A quasi experimental study of form focused instruction at hanoi university of industrial fine arts

As a result, fluency without appropriateness would cause serious misunderstandings incommunication Dai, 2002 Recently there has been a call for an integration of focus on forms and focus

NGUYỄN THỊ THỊNH

INSTRUCTION AT HANOI UNIVERSITY

OF INDUSTRIAL FINE ARTS

(Nghiên cứu giả thực nghiệm về phương pháp dạy chú trọng dạng thức ngôn ngữ ở Trường Đại Học Mỹ Thuật Công Nghiệp Hà Nội)

M.A THESIS

FIELD:

CODE:

ENGLISH METHODOLGY 601410

HANOI- 2010

NGUYỄN THỊ THỊNH

INSTRUCTION AT HANOI UNIVERSITY

OF INDUSTRIAL FINE ARTS

(Nghiên cứu giả thực nghiệm về phương pháp dạy chú trọng dạng thức ngôn ngữ ở Trường Đại Học Mỹ Thuật Công Nghiệp Hà Nội)

NGUYEN THI VUONG, M.A

HANOI- 2010

TABLE OF CONTENT

Page

Acknowledgements i

Abstract ii

Table of content iii

List of Abbreviations vi

List of figures vii

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Introduction 1

1.2 Rationale for the study 1

1.3 Aim of the study 2

1.4 Research question 2

1.5 Significance of the study 2

1.6 The scope of the study 3

1.7 The structure of the study 3

CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 5

2.1 Introduction 5

2.2 Definition of terminologies 5

2.2.1 Grammatical competence 5

2.2.2 Form-Focused Instruction (FFI) 5

2.2.3 Focus-on-forms vs Focus-on-form. 6

2.2.3.1 Focus-on-forms (FoFs) 7

2.2.3.2 Planned focus on form 8

2.2.3.3 Incidental focus on form 9

2.3 Advantages and Disadvantages of FFI 11

2.3.1 The Advantages of FFI 11

2.3.2 The Disadvantages of FFI 12

2.4 The summary 17

CHAPTER THREE: THE STUDY 18

3.1 Introduction 18

3.2 The rationale of using a quasi-experimental method 18

3.2.1 Definition of a quasi-experimental method 18

3.2.2 The rationale of using a quasi-experimental method 18

3.3 The study 19

3.3.1 The subjects 19

3.3.2 Procedures 20

3.3.2.1 Pre-treatment test 20

3.3.2.2 Post-treatment test 20

3.3.2.3 Interview 20

3.3.3 The treatment 21

3.3.3.1 Activities used in the treatment 21

3.3.3.2 Process of the treatment 22

3.4 Results 24

3.4.1 Scoring procedures……… 24

3.4.2 Results of pre-test and posttest 25

3.4.3 Data from interviews 28

3.5 The findings 30

3.5.1 The answer for hypothesis 30

3.5.2 The findings from the interview 30

3.5.2.1 Students’ perceptions of the differences between FFI and their conventional learning 30

3.5.2.2 Levels of motivating among the students when adopting FFI 31

3.5.2.3 Students’ evaluations towards the FFI method 32

3.6 The summary 32

CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION 34

4.1 Introduction 34

4.2 Summary of the major findings 34

4.3 Conclusion 36

4.4 Recommendation of the application of the FFI method 36

4.5 Limitations and suggestions for future studies 36

REFERENCES 38

Focus-on-Form Native language Target language Number

List of tables

Table 3.1 Students’ mean score in pre-test and post test ……… 28 Table 3 2: Descriptive statistics of the post-treatment test……… 29 Table 3.3: Results on the five criteria……… 31

List of graphs

Graph 3.1: Frequency distribution of the Experimental class……… 29 Graph 3.2: Frequency distribution of the Control class………30

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION

1.1.Introduction

Firstly, this chapter presents the rationale for conducting the study This part then will befollowed by the aim of the study, research questions, significance, and the scope of thestudy Finally, the structure of the study will be presented so that the reader will have anoverall look of order of the study

1.2.Rationale for the study.

