L'acquisition de la morphologie verbale chez des apprenants guidés en milieu naturel : une comparaison préliminaire des temps du passé en français langue seconde

This article presents a quantitative comparison of the development of past time verbal morphological forms in the case of a group of Anglophone L2 learners of French in a study abroad context. While previous studies call into question the potential of study abroad to have a more positive impact on grammatical development than classroom instruction, we firstly offer a critique of those studies in relation to a number of hypotheses which may constitute constraints on the potential of study abroad to impact grammatical development. We then present the results of a longitudinal study over a full year which attempts to control for some of these factors with a view to comparing development at three data collection times across the past time verbal morphological forms in L2 French. Results point to the complexity of identifying a uniform trajectory of development across the morphological forms, with some evidencing minimal change, while others point to relative stability. The results are discussed in relation to the hypotheses outlined and directions for future research.