an investigation into teachers correction and its effects on non english majored students motivation and improvement in learning pre esp subject at viettronics technology college

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES Chart 1 – The role of error correction in English learning as perceived by teachers 20 Chart 3 - Written mistakes most corrected by the teachers 22 Chart 4 – Th

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

  

NGUYỄN THỊ HỒNG LUYẾN

An investigation into teachers’ correction and its effects on non-English majored students’ motivation and improvement in learning

pre-ESP subject at Viettronics Technology College

(Tìm hiểu việc sửa lỗi của giáo viên và ảnh hưởng của nó

đối với hứng thú và tiến bộ của sinh viên tiếng Anh không chuyên

trong học tập môn học tiếng Anh cơ sở tại trường

Cao đẳng Công nghệ Viettronics)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology

Code: 60 14 10

Hanoi - 2010

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

  

NGUYỄN THỊ HỒNG LUYẾN

An investigation into teachers’ correction and its effects on non-English majored students’ motivation and improvement in learning

pre-ESP subject at Viettronics Technology College

(Tìm hiểu việc sửa lỗi của giáo viên và ảnh hưởng của nó

đối với hứng thú và tiến bộ của sinh viên tiếng Anh không chuyên

trong học tập môn học tiếng Anh cơ sở tại trường

Cao đẳng Công nghệ Viettronics)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology

Code: 60 14 10

Supervisor: Phùng Thị Kim Dung, M.A

Hanoi - 2010

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Declaration i

Acknowledgements ii

Table of contents iii

List of charts and tables v

PART A – INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Research questions 2

4 Methods of the study 2

5 Scope of the study 3

6 Significance of the study 3

7 Design of the study 3

8 Definitions of terminologies 4

PART B – DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER 1 – LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1.1 Perspectives on learner errors in foreign language learning 5

1.1.1 Errors as failure 5

1.1.2 Errors as positive aids to learning 5

1.2 Error correction and foreign language progress 6

1.2.1 Negative perspectives of error correction 7

1.2.2 Positive perspectives of error correction 8

1.3 Error treatment and learning motivation 9

1.4 Error correction in an integrated-instruction form language teaching context 11

1.5 Forms of error correction 12

1.5.1 Self-correction 13

1.5.1.1 Self-correction to oral work 13

1.5.1.2 Self-correction to written work 14

1.5.2 Peer-correction 15

1.5.2.1 Peer-correction to oral work 15

1.5.2.2 Peer-correction to written work 15

1.5.3 Teacher-correction 16

1.5.3.1 Teacher-correction to oral work 16

1.5.3.2 Teacher-correction to written work 16

1.6 Conclusion 16

CHAPTER 2 – THE STUDY 17

2.1 Setting of the study 17

2.2 Subjects and instrumentations 17

2.2.1 Subjects 17

2.2.2 Instrumentations 17

2.2.2.1 Questionnaires 17

2.2.2.2 Classroom observation 18

2.2.2.3 Quasi-experiment 18

2.3 Data collection 19

2.4 Data analysis 20

2.4.1 Analysis of teachers’ survey questionnaire 20

2.4.2 Analysis of students’ survey questionnaire 23

2.4.3 Analysis of the experimental and control groups’ pre-test and post-test results 27

2.4.3.1 Comparison of linguistic competence in pre-test between the treatment group and control group 28

2.4.3.2 Comparison of linguistic competence in the pre-test and post-test within groups 28

2.4.3.3 Comparison of linguistic competence between groups 29

2.5 Findings and discussion 30

2.5.1 Teachers’ perceptions of error/mistake correction and their corrective practices 30

2.5.2 The effects of teachers’ correction practices on students’ pre-ESP learning motivation 34

2.5.3 The effect of teachers’ correction techniques on students’ learning improvement 37

PART C – CONCLUSION 39

REFERENCES 41 APPENDICES I APPENDIX I I APPENDIX II II APPENDIX III IV APPENDIX IV VI APPENDIX V IX APPENDIX VI XI APPENDIX VII XIII APPENDIX VIII XIV

LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

Chart 1 – The role of error correction in English learning as perceived by teachers 20

Chart 3 - Written mistakes most corrected by the teachers 22 Chart 4 – The most useful correction type as perceived by the teachers 23 Chart 5 – The importance of error correction from the students’ perceptions 24 Chart 6 – Oral mistakes which the students most liked to be corrected 25 Chart 7 - Written mistakes which the students most liked to be treated 25 Chart 8 - The most useful correction type as perceived by the students 26 Table 1 – Factors affecting teachers’ decision of correction 20

Table 3 – The relationship between teachers’ correction and students’ learning

PART A - Introduction

1 Rationale

Making mistakes/errors is natural in learning any language including English As an Italian proverb goes “Sbagliando s’impara”, which means “We learn through our errors,” it is commonly agreed that mistakes and errors are indispensable parts in the learning process, and correction should be included in productive English lessons Surprisingly, the history of foreign language teaching and learning research has witnessed contradictory opinions on the effects of correction on learner’s English improvement On the one hand, scholars like Truscott (1996), Krashen (1978), Semke (1984), and many others found negative impacts as

a result of this classroom practice On the other hand, linguists like Chaudron (1986), Hendrickson (1984), Ferris (1999), Corder (1973) and Ellis (1989) maintain significant usefulness of error correction in learner’s learning success Moreover, despite being one form

of teacher-student classroom interaction and closely related to learners’ interest in learning in that it may either motivate or demotivate learners, how error correction affects learners’ learning motivation has not been adequately studied Therefore, the effects of correction on motivation and improvement deserve more detailed studies

