Corrective feedback and uptake patterns in English University speaking lesson = Hành vi sửa lỗi của giáo viên và việc tiếp nhận của sinh viên trong giờ nói tiến

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES



NHẠC THANH HƯƠNG


CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK AND UPTAKE PATTERNS
IN ENGLISH UNIVERSITY SPEAKING LESSONS
(HÀNH VI SỬA LỖI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ VIỆC TIẾP NHẬN CỦA
SINH VIÊN TRONG GIỜ NÓI TIẾNG ANH)

M.A Combined Program Thesis

English Methodology

Major code: 60 14 10








Hanoi - 2011

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES


FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES



NHẠC THANH HƯƠNG


CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK AND UPTAKE PATTERNS
IN ENGLISH UNIVERSITY SPEAKING LESSONS
(HÀNH VI SỬA LỖI CỦA GIÁO VIÊN VÀ VIỆC TIẾP NHẬN CỦA
SINH VIÊN TRONG GIỜ NÓI TIẾNG ANH)

M.A Combined Program Thesis

English Methodology

Major code: 60 14 10
Supervisor: Lê Văn Canh, M.A






Hanoi - 2011

5


TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acceptance……………………………………………………………………
Acknowledgements……………………………………………………………
Abstract………………………………………………………………………
Table of contents………………………………………………………………
Lists of abbreviations…………………………………………………………
Lists of tables and figures……………………………………………………


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………
1.1 Statement of the problem and rationale for the study……………………
1.2 Aims of the study………………………………………………………….
1.3 Scope of the study…………………………………………………………
1.4 Research questions……………………………………………………….
1.5 Methods of the study………………………………………………………
1.6 Significances of the study…………………………………………………
1.7 Terminology used in the study…………………………………………….
1.8 Organization of the study………………………………………………….
Summary………………………………………………………………………


CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………………
2.1 Language errors……………………………………………………………
2.1.1 Definition of language errors……………………………………………

2.1.2 Classification of language errors………………………………………
2.1.3 Approaches to error correction…………………………………………
2.2 Teachers‘ corrective feedback……………………………………………
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2.2.1 Definition of teachers‘ corrective feedback……………………………
2.2.2 Types of teachers‘ corrective feedback………………………………….
2.3 Learners‘ uptake…………………………………………………………
2.4 Issues in second language acquisition…………………………………….
2.4 Studies on corrective feedback in second language acquisition…………
Summary……………………………………………………………………


CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY……………………………………………
3.1 Participants………………………………………………………………
3.2 Data collection instruments………………………………………………
3.3 Procedures…………………………………………………………………
3.3.1 Procedures of data collection…………………………………………….
3.3.2 Procedures of data analysis……………………………………………
Summary………………………………………………………………………


CHAPTER 4: RESULTS……………………………………………………
4.1 An overview of students and teachers turns……………………………….
4.2 Two research questions……………………………………………………
4.2.1 What patterns of corrective feedback occur in English speaking lessons
for second- year students in Hanoi Law University?
4.2.2 To what extent does that corrective feedback lead to students‘ uptake?
Summary……………………………………………………………………….


CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION…………………………………………………

Summary……………………………………………………………………….

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CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION……………………………………………….
6.1 Brief summary of the findings…………………………………………….
6.2 Pedagogical Implications…………………………………………………
6.3 Limitation of the study…………………………………………………….
6.4 Suggestions for further studies…………………………………………….

REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………
APPENDIX
Appendix 1……………………………………………………………………
Appendix 2…………………………………………………………………….


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I
II

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LISTS OF ABBREVIATIONS

ESL English as second language
ELT English Language Teaching
EFL English as a Foreign Language

L2 Language 2
T1, 2, 3 Teacher 1, 2, 3

Sts Students














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LISTS OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 1: Frequency of Turns with Students Error, Teacher Feedback and Student
Uptake in 6 English- speaking periods of Pre-intermediate level.
Table 2: Frequency of Turns with Students Error, Teacher Feedback and Student
Uptake in 6 English- speaking periods of Intermediate level.
Table 3: Distribution of Total Corrective Feedback Types (of both pre-intermediate
and intermediate level)
Table 4: Distribution of Corrective Feedback of Pre-intermediate classes.

