Acquiring
the first language is not at the same way as the learners did in acquiring the second language, where the first language is relatively easier because the
learners did it in well motivation and unconsciously built because the learners
need the language urgently to communicate with the people around. On the
other hand, we are being forced by the need of social communication. This
factor is missing in acquiring the second language, because the learners think that
only the “complement” no forces, no an urgent need and we did with relatively
low motivation. Consciousness and unconsciousness also one of the different
ways learners acquiring their first and second language, the infant did not
know what actually they learn while the learner learn the second language in
well monitor. First language is acquired
by the learners followed by the growth of physics and physicist and it is
commonly done in informal environment. While the second language is learnt with
the native language has already existed and commonly set in formal situation.
A. Introduction
It
has been continuous for thousand years, the human being use “the language” as
the means of communication, as the media to share their idea what they think
and what they feel to other people. Language has become an important aspect for
the human being to interact among their social life. Language consists of so
many complex systems, and it is begins to acquired by the infant in a very
early age with a complex explanation how infant manage the task. .
How
language is acquired has been explained by many psychologists by providing some
theories about language acquisition such as Skinner from Behaviorism (Nurture) argued that language is acquired
through a form of operant conditioning (Brown, 2000:34). The children give
their language responses through the stimulus given that perform the
reinforcement which enable the children to understand particular utterance, it
is about contextual probability. In contrast, Chomsky’s theory from Nativism (Nature) stated that language is learned
by special genetically programmed procedures that are unique to language
learning (Chomsky, 1968:53). However, how to acquire the second language is not
the same with how children acquire their first language that used to call
“mother tongue”. The second language acquisition is relatively more restricted
and difficult compared to the first language acquisition, it is caused by some
different factors exist in acquiring the second language and it’s mainly come
from the environment factor. Even, the environment factor determines whether
the language that the learner acquired is the “good one” or “the bad one”.
Acquiring
the second language is not at the same way like when the children acquire the
first language “the mother tongue”. The first language acquisition begins from
the basic one (when the children still empty of any language even word) and
also this first language acquisition followed by the growth of physics and
physicist that informally done with well motivation and unconsciously built
because they need this language to communicate with the people around. On the
other way around, in the second language acquisition the learner has mastered
their first language and not followed by the growth of their physics and
physicist and it is done formally with a lower motivation because they do not
need this language to communicate to the people around them.
So,
the second language must be acquired through some process that is done
consciously and cannot be acquire automatically as the learner did in acquiring
their first language.
A. Theories in Language Acquisition
The
development of language acquisition theories arose from the views of some
psychologists about how language is acquired. Mainly, there are two different principles
in psychologist views. There
are Behaviorism and Nativism that lead to other psychologists to propose their
view that is Interactionism.
1. Behaviorism
This
theory believes that language is acquired through a form of operant
conditioning. The children will give their language responses through the
stimulus given that perform the reinforcement which enable the children to
understand particular utterance, where the environment act as the determiner.
The language is a part of human behavior like another behavior. Therefore, the
language must be acquired through the stimulus (Brown, 2000 : 34)
The
language is developed through learning.
Researchers, such as B. F. Skinner has found that infants learn language
through operant conditioning, reinforcement, imitation and observational
learning. The infants acquire their language through the interaction with the
environment by imitating what they heard and what they see. In this case, the
important factor is how often that word is repeated so that the word or
utterance will be reinforced in the children’s brain.
2. Nativism
In
contrast to the first theory, Nativism believes that language cannot be
acquired through learning. Reinforcement is also not necessary in producing the
correct sentences in this theory. Because parents and caregivers will reinforce
an incorrect sentence as often as a correct sentence.
Noam
Chomsky a psychologist from Harvard University is behind this theory. He said
that the first language skill come from the universal grammar that determine
the basic form of natural language.
Every child was born into this earth with some competencies one of them
is the competency to recognize the utterances (Brown, 2000: 21).