In Vietnam nowadays, with the increasingly important role of English in the society,

in most colleges where students major in information technology, accounting, business administration, electronics and electric technology or else other than English, freshmen are required to attend a pre-ESP course in preparation for their ESP courses At Viettronics Technology College (VTC), English is taught as a basic science to assist their work in the future In the curriculum, it is one of the compulsory subjects that have to be taken by first-year students before they take ESP courses in their second or third year The aims of the course are to help students improve their English communicative skills and more importantly, enhance their linguistic knowledge so as to successfully deal with ESP materials Lifelines Elementary is chosen as the course book Students need to practice pieces of grammar and learn the vocabulary needed for speaking, reading, listening and writing activities They are almost at the same low level of English proficiency, so error making is unavoidable Mistakes and errors occurring in this English course are in both spoken and written forms including those on grammar, pronunciation, word use and word/sentence meaning Understandably, teachers’ correction does follow as an attempt to fix these problems However, what might be unknown to these practitioners is the level of impact that their corrective practices assert on the language motivation and improvement of their students In the context of pre-ESP

teaching and learning of teachers and non-English majored students at VTC, it is worth our effort to investigate teachers’ corrective practices as well as how they influence students’ motivation and improvement in learning pre-ESP subject

2 Aims of the study

The aims of this study are threefold:

- To investigate teachers’ perceptions of error/mistake correction and their corrective practices

- To investigate the effect of teachers’ correction practice on students’ pre-ESP learning motivation

- To investigate the effect of teachers’ correction techniques on students’ learning improvement

What types of correction do they often use to correct students in pre-ESP classes?)

- What are students’ opinions on their teachers’ correction? How do teachers’ corrective practices affect their students’ learning motivation?

- What is the effect of teachers’ error correction on the students’ learning improvement in terms of linguistic competence?

The answer to this question will reveal the acceptance of either the hypothesis that

+ The students who receive error correction will make more improvement in linguistic competence than those who receive no error correction at all

+ There is no difference in learning improvement (in terms of linguistic competence) between the experimental group and the control group

4 Methods of the study

The instrumentations employed in this study are as follows:

- Two questionnaires to investigate teachers’ perceptions of correction as well as its relation

to students’ attitudes and motivation in learning pre-ESP

- Classroom observation to collect more information about teachers’ correction practices

- A quasi-experiment to work out if the teachers’ correction does lead to the students’ improvement in language learning

5 Scope of the study

Given that the teachers’ perceptions of error/mistake correction and their corrective practices as well as the effects of their error correction on students’ pre-ESP learning motivation and improvement are the foci of the study, this paper does not try to investigate written or oral error correction in details Instead, it deals with error correction of both kinds, which always occurs in a pre-ESP lesson Moreover, error correction is too broad a part of study in English language teaching, so this paper only focuses on teachers’ correction and its effects on non-English majored students’ motivation and improvement in learning pre-ESP subject at Viettronics Technology College First-year VTC students have to take two pre-ESP courses The first course aims at improving students in their four common communicative skills and the three language elements while the second, apart from focusing on the language areas as mentioned above, intends to enhance their linguistic knowledge so as to assist them

in processing and responding to the ESP materials Therefore, students’ improvement in this study refers to that in linguistic competence Finally, the relationship between motivation and improvement lies beyond the scope of our investigation

6 Significance of the study

This study, with the view to investigating the effects of teachers’ correction on students’ motivation and improvement in learning pre-ESP subject, hopes to bring a thorough look at one of the influential factors to the teaching and learning of a specific subject Additionally, it reveals a fact that though grammatical error correction is considered unnecessary by many scholars, it still receives much attention by both teachers and students

A discussion on useful and effective correction will also make this paper a worth-reading reference document for those who care about this pedagogical issue

7 Design of the study

This study contains three parts:

- Part A – Introduction covers an overview of the study in which the rationale, aims, research questions, methods, scopes, significance as well as design and definitions of terminologies of the study

- Part B – Development deals with a review of related literature, the setting, the methods, data analysis, and findings and discussions of the data collected

- Part C – Conclusion sums up the main findings of the study and presents the limitations as well as recommendations for further study

8 Definitions of terminologies

8.1 Error: “A systematic deviation from the accepted code.” (Norrish, 1983:127)

8.2 Mistake: “A non-systematic deviation from the language code indicating incomplete learning.” (Norrish, 1983:128)

8.3 Correction: A way of reminding learners of the forms of standard language

8.4 Feedback: Listener or reader’s responses provided to the learner’s spoken or written production Feedback covers two terms: assessment and correction In this paper, feedback refers to correction, thus, the terms “feedback”, “error correction”, “error treatment” and

“corrective feedback” can be interchangeably used

8.5 Language acquisition: The process of learning a native or a second language

8.6 Motivation: “The extent to which the individual works or strives to learn the language because of a desire to do so and the satisfaction experienced in this activity.” (Gardner, 1985:10)

