The Effects of Meaningful Learning of Spanish Article from the Perspective of Cognitive Grammar: the Results of Empirical Research

Abstract

The objective of this article is to determine the effects of meaningful learning of the article in Spanish from the perspective of the cognitive grammar through an empirical research to provide an Operative Model and a Processing Instruction for the teaching/learning of the Spanish article. The proposal of the Operative Model of Article is based on cognitive perspective and therefore different values of prototypical operation of the article by Langacker (2008), Cifuentes Honrubia (1989) and Lopez García (2005) were analysed. The cognitive grammar instruction exposed in this article draws on the pedagogical approach developed by Ruiz Campillo (1998), Radden Dirven (2007), Castañeda (2014), Montero (2014b) and Santiago (2016), and the Processing Instruction is based on Van Patten (1993, 1996, 2002). The results of the analysis of the data show a positive and progressive development in the acquisition of Spanish article. Learners from the empirical research were able to process the Spanish article from the Perspective of Cognitive Grammar by means of meaningful learning.