Noam
Chomsky comes up with the idea of a language organ, which is known as the
Language Acquisition Device (LAD). The
children were accomplished with language acquisition device (LAD) that contains
of four competencies as follow (Brown, 2000: 22):
a) Competency
to distinguish between language sound and another sound
b) Competency
to organize the linguistics unit into some classes
c) The
competency about the language system, analyzing which one is correct and which
one is incorrect.
d) The
competency in using language system that is based on linguistics system
development.
3. Interactionism
The
Interactionist comes up with their belief that language development is a
combination between biological and environmental influences. Constructivism is when a child uses his
innate biological influences along with the environmental stimulus to develop
language.
B. The Process in Acquiring First
Language
The
first language acquisition refers to the process in the children or infants’
brain when they acquire their “mother tongue”. The language acquisition commonly
distinguished to the language learning. The acquisition refers to first
language, while language learning refers to the second language (Chaer,
2003:167).
Chomsky
stated that there are two different
processes
in acquiring the first language by the children. They
are process of competence and process of performance.
1. Competence
process
This
stage refers to the process in which the children begin to acquire the
grammatical of their native language start from phonology, morphology, syntax,
and then semantics. The grammatical awareness happens unconsciously in the
children’s brain because every child was born with the competency that we call
a language acquisition device (LAD). By using language acquisition device the
infant are able to acquire the language in a relative short time with a complex
grammatical. The infant can also distinguish which one is language sound and
which one is not by using this LAD.
Howard
Gardner in Campbel stated that the infant has accomplished with some
intelligences one of those intelligence is language intelligence (Campbel, 2006:
3). However, this competency still needs some developments and guidance from
the people around to perform this competency becomes a qualified performance in
communication.
2. Performance
process
This
stage refers to the process in which the children able to perform the language
as a communication media that can be categorized into two levels. The first
level is understanding where the
children begin to observing, understanding and then give their perception to
the words or sentence that they heard. The second level is producing where the children begin to give their expression and
producing the sentence completely by themselves (Chaer 2003:167).
C. The Stages in Acquiring First
Language
The
children are not automatically producing a complete sentence for their
communication. In fact, the children’s first language development through some
stages to make it equal to what the adult say or communicate. Those stages are
chronologically discussed as follow:
1. Phonology
In
this stage the children try to produce a single word by saying “maamaa”
“paapaa”. Even though, they do not
know the meaning of that word (semantics), whether its word or what
(Morphology) or a sentence (Syntactic). Djardjowidjojo
(2005:245) said that the parents assume that the words “papaa” “maamaa” refer
to them, despite we do not know what it’s really refers to. Perhaps, just the
children articulation drill it can be.
But the main one on this stage is saying something or producing the
sound (phonology). Therefore, the first stage in children’ first language is
phonology.
2. Morphology
The
next stage is the stage in which the children are able to perform some
morphemes or words. Even begin to recognize and use derivation or inflexion,
performing word added by affixes or suffixes. Around hundred words are
memorized during this stage. However, grammatical correction commonly found as
the reflection of the grammatical development.
3. Syntactic
In
this stage the children are able asking a question, ignoring, and requesting
something. Begin imitating, classifying the morphemes, and arranging the words
together to perform the sentence (Alamsyah, 2007: 21). In this stage the
children also begin to interpret a simple instruction even though with an error interpreting. For
example, interpreting the notice “the
fire is hot” but in fact they try to grasp it.
4. Semantics
The
children are able define and distinguish the meaning of the goods even
sentences by comparing them into the size, form and characteristic of goods.
For example, “the elephant is big” so
everything that has the same size is also big.
D. The Second Language Acquisition and
Learning
Krashen
(1981 :8-9) stated that adults have two different ways to develop their
language competence, the first is language acquisition and the second is language
learning.
1. Language
Acquisition
Language
acquisition is a subconscious process like the way children learn their first language.
Language acquirers are not consciously aware of the grammatical rules of the
language, but rather develop a feel for correctness.
2. Language
Learning
Language
learning, on the other hand, refers to the conscious knowledge of a second
language, knowing the rules, being aware of them, and being able to talk about
them (language and its rules).