Table 5: Distribution of Corrective Feedback of Intermediate classes
Table 6: Uptake Moves following Different Types of Feedback of both Pre-
intermediate and Intermediate levels.
Table 7: Uptake Moves following Different types of Feedback (of Pre-intermediate
level)
Table 8: Uptake Moves following Different types of Feedback (of Intermediate
level)
Table 9: Number and Percentage of Feedback Turns leading to Repair
Table 10: Number and Percentage of Repair attributed to each Feedback Type
Table 11: Distribution of Repairs across Feedback Types and Error Types.
Figure 1: The Total for the entire Database of Pre- intermediate level
Figure 2: The Total for the entire Database of Intermediate level









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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This chapter introduces the study. It begins with the presentation of the statement of
the problem and rationale for the study. Next, it presents the aims and scopes of the
study as well as the research questions to which the study seeks to find answers.
This is followed by a brief description of methodology used in the present study.
Finally, the chapter concludes with a description of the organization of the thesis.

1.1 Statement of Problem and Rationale for the Study.
The impact of corrective feedback on learners‘ L2 acquisition remains controversial
in the second language acquisition (SLA) literature. In fact, there has been some
polarization of thought regarding the effectiveness of corrective feedback, leading
to different or even contradicting theories. For example, DeKeyser (1993) states that
corrective feedback is unnecessary to L2 learning. In other words, corrective
feedback does not lead to the acquisition of L2. However, scholars such as Brooks,
Schraw, and Crippen (2002) and Mason and Bruning (2000), for example, disagree
with DeKeyser, holding that feedback plays an important and crucial role in the
language learning process.

Recently, there has been increasing empirical evidence that corrective feedback
provided by teachers at least enables students to notice the gap between their inter-
language forms and the target language forms, thus helping them to restructure the
inter-language grammar. Additionally, corrective feedback from teachers also helps
enhance students' meta- linguistic awareness (Panova and Lyster, 2002). Therefore,
teachers' corrective feedback is of great importance in promoting student- generated
repairs and in turn, language acquisition. A literature review shows that researchers
have been increasingly interested in examining the relationship between corrective
feedback and uptake (Wai King Tsang, 2004). For example, negotiation of form has
been shown to be able to elicit uptake and successful repair more effectively than



11
explicit correction. Also it has shown that different types of feedback moves tend to
function differentially according to different types of errors.

One issue related to corrective feedback, which has gained little agreement among
researchers and scholars is which type of feedback, i.e., explicit or implicit, is more

effective to learners‘ uptake. For example, Carrol and Swain (1993) have suggested
that learners would benefit more from direct, explicit corrective feedback, whereas
other researchers, such as Lyster and Ranta (1997), Oliver (2000) and Oliver and
Mackey (2003) suggest that learners learn better, when the feedback is more
implicit. It can be interpreted that while consensus has been reached regarding the
effectiveness of corrective feedback on students‘ L2 acquisition, whether explicit or
implicit corrective feedback is more effective remains open. This has led to
confusion at the practical level. As Lyster and Ranta (1997) points out that ―because
of so many different approaches to feedback, second language teachers have trouble
finding research that addresses practical issues of corrective feedback‖ (p. 38).

