Productive rules?

[Ever Student]

Hi everybody,

According to Ellis "even if Krashen and Scarcella are right and formulaic
frames do not evolve productive rules, they understimate the importance of formulas for the L2 acquisition"

Would you please clarify what author means about "productive rules" here?


Thanks in advance

[Raymott]

Hi everybody,

According to Ellis "even if Krashen and Scarcella are right and formulaic
frames do not evolve productive rules, they understimate the importance of formulas for the L2 acquisition"

Would you please clarify what author means about "productive rules" here?


Thanks in advance

Productive rules are rules that one can use to produce language.
Formulaic frames are patterns such as "I don't know", or "Can I have ..." which a child learns as a complete phrase, a formula. The claim is that these formulas can't be used by the child to produce new language. The child can't infer anything about the usage of modal verbs and main verbs from "Can I have ..."

In this same way, you might know that "Sono molto contento di conoscerla' means something like "Pleased to meet you" in Italian. But you can't infer anything about the structure of Italian, or produce new phrases from that.

[Ever Student]

Productive rules are rules that one can use to produce language.
Formulaic frames are patterns such as "I don't know", or "Can I have ..." which a child learns as a complete phrase, a formula. The claim is that these formulas can't be used by the child to produce new language. The child can't infer anything about the usage of modal verbs and main verbs from "Can I have ..."

In this same way, you might know that "Sono molto contento di conoscerla' means something like "Pleased to meet you" in Italian. But you can't infer anything about the structure of Italian, or produce new phrases from that.

Thanks for your informative explanation.