THE EFFECTS OF MULTISENSORY STRUCTURED LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION ON NATIVELANGUAGE AND FOREIGN-LANGUAGE APTITUDE SKILLS OF AT-RISK HIGH-SCHOOL FOREIGN-LANGUAGE LEARNERS - A REPLICATION AND FOLLOW-UP-STUDY

According to research findings, most students who experience foreign l anguage learning problems are thought to have overt or subtle native l anguage learning difficulties, primarily with phonological processing. A recent study by the authors showed that when a multisensory structu red language approach to teaching Spanish was used with a group at-ris k high school students, the group's pre- and posttest scores on native language phonological processing, verbal memory and vocabulary, and f oreign language aptitude measures significantly improved. In this repl ication and follow-up study, the authors compared pre- and posttest sc ores of a second group of students (Cohort 2) who received MSL instruc tion in Spanish on native language and foreign language aptitude measu res. They also followed students from the first study (Cohort 1) over a second year of foreign language instruction. Findings showed that th e second cohort made significant gains on three native language phonol ogical measures and a test of foreign language aptitude. Follow -up te sting on the first cohort showed that the group maintained its initial gains on all native language and foreign language aptitude measures. Implications for the authors' Linguistic Coding Deficit Hypothesis are discussed and linked with current reading research, in particular the concepts of the assumption of specificity and modularity.