Zoe Gavriilidou

Exploring Language Learning Strategy Transfer between Greek L2 and English FL in Case of Early Adolescent Multilinguals.

ABSTRACT This study compares language learning strategy (LLS) use between Greek L2 and English FL and a possible variation in the frequency and type of LLSs employed in the two languages in order to depict the strategic profiles of the multilingual learners aged 12–15 (n = 307). It also observes the effect of gender in relation to a second vs. foreign language context. The Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) is used to measure the frequency of strategy use. The findings suggest a positive correlation between Greek and English LLSs. Also, there is a statistically significant variation with respect to the frequency of overall strategy use between Greek and English, statistically significantly higher in Greek, and between strategy categories, with cognitive strategies showing a higher frequency of use in Greek and affective strategies in English. There are statistically significant differences on 19 individual strategic items between Greek and English. The findings show that the differences are statistically significantly higher in multilingual girls, both when learning English and Greek. The multilingual boys’ higher use of LLSs in their second language Greek is observed, whereas multilingual girls tend to use strategies for both languages equally frequently.

The SILL revisited in light of the S2R model of language learning

ABSTRACT The Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) [Oxford, R.L. 1990. Language Learning Strategies: What Every Teacher Should Know. Boston: Heinle and Heinle] has been a widely used instrument for self-assessing the frequency of language learning strategy use across cultures and levels of education for some 30 years. Despite the fact that its six-factor solution has not been confirmed, it has displayed acceptable reliability across cultures and translations. In the present study, we attempt to demonstrate a new factor solution for the Greek version of the SILL which is in line with the S2R model of language learning. Our sample consisted of 1308 primary and secondary school students from public schools in the regions of Northern Greece. The SILL v7.0 was used with four additional items selected and adapted from SILL v5.0. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses revealed six factors which explained 42.48% of the total variance and demonstrated good or adequate reliability. The first two factors indicate the metastrategies of ‘monitoring cognition for progress’ and ‘obtaining resources’. The other four factors indicated strategies of ‘deep cognitive processing’, ‘using resources’, ‘surface cognitive processing’ and ‘overcoming gaps of knowledge’. We compare our results with factor solutions of the SILL obtained in earlier studies and we discuss implications for the development of new instruments to better accommodate the S2R model of language learning.

Promotion of language learning strategies in the classroom: EFL teachers’ perceptions

ABSTRACT The present paper aims to shed some light on those EFL teachers’ language learning strategy instructional practices which facilitate their learners’ identification and selection of L2 learning strategies (LLS). To investigate the LLS which teachers promoted in mainstream and Muslim minority schools in Greece, we used data elicited through a 47 item specifically-designed questionnaire. Results showed the categories of strategies that are more or less frequently promoted by the research population. Differences in LLS promotion were identified between mainstream and minority school teachers; age and teaching experience influenced the promotion of certain strategy categories (i.e. metacognitive and compensation, respectively) but no differences were found between primary and secondary school teachers or between postgraduate qualification holders and non-holders.

NN Combinations in Greek

In this paper, multiword NN combinations in Greek are explored within the framework of construction morphology (Booij 2009, 2010a, 2010b). I understand NN combinations as multiword sequences constructed by two inflected words, such as: arxitektonas-arxeolo γ os ‘architect-archeologist’; taksi δ i-astrapi lit. ‘trip-lightning’, thus ‘very fast and sudden trip’; saltsa manitarja lit. ‘sauce mushrooms’, thus ‘mushroom sauce’. I use the classification of Gavriilidou (1997) in order to account for possible different subtypes of NN combinations. I claim that all three types of NN combinations (coordinate, attributive and complementation NN combinations) are visible to syntactic operations, they exhibit, however, various degrees of tightness which are due to whether they exhibit a naming function or not.