8.7 Improvement: The process of something becoming better (Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary)

1.1.1 Errors as failure

With the coming into being of the Audio-lingual approach to language teaching after the Second World War and affected by the theory of Contrastive Analysis, language learner errors were seen as a negative phenomenon in language learning This approach, derived from the behaviorist psychology and emphasizing the teaching of oral skills i.e listening and speaking skills, maintained that “language performance consists of a set of habits in the use

of language structures and patterns” (Krashen & Terrell, 1983:14) Accordingly, it was not necessary for learners to understand grammar rules Instead, they were expected to memorize correct forms of the language and then produce error-free utterances As Mings (1993, cited

in Hashimoto, 2004:17) points out, “errors were to be avoided as if they were sinful”, this mechanistic approach stressing grammatical accuracy required that errors were treated immediately as they occurred so as to avoid compounding bad habits in the learner Influenced by this approach, many pedagogists treat errors as learner’s failure in acquiring the language

1.1.2 Errors as positive aids to learning

It can be said that the pedagogical treatment of foreign language learner errors is closely related to the changes in language theories Appearing at the same time as Communicative method, Error Analysis pioneered a positive thought of the significance of errors in language acquisition Enlightened by Chomsky’ s idea that a child generates language through innate

universal structures (Chomsky, 1975, cited in Fisher, 2007:7), views on how a foreign language learner strives to acquire the language have differed from the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis that language learning is simply a habit formation process Maamari (2010) sums

up Corder’s idea (1973) that “language learning is not so much a question of acquiring a set

of automatic habits, but rather a process of discovering the underlying rules, categories and systems of choice in the language by some sort of processing by the learner of the data of the language presented to him by the teacher” What is meant by this claim is that the learner plays a main and active role in his language learning in which he discovers language rules by going through several stages and processes including making errors As Corder (1967) sees

it, the making of errors is “a device the learner uses in order to learn It is a way the learner has of testing his hypotheses about the nature of the language he is learning.” (Corder, 1967:167) Therefore, his incorrect utterances can be interpreted as the “evidence that he is in the process of acquiring language” (Corder, 1967:165) This viewpoint was shared by the results of Carroll’s work (1955, cited in Corder, 1967:168) that the most efficient way to teach a student the correct linguistic forms is to let him test various hypotheses and find the right forms himself

In brief, foreign language teaching research in the past decades has shown a remarkable shift from contrastive analysis to error analysis with regard to learner error’s role in their learning process It is clearly pointed out that errors facilitate language learning Moreover, they are significant to the teacher in that they tell him “how far towards the goal the learner has progressed, and consequently, what remains for him to learn” (Corder, 1967: 167), and thus enabling the teacher to decide whether to move on to the next linguistic item or to design

a remedial syllabus or a reteaching program In this way, errors also contribute to best facilitating learning process

1.2 Error correction and foreign language progress

Following such a controversial issue like learner’s errors in language learning, the discussion over the effectiveness of error correction in foreign language acquisition has until now not ended since teachers’ and learners’ attitudes toward this issue are greatly influenced

by the teaching and learning approach that they adopt Since the mid 1960s, new approaches like the Cognitive Code theory (Carroll,1965), originated from transformational-generative grammar and Cognitive psychology, the Situational method and the Communicative method (Brumfit & Johnson, 1979; Widdowson, 1980) have shifted the emphasis in error correction from teaching students to make error-free sentences as required by the audio-lingual approach to encouraging them to communicate in the target language Thereby, error

correction, though not expected, but if any error occurs, is considered a must in audio-lingual language classroom The case is different in a communicative language classroom, however, where communicative competence is stressed rather than merely linguistic competence Errors are accepted in this context as a natural and useful part of learning for they show that learners are trying to discover the target language as they negotiate meanings through communicative situations Hence, it is important that the teacher knows how to sensibly treat

an error in a way that it positively supports communication On this basis, the questions of whether error treatment is beneficial or harmful, effective or ineffective have been put in the focus of attention of many methodologists in the past decade

1.2.1 Negative perspectives of error correction

It is commonly accepted that the purpose of error treatment is to help learners memorize the input and then produce as perfect output as possible In fact, there exists evidence that in the foreign language teaching context, corrective feedback not only shows little or no contribution to learner’s learning progress but also probable counter-productiveness Perhaps one reasonably outstanding advocate of this perspective is Truscott In his paper on the effectiveness of grammar correction in L2 writing classes, he argues that,

Veteran teachers know there is little connection between correction and learning: Often a student will repeat the same mistake over and over again, even after being corrected many times When this occurs, it is tempting for the teacher to say the student is not attentive or lazy; however, the pervasiveness of the phenomenon, even with successful students, argues against any such explanation Rather the teacher should conclude that correction simply is not effective.” (Truscott, 1996:341)

