QUESTION 1 (a) First language A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the

critical period or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity. The first language of a child is part of their personal, social and cultural identity. Another impact of the first language is that it brings about the reflection and learning of successful social patterns of acting and speaking. It is basically responsible for differentiating the linguistic competence of acting. A person's first language may not be their dominant language, the one they use most or are most comfortable with. For example, the Canadian census defines first language for its purposes as "the first language learned in childhood and still spoken", recognizing that for some, the earliest language may be lost, a process known as language attrition. This can happen when young children move, with or without their family (because of immigration or international adoption), to a new language environment. L2 to L1 is recognized as the fifth skill and the most important social skill since it promotes communication and understanding between strangers (Ross, 2000:63).

(b) Mother tongue The origin of the term "mother tongue" harks back to the fact that linguistic skills of a child are honed by the mother and therefore the language spoken by the mother would be the primary language that the child would learn. In some countries, the terms native language or mother tongue refer to the language of one's ethnic group rather than one's first language. Mother tongue has potentially both positive and negative consequences: it may serve social and cognitive functions (Carless, 2008:331). In the context of population censuses conducted on the Canadian population, Statistics Canada defines mother tongue as "the first language learned at home in childhood and still understood by the individual at the time of the census." Sometimes, there can be more than one mother tongue, when the child's parents speak different languages. Those children are usually called bilingual. Sometimes
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the term mother tongue or mother language is used for the language that a person learnt as a child at home (usually from their parents). Children growing up in bilingual homes can, according to this definition, have more than one mother tongue or native language. In some countries such as Kenya, India, and various East Asian countries, "mother language" or "native language" is used to indicate the language of one's ethnic group, in both common and journalistic parlance (e.g. 'I have no apologies for not learning my mother tongue'), rather than one's first language. Also in Singapore, "mother tongue" refers to the language of one's ethnic group regardless of actual proficiency, while the "first language" refers to the English language that was established on the island through British colonisation, which is the lingua franca for most post-independence Singaporeans due to its use as the language of instruction in government schools and as a working language. "The notion of 'mother tongue' is thus a mixture of myth and ideology. The family is not necessarily the place where languages are transmitted, and sometimes we observe breaks in transmission, often translated by a change of language, with children acquiring as first language the one that dominates in the milieu. This phenomenon . . . concerns all multilingual situations and most of the situations of migration." (Louis Jean Calvet, Towards an Ecology of World Languages. Polity Press, 2006)

(c) Second Language A second language is any language that one speaks other than one's first language. A second language or L2 is any language learned after the first language or mother tongue. Some languages, often called auxiliary languages, are used primarily as second languages or lingua francas (such as Esperanto). According to some researchers, the defining difference between a first language (L1) and a second language (L2) is the age the person learned the language. For example, linguist Eric Lenneberg used second language to mean a language consciously acquired or used

by its speaker after puberty. In most cases, people never achieve the same level of fluency and comprehension in their second languages as in their first language. Acquiring a second language can be a lifelong learning process for many. Despite persistent efforts, most learners of a second language will never become fully nativelike in it, although with practice considerable fluency can be achieved. A 'second language' usually has official status or a recognised function within a country which a foreign language has not and furthermore these two different situations frequently have important consequences to which attention has been drawn in some books. For example, Persian is a second language for Kurdish people, but not vice versa, because there is no Kurdish environment for Persian speakers who are learning Kurdish. On the other hand, English is a foreign language for both groups, because there is no contact between Kurdish and Persian people with English people. However, if an Iranian person goes to USA, then English becomes a second language for him or her. Thus British immigrants to Iran learn Persian as a second language and Persian speakers study English in Britain as a second language. In Kermanshah or Kurdistan, we can speak of learning Kurdish by Persian speakers as a second rather than foreign language.

(d) Foreign language A foreign language is a language indigenous to another country. It is also a language not spoken in the native country of the person referred to, i.e. an English speaker living in Japan can say that Japanese is a foreign language to him or her. These two characterisations do not exhaust the possible definitions, however, and the label is occasionally applied in ways that are variously misleading or factually inaccurate. Some children learn more than one language from birth or from a very young age: they are bilingual or multilingual. These children can be said to have two, three or more mother tongues: neither language is foreign to that child, even if one language is a foreign language for the vast majority of people in the child's birth country. For example, a child learning English from her English father and Japanese at school in

Japan can speak both English and Japanese, but neither is a foreign language to her. In pedagogy and sociolinguistics, a distinction is often made between 'second language' and foreign language, the latter being learned for use in an area where that language is not generally spoken. Arguably, English in countries such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands can be considered a second language for many of its speakers, because they learn it young, speak it fluently, and use it regularly, indeed in southern Asia it is the official language of the courts, government and business. The same can be said for French in the Arab Maghreb Union, except for Libya, although like for English in the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands, French is not an official language in any of these Arabic-speaking countries. In China (with the exception perhaps of Hong Kong), however, English would be considered a foreign language due to the lack of a number of characteristics, such as historical links, media, opportunities for use, similar vocabulary, and common script. In Malaysia, the scenario is different from other country because Malaysia is a multiracial country. There are many languages but French, can be considered a foreign language.