Language
is learnt by the students in a formal situation in the classroom with full of
consciousness. They know what they learn and monitoring why they learn the
language. For example, come to the classroom and ask the students what they
learn, and why they need to learn it. The question of course will be fully
answered, because the students are well monitored. That is the difference
between “learning” and “acquiring”, see also the schema below about the distinction
between learning and acquiring.
According
to Haerazy (2008:23) stated that as in first language acquisition, there are
also four stages in acquiring second language. However, the order is not
actually the same. If the children acquire their first language begin from
phonology, morphology, syntax, and then semantics. The learner begins their
second language from syntactic, phonology, morphology, and then semantics.
1. Syntactic
In
this stage the learners begin to ask and insist to know how to say or express
what they want. Commonly start from their daily activities and then try to say
it in the second language or target language.
For
example, the learners insist to know what would he say if he wants to go to eat, so he asks his dad or mom
‘pak apa bahasa inggrisnya “saya mau makan?”’ and then the father told him.
Let
see the example why the student did not asked her father ‘pak apa bahasa
inggrisnya ‘saya’?” and then “apa bahasa inggrisnya ‘mau’?” “apa bahasa
inggrisnya ‘makan’?” it is because of the first stage in acquiring the second
language begins from syntactic not morphology.
2. Phonology
The
second stage of second language acquisition is phonology, where the learners
begin to ask how that sentence is pronounced. After they knew about the
sentence “I want to eat” once more they asked how to say it? It is clear that
the second stage is phonology.
3. Morphology
In
this stage the learners begin to enrich the vocabulary. The glossary and
dictionary become their main necessary, finding out new words, distinguishing
and recognizing derivation and inflection are begun in this stage.
4. Semantics
After
arranging the words become a sentence, and then try to have the right
pronunciation, finding new words, recognizing the derivation and inflection, the
last stage is performing the semantics. This semantics element considered as
the last level because in this stage the learners are able to interpret the
second language into the first language (Haerazi, 2008 : 41).
F.
Closing
Remark
Acquiring
the first language is not at the same way as the learners did in acquiring the
second language, where the first language is relatively easier because the
learners did it in well motivation and unconsciously built because the learners
need the language urgently to communicate with the people around. On the
other hand, we are being forced by the need of social communication. This
factor is missing in acquiring the second language, because the learners think that
only the “complement” no forces, no an urgent need and we did with relatively
low motivation.
Consciousness
and unconsciousness also one of the different ways learners acquiring their
first and second language, the infant did not know what actually they learn
while the learner learn the second language in well monitor. First language is acquired by the learners
followed by the growth of physics and physicist and it is commonly done in
informal environment. While the second language is learnt with the native
language has already existed and commonly set in formal situation.
REFERENCES
Alamsyah,
T. 1997. Pemerolehan Bahasa Kedua (Second
Language Acqusition). Banda Aceh:
Universitas Syiah Kuala.
Brown,
D (2000) Principles Of Language Teaching
And Learning. New York: Longman
Campbel,
dkk. 2006. Metode Praktis Pembelajaran
Berbasis Multiple Intelligences. Depok: Intuisi Press.
Chaer,
Abdul. 2003. Psikolinguistik: Kajian
Teoretik. Jakarta: Rineka Cipta.
Chomsky
.N. (1968). Language and Mind.
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Inc
Chomsky.
N. 1986. Knowledge of Language: Its
Nature, Origin, and Use. New York: Praeger.
Dardjowidjojo,
S. 2008. Psikolinguistik: Pengantar
Pemahaman Bahasa Manusia. Jakarta: Yayasan Obor.
Haerazi.
2008. Pemerolehan bahasa ke-dua.
Mataram. IKIP Mataram
Krashen,
Stephen D. 1981. Principles and Practice
in Second Language Acquisition. English Language Teaching series. Oxford:
Pergamon
Lado,
R. (1957). Linguistics across cultures:
Applied linguistics for language teachers. University of Michigan Press:
Ann Arbor.
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