Correction techniques in esl classes

Correction techniques in the esl writing class

When to correct written work

While the writing is being done or as soon as possible afterwards. You can correct at 10 times the rate that they can produce. It is counter-productive to correct fully. Indicate the mistake and re-create the situation. Spare them of embarrassment - public humiliation. Tactful: can you see what's wrong with this?

How much should you correct?

Explain your marking system

Distinguish between three main categories of errors

  1. Those which lead to misunderstanding or breakdown of communication - caused by:
  2. Lesser but often irritating errors -
    • wrong tense
    • non-agreement
    • word order
    • articles omitted or misused
    • spelling mistakes
    • punctuation
  3. Stylistic errors - inappropriate style formal/informal, wrong register.

Samples of students' writing:

  1. Poor grammar: I has driven to London shopping. In the afternoon I come back, and I've eaten anything, after this I went tio a pub. At 11 o'clock I went home in my bed.
  2. Poor graphical skills - letters aren't vertical enough: He coming from Airport Hintero by Train to Prighton From ppighton to my flat by taxi I have flat near school. I walking from my flat to school.
  3. Poor spelling & punctuation - I give you Some instrustions how to get to my adreas or my place You can comeing from heathrou airport to victory station buy anderGraon and after you can comeing by trian to Hove.
  4. Direct translation - I'm very pleasant for me that you spend some days with me in my town, but you needn't go to a hotel, I think is much better that you go to my house. The form easier to get there is that you take a taxi, and indicate my address.


ESSAY TITLE: If used positively, correction can play an extremely important role in language learning. Give examples of the ways in which you correct both oral and written work at the elementary and intermediate levels.

A positive approach to correction begins with the way in which the language programme itself is planned. The teacher needs to anticipate the areas of language that are likely to cause difficulty and to decide how mistakes will be treated. Structures, functions and areas of pronunciation which commonly present problems can often be predicted from the linguistic backgrounds of the students. An entry test will confirm many of these predictions and may also reveal individual problems which need particular attention.

The teacher must then decide what role mistakes are to play in the learning process. A broadly behaviourist approach attempts to steer students away from errors by presenting language in small steps, providing considerable controlled practice and reinforcing correct responses. A more cognitive approach, on the other hand, deliberately allows learners to encounter potential problem areas and to learn from the mistakes they make. Julian Dakin's work provides an example of this problem-setting approach.

In practice, I am influenced by both approaches. I do not overlook the value of consolidation through repetition, particularly at lower levels, where patterns and drills can provide an essential framework for learning. Learners and teachers would be lost without some degree of structured practice. At the same time, I believe that lessons should provide opportunities for students to develop a better understanding of the language system. Some learners, particularly those accustomed to a more analytical approach to language learning, actively demand explanations of the rules. Correction can therefore become an opportunity for developing conceptual awareness rather than merely replacing an incorrect utterance with a correct one.

The question of when and what to correct, however, requires a clear system of priorities. If I have just presented a new piece of language and my immediate aim is for students to produce and practise it with reasonable accuracy, I am likely to correct more immediately. If, on the other hand, I am monitoring students during free communicative production, I am more concerned with fluency and the successful communication of meaning. I therefore tend to wear different "hats": an accuracy hat during controlled practice and a fluency hat during freer activities.

Not every mistake deserves immediate correction. A slip of the tongue, for example, may result simply from lack of thinking time and may disappear naturally if the student is allowed to continue. On the other hand, an error which is likely to interfere with comprehension, lead to further errors, or reveal a fundamental misconception should normally receive attention.

If students learn through successive approximation, the teacher needs to achieve a balance between allowing them time to evaluate and correct their own production and deliberately drawing their attention to mistakes. Self-correction is valuable because it requires the learner to think about the language. Nevertheless, the teacher has a responsibility to provide feedback. Students need some indication of whether what they have produced is acceptable. The traditional teacher functions of indicating "yes/no", "right/wrong" or "true/false" cannot simply be abandoned. The challenge is to perform these functions in ways which encourage learning rather than dependence on the teacher.

Neither a behaviourist nor a cognitive approach to correction can succeed unless students are given some indication that a mistake has occurred. Teachers following communicatively based programmes are justifiably reluctant to interrupt students and deal with every error, but this does not mean that errors should be ignored. The teacher needs an effective means of earmarking mistakes without necessarily interrupting communication.

