Nebensätze in freien schriftlichen Produktionen kroatischer DaF-Lernender

Abstract

The present paper looks into grammar competence of Croatian learners of German as a foreign language. More precisely, it deals with syntactic knowledge that learners need to activate in order to understand and produce complex sentences containing various types of subordinate clauses. Croatian learners of German as a foreign language spend a considerable amount of time during their German classes dealing with syntax – both explicitly and implicitly. In order to understand as well as convey complex ideas, thoughts, and plans in German properly, learners need to activate their syntactic knowledge. Applied linguists investigating the acquisition of grammar knowledge in SLA contexts have defined the order in which some grammar rules are acquired. They could observe that this order cannot be altered. The present paper discusses the results obtained in an analysis of students’ written essays. The objective of the analysis was to identify and describe the subordinate clauses learners use in their essays. The analysis shows which aspects of syntactic knowledge the learners in question possess. It also enables us to compare the curriculum and the syntactic knowledge actually displayed by the learners.