Nebensätze in Büchern und Köpfen : Zur Bedeutung der Begriffsvorstellungen beim Fremdsprachenerwerb

Sammanfattning: The benefits of explicit knowledge for language learning is a much debated issue. In this study this question is approached from a new perspective since it focuses on the correlation between students’ concept images and their language ability. The focused concept is the subordinate clause in German. By means of a short written test the performance of 12 Swedish university-level students in three types of tasks was elicited: translating, correcting an erroneous text and commenting on grammatical differences in parallel German and Swedish texts. The students were asked to think aloud, but complementary questions were also asked if verbalizations were not lucid. A semi-structured interview that focused on school experiences, attitudes towards language learning and grammatical concepts followed. One year later the same procedure was repeated with three of the students who had successfully finished their first year of German.As for the concept images many students had only blurred conceptions of subordinate clauses, especially when they did not have access to texts to refer to. When they had the help from artefacts they often focused on visual clues such as subjunctions and verb position. Many verbalized statements were simply wrong. A common concept image described the subordinate clause as positioned after the main clause with the function of adding extra information. This led to the conclusion that the relative clause is the prototypical subordinate clause.Despite the often vague concept images, most students had no difficulty in producing subordinate clauses or in correcting a text with word order errors. Interestingly, the relative clause proved to cause the most problems.The fact that the students were able to produce subordinate clauses, but not able to explain their chosen solution indicates implicit knowledge. This in turn gives reason to believe that students have formed their own natural concepts from experience and not learned a well defined scientific concept. The students in this study could also be seen to represent stages in the concept building process that begins with a category ‘sentence’. Step by step different types of subordinate clauses break loose and form a new category ‘subordinate clause’. With time the attributes become more refined.The analysis of four Swedish grammars of German showed that three of them had content shortcomings, whereas the fourth placed too much emphasis on linguistic correctness which would leave the learners behind.In the last chapter implications for grammar writing and grammar teaching are discussed. One key point is the necessity of opportunities to verbalize your thoughts since this promotes learning