Correcting oral work

There are many ways of drawing attention to an oral mistake. The simplest is to repeat the correct form. This resembles the behaviourist approach, since the learner hears the desired response and may be asked to reproduce it. However, merely repeating the correct answer does not necessarily encourage the student to think about the meaning of the utterance or understand why the original was inappropriate.

Correction can often be more effective if it refers back to the situation in which the language was presented. A picture, for example, can provide a useful context for correcting vocabulary. Spatial relationships can be represented on the board or overhead projector, while a timeline can help students reconsider the choice of tense. A clock with moveable hands can provide an immediate visual context for correcting expressions of time.

Other concrete teaching aids can also become useful corrective devices. Cuisenaire rods, for example, can be used systematically to prompt the insertion or omission of auxiliary verbs, agreement markers and articles, or to distinguish countable and uncountable nouns. Facial expressions, counting on fingers, arm movements, hand signals and mime can all provide unobtrusive ways of indicating that something needs to be changed. Nearby furniture can even provide a context for correcting prepositions such as on, under and in.

In many respects, these corrective techniques mirror the techniques used during presentation. This is an advantage. The visual or physical aid which originally helped students associate a linguistic form with a meaning can later act as a memory jogger when the form needs to be recalled or corrected.

There are also more explicitly linguistic techniques. A long or difficult utterance can be broken down into phrases, words and syllables through backchaining or frontchaining. Once the individual elements have been corrected, they can be resynthesised into the complete utterance. Another useful technique is to ask another student a similar question, obtain an appropriate response, and then return to the original student. The second response provides a model without making the original student feel that the teacher has simply supplied the answer.

Testing can also have a diagnostic role. If I am uncertain about the nature of the mistakes my students are making, teaching through testing can provide useful information. Dictation, for example, is not only a test of listening comprehension. It can also reveal problems which subsequently appear in students' written or spoken production.

The teacher as monitor

Correction during oral work requires the teacher to be an attentive monitor rather than an interrupter. During a discussion, language laboratory session or other communicative activity, I might keep a record of mistakes rather than interrupting students each time one occurs. A simple monitoring sheet could contain headings such as:

The purpose is not to accumulate a list of faults, but to decide afterwards which mistakes are significant enough to deserve attention. This is particularly important during communicative activities, where excessive correction can destroy the very fluency and confidence that the activity is intended to develop.

The teacher's knowledge of the linguistic background and level of the class should help to predict likely mistakes. The choice of material can then provide opportunities for students to encounter and deal with these potential problem areas. A cognitive approach may deliberately set a problem which students have a reasonable chance of getting wrong, while a more behaviourist approach may attempt to structure the material so that the error is less likely to occur.

There is no reason why the two approaches should be mutually exclusive. A lesson can contain controlled, behaviourist-style practice followed by a more cognitive phase in which students are encouraged to use the same language more independently. Coursebooks which follow a spiral approach, in which problem areas are introduced, revisited and revised, can support this process.

The choice of corrective technique should consequently depend on both the stage of the lesson and the nature of the mistake. A slip in a fluent communicative activity may be ignored, while a conceptual error in controlled practice may need immediate attention. Evaluation should continue throughout the programme and should influence the selection of content for subsequent lessons.

Correcting written work

Positive correction of written work requires the teacher to recognise what is good as well as what is wrong. Correction should not become a catalogue of deficiencies. At intermediate level, for example, the first attempts at genuinely connected writing, the successful use of a compound sentence, or a well-organised paragraph may deserve specific praise. At elementary level, correct transformations, subject-verb agreement, appropriate choice of tense and even accurate copying can be positively earmarked.

Students should therefore be helped to see correction as a process of improvement rather than as a judgement on their ability. One useful way of achieving this is to establish a correction scheme which is explained to students before they begin an assignment. They should know what the symbols mean and what is expected of them. Introducing a correction system only after work has been returned can make students feel that the teacher is continually "changing the goalposts".

A simple scheme might include symbols such as:

The scheme can first be introduced by giving students a faulty piece of writing and asking them to identify and correct the different types of error. They can then begin to use the same symbols when checking their own work.

