AL
Applied Linguistics
Applied Linguistics is the study of language and linguistics in relation to practical problems. Applied Linguistics uses information from sociology, psychology, anthropology, information theory, linguistics, and related areas to develop theoretical models of language use to be practically applied in syllabus design, language planning, language learning, and related areas.
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Language
Language is the system of human communication which consists of the structured arrangement of sounds or their written representation into larger units such as morphemes, words, sentences, and utterances. Language also refers to any particular system of human communication such as the English language or the Chinese language.
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Literacy
Literacy can refer to the ability to use reading and writing skills sufficiently well for the purposes and activities which normally require literacy in adult life or in a person’s social position. A person who is able to read and write in two languages is sometimes called biliterate.
Get to Know Us
Current Members
Dr. Barry Lee Reynolds is Assistant Professor of English Education in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau, Macau SAR, China and the lab head of ALLL. His extensive list of publications includes journal articles, book chapters, book reviews, editorials, conference papers, and edited books. He has taught EGP, EAP, ESP and trained language teachers in the USA, Taiwan, and Macau.
Ms. Ding Chen (Conan) is an English Education PhD student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She received an MA in Applied English Linguistics from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and a BA in English Studies from Anhui University. Before coming to the University of Macau, she taught English Language in Hefei University of Technology for almost two years where she began to notice patterns in her learners’ lexical errors and vocabulary usage. From these firsthand classroom observations, her research interests developed including formulaic language teaching, learning, processing and assessment and incidental vocabulary acquisition. Her PhD research looks at a number of previously overlooked factors influencing L1-Chinese learners’ incidental acquisition of vocabulary through reading graded readers.
Ms. Sylvia Liu received her MA in Early Childhood Education from Nanyang Technological University and her BA in Biology Science from Tianjin Normal University. She has more than ten years of experience with young children, having held various early childhood related positions including classroom teacher, management trainee, child development professional, and curriculum consultant. Her research areas of interest include child language acquisition and growth (both L1 and L2), vocabulary learning processes, and ICT use in early childhood education (ECE). She has given talks for parents, workshops for teachers, and presentations at several well-known international conferences about these and other topics.
Ms. Tianjiao Song (Tina) is a Ph.D. student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She received her MA (with Distinction) in TESOL from the Hong Kong University of Education. In 2019, she worked as a visiting faculty at the University of North Carolina, U.S. Her research focuses on incidental vocabulary acquisition, particularly making use of eye-tacking devices to explore some of the issues that have not been fully addressed in L2 contextual word learning.
Ms. Maja Milosavljevic is an MEd student majoring in Early Childhood Education and Child Development at the University of Macau. Her research interests include second language acquisition of very young learners and task-based second language teaching. She holds an MA in Philology and is currently an English Teacher of kindergarten students in China.
Ms. Jennifer Ann McDonald is currently working towards her MEd in Early Childhood Education and Child Development. Her research interests include vocabulary acquisition in EFL and ESL for young learners. More specifically, she is interested in exploring the differences between vocabulary learning through semantic clusters or thematic vocabulary in an early years setting. She is currently designing her research project on this subject.
Ms. Xiaochen Tan (Nichole) is a Master of Philosophy student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She received her BA in English from Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine. She has more than 5 years teaching experience in English Language training institutions in mainland China. Her research will focus on oral corrective feedback and vocabulary learning.
Ms. Chang Si Wai (Cindy) is a Master of Philosophy student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She also received her BEd in Secondary Education (English) at the University of Macau. She has been teaching English in a local school in Macau for three years. Her research will focus on eye tracking in Applied Linguistics.
Ms. Xiaoyan Ma (Crystal) is a Master of Philosophy student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She received her BEd in Secondary Education (English) from the University of Macau. She has been working as a research intern in the Applied Linguistics, Language and Literacy (ALLL) lab since June 2019. Her future research direction will focus on combining eye-tracking and vocabulary acquisition.
Ms. Jiaxuan Shi is a Master of Philosophy student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau. She received her MA in Linguistics from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and her BA in English from China University of Geosciences (Wuhan, China). Her future research direction will focus on combining eye-tracking and vocabulary acquisition.
Ms. Xinyu Yuan (Sally) is an undergraduate student in the Economics Programme at the University of Macau. She is currently working as an undergraduate research intern in the Applied Linguistics, Language and Literacy (ALLL) lab.
Mr. Xuancu Hong (Fortuno) is a Bachelor of Arts student in the English Studies Programme in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University of Macau. He worked previously as a research assistant for a language acquisition project and a language assessment project using EEG/ERP and eye-tracking techniques. He is currently working as a research intern in the Applied Linguistics, Language and Literacy (ALLL) lab. He is interested in L1 and L2 acquisition, cognitive linguistics, psycholinguistics, and neurolinguistics.
Ms. Ning Ren (Connie) is an undergraduate student in the English Studies Programme at the University of Macau. She is currently working as an intern in the Applied Linguistics, Language and Literacy (ALLL) lab.
Affiliates
Alumni
Ms. Yuanhua Li (Amber) is currently a PhD student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau.
Ms. Qiting Zhong (Stella) is currently a junior high school English teacher at Jinding Junior High School in Zhuhai.
Mr. Yuntao Zeng (Joseph) is currently a PhD student in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau.
Ms. Xiaofang Zhang (Jessie) graduated from the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau in 2019 with a MEd in Curriculum and Instruction (English Language Education). Her current applied linguistics research interests include second language acquisition, vocabulary and language teaching and learning. Her recent research investigated vocabulary learning strategies employed by Taiwanese medical school students and her MA thesis tackled how the keyword method facilitates the learning of English collocations.
Mr. Chon Hou Leong (Chris) is currently a BEd student studying Secondary Education (English) in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau.
Dr. Melissa H. Yu was a part-time lecturer at Newcastle University, UK (2016-2017) and a postdoctoral research fellow in the Faculty of Education at the University of Macau (2019-2020). Her research interests include English as a lingua franca (ELF), TESOL, language policy and curriculum, teaching materials, and ethnography.
Applied Linguistics, Language, and Literacy Lab
