Contrastive Analysis Model Of L2 Learning

1. Early SLA Theories (A)

Contrastive analysis model (CAM) posits that L2 learning is basically the process of transfer of L1 to L2. Therefore, CAM assumes strong influence of L1 and environment on L2 learning. In CAM, challenges in L2 learning are fully predictable by a comparison of L1 and L2 systems. For example, Spanish learners of English might say ‘clothes (n) used (adj)’ instead of ‘used clothes’ because in Spanish, nouns being modified precedes the adjectives (‘ropa(clothes) usada (=used)’ is the correct order in Spanish). Based on the structure of Spanish, CAM would correctly predict that this error would happen when a Spanish speaker learns English.

In the interlanguage model (ILM), L2 learning is not understood as a merely a process

On the aspect that input is the key to output, behaviorism was capable of addressing the importance of environment in language development. However, on a few grounds, it was revealed as an insufficient frame for understanding how humans learn language; most relevant to the replacement by rise of Monitor Theory is that, behaviorism was not capable of explaining variability in learning; why doesn’t learning always occur equally for everyone even when the same input is presented? Krashen’s Monitor theory was able to replace the behaviorist approach to language development by presenting a complex flowchart of second language learning, and to this day remains as the most widely recognized model in SLA. The strength of Monitor Theory lies in the comprehensiveness of its breath; it is comprised of five key components – the acquisition-learning hypothesis, monitor hypothesis, natural order hypothesis, input hypothesis, and the affective filter – that together cover the various factors at work during second language learning. The most important aspect of Monitor Theory is the divide between learning and acquisition. According to Krashen, acquisition is the subconscious, L1-development like process while learning is achieved to explicit instruction and learning process. In this model, first of all the input needs to be ‘comprehensible’, following the ‘natural order’ of learning. According to the natural order hypothesis, learners follow a general and universal schedule of progress stage, and optimal learning is possible when learners are presented with input only slightly higher (thus comprehensible) than their current level of achievement. Now, given a comprehensible level of input, with the ‘affective filter’, Monitor Theory addresses how much of the given input a learner will be capable of turning into intake. The affective filter brings