Academic interests
Tonne teaches second language acquisition, such as pupils’ text development, multilingual aspects of language development, sociolinguistics and contrastive grammar, with Norwegian as the pivot language.
In her research Tonne has been engaged with new literacy studies, in particular how an extensive access to quality literature may enhance the reading and writing development of children. She has also done research on the correspondences between pupils’ reading and writing competences.
She has published articles and columns on language topics for a wider public in books and in the press. Tonne has a PhD in linguistics (2001) from UiO, with a dissertation on aspectual contrasts between Norwegian, Spanish and English set in a formal semantics frame.
Recently taught courses
- NOAS1100 Innføring i norsk som andrespråk ('Introduction to Norwegian as a second language')
- NOAS2102 Andrespråksundervisning og andrespråkslæring ('Second language teaching and second language learning')
- NOAS4101 Andrespråksforskning i et faghistorisk lys ('SLA research in a historic perspective')
- NOAS2101 Norsk språkstruktur i et andrespråksperspektiv ('Norwegian language structure in a second language perspective')
- NOAS4103 Grammatiske emner i et andrespråksperspektiv ('Grammar in a second language perspective')
- NOAS2105 Skriftkyndighet i et andrespråksperspektiv ('Literacy in a second language perspective')
Background
Tonne is professor of Nordic Language/Norwegian as a second language at UiO since 2014, at the Dept. of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies (ILN). She was deputy Director of MultiLing (Center of excellence, Norwegian Research Council) (at ILN) January 2022-May 2024. Between Dec. 2015 and July 2017 she was head of studies at ILN. She has taught the linguistically oriented courses in second language acquisition at the department.
From 2002 to 2014 Tonne worked at the Faculty of Education, Oslo University College (now OsloMet), teaching pre-service teachers about grammar (phonology, morphology, syntax), historical linguistics, dialects, pupils’ learning of Norwegian as a second language, contrastive linguistics, pupils’ learning to read and write, sociolinguistics, mother tongue subjects and subjects relating to choice of language as medium of education.
Other courses taught were master courses in the Faculty of Education and international studies, in the department of primary school and the department of multicultural and international education. Until 2002 Tonne taught linguistic courses at the University of Oslo and at the University in Trondheim (now NTNU).