Modelling and Assessing Second Language Acquisition (Multilingual Matters, 18)

Hardcover, [vi] + 400 pages, NOT ex-library. Book is gently age-toned, clean, with unmarked text, free of inscriptions and stamps, firmly bound. Dust jacket shows light creasing, regular shelfwear, yellowing to spine; a touch of faint age-discolourations on inner panels. -- This book forms an invaluable reference work for all teachers of second languages and researchers in the field of L2 acquisition. In the first section of the book, the authors of the various chapters discuss the contribution that modern research into L2 acquisition has to make in the curriculum development process. In particular, the book provides the reader with arguments for and against the various approaches to teaching. In the second part of the book, the contributors concern themselves with the various assessment tests and their validity, discussing them in particular on psycholinguistic grounds. They also discuss the political function of such assessment and how tests are used or abused in many different contexts around the world. -- Contents: 1. Introduction; 2. Learnability and Syllabus Construction / Manfred Pienemann; 3. A Role for Instruction in Second Language Acquisition: Task-Based Language Training / Michael H. Long; 4. Can Language Acquisition be Altered by Instruction? / Patsy M. Lightbrown; 5. L2 Learners' Variable Output and Language Teaching / Kenneth Hyltenstam; 6. Linguistic Simplicity and Learnability: Implications for Language Syllabus Design / Teresa Pica; 7. Learnability and Learner Strategies in Second Language Syntax and Phonology / Björn Hammarberg; 8. Learner Variations and the Teachability Hypothesis / Howard Nicholas; 9. Medium or Object: Different Contexts of (School-Based) Second Language Acquisition / Michael C. Clyne; 10. Assessing Proficiency: An Overview on Some Aspects of Testing / David E. Ingram; 11. Testing Second Language Proficiency with Direct Procedures: A Comment on Ingram / Jan H. Hulstijn; 12. Profiling Second Language Development: A Procedure for Assessing L2 Proficiency / Harald Clahsen; 13. Pedagogical Implications of Direct Second Language Testing: A Canadian Example / Sharon Lapkin; 14. On the Validity of Second Language Tests / Lilian Fried; 15. Second Language Proficiency: An Interactive Approach / Jan H. Hulstijn; 16. Language Assessment as a Social Activity / Wilfred Stölting.…