One of the research gaps regarding corrective feedback is that the majority of
research on feedback on second language classrooms has been conducted either in
the context of immersion programs (Lyster, 1998; Lyster & Ranta, 1997) or in
English as a Second Language (ESL) classrooms (Fanselow, 1977; Lyster &
Panova, 2002). Unfortunately, few of any studies have been conducted at the
University level. In other words, little has been known about how adolescent EFL
learners respond to different kinds of teachers‘ corrective feedback. The situation is
similar in Vietnam, where this research avenue seems to be unattractive to
researchers. Despite the efforts made by the researcher of this study, she was unable
to identify any documented study on the relationship between teachers‘ corrective
feedback and learners‘ uptake which is conducted on Vietnamese university EFL
students. This motivates the researcher to carry out the present study, which is an
expansion of the one she conducted previously in a high school context. The study



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focused on the correlation between teachers‘ corrective feedback and learners‘
uptake in speaking lessons. The number of participants was rather small as it

focused only one level: elementary level, thus, the results, to some extent, could not
reflect the behavior of a larger population at different levels.

For all those reasons, this study is a modest attempt to contribute to the common
knowledge of the impact of corrective feedback on learners‘ L2 acquisition. It also
attempts to narrow the research gap in this area.

1.2 Aims of Study
This research aims to:
 Find out the patterns of teachers' corrective feedback and learners'
uptake in English speaking lessons for second- year students in Hanoi
Law University.
 Examine the relationship between different kinds of teachers'
corrective feedback and learners' uptake, so as to inform teachers of
English in the context of Vietnamese university classrooms of how to
enhance the effect of their corrective feedback.
 Identify the same and differences in the use of corrective feedback at
two different levels.

1.3 Scopes of the Study
This study limits itself to the exploration of the types of corrective feedback that
were commonly used by the teachers in the study and the relationship between
different corrective feedback types on students' oral errors. Thus, teachers' feedback
on students' written errors is beyond the scope of this study.
Given the scope of the study, data for this study were collected from the
observations of English speaking lessons taught to the second year students of pre-
intermediate and intermediate levels at Hanoi Law University.

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1.4. Research Questions
This study focused on (a) subsequent language teacher feedback to student errors
and (b) learner uptake patterns (learner responses to feedback) at University level.
Comprehensive observations of corrective feedback to students and the students‘
subsequent uptake in English language classroom were conducted to determine
answers to the two following research questions:
 What patterns of corrective feedback are observed in English speaking
lessons for second- year students taught by the teachers in an EFL
context of Hanoi Law University?
 To what extent does that corrective feedback lead to students‘ uptake?
And one sub- research question
 What are the differences in the use corrective feedback in English
speaking classes of two levels: pre- intermediate and intermediate

1.5. Methods of the Study
This is a quantitative study. Classroom observation was employed as the sole
instrument of data collection. Data were then analyzed by means of descriptive
statistics to identify the patterns of corrective feedback employed by the observed
teachers.

Participants in this study are four teachers. Two of them were teaching English at
pre- intermediate classes and the other two were teaching at intermediate classes
from Hanoi Law University were selected for observation. Each teacher was
observed in three periods.

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1.6 Significance of the Study
Feedback is a necessary part of every learning process. Feedback provides students
with the information on their performance and learning progress. Therefore, it is
very important to know the feedback types that lead to more effective learning,
especially in the secondary foreign language classroom. The literature review
demonstrated that there are many contradictory views on the issue of feedback
provision. As a result, there is still no agreement between researchers on which type
language feedback is more effective in terms of language learning. Moreover, there
is also no information regarding feedback effectiveness in relationship to students‘
language development. The study was conducted to find out whether there was a
correspondence between and the extent to which teachers‘ oral corrective feedback
led to students‘ uptake depending on types of errors that students made. This
information should be useful to foreign language teachers as they develop practical
feedback classroom strategies because Lyster and Ranta (1997) noted that ―because
of so many different approaches to feedback, second language teachers have trouble
finding research that addresses practical issues of corrective feedback‖ (p. 38).
Particularly, it offers teachers of English a number of important pedagogical
implications in terms of error treatment. Specifically, teachers can be informed
about the effects of different corrective feedback patterns, based on which they can
choose the ones that suit their students‘ levels and work for the types of errors that
these students make.

