Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning

far more valuable then the exercise itself. We teach language best when we use it for what it was designed for: communication.

Note

Correct use in obligatory occasions means simply that the acquirer supplied the morpheme where it was required. For example, the underlined portion of this sentence is an obligatory occasion for the plural morpheme in English:

I have three pencil__.

Analysis of grammatical morphemes in obligatory occasions was begun by Brown (1973). As indicated in Chapter 4, analysis in obligatory occasions does not give a complete picture of language acquisition. It does, however, provide valuable information on order of acquisition of grammatical items.