1st ed. publ. 1993.

Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Learning a first language; Milestones and patterns in development; Early childhood bilingualism; Developmental sequences; Summary; Theoretical approaches to explaining first language learning; Behaviourism: Say what I say; Activity: Analysing children's speech; Innatism: It's all in your mind; The interactionist position: A little help from my friends; Summary; 2. Theoretical approaches to explaining second language learning; Activity: Learner problems; Behaviourism; Innatism; Universal Grammar; Krashen's 'monitor model'; Recent psychological theories; Information processing; Connectionism; The interactionist position; Summary; 3. Factors affecting second language learning; Activity: Characteristics of the 'good language learner'; Research on learner characteristics; Intelligence; Aptitude; Personality; Motivation and attitudes; Learner preferences; Learner beliefs; Age of acquisition; Activity: Comparing child, adolescent, and adult language learners; Summary; 4. Learner language; The concept of learner language; Activity: The Great Toy Robbery; Developmental sequences; Grammatical morphemes; Negation; Questions; Activity: Learners' questions; Activity: More about questions; Relative clauses; Reference to past; Movement through developmental sequences; New ways of looking at first language influence; Summary; 5. Observing second language teaching; Comparing instructional and natural settings for language learning; Activity: Natural and instructional settings; Activity: Classroom comparisons: teacher-student interactions; Classroom observation schemes; Activity: Observing the kinds of questions you ask your students; Feedback in the classroom; Activity: Analysing classroom interaction; Summary of transcripts; Activity: Observing how you respond to students' errors; Summary; 6. Second language learning in the classroom: Five proposals for classroom teaching; 1 Get it right from the beginning; 2 Say what you mean and mean what you

This book is a comprehensive and readable introduction to how languages are learned. It presents the main theories of first and second language acquisition, and, with the help of activities and questionnaires, discusses their practical implications for language teaching.