1.7 Terminology Used in the Study
1. Foreign Language (FL) (language that is learned by a student who speaks
other languages everyday)
2. Second Language (L2) (language that is learned by a student which is

different from the first language)



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3. Second Language Acquisition (SLA)—―acquisition of another language
within one of the regions where the language is commonly spoken‖ (Shrum
& Glisan, 2000, p. 2)
4. Target language—―language of instruction in a foreign language classroom‖
(Shrum & Glisan, 2000, p. 2) or language that is learned by a student
5. Turn—one piece of a student-teacher dialogue that contains an error/s or
feedback.
6. Corrective feedback: " any reaction of the teacher which clearly transforms,
disapprovingly refers to, or demands improvement of the learner utterance"
(Claudron, 1977:31)
7. Explicit correction: By explicit correction, the teacher clearly indicates that
the student's utterance is incorrect, and then, he/ she provides the correct
form (Lyster and Ranta, 1997: 47)
8. Recast is an implicit corrective feedback move that reformulates or expands
an ill- formed or incomplete utterance in an obtrusive way, similar to the
type of recasts provided by primary caregivers in child L1 acquisition (Long,
1996)
9. Clarification request: is one kind of teacher's corrective feedback in which
teacher uses phrases like " Excuse me?" or " I don't understand", she/ he
indicates that the message has not been understood or that the student's
utterance contained some kind of mistake and that a repetition or a
reformation is required (Lyster and Ranta, 1997)
10. Meta-linguistic feedback: refers to either comments, information, or
questions related to well- formedness of the student utterance, without
explicitly providing the correct answer (Lyster and Ranta, 1997:46)

11. Clarification request is a corrective technique that prompts the learner to
self- correct (Lyster and Ranta, 1997)
12. Repetition. The teacher repeats the students' errors and adjusts intonation to
draw student's attention to it.



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13. Elicitation: is a corrective technique that prompts the learner to self- correct
(Lyster and Ranta, 1997)
14. Uptake is defined as "a student's utterance that immediately follows the
teachers' feedback and that constitutes a reaction in some way to the teachers'
intention to draw attention to some aspect of the student's initial utterance"
(Lyster and Ranta, 1997:49).
15. Repair is defined as the correct reformulation of an error as uttered in a
single student turn (Lyster and Ranta, 1997:49)
16. Needs Repair—A learner‘s actions as a reaction to corrective feedback on
his/her eroneous turn that failed to result in correction of an error/s
17. Pushed output is the output that reflects what learners can produce when they
are pushed to use the target language accurately and concisely (Swain, 1985)
18. Immersion Language Program—an intense language learning process,
whereby students not only study the target language, but use the language
exclusively in other classes, as well as in daily activities.

1.8 Organization of the Study
The thesis is composed of 6 chapters. The first chapter presents the research focus
and provides the rationale for it as well as its aims, scopes, method, research
questions and the significance of the study. Chapter 2 reviews the literature on
students‘ errors, teachers‘ corrective feedback and students‘ uptake as well as on the
relationship between teachers‘ corrective feedback and learners‘ uptake in order to

identify a research gap where the present study fits. Chapter 3, the Methodology,
presents the methodology employed to carry out the present study. This includes a
discussion of the participants, the data collection instruments and the procedures for
data collection and analysis. Chapter 4 presents the findings of the study with
reference to the patterns of teachers‘ corrective feedback and students‘ uptake and
also their relationship. It should be noted that in this chapter data collected from
classroom observation is analyzed separately between elementary level and pre-



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intermediate level to see clearly the same and differences between the patterns of
teachers‘ corrective feedback and students‘ uptake. Chapter discusses the findings,
which are presented in Chapter 4, with reference to the literature review, focusing
on the relationship between teachers‘ corrective feedback and students‘ uptake.
Chapter 6, the Conclusion, gives a brief summary of the main findings, from which
pedagogical implications are derived. This chapter also acknowledges the
limitations of the present study and provides suggestions for further studies.

