Grammar and the Chinese ESL Learner: A Longitudinal Study on the ...

data and further research are needed to justify such a claim. Third, research has shown that the acquisition of each individual type of article might pass through several stages as in the case of the definite article the. Lee et al. (1994), for instance, observed that the developmental sequence of the English definite article for L2 learners undergoes a referential place-holding phase and a referential substitution phase before it is fully acquired. However, the possible stages for the indefinite article a(n) and the zero articlestill remain unclear. Fourth, due to the complexity and the confusion involved in identifying the non-use of any article and the use of the zero article, research to date has not given enough attention to the acquisition process of the zero article. And lastly, noun phrases, the most important linguistic environment for articles, have not been given enough description, with the consequence that one can only see trees but not the forest. As an attempt to address those issues, the present study investigates one Chinese child’s longitudinal acquisition of the English articles.

Significance of the Problem

—Hatch (1978, p. 10)

The discovery of acquisition sequences has contributed to making SLA an independent field of inquiry, since demonstrating the existence of an L2 sequence of acquisition proves that there is a point to developing SLA research separately from the study of first language (L1) and L2, as well as from L1 acquisition (Cook, 1993). It helps to establish the fact that the ILs of L2 learners are valid and unique objects of study. Moreover, it provides a way of showing how learners acquire or learn a language. As R. Ellis (1994) pointed out, the discovery of “the existence of developmental sequences is one of the most important findings in second language research to date” (p. 21). With the identification and recognition of those developmental sequences, there is now a general acceptance in the field of the SLA research that the acquisition of an L2 grammar, like the