Acquisition of the Passe Compose and the Imparfait Will Be Tentatively Determined Using the Following Four Methods

ACQUISITION OF THE PASSE COMPOSE AND THE IMPARFAIT BY NON-NATIVE SPEAKERS OF FRENCH By SABINE DAVIS Bachelor of Arts Oklahoma State University Stillwater, Oklahoma 1993 Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate College of the Oklahoma State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS May, 1995 ACQUISITION OF THE PASSE COMPOSE AND THE IMPARFAIT BY NON-NATIVE SPEAKERS OF FRENCH Thesis Approved: / ean of the Graduate College ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to first aknowledge the 28 native speakers of French from the university campus in Nantes, France, who participated in recorded interviews and the 55 American students enrolled in the French courses at Oklahoma State University during the 1994 Fall semester, who volunteered 10 minutes of "painful" recording in French at the asu language lab for the purpose of my study. I also wish to thank the French professors from the asu Department of Foreign Languages - Dr. Gethner, Dr. Howland, Dr. Knottnerus and Dr. Schrader - who sacrificed some of their precious class time to allow me to conduct my study. My deepest thanks go to Mrs Homer, OSU Language Lab Assistant, whose cooperation and assistance made my undertaking realizable. I would like to acknowledge Dr. Payton from the asu Department of Statistics, who got me out of a black hole on several occasions and always on short notice. THANKS! I would like to thank Dr. Gene Halleck and Dr. Ravi iii Sheorey from the OSU English Department for serving on my committee, and reviewing my work. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my adviser, Dr. Carol L. Moder! whose enlightening teaching, precious advice and unconditional support gave me the enthusiasm and confidence to go through my graduate studies and accomplish this work. I am grateful and proud of the opportunity I had to learn Linguistics from her and work under her guidance. Je tiens aussi a mentionner toute rna farnille qui m'a beaucoup manque depuis mon depart et qui mlest devenue plus chere encore, il me semble! depuis que je suis partie. Finally! I would like to end with these words which mean everything to me: To Ed and Alex! with love. iv Shearey from the OSU English Department for serving on my committee, and reviewing my work. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my adviser, Dr. Carol L. Moder, whose enlightening teaching, precious advice and unconditional support gave me the enthusiasm and confidence to go through my graduate studies and accomplish this work. I am grateful and proud of the opportunity I had to learn Linguistics from her and work under her guidance. Je tiens aussi a mentionner toute rna famille qui m'a beaucoup manque depuis mon depart et qui mlest devenue plus chere encore, il me semble, depuis que je suis partie. Finally, I would like to end with these words which mean everything to me: To Ed and Alex, with love. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page 1. INTRODUCTION . 1 II. A REVIEW OF SLA METHODS . 3 Behaviorism and Contrastive Analysis. 3 The Mentalist School and Error Analysis.. 6 Interlanguage. ........................... 7 The Decline of Contrastive Analysis.. .. .. 10 Recent Development in Interlanguage.. .. .. 13 New Trends in Acquisition Studies. .. 15 Methods in Acquisition Studies 17 Elicitation Device 18 Data Analysis to Establish a Sequence of Acquisition................. ..... ... 21 Data Analysis to Establish the Stages of Acquisition 31 III. THEORETICAL DISTINCTION BETWEEN PASSE COMPOSE AND IMPARFAIT................................... 33 Aspectual Approaches.......... .............. .. 36 A Discourse Approach. ....................... .. 42 More Comprehensive Approaches..... .. .. .. 45 De Both-Diez , 45 Abrate I s Model.... ..................... .. 47 Conclusion. ................................. .. 54 IV. ON THE ACQUISITION OF PASSE COMPOSE AND IMPARFAIT. .................................... .. 56 Studies of Native Speakers 56 A Longitudinal Study..................... 57 Cross-Sectional Studies.................. 58 v Studies of Non-Native Speakers 66 Conclusion. ................................. .. 73 V. METHO,DS . 74 Subj ects. ................................... .. 74 Experiment. ................................. .. 75 The Task.. ............................. .. 75 Transcription. ......................... .. 77 Computation of the Index of Language Experience. ................................. .. 79 Computation of the Mean Length of T-Units.. .. 84 Classification of the Forms used by the Native and Non-Native Subjects 90 Preliminary Remarks 90 Rationale for the Classification.. ..... .. 96 Validation of our Task 106 Order of Acquisition of the Four Functors 109 Methods. ............................... III Hypothesis. ............................ .. 