Summary
This chapter presents the rationale of the study, which is aimed to examine the
patterns of corrective feedback and its impact on learners‘ uptake. In order to
achieve that aim, observation was used as the sole instrument of data collection. All
observational data were analyzed quantitatively in terms of the percentage. The
researcher believes this approach to data analysis was appropriate to find out the
common patterns of teachers‘ corrective feedback as well as the extent to which
teachers‘ corrective feedback led to students‘ uptake. Next chapter reviews the
relevant literature.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

The purpose of this chapter is to review the literature on the relationship between
teacher's error corrections, in a broader sense, teacher's corrective feedback and
learners' uptake. This chapter starts with an overview of language errors, and
approaches to error correction. Secondly, literature on teachers‘ corrective feedback
and students‘ uptake are reviewed. Finally, a number of studies on corrective
feedback in second language acquisition are discussed in terms of differences and
similarities.

2.1 Language Errors.
2.1.1 Definition of Language Errors
The definition of language errors is rather complex as different authors have
different ways of defining it. In order to provide the most appropriate definition of
error, it is necessary to consider some related issues.

Brown (1994: 205) claims that "a mistake is a performance error that is either a
random guess, or a "slip" in that it is a failure to utilize a known system correctly".
According to this definition, a native speaker could make a mistake in his native
language. Errors, on the other hand, are problems that a native speaker could not
have. Brown (1994: 205) defines an error as "noticeable deviation from adult
grammar of a native speaker, which reflects the inter-language competence of the
learner". The above definitions suggest that as someone learns a foreign language,
the errors he/ she makes indicate his/her level of proficiency. Obviously, the errors
of a beginner are different from the errors of an advanced learner. Moreover,
according to that definition, errors can become mistakes when the learner achieves a
near-native speaker‘s competence. At this time, what he makes are mistakes, not
errors.




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For Snow (1977), the distinction between errors and mistakes depends on whether a
L2 learner knows that he/she does something wrong and can fix it or not. In his
point of view, there are three stages of progression in the language learning process.
The first stage is noted when the learner does something wrong without knowing it;
in the second stage he/she may know he/she is doing it wrong but does not know
how to put it right; and the last stage comes when he/she can correct his/her wrong
version. With this process, Snow asserts that errors occur in the first two stages and
the last stage is for mistakes. Understandably, a mistake occurs when students know
the correct language but incorrectly retrieve it from memory whereas an error
occurs when student have incorrectly learnt or do not yet know the correct
language.

In sum, there are various ways of defining a language error. Each definition is

undoubtedly useful to language learning and teaching. In this study, an error is
defined according to Snow (1977) who assumes that errors are what occurs when
the learner does something wrong without knowing it, or he may know he is doing
it wrong but does not know how to put it right.

It is also noted that speaking errors are the focus of this study. Speaking errors, like
errors in general, occur when the learner does something wrong without knowing it
or he/she may know he/she is doing it wrong but does not know how to put it right.
Also, as speaking errors are a kind of spoken language, they can be understood as
"faults made by speakers during the production of sounds, words and sentences"
(Richard Platt, and Platt, 1992:344).








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2.1.2 Classification of Language Errors
Errors can be classified in different ways depending on the nature of such
classification and the purpose of the author. In this thesis, the researcher only
provides some typical ways of error classification.