Grammar correction was proved harmful in foreign language writing in many studies Those learners who do not receive grammar correction have a more positive feeling about writing than those who wrote more, and with more complexity, than those who did receive grammar corrections Regarding oral grammar correction, Truscott further states that “Given this failure, one would expect oral correction to fail as well, since it poses even greater problems both for teachers and for students.” (Truscott, 1999) In addition, Krashen’s Monitor Theory (Krashen&Terrell, 1983:45) stresses that “an over emphasis on conscious grammar has the undesirable result of encouraging over-use of the Monitor,” which will excessively slow down learning Before that, in his earlier study, Krashen pointed out that, in Ellis’s words, “ correction is both useless for acquisition and dangerous in that it may lead to a negative affective response.” (Ellis, 1994:584, cited in Hashimoto, 2004:22) In this way, Semke (1984: 195) concludes that “corrections do not increase writing accuracy, writing fluency, or general language proficiency, and they may have a negative effect on student

attitudes.” Therefore, the treatment of learner errors is not only ineffective but also productive

counter-Persuasive as the above evidence of the ineffectiveness of error correction may seem, many scholars advocate that correction does positively affect foreign language learning

1.2.2 Positive perspectives of error correction

The evidence for the effectiveness of error treatment is as much as that of its ineffectiveness Chaudron (1986) claims that,

Despite the lack of evidence that feedback on linguistic error in classrooms or outside them

is consistently effective in stimulating learners’ interlanguage progress, the possibility remains that certain learners, especially those with a formal learning style, can derive benefit from error correction (Chaudron, 1986:82, cited in Hashimoto, 2004:24)

Approving of this positive extreme, Hendrickson (1984) argues that

for those adults, error correction helps to discover the functions and limitations of the grammatical structures and lexical forms of the language they are using. (Hendrickson, 1984:145, cited in Hashimoto, 2004: 24)

Hammerly (1991, cited in Hashimoto, 2004) adds that feedback is helpful for mature learners to test linguistic hypotheses effectively provided that feedback has to be provided in

a clear and systematic way by the teachers This is because adult learners are under more pressure in producing the language about which they are uncertain and they always want the teacher to help them perfect their performance by means of correction In addition, Naeini (2008:123) reworded Long’s claim (1996) that “implicit negative feedback, arising from negotiation for meaning, provides an opportunity for learners to attend to linguistic form” even when they are taking part in a communicative activity Ellis (1998) points out that

“negative feedback in the context of communicative activities may promote interlanguage development” (Ellis, 1998, p 53, cited in Chang, 2000:2) Similarly, Chang (2000) reports on Doughty and Varela’s finding (1998) that in their communicative content-based science class, providing students corrective feedback on their oral presentation and written reports could significantly promote interlanguage development

The significance of corrective feedback, or negative evidence, was also affirmed in some other studies such as Thompson’s In her study, she insisted that “the student does not improve his skill if his work is not corrected” (Thompson, 1965, cited in Hashimoto, 2004:26) If errors and mistakes are not treated, they will become fossilized and thus inhibiting the learner’s language acquisition

From all related literature reviewed above, it can be concluded that error correction is beneficial in all kinds of language classroom activities from grammatical practice to oral communication or written work In this context, it provides learners with effective assistance

in developing both foreign language knowledge and skills As Chaudron (1988) perceives it,

Learners can use feedback as the powerful source of improvement in both target language development and other subject matter knowledge (Chaudron, 1988:133, cited in Inoue & Kubota, 1994:11)

While the outcomes of teachers’ error correction in terms of students’ foreign language improvement have still been controversial, it is apparent that there exists a close relation between teachers’ correction and learners’ learning motivation How this classroom interaction affects learners’ motivation in foreign language learning will be the focus of the hereunder part

1.3 Error treatment and learning motivation

Motivation has been the key concept ever since foreign language learning was studied It

is one of the most important factors that help to foster the process of language acquisition Yet, though very closely connected, error correction and motivation have never been under thorough investigation This paper, therefore, hopes to go into details about this relation The term “motivation” in second language learning is defined by Gardner (1985) as “the extent to which the individual works or strives to learn the language because of a desire to do

so and the satisfaction experienced in this activity.” (Gardner, 1985:10) According to him, motivation must be the combination of three elements namely “effort and desire to achieve the goal of learning the language” and “favorable attitudes toward learning the language” Therefore, “the individual may want to learn the language and may enjoy the activity, but, if this is not linked with a striving to do so, then it is not truly motivation.” (Gardner, 1985:10) Despite the fact that until now the connection between error correction and motivation has not been studied systematically, much research on error correction has more or less paid attention to this issue For example, Ferris (1999) asserts that the absence of correction may frustrate and demotivate learners Also, as far as they are concerned, Lavezzo and Dunford (1993) report on the opinion of a teacher of English about her English trainers “We find that there is practically no correcting at all, and this comes to us as a big disappointment.” Lavezzo and Dunford (1993:62, cited in Harmer, 2001:2)

On counting the factors affecting the students’ motivation in the context of foreign language learning we can find three most influential ones including teachers’ factors, learners’ factors and teaching and learning conditions

Many researchers believe that error correction touches not only the cognitive skills, but also the affective aspects of language learning including learners’ feelings and attitudes (Krashen 1987, Arnold and Brown 1999, Cathcart and Olsen 1976) Regarding this interrelation, Hendrickson (1984) proposes four learner factors affecting teacher correction as follows:

 Learners’ level of proficiency in the target language

 Learners’ purposes of target language learning

 Types of errors

 Individual learners’ attitudes toward error correction

(Hendrickson, 1984:146-7, cited in Hashimoto, 2004:42) From learners’ side, it is believed that a good teacher should be able to correct people without offending them As we see it, classroom interaction, as well as human interaction in general, is an art Whether the teacher offers correction or not, the correction techniques they apply, their attitudes toward learners’ errors, or whatever aspect of their corrective practices can negatively or positively affect the learners’ motivation for learning Obviously, for the reasons of self-esteem and face, people tend to dislike their error being pointed out or treated

by others In this aspect, the correction, if not offered at the right time, in the right place and

in the appropriate way, may threaten their face and thus causing them to lose enthusiasm for learning Ancker interestingly found out that “the most frequent reason given for not wanting correction was the negative impact on students’ confidence and motivation” (Ancker, 2000: 22) Hence, the factors coming from the learners should be taken into close consideration when the teacher makes policies on corrective practices

It is clear that teachers play an important role in determining the level of interest and enthusiasm of learners in foreign language learning In their corrective practices, they play different roles such as judges, designers, scholars, trainers and motivators According to Jimena et.al., generally, it is unpleasant experience to be corrected and some of learners may get frustrated and demotivated because they might not know what to do with the correction given by the teacher, especially when corrections are given without explanation In this case, learners who lack the confidence about their foreign language knowledge are the most likely people to be discouraged with corrective feedbacks Thus, it is necessary that foreign language teachers know how to maximally facilitate favorable learning condition through their corrective practices

Foreign language learning is different from other subjects in that learners’ interest in learning is greatly influenced by both the physical and psychological teaching and learning

environment Thereby, a healthy, relaxed and lively classroom atmosphere and a harmonious teacher-student relationship can help the students, especially those with bad English foundation or introverted characteristics, to overcome the feeling of shyness and anxiety They should be encouraged to make mistakes and do uptake and repair in order to improve their language competence Therefore, by providing appropriate treatment of students’ errors and mistakes, the teachers can create a pleasant and supportive atmosphere in the classroom

1.4 Error correction in an integrated-instruction form language teaching context

Those who have been following the debate over corrective feedback may get ambivalent when looking back on studies on its effectiveness in foreign language acquisition These studies, however, focused on error treatment in a particular language task, for example, oral work, written work, or grammar practice by means of activities like role play, essay writing

or doing exercises Little has been revealed on how positively or negatively error treatment affects the learner’s success in a general English course where both kinds of instructions, namely, meaning-focused and form-focused are integrated like pre-ESP course This paper,

as a result, aims to bridge this gap

In fact, the past decade have seen considerable attention to error correction in a language class in which language structures are incorporated within a meaning-focused activity This complex teaching context requires that the teacher should take some questions into consideration so as to best utilize error correction as a tool to improve the learner’s linguistic competence and communicative competence The questions framed by Hendrickson (1978, cited in Tedick, 1998:2) are as follows:

 Should learners’ errors be corrected?

 When should learners’ errors be corrected?

 Which errors should be corrected?

 How should errors be corrected?

 Who should do the correcting?

When the teachers successfully control the answers to these questions, they can take full advantage of corrective feedback in facilitating learning process

It is difficult for teachers to decide whether to correct or not in practical situations because of the temptation to do so as well as the feeling of guilt if the learners’ mistakes are ignored As a result, learners often feel discouraged when their teacher does too much correction Lewis and Hill agree that “Probably even more important, however, in undermining the learners’ confidence, is the teacher over-zealous correction of mistakes.” (Lewis and Hill, 1992:90) This practice is ineffective in that it causes the learners such great

confusion because of too many errors corrected in one lesson that they find it hard to attend

to and memorize any of them Further, the learners’ confidence in their ability to succeed in the tasks is reduced to a level at which they dare not take a risk on account of being afraid to commit mistakes Therefore, when encountering a learner error, teachers should carefully consider whether to correct it or not Often, it is advisable that in tasks focusing on fluency, teachers should let mistakes go unless they are the cause of misunderstanding and conversation breakdown Such global errors deserve correction while local one, those not hindering the comprehension of the message can be ignored Similarly, in correcting grammatical mistakes, teachers should provide treatment on errors relating to the piece of grammar in focus rather than others Therefore, global errors must receive high priority for correction

As regards the timing of correction, many teaching recommendations favour delayed feedback arguing that learner should not be interrupted “in the middle of what he is saying, which can be frustrating and discouraging” (Bartram & Walton, 1991:41) Moreover, when the main aim of using language is for spoken communication, constant interruptions to correct errors, great or small, will simply create a barrier to communication, rather than facilitate it

Among many questions raised on error correction, the question of how learner should be treated is probably the most interesting one Although providing the learners with the correct forms appears to be the most popular technique, it is preferable that the teachers use various types of treatment methods Hashimoto (2004:37) reports on Holley and King’s argument (1971) that “teachers should not use the methods which make learners feel embarrassed or frustrated” Therefore, how to respond to learner errors emerges as a sensitive issue, which requires that teachers should be thoughtful about selecting the appropriate and effective correction techniques In a word, however correction is carried out, it needs to be done with sensitivity to avoid embarrassment and demotivation

1.5 Forms of error correction

In an English course where all four skills are integrated, the teachers have to deal with errors of both spoken form and written form Whatever forms of errors may come up, the teachers can apply the following three forms of correction