Grammar is one of the most controversial issues in teaching a language At first, grammarwas taught through a traditional way in which, according to Long and Robinson (1998),discrete points of grammar are presented one at a time Whereas, Fotos (1998) write thatwhat EFL learners really need is a not grammatical feature, but opportunities forcommunicative language uses Therefore, a meaning-focused approach to languageteaching, according to Maley (1986) and Littlewood (1981) that concentrates on languageuse, appropriateness, fluency, learner-centeredness and integration of language skills (Cited

in Gao 2009, p.46), has appeared However Brown (1994:77) suggests that teachersworking in the communicative context try to implement “real life” communication in thelanguage classroom in order to help learners develop linguistic fluency not just accuracy

As a result, fluency without appropriateness would cause serious misunderstandings incommunication (Dai, 2002)

Recently there has been a call for an integration of focus on forms and focus on meaning inthe second language classroom that is focus on form As for Long and Robinson‟s opinion(1998:23), focus on form often consists of an occasional shift of attention to linguistic codefeatures - by the teacher and/or one or more student - triggered by perceived problems withcomprehension or production They argue that focus on form is the third option whichattempts to capture the strengths of an analytic approach while dealing with its limitation.According to Long this approach to grammar is more effective Long (1991: 45-46) claimsthat through focus on form, learners will be encouraged to achieve more accuracy in usinglanguage Rod Ellis (1994:659) also acknowledges that formal instruction results in

increased accuracy and accelerates progress through developmental sequences and itseffects are to some extent durable.

Studies on focus on form, which were conducted in various contexts, showed positiveresults However, this question has not been adequately studied in Vietnam, especially inthe context where English is taught as a sub-subject at the university

For all these reasons, I decided to conduct a quasi-experimental study of Form-FocusedInstruction in HUIFA This study aims at investigating the effectiveness of focus on formapproach in teaching grammar toward students‟ grammar achievements at HUIFA

1.3.Aim of the study

This study attempts to examine the effect of form-focused instruction on improvingstudents‟ grammatical competence

In order to achieve the above aim, a quasi-experimental method was used in this study Thehypothesis to be tested in this study was Form-focused Instruction (FFI) improvesstudents‟ grammatical competence significantly in comparison with the traditional focus-

on –forms approach (FonFs)

1.4.Research questions

1, To what extent does FFI lead to the improvement of students‟ grammatical competence?

2, Is there any difference in terms of students‟ grammatical competence between FonFsand FFI approach to grammar

1.5.The significance of the study

The result of this study will provide empirical information about the effectiveness of FFI

on students‟ grammatical competence in the context of English as a sub-subject taught at aVietnamese university The significance of the study will therefore lie in its contributions

to the understanding of how FFI works in an English-as-a-foreign language context

1.6.The scope of the study

The study is limited to the examination of the causal relationship between form-focusedinstruction and students‟ grammatical competence at Hanoi University of Industrial FineArts

1.7.The structure of the study

The study consists of four chapters:

Chapter 1: Introduction

Firstly, this chapter presents the rationale for conducting the study This part then will befollowed by the aim of the study, research questions, significance, the scope of the study.Finally, the structure of the study will be presented so that the reader will have an overalllook of order of the study

Chapter 2: Literature review

This chapter deals with an overview of the literature It starts with the definition ofterminologies including grammatical competence and FFI It is then concerned with FonF

vs FonFs Next part is about the advantages and disadvantages of FFI This chapter willfinish with a summary

Chapter 3: The study

This chapter presents the research design, research procedures, and the result of the study.Firstly, the rationale for using a quasi-experimental design is presented This will befollowed by the description of the procedures and the treatment Lastly, the findings will besummarized and discussed

Chapter 4: Conclusion

This chapter includes the summary of the main findings, the conclusions, therecommendations, and the limitations and the suggestions for future studies Firstly, thesummary of the main findings from the treatment is focused on This will be followed by

the conclusions and recommendation of the study This chapter will end with the limitations of the study and suggestions for future studies

CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

2.1 Introduction

This chapter deals with an overview of the literature It starts with the definition ofterminologies including grammatical competence and FFI by FonF vs FonFs and theadvantages and disadvantages of FFI At last, chapter will be finished with a summary

of lexical items and of rules of morphology, syntax, sentence-grammar semantics andphonology (1980, p.29) According to these authors, grammatical competence is the ability

to recognize and produce the distinctive grammatical structures of a language and to usethem effectively in communication Grammatical competence is the primary focus of study

in most academic language courses

2.2.2 Form-focused instruction

The term “form-focused instruction” (FFI) was defined by numerous linguists basing ondifferent aspects With its strong point that deals with limitation of focus on forms that,according to Gao (2009, p.46), emphasis on language knowledge teaching than students‟comprehensive abilities of using foreign language and capture the strengths of analyticapproach (Long & Robinson, 1998), FFI is a third option to grammar teaching approach

In some other works, focus on form or Form-Focused Instruction FFI is a dual approachwhich focuses on both meanings and forms (Spada, 1997) FFI refers to any pedagogicaleffort, which is used to draw the learners' attention to language form either implicitly orexplicitly that occur within meaning-based approaches

According to Long (1991), FFI is a type of instruction that holds up the important ofcommunicative language teaching principles such as authentic communication and student-centeredness, and, on the other hand, maintains the value of the occasional and overt study

of problematic L2 grammatical forms, which is more reminiscent of non-communicativeteaching

Ellis (2001:2) states that FFI is a cover term for terms such as “analytic teaching, focus onform, and focus on forms, corrective feedback/error correction and negotiation of form”

2.2.3 Focus-on-forms (FonFs) vs Focus-on-form (FonF)

Doughty (2001:221) points out that FonFs and FonF are “not polar opposites…” Shefurther stresses that “FonF entails a focus on formal elements of language, whereas FonFs

is limited to such a focus…”According to Doughty, a fundamental feature of FonF is that

at the time when learners‟ attention is focused on a linguistic form, they must already befamiliar with the meaning and the appropriate usage of that form If information aboutmeaning and usage is lacking, the attention to form would be considered FonFs

Doughty and William‟s definitions of “FonF”, “FonFs” and “FFI” can be representedschematically as follows:

forms

2.2.3.1 Focus on forms (FonFs)

According to Long (2000) FonFs is a traditional teaching approach in which teacherspresent the learners with pre-selected and sequenced linguistic items Echoing Long(2000), Sheen (2002) writes that FonFs is equated with the traditional teaching of discretepoints of grammar in separate lessons Sheen (2003) further mentions that FonFs providesthe understanding of the grammar by a variety of means, including explanation in the L1,pointing out differences between the L1 and the L2, and aural comprehension activitiesintended to focus students‟ attention on the forms being used

In Ellis‟ words (2001) “FonFs is characterized by a primary focus on form and intensivetreatment of pre-selected forms” (p.16)

Carter and Nunan (2001) argue that FonFs has some weak points For example, FonFs onlyemphasizes formal aspects rather than meaningful activities Also, Doughty and William(1998) maintain that FonFs always entails isolation of linguistic features from context orfrom communicative activity As a result, the students have no chance to practice speakingand listening The problem of FonFs is to lay emphasis on knowledge language teachingthan student‟s comprehensive abilities of using foreign language Student becomes almost

“structurally competent but communicatively incompetent.” (p.4) That is because languageform that is only one component of overall language knowledge native speakers possess,and thus communicative competence should incorporate sociolinguistic and contextualcompetence as well as grammatical competence

Besides, All these limitations are summed up by Long (1997) that FonFs instruction hastwo major limitations are as follows:

i) There is no need to identify a particular learner‟ or group of learners‟communicative needs, and no means analysis to ascertain their learning styles and preferences It

is one-size-fits-all approach

ii) Linguistic grading, both lexical and grammatical, tends to result in pedagogicmaterials of the basal reader variety and textbook dialogues and classroom language use whichare artificial and stilted

iii) Despite the best efforts even of highly skilled teachers and textbook writers,FonFs tends to produce boring lessons, with resulting declines in motivation, attention, andstudent enrolments

Despite these limitations FFI has recently been promoted as a more effective approach togrammar since this approach focuses on both the meaning and the form According to Ellis(2001) FFI is an umbrella term which is defined as “any planned or incidental instructionactivities that is intended to induce language learners to pay attention to linguistic form.”These two instructional strategies are further discussed in the sections that follow:

2.2.3.2 Planned focus on form

Ellis (2001) identifies two types of planned focus on form, namely enriched input andfocused communicative tasks

Enriched input uses input that has been carefully modified with the aim that learners will

notice the target forms in the input Ellis mentions two ways to enriched input that is inputflood and input enhancement

Input flood is achieved when input is purposefully enriched with numerous examples of

target forms, but without any means of drawing learners‟ attention to the forms that arebeing targeted The rationale with input flood is that acquisition will take place because offrequent exposure to targeted forms

Input enhancement is similar to enriched input, but with the important difference that with

input enhancement there will be some means of drawing learner‟s attention to the formbeing focused on This is achieved by simple mechanisms such as highlighting the targetedforms in texts

Focused communicative tasks

Focused communicative tasks are tasks that have become widely used since the advent ofthe task-based approach to second language teaching According to Ellis (2001:21) the aimwith focused communicative tasks is to provide opportunities for learners to produce aparticular target form This is done by designing tasks around a communicative setting that

is typically based on real-world events

The crucial element of focused communicative tasks is that while performing the tasks,learners‟ attention should be focused on meaning and not form Acquisition of target forms

is considered incidental and not the intended purpose as is the case with functional languageteaching Ellis (2001) states that the distinction between focused communicative tasks andfunctional language teaching lies in the perspective that with the former learners seelanguage as a tool which can be used to communicate in a near real-world communicativesituation With functional language teaching, the perspective falls more heavily on thelanguage and on the particular form or forms that need to be dealt with in order to complete

an activity successfully

2.2.3.3 Incidental focus on form

Two kinds of incidental focus on form have been identified: pre-emptive and reactive

(Ellis, 2001: 22)

Pre-emptive focus on form

During pre-emptive focus on form the teacher or the learners decide to turn the attentionaway from a communicative activity to focus conversation on linguistic form for a shortwhile before resuming the communicative activity This kind of focus on form is referred

to by Ellis et al (2002b) as unfocused tasks Therefore, the shift is not result of an error inproduction that has occurred or of a problem with meaning that has been encountered.With pre-emptive focus on form either teacher or the learners feel need for clarificationaround some structural point in order to facilitate understanding of the meaning-focusedactivity that will follow Examples of pre-emptive focus on form would be if the teacherovertly asked the learners if they were experiencing any problems that are form related and

if the teacher verbalized a grammatical rule Ellis a al (2002b: 427) state that pre-emptivefocus on form can be conversational or didactic in nature Conversational pre-emptive

focus on form takes place when the teacher or the learners initiate focus on form that hasarisen because of a communicative need According to Ellis et al this kind of focus onform is rare, as opposed to didactic focus on form which occurs frequently During didacticpre-emptive focus on form, the teacher or the learner interrupt the otherwisecommunicative activity to focus on linguistic structure The form that is being focused onthen becomes the topic of discussion.

Reactive focus on form takes place when the teacher provides negative feedback to actual

or perceived errors made by the learners (Ellis 2001:23) The nature of the feedback canvary from implicit to explicit negative feedback

Implicit negative feedback

According to Ellis (2005) implicit negative feedback takes place when the learners supply

a linguistically incorrect response, the teacher tends to avoid direct, explicit, overt negativeevaluation Teachers will display a general preference and rely extensively on recast.Moreover, teachers also use other implicit options such as requests of classifications andrepetitions

Explicit negative feedback

Explicit negative feedback views errors positively It reflects a sociolinguistic need on theparts of teachers to protect the face of their students Ellis (2001) mentions options ofexplicit negative feedback: explicit correction (provides the correct form), meta-linguisticfeedback (consists of comment, information, or questions related to the well-formedness ofthe student‟s utterance, elicitation (attempt to directly elicit the correct form from student)

Ellis et al (2002b:423) distinguish between conversational and didactic reactive focus onform

Conversational reactive focus on form happens when a linguistic error made by the student

leads to a communication problem, to which the teacher responds by engaging the student

in negotiation of meaning Conversational reactive focus on form can be achieved bymeans of requests for confirmation or requests for clarification The teacher can negotiate

meaning by requesting information form the student, who typically repeats the problematicitem or phrase with or without reformulating it With requests for clarification, negotiation

of meaning is achieved because the learner has to first figure out why the teacher is notunderstanding the utterance, and then come up with a way to reformulate the utterance insuch a way that the teacher will understand

