Four useful introductions for teachers

Cook, V (2001) Second Language Learning and Language Teaching, 3^rd edn, Arnold, London
Now in its third - and much improved - edition, this book is a classic in the field. It is highly readable and wide-ranging, with good coverage of cognitive aspects of language learning such as memory and comprehension processes. With introductory questions for each section and boxed sections of bullet points for classroom implementation, it is clearly aimed at language teachers. The author is one of the foremost UK 'interpreters' of SLA for language teachers.

Ellis, R (1997) Second Language Acquisition, Oxford Introductions to Language Study, Oxford University Press, Oxford
A pocket-sized introduction to SLA issues, the strength of this accessible book is its links to current research. Extracts from key articles are reproduced at the back of the book introduced by focus questions. This allows the reader to quickly get a flavour of the range of views and perspectives which make up the SLA community and the essential issues under debate. Rod Ellis' research work has been central to the major SLA debates over the last twenty years or so; he is also a prolific textbook author, producing the key textbooks in this area. This book provides a useful glossary of key terms.

Lightbown, P and Spada, N (1999) How Languages are Learned, 2^nd edn, Oxford University Press, Oxford
Another excellent introduction, clearly aimed at teachers. An enjoyable read, this short text provides very good coverage of the big research questions in SLA and lots of data for analysis. It is written by two of the most prominent North American researchers and refers extensively, but accessibly, to research findings in order to allow teachers themselves to see the kind of empirical support available for various pedagogic approaches. This book provides a useful glossary of key terms.

Littlewood, W (1984) Foreign and Second Language Learning: Language acquisition and its implications for the classroom, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
Even though it was written almost two decades ago, this straightforward book remains a useful introduction to the key issues for teachers from work in SLA. Although further theorizing and research work has since been conducted on issues such as the relationship between implicit and explicit learning, the basics established in the 1970s and 1980s are still valid today. Because of its balanced and insightful discussion, this book does not come across as significantly outdated.

Other useful textbooks with specific strengths

Encyclopedic coverage
Ellis, R (1994) The Study of Second Language Acquisition, Oxford University Press, Oxford
No bibliography on SLA would be complete without a reference to this impressive tome (824 pages!). It was published in 1994 and provides an encyclopedic coverage of research in SLA up until that time. Yes, important work has been done since, but no other source published since provides such thorough coverage of the SLA literature. Vital as a starting point for any small-scale research in the general area of SLA.

Textbook with exercises
Gass, S and Selinker, L (1994) Second Language Acquisition: An introductory course, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hove
A useful introductory textbook because of the exercises associated with each chapter, many of which present tasks based on data from published research projects, mostly from North American contexts.

Strong anchoring in a study of learner language within a European context
Klein, W (1986) Second Language Acquisition, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
An unjustifiably neglected textbook, Wolfgang Klein's readable introduction to SLA takes the learner's four tasks (see 2.1.1.1) as its central focus and explores each one in depth, based on detailed discussion of interlanguage data mainly from the European Science Foundation project.

An integrated model, based on different theoretical perspectives
Towell, R and Hawkins, R (1994) Approaches to Second Language Acquisition, Multilingual Matters, Clevedon
Not an easy introductory textbook, but an attempt to establish the 'givens' of SLA and review the explanatory merits of different theoretical perspectives and their empirical bases, leading to a sketch for an integrated model.