10.1 Function, objectives and aims – 10.2 Developing skills and confidence – 10.3 Error correction techniques

Paul Murphy

7 years ago

Congratulations on successfully passing the ninth module! 🙂

In this Error Correction tenth course module, we will be taking a look at (10.1) Function, objectives and aims, (10.2) Developing skills and confidence, (10.3) Error correction techniques. It is essential that you thoroughly read through all the information presented within this module, before then completing the Module Quiz and proceeding to the eleventh module. If you have any module-related questions, please contact your personal tutor through the CONTACT LESSON TEACHER button. Good luck and we hope you enjoy completing your tenth module! 🙂

(10.1) Function, objectives and aims. / (10.2) Developing skills and confidence. / (10.3) Error correction techniques.

Because the sections of this module overlap in many places, we will be looking at the module sections as a whole.

We have already looked at error correction in the Teaching Speaking Module, and we just need to add a little more information in this module, so that the circle is complete.

Errors are regarded as a natural part of the learning process, with the teacher performing the role of facilitator, providing help when necessary and creating a supportive environment in which learners can obtain a successful enhanced learning outcome. They are significant indicators of the learning progress showing what learners have attained and what remains to be acquired and provide the language teacher the necessary information about how to deal with the problems that may arise and give a meaningful comprehensible feedback which proves to be beneficial in the long run.

Furthermore, the teacher should guide learners to use the appropriate meta-language needed to communicate ideas and beliefs about their learning process. In addition, teachers should be sensitive and sympathetic toward the different learning capabilities present in their classes and try to avoid embarrassing a learner and instead encouraging them to take risks using the language.

The influence of a learner’s age, level of proficiency and learning style lead them to react differently to error correction. In order to prevent students feeling misled and confused, teachers should avoid over-correction. Teachers should provide a positive affective feedback, reduce the tension caused by error correction and encourage all their students to improve their works. Language anxiety may affect a student’s self-esteem, self-confidence, hamper proficiency in language acquisition, and hinder their achievement. Encouragement and non-threatening instruction are good ways to ease learner anxiety and strengthen their motivation.

In order to avoid learners’ embarrassment and inhibition that may result in their discouragement to respond to the teacher’s input, errors should be regarded as a natural part of the learning process, as a meaningful learning tool and not as an obstacle that may impede a successful learning experience.

Errors are manifestations of the learner’s latent linguistic and cognitive procedures, and a learner’s errors are significant in three different ways:

they tell the teacher how far towards the goal the learner has progressed and, consequently, what still remains to be learned.
they provide the researcher evidence of how language is learned or acquired, what strategies or procedures the learner is employing in his discovery of the language.
they are indispensable to the learner himself /herself, because we can regard the making of errors as a device the learner uses in order to learn.

There are different types of correction techniques the students may get acquainted with throughout their learning process: self-correction, peer correction, group correction and teacher correction. The teacher should choose the one/s that best suit the specific learning situation. More often than not, students’ affective filter is high, which makes them oblivious to repairing feedback and thus shelter under a negative attitude that impedes language acquisition problems to be solved.

The classroom atmosphere should be friendly and cooperative in order to prevent learners’ negative anxiety, hindrance and increase their self-reliance. The affective impact of error correction on learners, depends on their level of proficiency and level of anxiety; the higher, the more negative the impact on the language acquisition process. In other words, aiming to diminish the tension provoked by error correction, positive and constructive comments should be provided to encourage learners to become risk-takers. Methods and materials should not be a test of the student’s abilities, should not merely reveal weaknesses, but should help the student to acquire more. Hence, students may not be ‘on the defensive’ and may attempt to communicate without fear of making faulty productions.

For example, elicitation and repetition are techniques the teacher uses during the learner’s oral production when he/she expects a more complete answer from the latter or repeats the student’s idea so that he/she can realize that something has to be reframed.

When correcting the written work, the teacher may focus on a certain grammar point, for instance the Present Simple tense, narrowing the scope of the different types of mistakes. Therefore, the teacher may help the learner to concentrate on that specific grammar point and may have more time to evaluate the errors made and the learner is corrected privately, without experimenting the annoyance and embarrassment of being corrected in front of the whole group.

Teacher classroom feedback to students should give them the message that mistakes are not ‘bad’ but that most mistakes are good indicators that innate acquisition abilities are alive and well. Mistakes are often indicators of aspects of the new language that are still developing. Nevertheless, it cannot be ignored that, no matter how well intentioned the teacher’s feedback may be, if the student rejects the idea of being corrected, it will not be effective at all. In other words, the teacher will succeed in his/her attempt to correct his/her student only if the latter is open minded to acknowledge his/her weaknesses and accepts the feedback provided.

