Language Acquisition: How the Human Mind Creates and Acquires Language

1. Language Acquisition:How the Human Mind Creates and Acquires Language John De Mado Language Seminars, LLC 125 S. Collier Blvd./ B202 Marco Island, FL 34145 E-mail: info@demado-seminars.com Web: www.demado-seminars.com ____ Specifically Prepared for the MFLA Conference ~Saturday, October 13, 2012~

2. ~Attitude~ “The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company... a church... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the string that we have, and that is our attitude... I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our attitudes.” Charles Swindoll

3. Language, Error and Psycholinguistics . Risk-Taking: The willingness to confront more language than which you presently own. ·Vulnerability: The willingness to err for the broader goal of communication ·Intuition: The ability to sift for meaning

4. DIFFERENTIATING MASTERY FROM PROFICIENCY MASTERYPROFICIENCY GRAMMAR RULESVOCABULARY ACQUISITION (vocabulary) (grammar) TEACHING ACQUISITION FOCUS FOCUS METALANGUAGE INTERLANGUAGE IDENTIFY COMMUNICATE IMITATIONSELF- SELECTION

5. Defining Proficiency “...The ability to deliver and receive communication that is situationally appropriate...”De Mado

6. THE ROLE OF GRAMMAR BTTR

7. INTERLANGUAGE SPEAKER/ L2 SPEAKER/ L1

8. INTERLANGUAGE SPEAKER/ L2 SPEAKER/ L1

9. INTERLANGUAGE SPEAKER/ L2 SPEAKER/ L1

10. ERRORVs MISTAKES ErrorMistakes • -Inventive - Fossilized • -Dynamic - Static • -Transitional Influence - Permanent • -Intuitive Selection - Conscious Selection

11. Types of Error • Interlinguistic: Brought about by the clash of two or more languages… • Intralinguistic: Brought about by the unique peculiarities of a given language...

12. ~World Language Teacher Affirmation~ I am a World Language teacher and, as such, I am among the most colorful educators in the world. I am opinionated, volatile, emotional… and generally imbued with the capacity to find humor even in the most dire of circumstances. I am singularly patient with those around me who haven’t a clue as to the role of second language acquisition in the American curriculum. I am patient with the mythologies that propound the notion that functioning in more than one language is somehow outside the scope of the American mind. I am tenacious. The fact that mine is the only culture in the world where one can be monolingual and still be considered literate does not deter me from my mission of celebrating diversity. I am risk-taking. I have dared to acquire the language and assume the culture of at least one other linguistic group. I have traveled the world in search of understanding... allowed myself to be vulnerable... and learned to respect the value of intuition. I am, above all, optimistic... even in the face of absurdity. Like mythical Sisyphus, so often I push the rock up the hill only to have it roll back down on me. Even so, I adopt the stance offered up by Camus when he reminds me to “imagine Sisyphus happy."

13. JDMLS John De Mado Language Seminars, LLC 125.S. Collier Blvd./ B202 Marco Island, FL 34145 _______ Phone/Fax (239) 394-5304 E-mail: info@demado-seminars.com www.demado-seminars.com “Liberating yourself is nothing. What is arduous is knowing how to be free…” Gide, The Immoralist