Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Distinction Between Acquiring First Language and Second Language Acquisition

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.








 E.  The Stages of The Second Language Acquisition
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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