Teachers are expected to correct errors that affect understanding: errors that interfere with the general meaning and accuracy of utterances. They may be also uncertain about what and how to correct students’ errors and whether immediate or late correction is suitable. Awareness of the mistakes/errors made and early correction prevent them from being fossilized.

When is feedback expected to be given?

In the case of an oral task it is convenient not to interrupt the learner with corrections as he/she may find himself/herself in an embarrassing awkward situation and stop communicating. When the written production is overcorrected the student may feel demotivated and bewildered without knowing how to redo the work.

What is going to be corrected?

In a written task, the teacher should make it explicit which teaching point is going to be corrected, so the student may understand more easily the correction provided; while during an oral production, correction should happen only when the ideas are not clearly conveyed and the meaning cannot be grasped.

It is also interesting to note here that the native language of learners exerts a strong influence on the acquisition of the target language system. While that native system will exercise both facilitating and interfering effects on the production and comprehension of the new language, the interfering effects are likely to be the most salient. A Learner’s errors give signals of an underlying system at work. Errors are, in fact, windows to a learner’s internalized understanding of the second language, and therefore they give teachers something observable to react on. Errors of the native language interference may be repaired by acquainting the learner with the native language cause of the error.

Correction feedback.

Feedback may be defined as the information provided to learners concerning their performance either by the teacher or peers, aiming at bettering their knowledge of the target language.

It is intended to motivate learners and help them become aware of their problems and improve on them. The provision of corrective feedback can speed up the process of language learning by giving information about the rules and limits of the language use. The effectiveness and usefulness of corrective feedback imply both correcting students and offering them an assessment of how well they have performed, and a tolerant and positive attitude to errors on the part of the teacher.

Positive affective comments should be offered to encourage learners and reduce the tensions caused by error correction, avoiding the risk of demoralizing students who can be tied to their own limitations and attitudes as regards accuracy and errors. Teachers should give not only a selective correction, bearing in mind the learners’ level of proficiency in the foreign language, the kinds of errors made, and the learners’ attitude toward error correction, but also a supportive attitude to their learners, encouraging them to get over their fears and insecurities and fostering their self-confidence. A comprehensible and timely feedback should be provided in a safe and relaxed learning atmosphere so that learners can reach a low affective filter and acquire the language successfully.

Now read the following five examples of learner errors and mentally decide on an efficient way of indicating what is wrong, correcting it.

I am boring with this lesson!
I enjoy to swim.
He brokened the car.
I go to the party last Saturday.
I’d like some informations about the plane times.

An additionally useful correction technique is ‘Fingers’.

This section introduces this simple, but effective, basic technique for clarifying the structure of sentences and for instant error correction, which is especially useful when you are working mainly on spoken English without immediate use of written models. For example, you’re teaching, ‘He went to Milan yesterday’. And one of your learners is confused about the word order.

The basic technique of Finger correction:

Put down any pens, paper that you may have and hold up one hand in front of you.
Each finger represents one word. Use your other hand to indicate each word/finger in turn as you say the sentence (or you elicit the sentence from the students).
The learner gets a clear visual indication of the shape of the sentence.

Please note that the word order for your students must read left to right, so from your position ‘behind’ your fingers, the sentence will appear to be right to left.

Students may need a little training before this technique shows its real simplicity and power. The first time you use ‘finger sentences’, make sure your students are clear that fingers represent words. Don’t let them rush you; allow time to focus clearly on the individual words/fingers and clarify the problem they have. Once learners have seen the technique used three or four times, it soon becomes a valuable classroom tool.

Variations and ideas.

A learner says a sentence wrongly. You get him/her to repeat the sentence while you indicate with your fingers each word as it is said. When the error is reached, indicate that this word is the problem by facial expression or a gesture. You can then clarify the error by means of more specific signs:

These two words are in the wrong order (draw a small circle above the two appropriate fingers).
You don’t need this word (fold down the finger corresponding to the extra word).
There should be an extra word here (point to the gap between the appropriate fingers).
Say it quickly (hold out spread fingers, and with the other hand close them together).
Third syllable is wrong (use the joints of your finger to represent the syllables).
Contraction (for example, I am > I’m) (hold the appropriate fingers apart and then move them together).

Using finger sentences.

Practice this with a colleague facing you (or a mirror, if there are no volunteers around). Think of a nonsense sentence, for example: Pop tee tipple on ug. Say the sentence quickly and get your colleague to repeat it. Then use the techniques above to get them to:

improve their pronunciation of individual words and the whole sentence.
learn a question form with two of the words in a different order.

Congratulations on reading through the tenth module!

Now it’s time to take the Module 10 Quiz, after which you will gain access to the eleventh module.

Important! We recommend reading through the tenth module again to ensure that you are fully prepared to take this quiz.

Click on the VIEW THE LESSON QUIZ button to proceed to the Module 10 Quiz…