1 Acquirers must assume that they will be successful 2 Acquirers must consider themselves to be potential members of he users of
that language. In brief, according to the two theories above people will acquire a
language when people obtain comprehensible input in a low-anxiety situation, when the language is presented with interesting messages, and when people
understand the messages.
2.2 Second or Foreign Language Learning
Every one acquires his or her first language gradually but subconsciously. He or she never learns the patterns of the language but through the exposure of the
language used by their adults. It quit differs with language learning. Second or foreign language learning
means acquiring new habits or ways of using the speech organs and learning the forms and the arrangements of forms required by the system Marry Finocchiaro,
1974:19. In language learning, acquiring habits of the language comes through the intensive and extensive practice of numerous examples.
In the section which now follows, the writer will discuss the models of language learning proposed by Littlewood 1989. Those models are the creative
construction model and the skill-learning model.
2.2.1 Second or Foreign Language Learning as Creative Construction A model of a second or foreign language learning that has become
increasingly influential is one, which sees it as a creative construction. According to this model the learner constructs a series of internal representations of the
language system. This occurs as a result of natural processing strategies and exposure to the second or foreign language communication situations. Whenever
the right kind of exposure takes place, the learner’s internal representation develop gradually in predictable stages, in the direction of the native speaker’s
competence. This model owes a lot of similar concepts proposed for first language learning. Diagrammatically, the process can be represented as follows:
2.2.2 Second Language Learning as a Form of Skill Learning This model which is implicit in most current approaches to teaching a
second or foreign language contrasts sharply with the creative construction model The creative construction model emphasizes on the cognitive processing strategies
that the leaner bring to the tasks in order to develop internal representations of the seconds or foreign language. On the other hand, the skill-learning model is based
on the assumption that if we require the learner to produce predetermined pieces of language through drills or question and answer practice this productive
Second language exposure
Processing strategies
Temporary representation
of the system utterances
activity will lead them to internalize the system underlying the language. Diagrammatically the writer can represent the process as follows:
2.3 Second or Foreign Language Teaching