Errors are categorized into overt errors which are obviously ungrammatical or of
wrong pronunciation and covert errors, which are superficially well formed but not
interpretable (Brown (1994:208)). For example, an overt error is found in the
sentence ―Last Saturday, I go to Cuc Phuong National Park‖ in the form of incorrect
grammar. Whereas a covert error appears in the sentence ―The monitor makes an

example for the whole class‖. This sentence is superficially well formed but
―makes‖ cannot be used as native speakers use ―set an example for…‖ as an
unchangeable phrase.
Concerning the effect of errors, Bartram & Rechards (2001: 89) divided errors into
global and local ones. A global error is an error in the use of a major element of
sentence structure, which makes a sentence or utterance difficult or impossible to
understand (Richard et al, 1992:157) Understandably, global errors are often to do
with wrong word order or wrong use of conjunction, and thus involve the " overall
structure of the sentence" and often lead to the misunderstanding of the meaning of
the sentence. For example: I will go out unless it does not rain. This may be
contrasted with a local error, which is an error in the use of an element of sentence
structure, does not cause problems of comprehension (Richard et al, 1992: 157).
Thus, local errors are considered to be minor. An example of a local error is:―If I
heard from him, I will let you know‖

Referring to the causes, Richards et al (1992) classified errors into "inter-lingual
errors" and "intra-lingual errors". An inter-lingual error refers to the one, which
results from language transfer. For example, the incorrect French sentence " J'aime
te" (I love you) produced by a native speaker of English according to the word order



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of English, instead of the correct French sentence " Je t' aime". An intra-lingual
error is the one, which results from faulty or partial learning of the target language,
rather than from language transfer. Intra-lingual errors may be caused by the
influence of one target language item upon another. For instance, a learner may
generate" He is comes" based on a blend of the English structures" He is coming
and he comes"

In fact, it is hard to distinguish intra-lingual and inter- lingual errors in practice.
Therefore, errors caused by language transfer are not included in this study. Instead,
the researcher uses the way of classifying errors, which categorizes them into
various levels of linguistic form (Edge, 1989:11): phonological, grammatical, and
lexical

2.1.3 Approaches to Error Correction
There are a large number of differences in attitudes towards errors and error
correction between traditional and modern methods of language teaching. In
traditional language classes, errors were not allowed. Errors were seen as evidence
of ineffective learning or even laziness. Also, teachers paid little attention to how to
correct errors effectively. If they corrected an error, it would be giving the student
the correct model and getting him/ her to repeat it. However, Van Lier (1988) noted
that in the late sixties and early seventies, teachers began to comprehend that errors
might be more an indication of learner efforts to form a new linguistic system rather
than linguistic failure. Specifically, in the light of communicative language
teaching, errors are seen as positive steps towards learning. The teacher‘s attitude
towards correction is positive and correction techniques are used to encourage
students, not to put them down or make them feel stupid. For these teachers, a
perfect lesson is full of students' errors, in which teachers' correction is an integral
part.



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Error correction now is seen as a technique to get students to speak right out what
they want to say. Error correction not only helps a learner correct his/her errors but
also helps him/her to develop his/her language competence without distracting
communication purposes. It means that in language classes, when error correction is
carried out, the negotiation of meaning and negotiation of form, at the same time are

of equal value. Thus, error treatment in second language acquisition classroom has
been investigated in a larger scale and in a larger sense. These studies have all
borrowed the framing questions of the issue of error correction in the classroom
used by Hendrickson (1978). Those questions mentioned what, when, how and who
should do the error correction.
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?

The issue of whether errors should be corrected has been rather controversial. On
the one hand, Truscott (1999, 1996) claims that correction in both oral and written
work does not work as teachers correct inconsistently, sometimes wrongly; and
correction may interfere with fluency. On the other hand, Gass (1991: 136) stated
that: ―nothing in the target language is available for intake into a language learner‘s
existing system unless it is consciously noticed‖. One quasi- experimental study
carried out by DeKeyser (1993) found that error correction did not have an overall
effect on students' proficiency in the L2 but it did interact with each learner
differently. Thus, learners with high extrinsic motivation were affected in a way that
was not the same as those with low extrinsic motivation. For example, learners with
low extrinsic motivation did better on oral tasks after error correction whereas those
with high extrinsic motivation did better on oral task without error correction.
Hence, in order to ensure that students are receptive to error treatment, it is



23
necessary to find out their preferences and attitudes, as well as how sensitive or
resilient they are towards correction and feedback (Hugh, 2000)

