Feedback at the Core of a Language Class: When It Works Best
Reza Norouzian, Iran
Reza Norouzian is an Applied Linguistics PhD candidate at the University of Tehran, Iran. He currently runs “EAP” courses at the University of Tehran, Tehran University of Medical Sciences and at the English department of the Azad University. His main areas of interest are written feedback, interlanguage pragmatics, qualitative research and CALL. He has published a number of articles in internationally renowned journals. E-mail: rnorouzain@gmail.com
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Abstract
Introduction
Research method
Students’ specific needs
Students’ age group
Level of language mastery
Task goal
Source of error
Concluding comments
References
This exploratory study brings to the fore important considerations regarding how Teacher Feedback, as it stands, would be constructive. Initially, a set of fifteen experienced EFL instructors at five language institutes were sampled and orally interviewed (using open-ended questions). Following a qualitative methodology, the data were first recorded, transcribed and then were coded for their common features. Later, a systematic array of categories taken from data clusters was extracted. These were identified as “Students’ Specific Needs”, “Students’ Age Group”, “Level of Language Mastery”, “Task Goal” and “Source of Error”. It is concluded that to suit individual and group differences when providing feedback, an awareness of these categories is necessary.
It can be theorized from an integration of theory and practice that two elements are central to the progress in English as a Foreign/Second Language (EFL/ESL). One is involvement in communication or communicative tasks in which students can generate and test hypotheses about the target language (e.g. Rosa & Leow, 2004). And the other is providing error feedback (EF) which is said to help students evaluate, reflect and change their linguistic performance (e.g. Jensen, et al, 2010). General opinion is that EF makes it possible for language learners to notice the gap between the forms they produce and the target language forms. In cases where teachers opt for the former at the cost of the latter, learners may achieve inadequate mastery necessary to tackle their accuracy problems. Conversely, when they go for the latter and disregard the former, learners show low performance in communicating the desired meaning.
To remedy this situation, a suggestion for Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) advocates might be to focus on form, i.e., teaching rules in context, rather than on forms, i.e., teaching rules in isolation (see, Long, 1991). Clearly, this entails an integrated approach to language instruction, shifting attention to language structures within a meaning-focused activity or task. One method to achieve an integrated approach is to provide feedback in the course of communication.
Thought to be of value to learners, EFL/ESL teachers apply different methods of providing feedback. One method that has received considerable attention recently is recasting. A recast correctly reformulates a student’s incorrect utterance while maintaining the central meaning of it (Lightbown and Spada, 2006). Experts who do not support recasts tend to adhere to prompts instead (e.g. Loewen, 2007). In prompting, teacher does not offer the correct form but rather attempts to get the student to self-correct. It is intriguing to note that this technique is effective only if learners have some latent knowledge of the form. If the form is entirely new, no amount of prompting will suffice.
Apart from the type of technique used to give feedback to language learners, there seem to be critical considerations to make the whole thing more meaningful in an EFL/ESL context.
The study started with an experienced male teacher who consented to share his views on error feedback and give an interview to the researcher. Analysis and coding of this first interview shaped the subsequent questions and participants that could help developing the concepts and categories. Fifteen participants who taught EFL to mainly adult learners were finally located at five language institutions. Six of the participants had earned their Masters’ degrees in Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL), three had received their Bachelors’ degrees in English translation; and still six held Bachelors’ degrees in other fields of science. The theoretical sampling of concepts ended after interviewing these fifteen participants since the researcher was faced with theoretical saturation, i.e., a point at which new data seemed to be redundant.
What follows is an elaboration of five crucial conditions, taken from these fifteen experienced (with more than eight years of teaching experience) EFL instructors’ views at University of Tehran affiliated language institutes. Obviously, this might help language teachers developing procedural policies and designing unifying patterns in responding to students’ errors.
It is important to accept that the process of error feedback provision is decided on based upon a number of factors one of which is students’ specific need of learning English. In one class, there may be different groups of students who learn English for different purposes. There may be some who learn English because they need it for academic purposes. Alternatively, there may be some who learn English for social purposes such as travelling. Whereas the first group might want their errors to be rectified because accuracy is a main concern for them, the second group may not want their flow of speech to be interrupted because communication and fluency is vital for them. As a case in point, Kourosh, a teacher participant, distinguished his feedback based on the very learner variable. He reminded that his being lenient or strict towards learner error depended on learners’ expectations of the course. Similar to teaching, feedback should respond to learners’ needs. He explained:
“If they are trying English for university purposes, I tend to be strict on all errors as accuracy issues in academic arena are of great use. In contrast, if their purpose is to use English in social contexts, I place higher priority on the fluency issues, that is comprehensibility of their utterances. When my audiences are novice teachers, I comprehensively correct all errors because it helps them be sensitive about their own errors when speaking to the learners as a language teacher.”