Didactic reactive focus on form occurs when the teacher choose to react to an error in

linguistic form that a learner has made even though the error has not led to communicationproblems during conversation Ellis et al (2002b:424) calls this kind of error treatment a

“pedagogic „time-out‟” and state that this kind of focus on form is more often in adultsecond language classrooms than conversational reactive focus on form

2.3 Advantages and Disadvantages of FFI

Language teaching through FFI has been controversial issues among linguists As for them,there have existed both strong points and weak ones with FFI method to grammar teaching

2.3.1 The Advantages of FFI

There are some main advantages of FFI as follows:

Firstly, according to Ellis and his colleagues, FFI helps draw learners‟ attention to formwhile they are engaged in communicative activities which is not easy to achieve becauselearners find it difficult to attend to meaning and form at the same time (Ellis et al.,2001:422) Similarly, as for Dekeyser and Johnson‟s view (cited in Ellis, 2001:8), withgiven enough opportunities to use language in communicative activities and providedinstruction with attention to form (e.g negative feedback) during communicative activities,learners will become able to use their conscious knowledge of grammatical structuresautomatically, or unconsciously

Secondly, Ellis (1994:659) argues that this approach results in increased accuracy andaccelerates progress developmental sequences and its effects are to some extent durable

He further explains that without instruction in the linguistic elements of the secondlanguage, learners are not likely to achieve very high levels of linguistic competence

Sharing the opinion with Ellis, Long (1991: 45-46) points out that using FFI in theclassroom allows the teacher to instruct students to both accuracy and fluency Itemphasizes the accuracy of language forms in communicative classrooms Although FFI isnot likely to alter sequences of development, it does appear to speed up the rate of learning,help learners in their learning processes, gain long-term accuracy and raise the ultimatelevel of attainment It also maintains a balance between the focus on forms and focus onmeaning, calling on teachers and learners to attend to form when necessary (Long, 1991.,

& Long and Robinson, 1998)

Thirdly, as for Doughty and Williams (1998:2), some attention to formal aspects embedded

in activities that are primarily meaning focused will improve the limited effectiveness ofpurely communicative classroom practice They refer to a strong and a weaker claimregarding the need for attention to linguistic form within a communicative approach tosecond language teaching According to the strong claim, learners need to be provided withFFI in order to develop their ability in communicative competence, and to achieve target-like command of the second language According to the weaker claim, FFI will providelearners with “a more efficient language learning experience” because it is believed thatFFI “can speed up natural acquisition processes” (Doughty & Williams, 1998:2)

Some researchers (e.g Ellis, 1999; Long, 2000) found that FFI is most effective when it isfocused on raising learners‟ awareness of how a structure is formed, what it means, andhow it is used rather than on practicing drills for accuracy From the discussion above it isclear that the current language teaching and learning literature is generally in favor of someform of focus on linguistic form

The results of the majority of these studies also indicate that some models of focus on formare effective for language instruction

For instance, in an exploratory study, Lightbown and Spada (1990) investigated theinfluence of differences in the amount of FonF activity in four intact classes of Frenchlearners of English, in grades 5 and 6 (aged 10- 12) Analyses of the classroom data usingthe Communicative Orientation of Language Teaching (COLT) observation scheme

revealed that FonF activities “were almost always reactions to learners‟ errors or to studentrequests for assistance with some aspect of language use” (1990, p.437) and rarelyinvolved explicit grammar teaching Lightbown and Spada found that using suppliance inobligatory context analysis of production data obtained from a picture-description task,learners in the class who received the most focus on form were most accurate in their use

of the progressive –ing and at a higher developmental level in their use of the possessive determiners his and her.

