Order of Acquisition

Question 1

L2 Question Formation

Stage 1

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 1

• Single words or sentence fragments with rising intonation. (Four children?)
• Memorized question formulae. (How are you?)

Question 2

L2 Question Formation

Stage 2

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 2

Declarative word order with rising intonation

• no fronting,
• no inversion

(The boys throw the shoes?)

Question 3

L2 Question Formation

Stage 3

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 3

Fronting

• “Wh” fronting but no inversion (What the dog are playing?)
• “do” fronting (Does in this picture there are four astronauts?)
• other fronting (Is the picture has two planets on top?)

Question 4

L2 Question Formation

Stage 4

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 4

Inversion in some “wh” + copula and yes/no questions. (Where is the sun? Is there a fish in the lake?”)

Question 5

L2 Question Formation

Stage 5

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 5

Inversion in “wh” questions with “do” and other auxiliaries.

(How do you say this? What’s the boy doing?)

Question 6

L2 Question Formation

Stage 6

(Lightbown & Spada, 1999)

Answer 6

Complex questions

• Tag questions. (It’s better, isn’t it?)
• Negative questions. (Why can’t you go?)
• Embedded questions. (Can you tell me what the date is today?)

Question 7

L2 Negation

Stage 1

Answer 7

“No” or “not” placed before verb. (No have any sand. I not like it.)

Question 8

L2 Negation

Stage 2

Answer 8

“Don’t” alternates with “no” and “not” but is not marked for person, number or tense. (He don’t like it, I don’t can sing.)

Question 9

L2 Negation

Stage 3

Answer 9

Negative element is inserted after auxilliary verbs like “are,” “is” and “can.” (You can not go there. She don’t like rice.)

Question 10

L2 Negation

Stage 4

Answer 10

“Do” is marked for tense, person and number. (It doesn’t work. I didn’t went there.”