- Self-correction

- Peer-correction

- Teacher-correction

1.5.1 Self-correction

The first and probably the most recommended form of error treatment is self-correction Makino claims that “it is important for teachers not to correct learner errors or give the right answers to them immediately; giving cues to the students so they can correct their own errors will further activate their linguistic competence” (Makino, 1993:340, cited in Chang, 2000:3) Edge (1989:24) adds that “People usually prefer to put their own mistakes right rather than be corrected by someone else.” Indeed, self-correction gives the learners a sense

of achievement and confidence Here, correction is like a task which the learners have successfully fulfilled Meanwhile, they are more likely to memorize the mistakes they have corrected themselves and thus hopefully not recommitting them in the future Moreover, teachers are advised to teach the students to edit their own writing or utterances because they will not succeed outside the classroom unless they can learn how to reduce their errors As for teachers, by using this type of correction, they can gain an insight into the students’ knowledge base, an important criterion to design and organize classroom activities Despite not directly correcting the mistakes, the teacher’s role is crucial in that they show the learners

a mistake has been made This practice best works when the mistake is a slip, a kind of

mistake on known language made by carelessness

As stated earlier, both spoken and written errors can be corrected by means of correction The following are some techniques for error treatment collected and introduced

The teacher provides several possible answers to the questions asked This technique is also useful when the student lacks understanding of an entire question

Here, the teacher localizes an error by mentioning what function it plays in the sentence

It is a form-focused technique and is only useful with students who understand the vocabulary and who are fairly proficient

 Gestures

Nonverbal error correction can occur by means of gestures This technique ideally makes teachers’ correction attractive to the students by the teachers’ interesting actions on the condition that both learners and teachers can interpret the meaning of these actions Other techniques (Edge, 1989) can be,

 Clarification request

The teacher uses phrases like “Excuse me?”, “Pardon?” or “Sorry?” to indicate that there exists at least one mistake in the student’s utterance and asks for a repetition or reformulation

 Metalinguistic clues

The teacher poses questions or provided comments or information related to the formation of the student’s utterance, for example, “Do we say it like that?” Or “We need a noun here.”

1.5.1.2 Self-correction to written work

 Symbols and abbreviations

Like gestures in correcting oral mistakes, symbols and abbreviations, for example, ‘Sp’ for ‘spelling mistake’, are only useful in case there is an agreement in decoding them

 Reference to grammar rules

The teacher provides reference to a specific rule of grammar on which the student makes

1.5.2.1 Peer-correction to oral work

The teacher can apply any techniques for self-correction to peer correction by simply calling on another student who can correct the mistakes After the correct form has been pointed out, the student who commits the errors is required to repeat the correct utterance

1.5.2.2 Peer-correction to written work (Walz, 1982)

1.5.3 Teacher-correction

“If neither the student who made the mistake, nor any other student can correct it, then the teacher has to give more help.” (Edge, 1989: 27) Teacher correction is especially useful for adult learners in that it reduces the risk that the learner feels ashamed if corrected by their peers Moreover, the teacher can actively manage the timing of correction so that it will not affect task organization in a lesson However, students who do not commit the error often feel less involved when correction takes place

1.5.3.1 Teacher-correction to oral work (Lyster & Ranta, 1997, cited in Tedick,

The teacher implicitly reformulates the student’s error or provides the correct form

1.5.3.2 Teacher-correction to written work (Walz, 1982)

 Direct correction

The teacher underlines a word to draw attention to a hint written near it A misplaced word can then be bracketed and placed in its proper order with an arrow Unnecessary words are crossed out

CHAPTER 2 – THE STUDY 2.1 Setting of the study

Students at VTC have to attend two courses of pre-ESP in their first year These courses aim at developing students’ English communication competence by offering four-skill practice and preparing students for their ESP courses by revising and consolidating their grammar and vocabulary knowledge The first aim is set for the first semester, which ends with an oral final exam while the second one is the focus of the second semester ending with

a written test In other words, we put our focus on fluency and English communicative competence in the first term whereas the second term is for accuracy and linguistic competence As cited in Wikipedia, linguistic competence was defined in 1965 by Noam Chomsky as the system of linguistic knowledge possessed by native speakers of a language Therefore, in this study what is meant by improvement in learning pre-ESP is the improvement in students’ linguistic competence Moreover, the students are almost at a low level of English proficiency, thus, the contents as well as activities designed in the course book Lifelines Elementary (by Tom Hutchinson, Oxford University Press, 1999) are deemed suitable for them

2.2 Subjects and instrumentations

2.2.1 Subjects

The subjects chosen for this study include 5 teachers of English from the English division of VTC and 100 students, each 20 of whom come from a class taught by one of these teachers Additionally, for the quasi-experiment to carry out, two groups of students of IT will be divided into the treatment group and the control group, which will be elaborated in the instrumentation

and the items 10 and 15 were based on items 24, 77 of the Attitudes/Motivation Test Battery (Gardner, 2004)

2.2.2.2 Classroom observation

This instrument was exploited in order to attain details about common error

treatment techniques employed by the teachers The data collected provided preliminary conditions for the experiment to be conducted

