Theme: while-reading skills and activities. Introduction

1.2 Read the section with the students
It is worth noting that the period in which a child acquires his/her first language is called “Critical Period”, and if the child does not acquire the language during this period, language acquisition becomes language learning. Accordingly, the term “Second Language Learning” (SLA) emerges to refer to the language that a child learns after his/her first language acquisition process is/not completed. In SLA, a person is cognitively affected by factors as he/she need to exert cognitive effort in order to learn this language, unlike the first language acquisition process, which is spontaneous and discrete, and there is room for any cognitive effect (Leaver et al., 2005). So, the difference between first language acquisition and second or foreign language learning is that acquisition takes place autonomously and spontaneously at an early age, while learning - which involves direct instruction and guidance - takes place when a child has/not already acquired their first language. In language learning whether it is second or foreign, cognitive factors play a big role. Different types of word stress are distinguished not only according to its physical (acoustic) nature and degree, but also according to its position in different words of the language. "From this point of view two types of word stress are distinguished: fixed and free.
a) In languages with fixed word stress the position of stress is the same in all the words. For instance, in Czech and Lettish the main stress falls on the first syllable of each word and grammatical form of а word; in French, stress is tied to the last syllable of each word; in Polish, it falls on the prefinal syllable of all words and their grammatical forms.
b) In languages with free word stress the primary stress may fall in different words on any syllable. For example in Russian: к`омната, раб`ота, матем`атика, преподав`атель, машиностро`ение, окн`о; in English: `mother, ig`nore, соn`sideРration, ciga`rette.
Within frее word stress two subtypes are distinguished on morphological grounds: constant and shifting.
a. А constant stress is one which remains on the same morpheme in different grammatical forms of а word or in different derivatives from one and the same root. For example: ``wonder - `wondering - `wonderful - `wonderfully.
b. А shifting stress is one which falls on different morphemes in different grammatical forms of а word or in different derivatives from one and the same root,
The total system of accents in a language is sometimes called the accentual system, and would be part of the study of phonology. The coinage accentology for the study of accents is sometimes found in European linguistics. (3) In graphology, an accent is a mark placed above a letter, showing how that letter is to be pronounced. French accents, for example, include a distinction between e, e and e. Accents are a type of diacritic"
Most linguists believe that syllabic and lexical accents do not change the meaning of words in English. However, we know that syllabic and lexical accents are also components of linguistic stress along with other concepts such as syllabic and lexical sonority variations and metrical variations. English word stress is traditionally defined as dynamic, but in fact, the special prominence of the stressed syllables is manifested in the English language not only through the increase of intensity, but also through the changes in the vowel quantity, consonant and vowel quality and pitch of the voice. The analytical question here, which attracted a great deal of attention in the middle decades of the twentieth century, is how many degrees of stress need to be recognized in order to account for all such contrasts, and to show the interrelationships between words derived from a common root, such as `telegraph, tele`graphic and te`legraphy.
Thus, it is clear that memory plays a big role in the process of storing information and retrieving it when needed. There are different forms of memory, three of which Leaver (2005, p.43) refers to according to the type of information it deals with: episodic memory, whose task is to remember events and situations, procedural memory, which relates to the recall of normal operations and semantic memory, whose task is to remember the main information or language lexical and structural forms and their meanings. These forms affect the process of language learning, particularly the semantic memory (the memory of the language). Thus, the learner needs the episodic memory to store learning situations, procedural memory to make the learning process automatic and semantic memory to remember the lexical and structural forms in order to build a knowledge base about language. Richard and Schmitt (2002) point out that there are two basic types of memory: (1) short-term memory which is responsible for storing information for a short time (up to 20 seconds) and where information is analyzed and interpreted. Working memory is another term for short-term memory, and refers to the active system of storing and using information temporarily for complex mental tasks such as learning, reasoning, and understanding. The opposition of the second primary stress to weak stress is also distinctive:
A prominent syllable or word is said to be accented or tonic; the latter term does not imply that it carries phonemic tone. Other syllables or words are said to be unaccented or atonic. Syllables are frequently said to be in pretonic or post-tonic position, and certain phonological rules apply specifically to such positions. For instance, in American English, /t/ and /d/ are flapped in post-tonic position. Lever et al. (2005) further point out that there are a number of things that can go wrong in the storage, recall and reconstruction process. Some of the things that can go wrong are retrieval errors, lost data, and overwritten information. Retrieval errors, as stated by Harman and Asher (2001) , occur when the information loss over time results from storage capacity limitations due to a passive process of time-based decay and/or displacement of weakly activated information by more strongly activated information. Lost data occurs when the information is not settled in the permanent memory as it is not left long enough in the short-term memory, and then lost and cannot be retrieved. Overwritten information occurs when new information will erase the old information, and thus the old information became distorted. Long (1997, p.319) claims that second language learning is a process that occurs in a social context, and this learning process is a combination of cognitive processes and the social context."¹