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Date Submitted: 04/27/2012 08:02 PM
Wagner 1
Acquisition of Grammatical Morphemes in English as a Foreign Language Learners
Introduction
This study was designed to investigate the acquisition order of several English
inflectional grammatical morphemes by French-speaking secondary school students
learning English as a Foreign Language (EFL) in France. Several studies of students
learning English as a Second Language (ESL) in the United States have indicated that
certain grammatical morphemes are acquired before others, regardless of age, first
language (L1), length of ESL instruction or amount of exposure to English. Researchers
believe this evidence suggests that ESL Learners acquire these grammatical morphemes
in relatively the same order (Dulay & Burt, 1974; Bailey et al., 1974; Larsen-Freeman,
1976).
However, the majority of these studies have been done on learners of English in
the United States, where English is the dominant language. Few studies have addressed
the issue of learning location or environment, i.e. learners of English in a country where
English is not the dominant language. Due to the fundamental difference between the two
learning methods, this study aims to establish any similarities or differences in
acquisition order among ESL and EFL students.
Furthermore, this study will address the issue of Interlanguage (IL – see below)
interference and the extent to which it affects the acquisition order of EFL learners. Four
morphemes from Dulay and Burt’s original acquisition order list (1974) were
investigated: plural –s, progressive –ing, third person singular present tense –s, and
possessive –‘s. Two of these morphemes (plural -s and present tense -s) are functionally
similar to their French counterparts, and the other two have no direct equivalent in French
Wagner 2
(progressive -ing and possessive -'s). Researchers of previous ESL studies have
concluded that L1 has little effect on the acquisition order of English morphemes. This
study examines whether...