4. Conducting and Supporting Research in Applied Language Studies

4.1. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) PhD Program

The Language Institute is the administrative home of the SLA PhD Program, an interdisciplinary doctoral program that prepares students to research and teach in a rapidly growing field that investigates second language learning and acquisition, bi- and multilingualism, language teaching, and the relationship among language, culture, identity, and thought in diverse social contexts.

People

MONIKA CHAVEZ, Director

JANA MARTIN, Graduate Program Coordinator

18 core faculty and academic staff in 7 L&S departments (African Cultural Studies; Asian Languages and Cultures; English; French and Italian; Language Institute; German, Nordic, and Slavic+; Spanish and Portuguese) and in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction

By the Numbers

• SLA doctoral majors: 16

• SLA doctoral minors: 19

• Students earning the PhD in SLA in 2022-23: 5

• Applicants to the program for Fall 2023: 66

Program Highlights

• The program reached an agreement with the Department of English to offer multiple year funding packages to up to three qualified incoming SLA students each year

• The program welcomed four new faculty to the Steering Committee: o JULIA GOETZE, Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic+ o EMILY MACHADO, Department of Curriculum and Instruction o L.J. RANDOLPH JR., Department of Curriculum and Instruction o WEIHUA ZHU, Department of Asian Languages and Cultures

• Two faculty retired after many years of service and support of SLA: o MONIKA CHAVEZ, Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic+ o MAGGIE HAWKINS, Department of Curriculum and Instruction

• Five SLA students successfully defended their dissertations and graduated: o TIM CAVNAR (advisor KATE VIEIRA), Chinese International Students’ Academic Writing: The Role of Social Networks in Shaping Language Ideologies on a U.S. University Campus o HADIS GHAEDI (advisor MONIKA CHAVEZ), English as Second Language Undergraduate Chinese Students’ Perceptions of Their English Writing Practices and L2 Writing Self in Four Different Writing Contexts of ESL Courses, Academic Major Classes, Personal Pleasure, and Professional Communication o SCOTT STILLAR (advisor MARIAN PACHECO), Teaching Whiteness as a Second Language: Raciolinguistic Perspectives on Standardized American English Within a PostSecondary English Language Education Space o MARINA TSYLINA (advisors MONIKA CHAVEZ and KAREN EVANS-ROMAINE), The Perspectives of Learners, Non-Native-Speaker and Native-Speaker Teachers, and Non-Teacher Native Speakers on the Quality of L2 Russian Writing o GORDON WEST (advisor MAGGIE HAWKINS), Tracing Global Narratives: Examining Meaning Making and Positioning of Youth in Transnational Digital Communications

Events and Activities

Lectures

• Narrative Analysis as a Research Method for Studying Language and Identity, CHRISTINA HIGGINS, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, October 2022

• Understanding and Analyzing Narratives in Context, ANNA DE FINA, Georgetown University, November 2022

• How Your Contacts Shape

Your Language: From the Diffusion of Lexical Innovation to Second Language Acquisition,

MICHAŁ PARADOWSKI, University of Warsaw, April 2023 (co-sponsored with the Department of Psychology)

Professionalization Workshops and Brown Bags

• Dissertation Journeys: From Initial Interest to Committee-Approved Dissertation Topic, organized by SLA students GORDON WEST and TIM CAVNAR; presenters were ERIC HO, JOSÉ LUIS GARRIDO RIVERA, SCOTT STILLAR, and MARINA TSYLINA, November 2022

• Academic Publishing, KATRINA DALY THOMPSON, core SLA faculty, December 2022

• Making the Most of Final Course Papers, CATHY STAFFORD, core SLA faculty, December 2022

• Teaching at a Community College, CAROLINA BAILEY, SARAH FRITZ, HICHAM EL MAJDI, Madison Area Technical College, April 2022

• Preparing for Preliminary Exams, JUNKO MORI, core SLA faculty, and REBECCA SAWYER, SLA PhD student, April 2022

• CV Building, JULIA GOETZE, core SLA faculty, April 2022

Community Events

• Welcome Back Social, September 2022

• SLA Student, Faculty, and Staff Social, October 2022

• End-of-Year Celebration, May 2023

Events for Prospective and Incoming Students

• Online information sessions for prospective applicants, MONIKA CHAVEZ and JANA MARTIN, October 2022

• Welcome to SLA PhD Program, meeting of advisors, director, and current SLA students with Fall 2023 incoming SLA students, led by MONIKA CHAVEZ, April 2023

SLA Travel and Research Grant

• Six SLA students were awarded an SLA travel and research grant to present their research at a scholarly conference or to conduct dissertation research: o MARTINIANO ETCHART, American Association for Applied Linguistics Conference o ERIC HO, ethnographic research in Uganda o THERESE JASPERSON, American Association for Applied Linguistics Conference o REBECCA SAWYER, American Association for Applied Linguistics Conference o MARINA TSYLINA, American Association for Applied Linguistics Conference o SANDRA DESCOURTIS, American Association for Applied Linguistics Conference o JOSÉ LUIS GARRIDO RIVERA, research on the role of semantic similarity in L2 vocabulary learning

