Program Overview

Those of us in the school interested in language learning and acquisition have conducted research on both first and second-language acquisition.We investigate contexts where issues such as language teaching methodology, assessment, language teacher education, and curriculum design are highly relevant, and model the mental processes and structures involved in learning all aspects (from pragmatics, through semantics and syntax, to phonology and phonetics) of a linguistic system.

There is a strong international dimension to our work. Many of our projects involve the relevance of intercultural communication and English as a global language in debates about language acquisition and learning and teaching. Our research group is a pioneer in bringing together theoretical research on the nature of language and actual classroom practice.