Grammar Acquisition and Processing Instruction: Secondary and Cumulative Effects

Benati (U. of Greenwich, UK) and Lee (U. of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia) investigate transfer-of-training effects, both secondary and cumulative, of Processing Instruction (PI). The authors review the theory of input processing and how learners work with input; review the empirical research on the primary effects of PI; and present results from three studies on the acquisition of French, Italian, and English as a second language which investigate the transfer of training effects for PI. They find that through PI individuals learn to process and produce the morphological form for which they received instruction, and that they also transfer that training to process and produce another morphological form for which they did not receive instruction. The authors conclude with a summarization of the findings and possible future directions for research on the PI model. Distributed in the U.S. by UTP Distribution. Annotation c2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Alessandro G. Benati is Head of Languages Department at the University of Greenwich in the UK. He has researched and taught in the area of second language acquisition and processing instruction. He is co-author with James Lee of the following books: Delivering Processing Instruction in classrooms and in Virtual Contexts; Second Language Processing: An analysis of Theory, Problems and Possible Solutions.

James F. Lee is Head of Department of Spanish and Latin American Studies at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He is the author of Task and Communicating in Language Classrooms.