Language and Language Acquisition
Domain 1: Language and Language Acquisition
This domain tests how well you understand language as a system and how additional languages develop in school contexts. Expect items on second-language acquisition stages, academic versus social language, cross-linguistic transfer, and the linguistic demands of content-area tasks.
Core concepts
- BICS and CALP (Cummins): BICS is conversational fluency, often reached in 1–3 years; CALP is academic language proficiency, often 5–7 years. CALP includes syntax, discourse, and genre, not just vocabulary.
- Comprehensible input (Krashen): learners need input slightly beyond their current level, with a low affective filter. Input alone is insufficient; output and interaction matter.
- Interlanguage: learner errors often show rule application, not carelessness. L1 transfer can help or hinder.
- Language levels: preproduction, early production, speech emergence, intermediate fluency, advanced. Progress is uneven across listening, speaking, reading, and writing.
- Academic language: register, discipline-specific syntax such as cause-effect in science, and text structures.
Worked example
A fourth grader writes, “He goed to the store.” A deficit response marks it as a bad habit. A stronger response identifies overgeneralization of the regular past-tense rule-a developmental interlanguage error. The teacher recasts: “Yes, he went to the store,” then provides multiple meaningful exposures to irregular past forms in read-alouds and oral retells. The reasoning: the error is systematic, so targeted input and contextual use are more effective than isolated copying.
Traps that cost marks
- Treating BICS as proof that a student no longer needs language support.
- Calling every L1-influenced error “interference” without checking the developmental pattern.
- Confusing accent with comprehension or academic ability.
- Overcorrecting during fluency work; correction should match the task’s purpose.
- Assuming one language level applies to all four domains.