2.2.2.3 Quasi-experiment

To test the effects of teacher’s error correction on students’ improvement, the author carried out a quasi- experimental study The subjects were 100 students coming from two classes of informatics majors (50 each), who then non-randomly constituted two groups for the treatment, i.e the experimental group and the control one They were given the same materials, instructions and tasks given by the same teacher during the treatment The ratio of male and female students in the two groups was approximately equal at 4:1, and they were virtually equally motivated and attentive in learning, as perceived by the teacher Before the treatment, in order to eliminate the possibility that some students may be familiar with the language knowledge to be presented during the treatment whereas others do not, which might falsify the results of the study, the teacher presented the new language without any tasks given to the students The students then took a written pre-test on the language relating to what they had just learnt During the treatment time of 15 forty - five - minute periods, the teacher elicited what the students had learnt and organized activities for practice on that language without assigning any homework or giving in-class tests By not assigning homework and tests, the possibility that the students’ better performance in the post-test, if there were any, was due to their efforts in revising what they had learnt would be limited to a maximum level Thus, the findings on the effects of the teacher’s correction on the students’ improvement, if there were any, would be more reliable For the treatment group, the teacher applied the oral and written correction techniques most commonly used by the teachers in the college, as collected from classroom observation, to correct students’ mistakes and errors while the control group received no correction at all After the treatment, the students took a post-test to check whether they had made improvements on the mistakes/errors corrected or not

The lesson contents are presented in Appendix 1

Pre-test, post-test

The tests, to measure student’s linguistic competence, were designed in the way that they included the questions on the language easily mistaken by the students during the

activities The questions were on the phonological rules, grammatical rules and vocabulary presented in the lessons In order to maximally limit the students’ feeling of familiarity, the question types in the pre-test were changed when used in the post-test

The validity and reliability of the test

As regards the test validity, which is defined as “the extent to which the test measures what it is intended to measure” (Harrison, 1991:11), the contents of the questions were taken from the Progress Tests in the book Lifelines Elementary Teacher’s Book and they were also designed on the basis of what was presented in the course book This ensured that the test tested what the students actually learnt Moreover, for the purpose of investigating the students’ improvement in using the language they learnt in terms of the mistakes/errors they made, the pre-test had to cover many examples of their mistakes and errors during the treatment This was done by the author’s consultation with other teachers who had had four

to seven years of experience in teaching this subject

In addition, this test had a high level of reliability because each question had only one correct answer Thus, the measurements of the tests kept unchanged under any circumstance

of administering and marking

2.3 Data collection

The survey in the form of questionnaires was conducted from May 3rd to May 9th Out of the 120 questionnaires delivered, 115 were collected back and no items were left blank The open-ended questions were fully answered as well Classroom observation was also done at this time In all, the author spent ten 45-minute periods observing the teachers’ in-class correction practices Generally, most of the teachers employed the following correction techniques:

 Self-correction to oral work

 Peer-correction to in-class written work

The experimental study took place from May 10th to May 30th The teacher created the same learning condition for both groups except that she provided error correction in the forms of the above mentioned techniques for the treatment group while the control group

received no correction The pre-test and post-test were strictly and carefully marked by the author The t-value was calculated by Excel T-test function

2.4 Data analysis

2.4.1 Analysis of teachers’ survey questionnaire

- What do teachers think of the role of mistake/error correction in English learning?

On being asked what they thought of students’ making mistakes/errors, all the teachers saw this as an essential part of learning process rather than a sign of students’ failure Accordingly, four of them agreed that error correction is important in English learning, and the other one viewed it as very important None of them denied the important role error treatment plays in this process

0%

80%

20%

Very important Important Not important

Chart 1 – The role of error correction in English learning as perceived by teachers

- What factors affect teachers’ decision of correction?

Error treatment can be said to be one of the most difficult practices of foreign language teachers In order for this practice to be effective, there are some factors needed to be taken into consideration before a teacher gives correction Those factors, from the teachers’ viewpoints, are stated in the following table:

Table 1 – Factors affecting teachers’ decision of correction

As can be seen from the table, 80% of the respondents paid attention to the focus of the task, that is, whether the task is accuracy-focused or fluency-focused This choice is understandable since the focus of the task helps to determine whether to correct, when to correct, what to correct and even how to correct Similarly, the majority of teachers, accounting for 60%, took students’ attitudes toward correction as well as their English proficiency level into consideration when deciding to give corrective feedback Most surprisingly, only one teacher cared about the timing of the lesson

- What kind of mistakes do teachers correct most?

Undeniably, in a pre-ESP course, non-English major students often commit mistakes and errors both when they speak and when they write As regards speaking activities, teachers have to deal with students’ mistakes on grammar, phonology, word use and word/sentence meaning, and idea organization in case they have to talk about a topic According to the teachers’ responses, grammatical mistakes and mistakes on word use and word/sentence meaning were most noticeable 40% of them corrected mistakes on grammar and the same number paid attention to mistakes on word use and word/sentence meaning Treatment of mistakes on phonology, one feature to distinguish spoken English from written English, is however, preferred by only one teacher Finally, no one chose to put their focus on mistakes on idea organization

Chart 2 – Oral mistakes most corrected by the teachers

As for written errors, perhaps because accuracy is the most important criterion for a good piece of writing, 80% of the population put grammatical mistakes on the top of the most

corrected list The other 20% put their stress on the correctness word use and word/sentence meaning None of them paid much attention to mistakes on spelling and idea organization

0%

80%

Grammatical mistakesSpelling mistakesMistakes on word use and word/sentence meaningMistakes on idea organizing

Chart 3 - Written mistakes most corrected by the teachers

- What is the amount of correction do teacher offer in a pre-ESP lesson?

