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Ercan Ylmaz

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The problem Articles are one of the most difficult structural elements for EFL learners (Master 2002) Acquisition of the article system in English is very demanding for L2 learners. Butler (2002)

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The purpose 1. to understand whether different types of articles are acquired by different proficiency level learners with different proficiency 2. to determine whether there is a hierarchy in the acquisition of definite and indefinite articles

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The English article system -the indefinite article a/an, -the definite article the -and the zero (null ) article.

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Master (2002) The difficulty comes from three principle facts about the article system. 1.The continuous rule application effort put by the learners there are more than one alternatives for the same category

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2. The article system puts multiple functions on one single morpheme, a considerable burden for the learner, who generally seeks for a one-form-one function correspondence in navigating the language until the advanced stages of acquisition.

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3. Function words are normally unstressed and consequently are very difficult for non-native speaker of English to discern, thus affecting the availability of input in the spoken mode.

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O pened a new avenue of research on L2 article acquisition. Not only did he look at the presence or absence of articles in obligatory contexts, but he also analyzed various types of NPs and the articles used with each semantic type. Huebner (1983)

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Huebner divided the articles into 4 types + Thomass idiomatic & other conventional uses (type 5): Type :1 [- SR, +HK] a, the, 0 These are generic nouns Lions are big wild cats The Lion is a big wild cat A lion is a big wild cat

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Type 2 [+SR, +HK] This refers to the article the Pass me the salt I found a book. The book was.. The first person to walk on the moon.. The idea of coming to the US was

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Type 3 [+SR, -HK] referential indefinites & first mention nouns (a, ) -I saw a dog in Ahmets garden. -Susan kept on sending messages to her boyfriend after they broke up.

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Type 4 [-SR, -HK] Non-referential nouns, attributive indefinites & nonspecific indefinites ( a, ) -Alice is an actor. -I think, I should find a better job. - Foreigners would come up with a better solution.

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Type 5 Idioms & Other conventional uses a the - All of a sudden, he woke up - In the 1950s, there werent many cars. - His family is now living hand to mouth

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According to (Celce-Murcia &Larsen-Freeman, 1999; Chesterman, 1991; Master, 1997) The zero article is divided into two types: zero and null. The zero article occurs with nonspecific or generic noncount and plural nouns: - Water is essential to live. - Cats arent as loyal as dogs. The null article occurs with certain singular count and proper nouns - zmir is a very beautiful city. - I think that breakfast is the most important meal.

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Article Acquisition by L2 Learners Research on the L2 acquisition of articles has been rather made, focusing on isolated features of the English article system. Only Master studied the acquisition of articles exclusively

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Master (1987, as cited in Master,1997) how the English article system develops in the interlanguage of speakers of +Art and Art languages. The acquisition order of articles differed depending on the L1s of subjects. The zero article dominated the others. For Art learners the acquisition of a was delayed compared with the.

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Thomas (1989) Differences-similarities btw.L1 and L2 patterns in article acquisition Do L2 learners Associate definite article more with +SR rather than +HK if so Overuse of the in first mention. 30 participants 7 +ART 23-ART Story telling task No accurate control of a in SR HK and the in +SR +HK Overproduction of zero article is present in ART Overgeneralization of the [+SR HK] contexts.

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Atay 2010 120 students 40 elementary, 40 intermediate and 40 upper intermediate students Data collection instrument, a forced-choice elicitation task is used. 40 short and contextualized dialogues. each dialogue is missing an article a/an, the or four different contexts; i.e. definite/specific, definite/non-specific, indefinite/specific indefinite/non-specific. Each context has 10 dialogues with four different contexts that are randomized

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A sample question in the tool Mothers calling up to her daughter who is upstairs Mother: Ann! Could you please close ____ ( / a/ an / the) windows up there? Its getting cold outside! Ann: Ok mum!

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Atay 2010 intermediate level learners exhibited fluctuation between definiteness and specificity to a great extent in (+definite/- specific) and (-definite/+specific) contexts. Elementary level learners were more accurate in these contexts exhibiting article omission errors in definite contexts. upper intermediate level students were quite successful in article assignment in defined contexts. This revealed that there is a positive correlation between article system acquisition and proficiency.

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The -ART language Turkish Definiteness Specifity

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Turkish does not have an article system to mark definiteness or specificity. It encodes these semantic universals by some other alternative ways such as case morphology word order, stress tense aspect-modality.

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Bir in Turkish can be interpreted both as the indefinite determiner or numeral one. Eg: Snf ta gzel bir kz var. class LOC beautiful one girl there is (There is a beautiful girl in the class.) Eg: Snf ta bir gzel kz var. class-LOC one beautiful girl there is. (There is one beautiful girl in the class.)

