ICLSL 2016

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://repository.kln.ac.lk/handle/123456789/14246

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    The Lack of the Sinhalese Language Literacy among the Students: A Case Study of a School in Kolonnawa Educational Division
    (Department of Linguistics, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Wickramasinghe, P.D.D.D.
    Sri Lanka has a commendable record for one of the highest literacy rates in the South East Asia. This achievement can be largely attributed to the free education system of the country which came into operation since 1945. The many decades since then the country‟s education system has evolved under various socio-political nuances. Kolonnawa is an area known for its complex social background. This isolated study which concentrates upon a cohort of 22 students assigned to a special Sinhalese language literacy class in a school located in Sedawaththa tries to unearth the reason as to what has made the particular student population lagging behind the required Sinhalese language literacy for their age. The study found out that the sheer lack of parent‟s concern for their children‟s education has mainly led for this predicament. In addition, the poverty, the disintegrated family setups, lack of effective educational policies on the part of relevant authorities corresponding to the above social setting have been the contributory factors for this issue. The methodology adopted for the study was face to face interviews with the relevant students and the teachers. It is not a high profile technical report but it is a simple case study which tries to highlight the current problems relating to the Sinhalese language literacy among the students in the concerned area.
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    Problems Faced by a Bilingual Child in Learning
    (Department of Linguistics, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Thilagarajan, N.
    Generally, people start to learn a second language after a particular age when they would have a clear idea about a second language. However, in present society many children happen to be bilingual by birth, because of the multi-ethnic nature in their parents‟ marriage. The child thus begins to acquire the language from his parents‟ mother tongue. When the child lacks words in one language, he replaces them with the words from the other language. Though, children have a flair of understanding both languages from the childhood, they encounter some challenges when the start their initial education. For instance, the inability to understand the differences between the two languages, proceeding their conversations using both languages, making syntactical and grammatical mistakes and suffering to pronounce different sounds properly are some of the perennial challenges in this regard. It is difficult for a bilingual baby to keep every difference of the languages in mind. When a learner is exposed to unfamiliar situations in the learning at the first time, bilingual baby faces a difficult situation and ultimately seeks the help of the rules of his most familiar language to understand the learning. Consequently, the respective children are mentally affected and suffer considerably at the commencement of their primary education. Thus, it should be examined how these problems can be minimised. The aim of this research paper is to identify the problems faced by these children and to suggest viable solutions to overcome them. This study is based on a child whose mother‟s mother tongue is Sinhala while her father's mother tongue is Tamil. This is a qualitative research and data will be collected from a sample of selected bilingual babies and teachers. The ultimate goal of this research is to introduce techniques to overcome the problems faced by a bilingual child in the process of learning.
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    Cognitive Barriers in Learning English as a Second Language at Tertiary Level: A Survey of English as a Second Language Class at the University of Jaffna
    (Department of Linguistics, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Santhirasegaram, S.
    This paper aims to probe the principal difficulties and barriers of the second language learners in the ESL classroom at tertiary level. This study mainly focuses on the barriers of learning English as a second language at the University of Jaffna and to provide some effective teaching approaches to improve English knowledge of undergraduates. The researcher has conducted this survey to explore the cognitive barriers in the skill of writing in English. This study has been carried out in relation to the second year students in the Faculty of Arts, University of Jaffna. The objective of this study is to examine the cognitive barriers in the ESL classroom. The researcher tries to investigate what are the causes for the difficulties and the link between the barriers and the language learners‟ family factors, cultural factors and psychological traits. This study also provides valuable suggestions to improve the learners‟ language acquisition level and the development of writing skill, how to motivate them via effective teaching approaches and strategies and help them to overcome their learning barriers. The data has been analysed through qualitative and quantitative research methods. This study is based on writing materials that were collected from the undergraduates to gather information and discussions regarding this study. This study helps to diagnose the learners‟ cognitive barriers in writing, to bring an effective learning outcome and to improve the learners‟ cognitive level in the ESL classroom.
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    Lullabies Enrich Child Linguistic Development
    (Department of Linguistics, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Nandakumara, U.A.
    This research paper confers the importance of lullabies being sung to children, commencing from the pre-linguistic stage of language acquisition until the end of the first few years of the infancy. Thus, this report deals with the contributory linguistic factors that lullabies bear in triggering the language acquisition of infants apart from the first language cues that they receive and perceive through the speech that the adults use to communicate with them. The intention of this is to determine the whole-scale linguistic significance of lullabies, which are a universally shared experience within the human race. This paper once again investigates whether lullabies are mere sleep inducing melodies or whether they possess distinctive traits that reinforce language cues to the highly absorbent infant brain. The research was conducted using two methodologies: Questionnaire in the Sinhalese language was issued to twenty eight mothers, who have children below or of the age of three years, to provide personal and authentic responses, and a linguistic analysis of a Sinhala lullaby was done using the linguistic knowledge of the researcher. However, there could be different theories regarding this since actual baby brain image in the presence of lullabies was absent in the course of this research. Consequently, the results reveal that lullabies enrich the child linguistic development and thereby suggest the necessity to diverge the linguistic eye on lullabies as a rich resource which evokes and feeds diverse linguistic skills. Lullabies do not reach the heights as parentese do, but they are a rich resource which ensures informal education of an infant‟s first language. Hence, this research outlines the value of incorporating lullabies to communicate with children and assertively recommends their usage.
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    An Investigation on the Problems Encountered by the First Year Students Following French Certificate Course for Beginners at the University of Kelaniya
    (Department of Linguistics, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Kulathunga Arachchi, M.S.
    The Department of Modern Languages, University of Kelaniya being the leading language teaching Department in both undergraduate and graduate levels in Sri Lanka has granted the opportunity for the undergraduates from four all the four faculties of the University to learn French language as beginners. This study intends to analyse the problems of the undergraduates who follow the Part one of the Certificate Course in French encounter at the initiative period of learning the language. In doing the research the undergraduates who follow the Level one of the Certificate Course in 2016 are taken into consideration. The students are interviewed at the end of each lesson individually by distributing a questionnaire to make a database about each and every difficulty that they came across in terms of syntax, dictation, pronunciation etc. This process is going to be followed during a period of six months that can be considered as the initiative period and at the end it is expected to analyse the data with the intention of designing the pedagogy, teacher techniques and exercises in order to minimize the commonly faced problems by a majority of the students. Moreover the research findings will be utilised to select substantial studying materials that can cater to the needs of the beginners of the language which will enable the students to improve their vocabulary, dictation, pronunciation and listening. Especially the research findings will make it easy in selecting the materials that give extra practice to the difficult areas of language. Additionally, the research will open the gates to find out the language acquisition levels of the undergraduates who follow the subjects related to Science, Commerce and recognise the extra exercises that will help them master the language while following their major courses as a lack of enthusiasm towards language learning within the undergraduates from the mentioned faculties has being observed in the last few years owing to the workload in their main Degree course.