QUESTION 2 Normally, there are several materials in Malay language (first language) that I often read.. They are magazines, prescriptions of medicine, IT advertisements, skincare pamphlets, healthcare brochures and so forth. I never missed every edition of Majalah Pengguna magazines because my school library provided them monthly through subscription orders. Plus, the information given is worth for everyone to know and share with others. To catch up with the local issues of woman and health, I read Majalah Wanita as many of my senior friends bought it at school. Dewan Siswa is another Malay reading material that I always have a look on because theres a lot of issues mentioned here relatively on our local education, scientific inventions,

learning opportunities and more. I do not have any IT magazine at home but I do love to visit IT or PC Fair for the latest news in IT gadgets. As for the other materials such as prescriptions, skincare and healthcare products I choose to read the Malay translation as references because it is easy to understand the scientific terms and conditions compared to the English translation. At least it gives me better understanding for safety precautions, of course.

QUESTION 3 My second language is English. I love newspaper since I was introduced to it during pre-school. Pity, though in my very little town there wasnt much newspaper and rarely door service in the morning. The common one that my parents bought was either New Sabah Times or Daily Express. Reading newspaper everyday helps to engaged myself to the current scenario on locals, in and outside the country. Also, there were many types of reading texts that we can see in the newspaper. We can read forums, weather forecast, special report such as documentaries and research, advertisements for examples vacancies, travels, promotions and the lists go on. All these form of reading texts benefit us because they can be used as references. I was also a big fan of Readers Digest and novels. Readers Digest fascinates me with its true stories and breath-taking life experiences from all over the world. I bought monthly collections of RD through mail because it was not sold here in my town. I found out that reading more materials in English Language helps a lot to improve myself and my students in term of speaking and writing plus widen the vocabularies and understanding the rules of English grammar. I was grateful that English was no longer an alien language in my rural school, thanks to the modern technologies and Internet access provided by the ministry of education.

QUESTION 4 (a) Reading novel is interesting when the words are easy to understand and when the story itself presented a beautiful chronology. Normally, novel is

more detailed than a movie. Reading novel really suits those keen readers than those seasonal reading type. A person who makes reading as a hobby will feel both excitement and satisfaction after they have completed their best novel. The enjoyment however was overjoyed and the process of reading goes on and on again, with a new novel. Meanwhile, watching movie based on a novel will be the choice for those whom rarely read books or not having much time to read one. They prefer to get the input through audio and visual at the same time. They love seeing something lively in actions and not

passive as reading. Reading for a long period of time makes them bored rather than watching a movie based on it. However, the chronology of the story in the movie is not detail as novel. So, the best way to really get in depth in a story is reading but if we choose to have a good time, watching movie is the best way.

(b) My experiences tells me that I do love reading during my childhood but my preference was watching movie. There are times that I choose to watch movie based on a novel because its more time valuable and I can do other things at the same time. While watching, I can finish my corrections on students work and do other chores of homemaker routines . Reading habit needs a good mood, relaxing time and a pleasant environment to focus on the story and the worst is reading takes time to finish and sometimes we didnt finish reading it at all. Just a simple example, it may only takes three hours to watch Lord of the rings movie but it needs more than a week to finish the book. So in my opinion, I would prefer to watch movie than reading because I love watching something with special effects, modern and futuristic setting plus excellent acting and performances by real actor and actress.

QUESTION 5

(a)

Early reading at home begins with reading simple storybooks with pictures.. The parents guides their young children to pronounce the words and short phrases. Sometimes , there are parents who reads for their children on bed. It was like a theraphy so that the children can sleep well and also encouragement for them to begin reading. As a follow-up, parents can ask their children to draw something about the story as an expression and showing sense of creativity. During my childhood, I rarely read with my siblings but it was a routine for us to visit the town library on Saturdays to lend books. My sister loves reading books on bed but I prefer much reading books at the living room. I feel sleepy reading on bed and not comfortable. My sister often reads detective stories. I read children and folklore stories as well as adventures. My two brothers read comics when they finished playing computer games. My parents also

rewarded us when they bought books home during outstation. My mother reads magazines on cooking and health. She would sit in the kitchen when she got time to read her favourites. My father likes politics so he does have a bunch of collections on the shelves. He usually reads during the weekends. Buying newspaper is a must for him and he never missed everyday news.
(b)

Usually at school, pupils were guided in reading at the early stage. Big Book approach was a popular activity in English language. The teacher read the story and shows pictures to the pupils. It helps the pupils to get engaged in the story and understand better.During my school time, I was a librarian. I did my duties during recess time. As a librarian, it was easy for me to read and lend books, especially the new collections. Adventure stories has become my favorites because they got many series and stories . Among my favourite was Alice In Wonderland. My friends and I love sharing and exchanging books so if the teacher was not around, we usually reads in the classroom. While waiting for the bus to fetch me, I do spent some time to continue reading. One of the great memory in school was when I was awarded The Best Storyteller. I was in standard 5 at that time. I remember reading a storybook entitled The
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Three Wishes and I found out the story was interesting so I decided to memorise it as a preparation for the competition. My mother trained me at home. She asked me to present the story in front of the mirror and taught me to do a little bit of acting and mimicking. She really builds up my confidence. I was so proud of her and myself. I never forget the memory until now.

(c)

Reading in a cafe ,waiting room, bus stations or elsewhere is common for those who likes to read. Maybe its a habit or just doing something for fun. It gives us time to be more relax and feel free to read something that ease our mind. Some people finds it happy to read in public because they want to feel the real environment and watching people. It Most of the time, I will have a book with me. I cant stand without doing anything especially when travelling or in the waiting room. Once I was in a caf, I left my plastic bags with two novels. I was in a rush to catch the bus without realising I have left something. I reached home later and came back to the caf to fetch it but it was lost. I was disappointed and I told myself to bring a bag next time.