幼兒外語學習者對字的認知能力

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(1)國科會結案報告 (NSC89-2411-H-006-031) 關鍵詞：後設語言認知；字的認知；幼兒外語學習者；學齡前兒童英語；雙語兒童；外語教學；臺灣. 幼兒外語學習者對字的認知行為閔慧慈國立成功大學外文系. 長久以來，學者大多認為雙語能力(bilingualism)對雙語兒童的後設認知發展有助益。而有關雙語兒童後設認知發展的研究，大多專注於渠等對字的認知領域方面，學者咸認為雙語兒童對字與物之間任意的(arbitrary)關係較單語兒童有較多的認知與了解。但是實證性研究的結果卻莫衷一是，近來的學者則提出另一新見解，即雙語能力對第二語言學習者(而非雙語兒童)的認知能力有所助益。從心理學的觀點而言，學習外語和第二語言的過程有許多相似之處，因此本計劃旨在研究學習外語是否對學齡前幼兒的字的認知能力有所提昇，並進一步比較台灣學習外語幼童與單語兒童在對字的觀念，分割與辨識三方面是否有差異。參與本研究計劃的兒童包括學習第二外語組及單語組兒童各三十位，年齡平均約四歲左右，這兩組幼童分別接受三種測試：(一)字的分割(將字串分割成字，例：「紅色美麗」分割成「紅色」、「美麗」，「老虎桌子電視」分割成「老虎」、「桌子」、「電視」) ；(二)字的長短辨識(例：毛毛蟲(字長物小)和豬(字短物大)兩字長短的比較) ；(三)物名的操控(例：將兩物的名字互換，其屬性是否隨之變更？若將「小狗」的名字改成「小貓」，則它的叫聲為何？是「汪汪」還是「喵喵」？) 實驗結果顯示，學習第二外語組幼兒雖在三項測試均較單語組幼兒略勝一籌，但只有在「物名操控測試」這一項，學習第二外語組幼兒才顯著的勝過單語組幼兒。這結果表示，即使有限度的學習第二外語，幾個月就能提昇幼兒對字與物之間任意關係的了解。此項發現亦證明 Bialystok 在一九八七年所提出的見解，即剛開始學習第二外語即可以提昇幼兒後設語言認知能力，並非要等到幼兒的第二語能力達到和母語相等程度時，第二外語才能對渠等後設語言認知能力有所助益。.

(2) Final Report (NSC89-2411-H-006-031) Key words： metalinguistic awareness; word awareness; young foreign language learners; preschool English; bilingual children; foreign language education; Taiwan. Wor d Awareness of Young Foreign Language Lear ner s Hui-Tzu Mi Department of Foreign Languages and Literature National Cheng Kung University. It has been argued among researchers that bilingualism contributes to bilinguals’ heightened metalinguistic awareness, defined as the ability to reflect on and manipulate the structural features of language irrespective of meaning. Studies of bilingual children have primarily focused on lexical awareness and in particular, on the assumption that bilingual children have heightened awareness of the arbitrariness of word-referent relationships. However, results of studies on this issue are mixed. More recent conceptualizations proposed that it is the second language learners rather than bilinguals that are likely to benefit from the cognitive advantage. From a psychological point of view, foreign language learning shares a lot of similarities with second language learning. Thus, this study is designed to examine the effects of foreign language learning on Taiwanese preschoolers’ word awareness skills. Specifically, it intends to examine whether there are significant differences in marginal bilingual and monolingual preschoolers’ knowledge of the metalinguistic term “word,” word segmentation and word judgment (Bowey & Tunmer, 1984). Thirty bilingual and thirty monolingual preschoolers (age mean 4) have been selected to participate in this study. Three word awareness tasks were used to examine the marginal bilingual and monolingual children’s word awareness skills: word segmentation task (segmenting word lists into words),, word judgment task (word size judgment, e.g., “maomaochung” [caterpillar] (a long word but small in size) v.s. chu [pig] (a short word but large in size), and name manipulation task (declarative/procedural knowledge in label change, and application of such knowledge). The results show that the two groups did not differ significantly from each other on two of the three measurements, but on name manipulation task. The results from this study suggest that limited exposure to a second language can enhance one aspect.

(3) of word awareness— that of the arbitrary relationship between words and objects. The findings corroborate Bialystok’s (1987) proposal that the more sophisticated development of metalinguistic skills by children learning a second language does not hinge on comparable competence in the two languages. Rather, it demonstrates that the child’s recognition of the coexistence of two separate language systems in representing the same set of concepts is the key to their enhanced word awareness (Bialystok, 1988)..

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