Having agreed with the principles of correction, the next question to ask is “Which
errors should be corrected?‖ According to Hugh (2000), errors, which are regularly
repeated by one or more students or are considered to be the most serious, should be
treated. In order to do that, firstly, types of errors should be differentiated (Hugh,
2000). The distinction can be made between global errors and local errors. In
general, global errors, which hinder or interfere with communication of the
speaker‘s message are more serious and thus should be corrected so that learners
can carry out clear communication (Mac Donald, 2000). Another distinction can be
made between competence errors, which occur because the learner does not yet
know how to perform a skill and performance errors, which are often ―slips of
tongue‖ or ―slips of pen‖ (Mac Donald, 2000). If the mistakes are competence
errors, then feedback should be provided. Another important point is the frequency
of an error. If an error is repeated several times insistently, it needs to be corrected
(Hugh, 2000)

There is no absolute ―rule‖ about when to or not to correct students’ errors. Perhaps
we should not correct when a learner is focusing on communicating because it is
non-communicative, inauthentic, and inappropriate to the aims of the task (Ur,
2006). However, Harmer (2005) claims that learners want to be corrected at the
moment they make the mistake. Both ideas seem plausible, nonetheless. Thus,
which is more important? ―Preserving the fluent process and communicative nature
of the interaction?‖ or ―providing corrective feedback where it is needed to help
learners improve their accuracy?‖ The decision will involve a lot of different
considerations specific to the learner: the importance of encouraging fluency, the
importance of encouraging accuracy, the confidence and self-image of the learner,
and the sheer number of mistakes (Ur, 2006).

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Concerning the question posed by Hendrickson (1978) “how to correct‖, a number
of studies have been carried out. Teachers and learners tend to have different
preference for correction patterns according to the types of errors. For example, for
grammatical errors, students may prefer a model of incorrect/ correct, while
teachers may prefer marking the errors only and then let students self- correct; yet,
for pronunciation errors both teachers and students may prefer a simple model of
correct forms (Cathcart and Olsen, 1976). In communicative language lessons,
corrective feedback, which does not provide the target form, proves to be more
valued than those, which provide the target form. Different researchers have
different ideas regarding how to provide corrective feedback. In Oliver's study
(1995), advanced learners were said to be more sensitive towards recasts. Young
learners, in contrast, did not tend to notice recasts in communicative classrooms
(Lyster, 1998). However, recasts may be ambiguous as the learner, in fact, cannot
determine whether it is the model of the correct version or a different way of saying
the same thing (Long 1996; Lyster 1998). On some occasions, teachers might tend
to elicit uptake, or engage students to correct their errors when they use recasts. On
other occasions, although students may not commit errors, teachers might just aim
to expose learners to or emphasize target-like form, while still encouraging learners
to continue with the topic and maintain the interaction, not expecting uptake from
students. Thus, it seems that more explicit focus than recasts alone might help to
draw learners' attention to errors more clearly (Doughty and Varela, 1998).

The question of ―who should do the correcting‖ also raises a large number of ideas.
―A self- discovery approach‖ (Hugh, 2000) may reduce the likelihood of learners
becoming dependent on teacher assistance. At the beginning, learners require
teacher support to become aware of, and correct their errors. However, gradually,
teacher intervention should be reduced and learners should be encouraged to
recognize their own errors (Mac Donald, 2000). Bailey (1991) also advocates the
delayed use of corrective techniques in order to make room for learners to do self-

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repair. Others, such as Calve (1992), recommend both self- repair and peer- repair,
which are also known as student- generated repairs (Lyster and Ranta 1997), with
teachers' clues rather than recast. However, Gass and Varonis (1994) do not share
the same view with Calve (1992) when he advocates more teachers‘ direct and overt
corrective feedback in order to avoid misleading learners into believing that
linguistic errors are acceptable.

