Adult problems in second language acquisition

CONTENTS

I. Introduction. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 1

II. Misconceptions about age in Second Language Acquisition. _ _ _ 2
a. The Critical Period Hypothesis in the Second Language Acquisition.

III. Second Language Teaching Methods in Adult’s Learning. _ _ _ _ 4

IV. Andragogy in the Adult’s Learning Proccess. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 8a. Andragogy The Discipline of Adult Learners

V. Factors affecting Adult’s Second Language Acquisition. _ _ _ _ _ 9
a. Characteristics of Adult’s Learning

VI. Teachers Role in Adult’s Second Language Acquisition. _ _ _ _ _ 11
a. Teaching Foreign Languages to Adult Students.

VII. Conclusion. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 13

VIII.References. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 14

IX. Annexes. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ 16

I. Introduction

The greatest impact in the society nowadays is made by the continuous changes in technology and science that exceed everyone expectations. Besides that, there is a growing development of communication that accelerates people’s way oflife. Consequently, one of the major challenges for people is to adapt themselves to those changes in order to keep their life that matches those challenges and improve their quality of life. A clear example of this is the quantity of people studying that everyday grows at higher speed. Also, it’s remarkable the fact that lately adults are more interested in taking part in formal courses of studyin Technical Institutions or in Universities. Among all the variety of carreers, the learning of a foreign language is one of the most requested by adults in many of the educational institutions in Santa Cruz. Nevertheless, it’s frequent that those students of 30 years of age or older, need some special requirements as learners because an inapropiate focus of these factors could produce afrustrating and difficult experience in the second language acquisition. However, even though adults sometimes present more problems in learning a second language than children or teens, this does not mean that it is impossible to acquire a second language at later stages of their life.

The intention of this project is, firstly, to identify the most frequent problems in Adult Second LanguageAcquisition that affects the good development of learning in Adult Students. Second, it is to guide language teachers in their position about some misconceptions of problems that adult learners may deal with in the learning process. Additionally, this paper has the purpose to encourage adult learners to read this material in order to change their attitude about some probable mistakes in the secondlanguage learning process. For this, a research was conducted among adult students through questionnaires that let us know their weaknesses and difficulties when they learn a second language. In the same way, language teachers answered surveys in which they mention some believes and methods that they use concerning adult learners.

This project has been carried out with teachers andstudents of the Language Learning Institute C.A.I. (Cursos Autofinanciados de Inglés) which belongs to the Language Department of the U.A.G.R.M. Moreover, this project provides valuable information about adult second language acquisition and not only considers students’ intellect but also it has some understanding about adult needs and their intrinsic motivation to learn. Indeed, it is considered that abetter understanding of adult learning process may be strongly helpful for teachers and learners in the process of teaching and learning a second language.

II. Misconceptions about age in Second Language Acquisition

Over the last few decades many adult students have returned to the classroom to learn again. Many are the reasons why those people look for the direct access to this...