Next, in a quasi-experimental study isolating just one of the instructional featuressubsumed by functional-analytic teaching, the use of visual input enhancement, Leeman,Arteagoitia, Fridman, and Doughty (1995) examined the effects of focus on form on thelearning of preterit and imperfect tenses in Spanish during content-based instruction Theycontrasted performance by a group receiving a purely communicative treatment and agroup receiving an integrated focus on form The treatment was delivered in two 50-minuteperiods of instruction Before the first period, both groups were assigned the same readingand questions on a topic in Spanish history The target forms were highlighted, underlined,and color-coded for the treatment group Subjects were instructed to read and answerquestions in preparation for a discussion In addition to input enhancement, the treatmentgroup as also told to pay special attention to how temporal relations were expressed in thematerial During the first class discussion session, the treatment group, in contrast to thecommunicative controls, received corrective feedback targeted at the use of preterit andimperfect tenses This varied from recasts, through presentation of models, to the use ofgestures and expressions to indicate errors The second class session consisted of a debate,during which the treatment group was again told to be careful when expressing temporalrelations and was given corrective feedback The communicative group was not soinstructed or corrected This treatment was, therefore, brief and administered outside theclassroom (reading texts for homework), as well as inside the classroom (receivingcorrective feedback) Comparing pretest and posttest scores on three measures, a clozecompletion task, a written essay, and an analysis of production during two in-class debates,Leeman et al found a significant pretest to posttest gain for accuracy and suppliance(amount of use) pf preterit and imperfect forms during the debates

To test the effectiveness of FFI in a communicative classroom, an experiment was carriedout by Qian (2006) in the course of “Integrated Skills of English” in Gongshang University

in 2003 Subjects were the 72 English majors, 19 males and 53 females who are freshmen

in 2003 As the classes had already been organized before students came to the university,

we could not choose the samples from different classes and then reorganize new classes.Class 0302 (with 23 students) was the experimental class and was to be treated with theintegrated method Class 0301 (with 24 students) was one control class to be treated with adominantly form-focused method Another control class, class 0304 (with 25 students),was to be treated with a highly meaning-based method without explicit instruction onlanguage forms These three classes were chosen out of nine classes because the subjects‟EFL scores in the university entrance examinations were not very different The course waslast for four semesters and the results of the treatments were to be assessed by thenationwide Test for English Majors-Band Four (TEM-4) in 2005 The classroominstruction was tasked-based but with a focus on the language forms at the end of eachunit The teaching units are divided by topics For each topic students are first engaged incommunicative interaction by doing brainstorming to activate prior knowledge, dialogues,role-play, top-down processing of the text, post-reading discussion for high-order thinking,presentations to share ideas, etc After all these have been done, there are awareness-raisingactivities to draw students‟ attention to language aspects and grammar exercises areassigned for students to practice Students got corrective feedback from the teacher whenthey made errors Judging from the means, the proficiency level of class 0302 was higherthan both of the control classes The improvement difference between class 0302 and class

0304 was significantly different but the performance difference between class 0302 andclass 0301 cannot be viewed as significantly different There was no significant differencebetween class 0301 and 0304 These results have proved that FFI is helpful for thedevelopment of students‟ inter-language system

Ellis et al (2002a) also mentioned Doughty and Varela‟s evidence to show that plannedfocus on form promotes acquisition even when this is measured in terms of spontaneousoral production In this investigation, they provided reactive focus on form directed at pasttense verbs in the context of students producing oral and written science reports Thereactive focus on from consisted of corrective recasting, where the teacher first repeated a

learner‟s utterance containing a past tense error, highlighting the error through emphasis,and then, if this did not result in a learner self-correction, the teacher recast the utteranceusing the correct verb form As a result, the students showed marked improvements inposttest through oral and written science reports.

In summary, FFI has some major advantages such as drawing learners‟ attention to formwhile they are engaged in communicative activities; increasing accuracy and acceleratingprogress developmental sequences and its effects are to some extent durable; improving thelimited effectiveness of purely communicative classroom practice

2.3.2 The disadvantages of FFI

Besides good points, FFI also suffers from some disadvantages

Sheen (2003) shows that the advocacy of FFI as the most effective on teaching strategy isonly theoretically motivated, and lacks credibility in terms of the empirical evidenceavailable She argues that FFI actually entails the contributive use of a FonFs Further,FonFs is consistently just as effective or more than other options

In alignment with Sheen‟s view, Poole (2005) highlights the fact that FFI has not beenempirically tested in a variety of instructional contexts