SLA Faculty/Student Research Partnership

Core SLA faculty JULIA GOETZE received funding to support a research partnership with SLA student PATRICIA HABERKORN, who will assist with the development and piloting of a survey rating scale as a part of a study to investigate the cognitive processes hypothesized to regulate foreign language teachers’ emotions

Select SLA Faculty Achievements

• HEATHER WILLIS ALLEN (French and Italian) signed a contract for the sole-authored book, A Design Orientation to Second Language Writing Instruction

• L.J. RANDOLPH JR. (Curriculum and Instruction) was elected as President of ACTFL and published the co-edited volume, How We Take Action: Social Justice in PK-16 Language Classrooms

• JACEE CHO (English) received a Vilas Associates Award for 202324 for the project, Multilingual Acquisition: Kazakh–Russian Bilingual Speakers’ L3 English Acquisition

• JULIA GOETZE (German, Nordic, and Slavic+) published the soleauthored article, An Appraisal-Based Examination of Language Teacher Emotions in Anxiety-Provoking Classroom Situations Using Vignette Methodology in the Modern Language Journal

• DIEGO ROMÁN (Curriculum and Instruction) was recognized with UW-Madison’s Distinguished Teacher Award

• KATRINA DALY THOMPSON (African Cultural Studies) published the sole-authored book, Muslims on the Margins: Creating Queer Religious Community in North America

4.2. Research Study on the Speaking Proficiency Outcomes of F2F and Online Intensive Summer Programs in Less Commonly Taught Languages

People

OMAR DUMDUM, Student Assistant

LIDIA GAULT, Student Assistant

HADIS GHAEDI, Student Assistant

RYAN GOBLE, Research Analyst

FELECIA LUCHT, Lead Researcher (through October 2022); WISLI liaison, with LAURA HAMMOND MARGARET MALONE, Outside Evaluator

JANA MARTIN, Researcher

DIANNA MURPHY, Principal Investigator and Lead Researcher

SONYA SEDIVY, Statistical Design and Consulting

About the Study

This federally funded research study documents the speaking proficiency outcomes of intensive summer programs offered through the Wisconsin Intensive Summer Language Institutes (WISLI) in both traditional face-to-face contexts and online during the COVID-19 pandemic. Fourteen less commonly taught languages are included in the study: Arabic, Bengali, Hindi, Indonesian, Kazakh, Persian, Portuguese (Brazilian), Tamil, Thai, Tibetan, Turkish, Urdu, Uyghur, and Uzbek. The study is funded by a three-year grant (2020-23) from the U.S.

Department of Education International Research and Studies Program and by an ACTFL Research Priorities grant.

Major 2022-23 Project Accomplishments

• Completed data collection: o Pre- and post-program Oral Proficiency Interview ratings (N = 487) o Background questionnaires (n = 126) o Interviews (n = 92) o Eight weekly journals to report on time spent in different L2 learning and use activities (n = 82)

• Completed quantitative data analysis related to research questions comparing face-to-face and online instruction, and to the speaking proficiency attainment by language and level of instruction.

• Completed thematic coding of qualitative data and preliminary analysis related to research questions on student perceptions of the affordances of face-to-face and online instruction, and on engaging L2 learning and use activities.

• Prepared a report for The Language Flagship on speaking proficiency gains made by students participating in WISLI programs in Hindi, Indonesian, Turkish, and Urdu as part of Regional Flagship Language Initiative (RFLI) programs, or as non-RFLI students participating in those same programs.

• Shared findings from the study at national conferences and meetings: o Using Proficiency Tests to Examine Student Outcomes and Improve Learning: Four Studies and a Discussion of Test Use, DIANNA MURPHY and SONYA SEDIVY, Colloquium for the 2022 Language Assessment Research Conference, September 16, 2022. With MEG MALONE, ACTFL, chair; TROY COX (Brigham Young University), CHARLENE POLIO (Michigan State University), and JOYCE WU (University of Rhode Island). o The Proficiency Outcomes of F2F and Online Intensive Summer LCTL Programs, DIANNA MURPHY, ACTFL 2022 Convention, November 19, 2022. o Applied Research Panel, DIANNA MURPHY, Language Flagship Annual Meeting, May 24, 2023. o Did Student Speaking Proficiency Gains Suffer During the Pandemic?, JANA MARTIN, International Association of Language Learning Technology Conference, June 16, 2023.

• Drafted a first publication on the study (still in preparation; see Section 4.3) to submit to a scholarly journal in Summer 2023.