Interlanguage Fossilization In College Students’ English Writing And Its Teaching Implications

Interlanguage can be described as a non-continuous linguistic system between the native language and the target language. In the process of second language acquisition, learners transfer the rules of native language to the target language and apply the rules of native language so as to simplify the rules of the second language. The fossilization of interlanguage is a common phenomenon in the second language learning, and it is also a distinguishing characteristic of second language acquisition. The research of the interlanguage fossilization has received growing attention of researchers in SLA in recent years.With the development of economic globalization, the international communication becomes more and more frequent. More and more people from different countries begin to learn English. Writing is the weak link for many English learners. Especially for the learners in China. English writing is a kind of language skill which is earnestly needed to be improved. Listening, speaking, reading, writing and translating are English five basic skills. Writing is the embodiment of the comprehensive skills of students’language. It’s the re-creation process on the basis of the language knowledge which students have learned. At the same time it is also an important form to reflect the students’communicative ability. But there are some errors which appear repeatedly in the college students’writing. Even if learners have accumulated a lot of basic grammatical and lexical knowledge, the students’writing ability remains stagnant. It is the reflection of the IL fossilization in English writing.This paper reviews the theories of IL and fossilization and studies the IL fossilization in Chinese college students’English writing. The author has collected the students’compositions and questionnaires, and makes an attempt to analyze the causes of fossilization with the aid of EA. This paper can be divided into five chapters. In Chapter One, it makes a literature review of the interlanguage fossilization, including the studies of interlanguage fossilization abroad and in China. In Chapter Two, it introduces the theoretical framework of this paper. It introduces the theory of interlanguage, fossilization and Error Analysis, which is the analyzing method of fossilization. Chapter Three is the methodology of the study. In Chapter Four, it discusses the causes of interlanguage fossilization in college English writing. In Chapter Five, it discusses some implications for the college English teaching in order to decrease the fossilization phenomenon in the English writing and improve students’writing ability.