TESTING THE SPOKEN ENGLISH OF YOUNG NORWEGIANS: A STUDY OF TEST VALIDITY AND THE ROLE OF ‘SMALLWORDS’ IN CONTRIBUTING TO PUPILS' FLUENCY.Angela Hasselgreen. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Pp. v + 304. $36.00 paper.

This volume is an impressive demonstration of what is suggested by language testers' and teachers' discussions of test validity but is seldom undertaken. Hasselgreen's book represents a monumental and painstaking study that began with the pilot of the speaking portion of the evaluation of English as a school subject (EVA) in the spring of 1995 and, we can assume, has continued even after the publication of this book in 2004.

The study of relative clauses (RCs) has been central to both theoretical linguistics and studies in acquisition. This thematic issue of Studies in Second Language Acquisition makes a very important new contribution in this area by highlighting recent developments in thinking on the structure of RCs crosslinguistically and by introducing new data on the acquisition of Japanese, Korean, and Cantonese as first languages (L1s) and second languages (L2s). In this commentary, I will focus on two themes that emerge from the articles: representation and processing of RCs.

This study investigates how second language (L2) learners engage in prediction based on their processing goals. While prediction is a prominent feature of human sentence comprehension in first–language speakers, it remains less understood when and how L2 learners engage in predictive processing. By conducting a visual–world eye–tracking experiment involving Chinese–speaking L2 learners of Korean, we tested the hypothesis that L2 learners determine whether to engage in prediction by evaluating the costs and benefits of anticipatory processing. The experiment specifically focused on the impact of a top–down comprehension goal for L2 learners’ predictive use of an honorific form in Korean by providing them with different types of task instruction. Our results indicated that all groups engaged in predictive processing in early and entire predictive regions. However, in the late predictive region, L2 learners presented with a prediction–oriented task, but not those with a simple comprehension task, actively generated expectations about the honorific status of an upcoming referent. These findings lend support to the utility account of L2 prediction, suggesting that L2 learners’ engagement in prediction depends on their current goals and strategies for processing efficiency.

Language Development Across Childhood and Adolescence. Ruth A. Berman (Ed.). Amsterdam: Benjamins, 2004. Pp. xiv + 308. $102.00 cloth.

This volume is the third in the Trends in language acquisition research series by the International Association for the Study of Child Language. It focuses on first language (L1) development in school-age children and adolescents, including both normal and impaired learners. The introductory chapter by Nippold lays out broad questions of later language development—namely (a) what develops (figurative language, low frequency syntactic structures, metalinguistic awareness, etc.) and (b) what drives development (education and literacy, new cognitive abilities, etc.). The 10 chapters that follow describe work in a variety of languages: English, French, Hebrew, Spanish, and Swedish.

A bilingual’s language system is highly interactive. When hearing a second language (L2), bilinguals access native-language (L1) words that share sounds across languages. In the present study, we examine whether input modality and L2 proficiency moderate the extent to which bilinguals activate L1 phonotactic constraints (i.e., rules for combining speech sounds) during L2 processing. Eye movements of English monolinguals and Spanish–English bilinguals were tracked as they searched for a target English word in a visual display. On critical trials, displays included a target that conflicted with the Spanish vowel-onset rule (e.g., spa), as well as a competitor containing the potentially activated “e” onset (e.g., egg). The rule violation was processed either in the visual modality (Experiment 1) or audio-visually (Experiment 2). In both experiments, bilinguals with lower L2 proficiency made more eye movements to competitors than fillers. Findings suggest that bilinguals who have lower L2 proficiency access L1 phonotactic constraints during L2 visual word processing with and without auditory input of the constraint-conflicting structure (e.g., spa). We conclude that the interactivity between a bilingual’s two languages is not limited to words that share form across languages, but also extends to sublexical, rule-based structures.

There exists a general belief that the ideal English teacher is a native speaker (NS). Because of this native speaker fallacy, it is undeniable that nonnative speaker (NNS) teachers have been marginalized in the English language teaching (ELT) profession. Until recently, however, the voices of NNS English teachers expressing their own concerns have rarely been heard. Non-Native Educators in English Language Teachingis the first and most comprehensive work done in the field to fill this gap. It focuses solely on the theme of NNS educators in ELT and provides a forum for language professionals to discuss the issues surrounding the NS-NNS dichotomy from linguistic, psychological, pedagogical, and sociopolitical perspectives. This anthology is unique and powerful. All of the contributors are NNS professionals from diverse linguistic and ethnic backgrounds. Because of the unique nature of its contributors, purpose, and contents, this volume makes a great impact on, and a valuable contribution to, the fields of TESOL and applied linguistics. It is powerful because the messages are coming from authorities on the theme—NNSs themselves.

This study conceptually replicated Huensch and Tracy-Ventura’s (2017) analysis of the relationship between L1 and L2 utterance fluency with adult L1-English learners of Spanish. Data from 88 participants were analyzed to explore the proportion of the variance in L2 fluency measures that can be attributed to the corresponding L1 measures, and the relative weights of L1 fluency and L2 proficiency as predictors of L2 fluency. This study applied the same fluency and proficiency constructs and operationalizations as the original study, but differed in task type and learners’ L2 proficiency. Results were most similar for speed and repair frequency, and for silent pause duration. Findings concerning silent and filled pause frequency differed. Combined, the studies show that some L1-L2 fluency relationships are relatively stable across proficiency levels, task type, and learning context.