In terms of the amount of correction teachers offer in a pre-ESP lesson, two teachers, accounting for 40% of the population, gave correction whenever they caught a mistake from the students, which means that they offered 100% of correction during a pre-ESP lesson They both argued that the students needed to acquire as high a level of accuracy as possible The rest 60% were of the opinion that teachers should not offer complete error correction They reasoned that only important errors should be dealt with so that the students would not have to suffer from bewilderment and confusion, which lessen the effectiveness of correction However, they did not deny the importance of giving corrective feedback by asserting that from 70% to 80% of students’ mistakes should be dealt with

- When do teachers often give correction?

On being asked what corrective practice the teachers preferred in terms of the time of correction giving, two out of five teachers preferred immediate correction, another two teachers supported delayed correction, and the last one chose neither of these two options This teacher stated that sometimes she corrected students immediately and sometimes she employed delayed correction, reasoning that it depended on the task she asked the students to

do According to her, immediate correction was best utilized in grammar practice whereas

delayed correction was more ideal in speaking tasks when students’ flow of talking should be interrupted as little as possible

- What types of correction do the teachers often use to correct students in pre-ESP classes?

With regard to the type of correction employed by the teachers, the frequency of use as shown from the data collected is presented as follows

Chart 4 – The most useful correction type as perceived by the teachers

2.4.2 Analysis of students’ survey questionnaire

- What are students’ opinions on their teachers’ correction?

- How important is error correction to the students’ English learning?

1%

14%

85%

Very importantImportantNot important

Chart 5 – The importance of error correction from the students’ perceptions

As apparent from Chart 5, the significance of error correction was solidly affirmed by 99% of the respondents, among whom 85% saw it as very important Despite this remarkably persuasive result, still there was 1% of the opposing opinion that error correction was not important to their English learning

- How much correction do students’ expect in a pre-ESP lesson?

Whereas over a half of the teachers favoured selective correction, the majority of the students, 87% exactly, preferred to be corrected whenever they committed a mistake They explained that the teachers’ correcting every mistake they made would indicate to them what was right and what was wrong so that they would not recommit it anymore They added that they preferred the English they produced to be perfect, and this would be impossible without their teachers’ help Moreover, correcting all the students’ mistakes meant that their work was being carefully attended to by their teachers The other 13% of the informants did not favour comprehensive correction, reasoning that correcting too many mistakes arising in their work would make them feel less motivated in completing the tasks Nevertheless, they claimed that an amount of 85%-90% of correction should be done per lesson

- What kind of mistakes do the students like to be corrected most?

In speaking activities, phonological errors were most expected to be corrected by 49%

of the informants The second in the list was grammatical ones with 36%, and the least favoured was mistakes on idea organization with only 2%

48%

Grammatical mistakesPhonological mistakesMistakes on word use and word/sentence meaningMistakes on idea organizing

Chart 6 – Oral mistakes which the students most liked to be corrected

The case was a bit different in written tasks in which 47% of the students liked their grammatical mistakes to be treated most Mistakes on word use and word/sentence meaning were ranked second in the list with 43%, and those on idea organization and spelling seemed not to have much attention by the students with only 7% and 3% respectively

Chart 7 - Written mistakes which the students most liked to be treated

- When do the students want correction?

As for the time of correction giving, 63% of the respondents preferred immediate correction whereas 30% favoured delayed correction The rest 7% said that it depended on the kind of mistakes If the mistakes were on grammar or word use and meaning, the teachers could correct them later, but if they were mistakes on pronunciation, stress or intonation, they needed to treat them immediately so that they would not have to recall the students to the incorrect English they had produced

- What type of correction do the students find the most useful?

Chart 8 - The most useful correction type as perceived by the students

It is clear from Chart 8 that teacher-correction was the most useful correction type from 58% of the students’ viewpoint Peer-correction was deemed the most helpful for 32% of the population Like the teachers, the students perceived self-correction as the least useful means

of correction with only 11 advocates

- What are the teachers’ attitudes towards the students’ making mistakes/errors? How would the students like to receive correction?

As regards the teachers’ attitudes towards the students’ making mistakes/errors, an impressive percentage of 88% of the students revealed that their teachers gave correction with sympathy and enthusiasm Only 14 respondents, accounting for 12%, saw a feeling of annoyance and dissatisfaction from their teachers In terms of the students’ preference in correction receiving, 80% were of the opinion that they preferred correction with encouragement whereas 20% believed that criticism in correction giving might help them improve their English learning

- How is teachers’ correction related to their students’ learning motivation?

The above is the analysis of the collected data on the teachers’ perceptions and practices

of correction in pre-ESP lessons as well as the students’ opinions on their teachers’ correction practices The other 7 items of the student questionnaire are designed to investigate the effect

of the teachers’ correction on the students’ learning motivation