. Based on a formative evaluation, the manual and guide were revisedand expanded. The materials developed were based on the Cognitive AcademicLanguage Learning Approach; and consisted of five steps by which studentscould deal with the difficulties involved in the academic language ofcollege: Preparation, Presentation, Practice, Expansion or Extension, andEvaluation. Reilly (1988) states that this method has been found tobe very successful in remediating the negative effects of academic languageand, as a result, has been used for many years in adult, professional, anduniversity education programs for foreign students and other limitedEnglish speakers. For example, Miller (199 ) discusses a restructuring of an ESLprogram based on the needs of limited English Asian students. The project began with asurvey of Asian students at Northeast Missouri State University in whichthey were asked to define the types of academic writing Asian students facein the university. Miller, R.E. Oxford: Pergamon Press. ED 3 4 193. As co-researchers the students shared their own ideas toimprove the lessons and to write their own lessons. 3) What occurs, according to Heather (1993), is that academic languageacts as a symbol of membership, separating those of insider status fromoutsiders (defined as those who have not undergone the appropriateinitiation rites associated with understanding and manipulating academiclanguage). The student's manual consists of 14 lessons for training students touse the following language learning strategies: advance organizer,selective attention, self-management, self-monitoring, notetaking,grouping, elaboration, inferencing, questioning for clarification, self-talk, problem-solving, summarization, and self-evaluation. According to their literacy histories, individual students wereclassified as schoolwriters, personal writers, or functional writers.Courage (199 ) reported that each student reached into a personalrepertoire in response to the tasks posed by this course, in the processcreating "a linguistic palimpsest," defined as an overlay of new languagepatterns and purposes associated with academic discourse onto old patternsand purposes associated with the language of other communities(neighborhood, ethnic, work, social, religious, etc.). Four students were able to produce original lessons for teachingother students to use a strategy. As she puts it: ...the gaps in meaning in a given text do not represent a failure of students' understanding or perceptive powers; on the contrary, the gaps become opportunities for students to discover their own creative imagination. They selected grouping, strategy evaluation, problem solvingand summarization. ERICDocument Reproduction Service No. 1) Conclusions This paper presented a brief examination of the literature related tohow learning difficulties posed by academic language are being dealt within the college setting. Academic Language and College: Research Addressing The Problem Several different methods have been used for counteracting thenegative effects of academic language at the college level. While Heather notes that it is possible that the complexsentence structures and long or invented words characteristic of academiclanguage add richness and precision to the educational effort, she notesthat it is equally possible that such language "hides a paucity of vision,claiming membership without contributing to understanding." In thiscontext then, it can be seen that being an insider with respect to academiclanguage actually isolates the user, only in a manner different than thatit which it isolates the outsider. Finally, Dean (1988) has suggested that one answer to helpingnontraditional students deal with academic language difficulties may be tomore strongly emphasize literature in their ESL classes. The study conceptualized higher education as "an academic community,"characterized, like other communities, by culturally distinct patterns oflanguage use. Heather choose this type of student inorder to show that academic language can exert negative effects that gobeyond ESL students to merely nontraditional students. Forexample, Velazquez de Almo (1994) described a project which developed suchmanuals for ESL adult college students at a private university. Anexample of this kind of research can be seen in work conducted by Courage(199 ) who reported findings of a study of 24 nontraditional students in afirst-semester basic writing course. AAD91-18547) Dean, R.B. (1994). Nontraditional students and the basic writingcourse: A study of classroom interactions. (Doctoral Dissertation, ColumbiaUniversity) Dissertation Abstracts International, 52(3-A), p. (1993). These linguistic palimpsests were said to blur the boundaries andgive the students a peculiar, hybrid discourse. Essentially, theperspective holds that parallels drawn between first and second languageacquisition suggest that the kinds of input obtained during first languagelearning should be similar to that of second language learning; sinceacademic language is in no way similar to most foreign student's firstlanguage learning input, the content-based ESL approach attempts to correctfor this discrepancy. Related to research efforts to more comprehensively understand theeffects of academic language as specifically applied to college settingshas been theory building. Heather, B. ESL through content area instruction. One set ofmethods has been to develop curricula that take the difficulties ofacademic language into account and provide strategies for overcoming them.According to Reilly (1988), one such approach has been content-based ESLinstruction. She feels that theefficacy of the approach lies in its ability to get students to stretchtheir imaginative powers toward the goal of comprehension. Introduction Academic Language, the distinct type of English used in classroomsettings, has been fairly well-established as a variable that increases thelearning difficulties of language minority students (Solomon & Rhodes,1995). Principles and practice in second languageacquisition. (1982). A third highly innovative way thatcolleges and universities are meeting the problems posed by academiclanguage is to provide foreign students with manuals especially developedto inform them and educate them about the difficulties; such manuals alsoprovide techniques and strategies for dealing with these difficulties. (Paper presented at the Community Colleges of ChicagoNational Literature Conference (3rd, Chicago, IL, October 14-15)). Not only has a new reality to be constructed, but this must be understood and expressed in unfamiliar glossaries. The subsequentlydeveloped program drew from a variety of current ESL program approaches andwas judged to provide a workable solution to the academic language problemslimited English-speaking Asian students face. 125. (p. 826.(Microfilm Order No. Clear language: Initiation into sociology.Society-Societe, 17(2), 3-8. An analysis of the sociocultural dynamics of the class was said toshow that the writing course was a meeting ground of cultural and languagedifferences, rife with possibilities for tension, conflict, andmisunderstanding, an arena in which all participants were constrained bylimited resources, where students relied heavily on peer interpretations ofacademic language patterns and generated a de facto curriculum from theirlife concerns. (1981). Another way in which American colleges and universities are dealingwith the problems posed by academic language has been to conduct researchon academic language and subsequent problems specifically as it relates tothe college or university setting. These theories, of course, differ--- not onlydepending upon which language components the researchers emphasize (e.g.,grammar versus syntax versus vocabulary, etc.), but also upon the field ofdiscipline of the researcher (e.g., psychology, education, sociology). Conceputalizing academic language.Washington, D.C.: National Center for Research on Cultural Diversity andSecond Language Learning. The developed program focused mostly on meeting students needs inrelation to improving their writing ability. References Courage, R.A. An example of one such model is the sociological perspective ofacademic language offered by Heather (1993) who developed a model of thesocial effects of academic language specifically upon the student who movesfrom work back to the university. Several factors have been said to be associated with causing thisinterference with learning including the vocabulary, syntax, structure,content and cognitive demands of academic language (Solomon & Rhodes,1995). (p. (199 ). Krashen, S. While academic language poses difficulties for students at alllevels of learning (elementary, secondary, college), the review ofliterature presented here specifically explores studies that have focusedon dealing, at the college level, with the problems posed by academiclanguage. Developing remediative curricula as well as formulating theories andconducting studies into the nature of academic language at the collegelevel are not the only means by which the college/university system hasattempted to deal with this problem. Oxford: Pergamon Press. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.