Étude de l’appropriation de l’orthographe française langue seconde/étrangère d’élèves arabophones du secondaire en Égypte
The aim of this research was to assess French language-spelling development for the first year Arabic language-speaking students of the Secondary Schools in Egypt. These students were studying “French” as a foreign language. Previous studies performed in Egypt addressed the grammatical errors committed by these students in the field of “written French language”. To date, and to the best of our knowledge, there are no available studies addressing the issue of “French language-spelling development”. To fill this gab in literature, we examined the spelling competence of the students. We evaluated the features of the French language - spelling development for the first year Arabic language - speaking students in Secondary schools in Egypt. Also, we examined the relationships between these features and corresponding features in French and Arabic language development for preschool Arabic language-speaking children in Quebec.    To achieve our goals, 30 students of the first year Arabic language-speaking students in Secondary schools in Egypt underwent a test of invented spelling, through semi-structured interview. The test was repeated four times on different occasions. During the test, the students were asked (on individual basis) to produce some writings (French language). The results of these tests raised three writing features, namely: visuographic, phonological and orthographic concerns. Moreover, their writings showed a language transfer produced from both Arabic as a mother language and English as a foreign language. Our findings revealed that, during writing, students have employed three strategies: lexical, phonological and orthographic.   In addition, a multiple case study exploratory was conducted with four Arabic language-speaking preschool children in Quebec. Each child was asked to produce some writings in French and in Arabic languages. The French language-spelling development of the students the Secondary Schools was made comparable to that of the preschool children in French. Such strategy allowed us to test the effect of age on the spelling development and on language transfer. We found that the written performance of the students from Secondary Schools was significantly more advanced as compared to that of the preschool children. Also the students from Secondary Schools were more able to produce language transfer. These findings indicated that the learner’s age had a significant impact not only on the French language - spelling development but also on the language transfer in second/foreign language. Finally, the scientific and practical ramifications open avenues for further investigations in these fields.
spelling appropriation invented spelling mother language foreign language second language Arabic language-speaking students in Secondary Schools and in preschool language transfer learner’s age