It is commonplace to hear from English teachers that direct feedback, i.e., presenting the correct form, is effective for adults. Quite the contrary, children respond better to indirect feedback i.e., circling, underlining the erroneous form. There is growing body of evidence to show that children grasp better the target language form through implicit, inductive approaches. Conversely, adults come to grips with the target language form better through explicit deductive approaches. Comparably, children rarely understand it if the teacher explains a target language rule. Mehrdad, another teacher participant, pointed out:
“During young learners’ talks, I prefer to skip their errors. If I have to give feedback, I correct them in such a way that does not hurt their feelings. As long as they proceed, I never correct. Instead, I write the erroneous forms and guide them through the correct form inductively. As young learners do not know technical jargon, they cannot understand it if I explain the rule. Again, I usually plan to immerse them in examples of the correct use of the erroneous form, and I leave the rest to the learners. It is my belief that they would find the correct form from patterns presented.”
Expert teachers usually believe that depending on students’ levels of language mastery they should use different methods and different degrees of error feedback. They distinguish their feedback techniques based two distinct objectives: fluency and accuracy. Most of them seem to agree that at lower levels of proficiency they should focus on fluency. When learners are able to convey their intended meaning fluently, they focus on accuracy. It is at this stage that providing feedback comes into play. Mahgol explained:
“At lower levels, I focus on communication and learners’ communicative intent rather than the form of their speech. At these levels we should rarely correct learners' errors for two reasons: first, correcting de-motivates learners, and second, they are likely to encounter and discover the correct form at other higher levels. At higher levels, I correct learners directly by showing what the erroneous form is and then try to present them with the relevant linguistic information through explanation.”
One teaching unit may be organized around different types of tasks. Whilst some aim to involve students in communication, others may aim at presenting learners with mere practice. Moreover, some tasks are devoted to developing pronunciation and some to improving grammar and vocabulary. One of the common pitfalls of teacher feedback is to correct all errors irrespective of the objective of the task (comprehensive feedback). This unsystematic approach not only disrupts communication, it is also useless in terms of creating form-awareness. Sadegh stated:
“In observing classes, I have found that feedback is very unsystematic. That is, each and every mistake is corrected on the spot. I believe that error correction should be systematic. I believe that error correction should be in line with the objectives of the task in hand. That is, if we teach grammar, we should correct grammatical mistakes. If the purpose of the task is to improve learners' pronunciation, I focus on their pronunciation errors and try to ignore errors in other areas such as grammar or word choice. I believe if you correct everything, you correct nothing; the reason being that students lose the objective of the task and they do not learn anything at all.”
One cannot start “feedbacking” without first distinguishing the source of errors. In Audio-lingualism teachers’ recognized interlingual errors, i.e., errors coming from the first language habits, (the case of negative transfer) as the only source of errors. Today, however, such a supposition is not accepted. Thus, teachers should differentiate their approach to the treatment of errors depending on the source of the error. For interlingual errors, teachers might like to juxtapose the first language form and the target language form on the board. Then through explanation, make students aware of the differences. For intralingual errors, however, direct feedback might not be a good option. This is because through further exposure to the target language, there is always a possibility for learners to discover the correct form. This way, they will better notice the faulty rule that produces the faulty example.
This realization helped these teachers take different approaches to each error source. Abbas explained:
“While students are communicating, I write their errors down. Then I classify them into interlingual and intralingual errors. For each group, I follow a different strategy. For interlingual errors, I try to juxtapose the first language form and the target language form on the board. Then through explanation, I try to make students aware of the differences. As for the second group, i.e., intralingual errors, I never correct them, since I believe that through further exposure to the target language, learners will discover the correct form and they will self-correct the faulty rule that produces the faulty form.”
The idea of learner-tailored feedback, is in step with the latest theoretical findings concerning instruction. For instance, Connor, Morrison, and Katch (2004) discovered that students achieved more growth when their instruction was matched to their needs—different children with different needs benefited from different opportunities. Similarly, it is prudent to suggest that teachers should realize that provision of feedback leads to language development if it is tailored to meet individual differences. Meanwhile, they should be cautioned that one-size-fits-all instruction would not be as effective as differentiated instruction.
Connor, C. M., Morrison, F. J., & Katch, L. E. (2004). Beyond the reading wars: Exploring the effect of child-instruction interactions on growth in early reading. Scientific Studies of Reading, 8, 305–336.
Jensen, M. H., Kornell, N., and Bjork, R. A. (2010). The costs and benefits of providing feedback during learning. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 17 (6), 797-801.
Lightbown, P. M., & Spada, N. (2006). How languages are learned. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Loewen, S. (2007). Error correction in second language acquisition. Clear News, 11(2), 1-7.
Long, M. (1991). Focus on form: A design feature in language teaching methodology. In K. de Bot, R. Ginsberg & C. Kramsch (Eds.), Foreign language research in cross-cultural perspectives (pp. 39-52). Amsterdam, Holland: John Benjamin.
Rosa, E., & Leow, R. P. (2004). Computerized task-based exposure, explicitness, type of feedback, and Spanish L2 development. Modern Language Journal, 88(2), 192-216.
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