The gradual development of this procedure is particularly valuable. Brumfit's 1977 staged approach provides a useful model:

The progression gradually transfers responsibility from the teacher to the learner. At first, the teacher identifies both the location and nature of the error. Eventually, the student is expected to locate, diagnose and correct the problem independently.

There will, of course, be mistakes which students cannot identify or correct for themselves. In such cases the teacher can provide a written comment or additional guidance. Even a brief instruction such as "see me" may sometimes be appropriate, although too many such requests can create practical problems when a teacher is responsible for a large number of students.

The correction system can also become a study skill. Students can be encouraged to keep checklists of their recurring weaknesses and to use the correction symbols when proof-reading their own work before handing it in. They should be given time for a final check and encouraged to look deliberately for problems with spelling, punctuation, word order, grammar and lexical choice.

This is preferable to making correction the basis of a long teacher monologue in the following lesson. If the teacher spends most of the next lesson explaining every error in every script, students may become passive recipients of correction. Their critical ability is more likely to develop if they first attempt to correct their own work and then discuss problems in pairs or small groups. Comparing two or more pieces of writing can also help students notice differences in effectiveness without making the teacher the sole judge of every sentence.

Correction and learner independence

A good correction system should ultimately make the learner less dependent on the teacher. Students need to develop the ability to recognise their own weaknesses and to take responsibility for improving them. This involves more than keeping lists of vocabulary. Study records should contain coherent examples and illustrations of the problems students have encountered. For example, examples of connected speech are likely to be more useful than long strings of bilingual vocabulary.

The same principle applies to reading and discussion activities. Students can be given open-ended questions about a text which invite critical comment, rather than being restricted to questions with a single predetermined answer. The appropriate standard will depend on the text: some texts invite considerably more comment than others. What matters is that students should learn to evaluate and respond to what they read rather than simply reproduce information from it.

The correction scheme can provide a useful bridge between teacher feedback and self-correction. The same symbols which the teacher uses can become a checklist which students apply before submitting their work. In this way, correction ceases to be something that happens to students after they have completed an assignment and becomes part of the writing process itself.

The role of problems in learning

The teacher can therefore be seen not simply as someone who corrects mistakes, but as someone who sets problems which encourage learning. If the teacher can anticipate where mistakes are likely to occur, materials can be designed to provide students with a reasonable opportunity to encounter and resolve those problems.

Strong use of situation, supported by effective illustrations, can help students relate linguistic form to function. This reinforces learning and can help to prevent misconceptions. Meaningful drills can also make use of situations rather than presenting isolated patterns. For example, a carefully constructed situation involving a careless driver or an au pair, such as those found in Robert O'Neill's Kernel Lessons Plus, can give a grammatical or functional pattern a meaningful context.

The important distinction is therefore not simply between drills and non-drill activities, but between language which is presented meaningfully and language which is presented as a meaningless sequence of patterns. Even a cognitive approach need not reject drilling if the patterns are carefully selected and given a meaningful structural and functional context.

Conclusion

Positive correction requires a balance between accuracy and fluency, between teacher intervention and learner independence, and between the prevention of errors and learning from them. At elementary level, repetition, structured practice and immediate correction can provide a valuable foundation. At intermediate level, students can increasingly be encouraged to recognise, diagnose and correct their own errors, particularly during freer communicative and writing activities.

The teacher therefore needs to make decisions about correction rather than simply correct everything that is wrong. The linguistic background of the students, the stage of the lesson, the purpose of the activity and the nature of the mistake should all influence the decision. A slip of the tongue in fluent communication may not require interruption, whereas a fundamental misconception may need immediate attention.

Most importantly, correction should provide students with information which they can use. Oral correction can employ repetition, questioning, visual aids, gestures, physical objects and techniques such as backchaining. Written correction can use an agreed system of symbols which progressively transfers responsibility from teacher to learner. Both approaches can encourage students to become more critical observers of their own language.

A correction scheme agreed between teacher and students can therefore become a valuable aid to self-correction, particularly on courses long enough for students to recognise and work on recurring weaknesses. The ultimate objective is not to produce learners who wait for the teacher to tell them what is wrong, but learners who are increasingly able to recognise problems, understand why they have occurred and make appropriate adjustments themselves. Used in this way, correction is not merely the removal of errors: it becomes an important part of language learning itself.