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Bir adam gel di. One man come PAST ( A man came ) Bir adam gel di One man come-PAST (One man came)

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In Turkish the minimal requirements for a noun phrase to be interpreted as DEFINITE the absence of an indefinite determiner Garson tabak lar - temizle - di. Waiter plate -PL-ACC clean PAST (The waiter cleaned the plates.) accusative case marking where the NP is functioning as direct object Mdr araba -y - iste - di. president car -ACC ask for PAST (The president asked for the car.)

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Mdr araba iste - di. president car ask for PAST (The president asked for a car.)

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Alternative Ways of Definiteness Marking in Turkish 1. Word Order Preverbal position Bura dan hrsz gir - mi. here ABL burglar get in PAST (A burglar got in through here. ) Hrsz bura dan gir - mi. burglar here- ABL enter PAST (The burglar got in through here.)

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2.Sentence Stress RaporLAR yaz l- d. Report-PLURAL write-Passive- PAST (Reports were written.) Raporlar yaz l - DI. Report-PLURAL write-Passive- PAST (The reports were written.)

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3.Tense-Aspect-Modality ocuk - lar abuk yorul- du. child -PL fast get tired PAST (The children got tired fast.) ocuk - lar abuk yorul- ur. Child PL fast get tired AOR (Children get tired fast.)

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Specifity En (1991) asserts that in Turkish definite NPs are always specific Hasan dekan- ar- yor. Hasan dean-ACC look for- PR.PROG. (Hasan is looking for the dean.) But there is one exception: Hasan dekan ar- yor, dekan kim ol-ur- sa ol-sun. Hasan dean-ACC look for-PR.PROG who be-AOR-COND be-OPT (Hasan is looking for the dean- whoever the Dean may be.)

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An indefinite NP can perform two referential functions: 1. First time mention: Dn yol -da bir araba gr -d -m Yesterday street-LOC one car see PAST-1SG (Yesterday, I saw a car in the street) (indefinite/specific) 2. non-specific entity which is unknown and unidentifiable also for the hearer. Daha geni bir araba almay dn -yor -uz. More large one car to buy think PROG- 1PL (We are thinking of buying a larger car.) (indefinite/nonspecific)

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The presence or absence of accusative case in indefinite NPs Ali bir piyano-yu kiralamak ist - i- yor. Ali one piano-ACC to rent want-PROG-3SG (Ali wants to rent a (certain) piano.) (indefinite /specific) Ali bir piyano kiralamak ist- i- yor. Ali one piano to rent want-PROG-3SG (Ali wants to rent a (any) piano.) (indefinite/nonspecific)

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Study Ekiert(2004)s test instrument Elementary Pre-int Upper-int 42 sentences 75 items All types of Huebners & Thomass models are used. 15 of each type

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Fred bought a car on Monday. On Wednesday, he crashed the car. [Type 3] [Type 2] A/the Cat likes 0 mice. [Type 1] [Type 4] All of a sudden, he woke up from his coma. [Type 5] My computer has a new sound card. [Type 3] Sally Ride was the first American woman in 0 space. [Type 2] [Type 5]

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elementary -T4>T3>T2>T1>T5. T1T2T3T4T5 ElementeryQ.A.225 N=15C.A1547788814 %6,720,934,739,16,2

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Pre int T1T2T3T4T5 Pre- intQ.A.1320 N=88C.A8326743038744 %6,320,232,629,33,3 -T3>T4>T2>T1>T5

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upper T1T2T3T4T5 Upper-intQ.A.630 N=42C.A6224632127944 %9,839,051,044,37,0 - T3>T4>T2>T1>T5

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All levels T1T2T3T4T5 All levelsQ.A.2175 N=145C.A160560829754102 %7,425,738,134,74,7 -T3>T4>T2>T1>T5

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Comparison (Ekiert-Own Study) T1T2T3T4T5 low-ability62,228,8046,668,860 int-ability75,571,173,3 57,7 high-ability6073,38088,357,7 T1T2T3T4T5 low-ability6,720,934,739,16,2 int-ability6,620,232,629,33,3 high-ability9,839,051,044,37,0

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conclusion Students lack the usage of articles with generic nouns and in idiomatic context Elementary= t4 t3 t2 t1 t5 Pre-int and Upper- int= t3 t4 t2 t1 t5 all levels: a/an >the >T1 > T5 Acquisition of the is delayed compared with a/an No overproduction of and no THE flooding

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Thanks for listening =)