112 Stages of Acquisition of the Four functors 113 Method 113 Hypothesis. ............................ .. 114 VI. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 117 Comparison of the Non-Native Subjects' Peformance to that of the Native Subjects ..... 117 Comparison of the Mean Length of T-Units and Narrations 117 Comparison of the Distribution of Obligatory Occasions by Functor 121 Order of Acquisition 123 Analysis of Implicational Scalability 123 Methods I and I I. ...................... .. 124 Method III 126 Method IV................................ 128 Conclusion 130 Stages of Acquisition. ...................... .. 132 Stages of Acquisition of the Functor MV in PC 133 Stages of Acquisition of the Functor NMV in Imp.......................... 143 vi Stages of Acquisition of the Functor MV in Imp 149 Stages of Acquisition of the Functor NMV in PC.................. .......... .. 155 Conclusion. ............................ .. 159 VII. IMPLICATIONS FOR FFL CLASSROOM AND FUTURE RESEARCH IN SLA. .............................. .. 163 REFERENCES. ........................................... .. 1 71 APPENDICES. ........................................... .. 177 APPENDIX A- SERIES OF PICTURES 178 APPENDIX B- TRANSCRIPTS OF THE NON-NATIVE SUBJECTS' NARRATIONS 180 APPENDIX C- TRANSCRIPTS OF THE NATIVE SUBJECTS' NARRATIONS 203 APPENDIX D - INFORMATION SHEET 212 APPENDIX E- TRANSCRIPTS OF THE FIVE NATIVE SPEAKERS ON THE FREE SPEECH TASK .... 214 vii LIST OF TABLES Table Page I. Abrate's Model of the Imparfait/Passe Compose Distinction. ................................... .. 48 II. Application of Abrate's Model to Sample Sentences. ..................................... .. 49 III. Application of Abrate1s Model to Our Previous Sentences. ..................................... .. 52 IV. Ranking of the Non-Native Subjects by Index of Language Experience 85 V. Mean Length of Tunits for the Native Subjects.... 88 VI. Mean Length of Tunits for the Non-Native Subj ects. ...................................... .. 89 VII. Classification of Forms for the Non-Native Subjects 105 VIII. Classification of Forms for the Native Subj ects. ...................................... .. 106 IX. Comparison of Tasks . 108 X. Mean Length of Tunits for the Native and Non-Native Subjects 118 Xla. Order of Acquisition by Methods I and II 124 Xlb. Order of Acquisition by Methods I and II Including Subjects with Three Obligatory Occasions or More 126 viii XII. Order of Acquisition by Method III 127 XIII. Order of Acquisition by Method IV 129 XIV. Ranking of the Four Functors by the Four Methods. ....................................... .. 130 ix LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. Kielhofer Reconstructed Sequence of Acquisition of the Imparfait/Passe Compose Distinction by Native Speakers of French 64 2. Matrix for the Analysis of Scalability 110 3. Distribution of Obligatory Occasions by Functor among the Native Subjects 122 4. Distribution of Obligatory Occasions by Functor among the Non-Native Subjects 122 5. Percentages of Correct Forms by Functors 131 6. Distribution of Correct and Variant Forms for the Functor MV in PC 135 7. Alternative Forms for the Functor MV in PC 135 8. Errors of Form in the Passe Compose 139 9. Types of Error of Form in the Passe Compose 139 10. Distribution of Correct and Variant Forms for the Functor NMV in Imp... ...................... .. 145 11. Alternative Forms for the Functor NMV in Imp ..... 145 12. Distribution of Correct and variant Forms for the Functor MV in Imp 152 13. Alternative Forms for the Functor MV in Imp 152 x 14. Distribution of Correct and Variant Forms for the Functor NMV in PC. ......................... .. 157 15. Alternative Forms for the Functor NMV in PC 157 xi CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION One of the main objectives of second language research is to provide a theoretical and empirical basis for designing efficient teaching methods. It is with this goal in mind that the following study was undertaken. When trying to acquire the two French past tenses passe compose and imparfait - and the distinction between them, learners of French as a foreign language (FFL) experience great difficulty. The traditional teaching approaches offered in textbooks often seem confusing and therefore inadequate; alternative teaching methods are needed. The present cross-sectional study of the acquisition of the passe compose/imparfait system by FFL learners was undertaken with the expectation that a detailed account of the order and successive stages second language learners go through in acquiring the two tenses would generate valuable information for pedagogic purposes. 1 2 Over time, linguists have used different approaches to investigate second language acquisition (SLA) , influenced to a great extent by the general language theory in favor at the time. Chapter II provides

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