In conclusion, error correction has been investigated from the early times of
communicative language teaching. Those studies, in some ways, all imply the
relationship between teachers' error correction and learners' responses after being
corrected. In the scope of this study, the researcher only examined a case study in
one university to confirm conclusions drawn from earlier research. In this study,
corrective feedback is to be investigated.

2.2 Teachers' Corrective Feedback
2.2.1 Definition of Teachers’ Corrective Feedback
One of the main roles of the language teacher is to give feedback to students' work.
In Lumetta‘s (2005) view, effective feedbacks are those which not only need to be
specific (precise and specific examples or behaviors), frequent (giving feedback as
frequently as possible), timely (delivering as close in time to the incident if
applicable), but also contain both positive (reinforcing)/ negative (corrective)
feedback. In this study, the researcher only focuses on negative feedback, which
often takes the form of error correction in English speaking lessons. Error
correction, in the view of Edge (1989:20) is "a way of reminding students of the
forms of Standard English. It should not be a kind of criticism or punishment".
Long‘s (1996) view of feedback in general is more comprehensive. It suggests that

environmental input can be thought of in terms of two categories that are provided
to the learners about the target language: positive evidence and negative evidence.
Long defines positive evidence as providing the learners with models of what is



26
grammatical and acceptable in the target language; and negative evidence as
providing the learners with direct or indirect information about what is
unacceptable.

James (1998:256-257) offers another way of understanding error correction.
According to him, correction can be understood in "three senses". In the first sense,
correction can be understood as feedback, which informs learners that there is an
error, and leaves them to diagnose and repair it themselves. In the second sense, it
refers to proper correction in which learners are not only informed about the error
but also shown how to repair it, or even given an alternative. The third sense of
error correction is remediation, which means carrying out error analysis that
explains why an error is committed with the view to preventing its recurrence. In
this research, error correction is one kind of teacher's feedback and it can be used
interchangeably with term "corrective feedback"

Chaudron (1998) holds that the term corrective feedback incorporates different
layers of meaning. In Chaudron‘s view, treatment of error may simply refer to: ―any
teacher behavior following an error that minimally attempts to inform the learner of
the fact of error‖.

Lightbown and Spada (1999) define corrective feedback as: any indication to the
learners that their use of the target language is incorrect. This includes various
responses that the learners receive. When a language learner says, ―she clean the

room everyday‖, corrective feedback can be explicit, for example, ―no, you should
say cleans, not clean‖ or implicit ―yes, she cleans the room everyday‖, and may or
may not include meta-linguistic information, for example, ―Don‘t forget to make the
verb agree with the subject‖.




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Thus, teachers' corrective feedback, to some extent, is the teacher's correction and
can be defined as teachers' indication to learners' errors, which takes the forms of
implicit or explicit correction. The researcher of this study agrees with Lightbrown
and Spada‘s (1999) definition above, but adopts the following definition by Ellis,
Loewen and Erlam (2006) that
Corrective feedback takes the form of teacher‘s responses to learner
utterances that contain an error. The responses can consist of (a) and
indication that an error has been committed; (b) the provision of the correct
target language form; or (c) metalinguistic information about the nature of
the error; or any combination of these (p.340)

2.2.2 Types of Teachers' Corrective Feedback
Lyster and Ranta (1997) observed a variety of lessons and yielded six different types
of corrective feedback
Explicit correction: By explicit correction, the teacher clearly indicates that the
student's utterance is incorrect, and then, he/ she provides the correct form (Lyster
and Ranta, 1997:47)
 For example:
S: The day…. tomorrow (lexical error)
T: Yes, no. The day before yesterday (explicit correction)
Recast: is an implicit corrective feedback move that reformulates or expands an

ill formed or incomplete utterance in an obtrusive way, similar to the type of recasts
provided by primary caregivers in child L1 acquisition (Long, 1996)
 For example:
S: He asked you why didn't want to speak with him. He said that you are
rude to him (grammatical error)
T: Good. You were (recast)
S: You were rude to him