英语教学法原著选读19：二语习得输入假说C

本篇选自克拉申《第二语言习得的原则与实践(Principles and Practice in SLA）》第二章“第二语言习得理论”A节“有关第二语言习得的五个假说”第四个假说，武太白翻译。

敬请转载到您的QQ空间、分享到您的朋友圈！也欢迎朋友们和你们的朋友们都来关注我的公众账号“武太白金星人”，这是对我最高的鼓励和奖赏！

------------------------

-----------------------

A third characteristic of caretaker speech that concerns us is known as the "here and now" principle. It is well established that caretakers talk mostly about what the child can perceive, what is in the immediate environment. Discourse with children is far more likely to deal with what is in the room and happening now ("See the ball?") than what is not in the room and not current ("What will we do upstairs tomorrow?"). As Newport et al. (1977) points out, this is a topical constraint--the "here and now" principle reflects the common interests of the caretaker and child.

While there is no direct evidence showing that caretaker speech is indeed more effective than unmodified input, the input hypothesis predicts that caretaker speech will be very useful for the child. First, it is, or aims to be, comprehensible. The "here and now" feature provides extra-linguistic support (context) that helps the child understand the utterances containing i + 1. As MacNamara (1972) pointed out, the child does not acquire grammar first and then use it in understanding. The child understands first, and this helps him acquire language.

As discussed earlier, roughly-tuned caretaker speech covers the child's i + 1, but does not focus on i + 1 exclusively. Part (3) of the input hypothesis claims that this is optimal. Rough-tuning has the following advantages in child first language acquisition:

(1)It ensures that i + 1 is covered, with no guesswork as to just what i + 1 is for each child. On the other hand, deliberate aim at i + 1 might miss!

(2)Roughly-tuned input will provide i + 1 for more than one child at a time, as long as they understand what is said. Finely-tuned input, even if accurate (i.e. even if it "hits" i + 1), will only benefit the child whose i + 1 is exactly the same as what is emphasized in the input.

(3) Roughly-tuned input provides built-in review. We need not be concerned with whether a child has "mastered" a structure, whether the child was paying attention to the input that day, or whether we provided enough. With natural, roughly-tuned input, i + 1 will occur and reoccur.

In other words, if part (3) is correct, if it is the case that with enough natural communication and understanding that i + 1 is always provided, the caretaker need not worry about consciously programming structure.

This must be a good thing! Adding the responsibility of grammatical sequencing to parenthood would make parent-child communication much less spontaneous and far more difficult.

(ii) Evidence from second language acquisition: simple codes. The input hypothesis also holds for second language acquisition. First, as presented earlier, the second language acquirer, child or adult, is also an "acquirer", just like the child acquiring first language. Also, according to hypothesis (2), there is a natural order of acquisition for second language as well as first language, so we can talk about the second language acquirers' i + 1 as well. Third, second language acquirers can also receive the kind of modified input that children get.

This modified input is of three sorts. Foreigner-talk results from the modifications native speakers make with less than fully competent speakers of their language (see, for example, Hatch, Shapira, and Gough, 1978 for some good examples). Teacher-talk is foreigner-talk in the classroom, the language of classroom management and explanation, when it is in the second language. A third simple code is interlanguage talk, the speech of other second language acquirers.

While there are some differences between these simple codes and caretaker speech (Long, 1980; Freed, 1980), there are important similarities. As is the case with caretaker speech, modifications made in foreigner-talk and teacher-talk are not made for the purpose of language teaching, but are made for the purpose of communication, to help the second language acquirer understand what is being said. Second, the available research indicates that foreigner-talk and teacher-talk are roughly-tuned to the level of the acquirer, and not finely-tuned (Freed, 1980; Gaies, 1977; for a review, see Krashen, 1980); more advanced second language performers tend to get more complex input, but the correlation between proficiency and input complexity is less than perfect.

我们关切的带孩子语言的第三个特点是其“当时当地”原则。这是公认的，带孩子的人所说的绝大部分是孩子能够感知的，是孩子身周环境中的。与孩子的会话基本上要与房间里的、正在发生的相关（“看到那个球吗？”），而非不在屋里、也非当时的（“我们明天到楼上去做什么？”）。正如纽波特等（1977）所指出的，这是一种话题上的限制——“当时当地”原则反映出的是大人和孩子的共同兴趣。

尽管没有直接证据表明带孩子语言比未调整的输入更有效，输入假说还是预测：带孩子语言对孩子来说非常有用。首先，这种语言是，或者说目标是，可理解的。“当时当地”特色提供了语言之外的支持（语境），这帮助孩子理解包含着i+1的话语。如同麦克纳马拉（1972）所指出的，孩子并非先习得语法，然后使用语法进行理解。孩子先理解，这帮助他习得语言。

如前所述，粗略调制过的带孩子语言覆盖了孩子的i+1，但并不单独强调i+1。输入假说的第3部分表明这是最优化的。在儿童的一语习得中，粗略调制有如下优点：

（1）保证了i+1的覆盖，不必去猜想每个孩子的i+1是什么。另一方面，有意瞄准i+1却可能不准确！

（2）粗略调制的输入能够一次性给一个以上的孩子提供i+1，只要他们能理解所说的话。精确调制的输入，即便很准确（“命中”了i+1），也仅有利于一个孩子。

（3）粗略调制的输入提供了内置的复习。我们无需关心孩子是否已经“掌握”了某一结构，对当天的输入是否注意，或我们是否提供了足够的输入。有自然的、粗略调制的输入，i+1会出现、再出现。

换句话说，如果第3部分是正确的，那么有了足够的自然交际和理解，i+1也得到提供，带孩子的人也无需操心，去编写语法结构什么的。

这必定是件好事！如果要在父母职责上添加语法教学一项，会使得亲子交流不够自然，增大其困难。

（ii）二语习得的证据：简单编码。输入假说对二语习得也适用。首先，如前所述，二语习得者，不管是儿童还是成人，也是“习得者”，如同儿童习得第一语言。其次，根据假说（2），二语习得和一语习得一样有自然顺序，所以我们一样可以讨论二语习得者的i+1。第三，二语习得者也能够接收儿童所获得的那种调整过的输入。

这种调整过的输入有三类：外国人话语，由本国语者与未达流利水平的语言学习者交流时所作的调整产生；教师话语，是教室里的外国人话语，以外语进行教学管理和解释的语言；第三种编码是语际话语，即其他二语习得者的语言。

尽管这些简单编码和带孩子语言之间有一些不同，两者也有重要的类似之处。如同带孩子语言，外国语人话语和教师话语中所作调整并非为着语言教学的目的，而是为了交流的目的，是为了帮助二语习得者理解所说的东西。第二，现有的研究显示，外国人话语和教师话语是针对习得者水平的粗略调制，而非精细调制；水平较高的二语表现者倾向于得到更加复杂的输入，但语言能力与输入复杂性的关联度远非完满。