In terms of empirical, studies on FFI have taken place in settings that appear to be funded, adequately supplied with teaching and learning material, and generally free ofclassroom discipline problems, notably the United States, New Zealand, and Japan In fact,not a single empirical study can be found that took place in a setting in which classes wereovercrowded with up-to-date materials Even though FFI has been investigated in manysettings, it appears to be currently undoable in many circumstances due to curricularconstrains In particular, in many schools and language programs, teachers are obligated toteach certain forms in a specific order by using government- mandated materials.According to Sheorey and Nayar (2002), “Teachers have little say in designing thecurriculum, choosing the materials and textbooks, or developing assessment techniques, ofall which are controlled by Boards of Studies composed of senior members of the Englishfaculty” (p.18) If the textbooks and materials provided focus on the explicit learning of L2

well-grammatical forms and marginalize authentic oral and written communication make noallowance for occasional grammar study, teachers will be left without resources withwhich they can both promote real-life interaction

Another problem with FFI is its practicality, especially in educational settings where theclass size is large (Poole, 2003b) According to Long (1991) and Long and Robinson(1998), FFI is suited to small-sized classrooms, where instructors can verbally address theirstudents‟ problematic forms, presumably via classroom discussion, question- answersessions, and impromptu and planned public speaking events In many settings, however,classes are large and individual attention and student-student interaction is not impossible

In addition to curricular problems, Long (1991) and Long and Robinson (1998) have notedthat conception of focus on form instruction obliges teachers to have native- like or nearnative-like competence fluency More specifically, in oral situations, they would need to beable to spontaneously recognize students‟ form-based errors and provide them with thecorrect ones However, many English language teachers lack a high level of L2 oralproficiency and do not have opportunities for developing it, particularly in the area of oralgrammar Yu‟s report (2001) revealed that Grammar-translation method is the only optionfor EFL teacher in China because they can basically teach English in Chinese (p.197)

Personally, the researcher does not agree that FFI requires teachers to have native-likecompetence fluency in order to be able to recognize and correct students‟ errors Also, theuse of students‟ L1 does not prevent the use of FFI if we take Ellis‟s (2001) definition ofFFI which has been presented earlier in this chapter

Another linguistic problem with FFI is the language spoken by English learners and theirteachers As Poole (2003b) has pointed out, in many settings, the students and the teachersoften share a common first (or second, or third) language and culture, and thus can easilycode-switch in order to overcome communicative difficulties or fill communicative gaps.However, if problematic grammatical forms can be addressed using another language andthen FFI could be seen by teachers and learners as either unnecessary or impractical Long(1991) and Long and Robinson (1998) do not address how the issue of code-switch should

be approached For the researcher, code-switching is a natural phenomenon and it does notaffect the adaptation of FFI

And a final problem with FFI is cultural As for Alex Poole (2005) focus on form is highlyindividualistic in that errors are frequently, although not exclusively, addressed on anindividual basis Therefore, a successful FFI would need to take place in a culturalatmosphere that allows students to actively participate in daily activities Moreover,administrators, teachers, parents, and students would need to feel some degree of comfortwith letting students be active participants- and sometimes leaders- in the content andmanner in which they study However, in many cultures, such student-centeredness beconsidered disrespectful and/or a break of tradition (Poole, 2003b) In fact this problem ismore related to teachers‟ attitudes

R Ellis (2002) found that seven of the eleven studies were effective in improving accuracyscores and identified three key variables that might impact on such success, namely thecomplexity of the target feature, the extent of the instruction and the availability of thetarget feature in non-instructional input

2.4 Summary

In this chapter, FFI has been defined Also, the advantages and disadvantages of FFI havebeen reviewed The major drawbacks or limitations of FFI are the large classes, theteachers‟ proficiency in the target language, and the students‟ learning culture All thesefactors the researcher believes are dynamic and the appropriate adaptation of this approach

to grammar may be more effective regardless of those contextual factors This beliefmotivates the researcher to undertake this quasi- experimental study with a view to testingthe impact of FFI on students‟ grammatical competence The next chapter will present thestudy that was conducted at Hanoi university of Industrial Fine Art