مدرسة القرية للبنين - التغذية الراجعة

Feedback in English language (Why, when and how?)

Classroom discourse, (Tusi's ideas 1995): -

            According to Tsui (1995), teacher talk is the most important portion inside the classroom. So, through this article, I have discussed this point and compared it with some other ideas that may agree or disagree with it.
             1.a. IRF: -
              IRF is the usual strategy for initiating, responding and giving feedback. Sinclair and Brazil (1982) have mentioned in their article the way that the teacher do the initiation. They say that teachers always, ask a lot of questions and use pupils' responses for learning process. Conversely, Tsui (1995) has the idea of the teacher role in imitating inside the classroom. Totally, initiating role is not only the teacher job, but the pupil can be also the one who can initiate. Malamah-Thomas (1987) has also displayed how can pupils initiate the lesson. They have said that pupils can talk and express their own ideas, present new issues and ask questions. So, the initiating role can be divided between both the teacher and the pupils and it is the good model for healthy communication inside the classroom.
              Responses are also a very important factor in IRF. Pupils have to respond according to what they hear. Maybe their responses are an answer to a question or responding to an instruction. Malamah-Thomas (1987) defines responding as " any act directly sought by the utterance of another speaker, such as answering a question". Therefore, there are a lot of types of responses, Jarvis (1996) displayed a lot of these types and said that these responses depend on the questioner whether it is a questions or an instructions.
              Further the teacher could use some strategies that Lynch (1997: 47) calls " Interaction modifications". These modifications are listed in seven different categories. They are:
                 - Confirmation check, where the teacher makes sure that what the learner understood is what he meant. Tsui (1995: 65) states that this type of modification " is used to ensure that the speaker has correctly understood what the previous speaker said". Therefore, this type helps the learner's understanding the purpose of the speaker's talk.
                - Comprehensible check, where the teacher makes sure that the learners have understood what he meant.
                - Clarification request, where the teacher asks pupils to explain or rephrase.
                - Repetition, where the teacher repeats his words or the learners' words.
                - Reformulation, where the teacher rephrases the content.
                - Completion, where the teacher attempts to complete the learner's utterance.
                - Backtracking, where the teacher returns to a point in the conversation up to which he believes the learner has understood.
               These modifications are very supportive ways to help the learners to understand the content and the aims of the learning process.
               Basically, there are a lot of reasons for asking questions. Doff (1998) states some of these reasons, for example checking pupils' understanding, giving more chances to pupils to practice and checking pupils' thinking and their knowledge.
Therefore, there are also different types of questions, which are used according to the aim of the lesson. Displaying questions is one of these types. Tsui (1995) defines this type by saying that the teacher already know the answer but his aim is to check pupils' understanding. On the other hand, Thompson (1997) defines this type as not for collecting information rather than checking pupils' understanding. So, we can see that there is an agreement on the aim of using display questions.
                The other kind of questions is the referential question. Where Tsui (1995:28) states that " Referential questions generate interactions typical of social communication". Hence, Tsui has defined this type of questions as a kind of typical social communication, where the teachers ask his pupils to talk about themselves. Alternatively, Thornbury (1996:281) defines this type of questions " Referential questions are genuine questions: those for which the teacher does not know the answer". Therefore, there is also some similarity in defining this type of question where the teacher does not know the answer, and to allow pupils to display their knowledge.
                There are also two different types of display and referential questions. They are closed and open questions. Where we can define the closed question by saying that the answer is a single word or very brief response, one acceptable answer, pre-determined or expected by the questioner. On the other hand, open question requires a longer answer, a variety of responses are acceptable. The answer is not predefined. Thus there is no expectation by the questioner.
Peacock (1990) showed the distinction between them. Peacock said that the open question's answers are not the same. They may be more than one response and the teacher must allow the pupils to answer what they want. But in case of the closed question, the answer must be a particular predefined answer.

             1.b. Other patterns: -
             There are also other patterns of classroom interactions such as group work and pair work. These types help the teacher to give free chances to the learners to do some private exercise individually or in pairs. As a result, these will develop and improve the self-directed approach and let them be self-depended. But the teacher must play the observer role and interfere if it is necessary to correct their mistakes. The aim of using group work and pair work is to create a cooperative atmosphere inside the classroom and between the pupils' themselves.
             Therefore, using a mixture of different types of interaction will help the pupils to be able to understand. It also will help the teachers achieve the aims of the lesson and at the same time it will surely save the teacher time. So, there will be a balance between the input and the output.
             To sum up this part of my dissertation, feedback seems to be a very important element of the classroom discourse. It is one part of the IRF model, which is presented by Tusi (1995).

             2. Feedback definition: -
             Thornbury (1996:282) defines feedback on content as " feedback on content involves responding to the content of what learners are saying, rather than commenting solely on the form". Therefore, there are different kinds of feedback. One of them is corrective feedback where the teacher corrects every mistake or errors and it may be counter-productive if it used continuously. The second type of feedback is the evaluative feedback where the teacher evaluates the learning process through pupils' mistakes. It may motivate the pupils but on the other hand it does not give specific information on how to close the gap between the target performance and the current performance. The third type is the strategic feedback, where the techer aims to lead to the pupils to the correct answer by using some planned ways. So, there are different types of feedback to use for different purposes and if we overuse one particular type could produce negative effects. Keh (1990) defines feedback as any input from reader to writer that provides information for revision. Therefore, feedback is very important to help the pupils in their writing but teachers should be aware of three results, which may affect on the effectiveness of feedback. These results has been presented by Burnham (1986) and they are:
        - The student doesn't comprehend the responses.
        - The student understands the responses but does not know how to implement.
        - The student understands the responses and implements them, but the writing is not improved.
        Furthermore, all the mentoined types of feedback could be sort under two categories. They are, summative and formative feedback. Reid (1993:218) describes summative feedback as "a response that is an overview of more general considerations in an essay" and formative feedback as " an immediate intervention in discrete parts of an essay". To conclude from all these definitions and types of feedback, we can say that the teacher should be perceptive while giving the feedback to any piece of pupils' work. They should choose the suitable and appropriate type of feedback.

              3. The purpose of giving feedback: -
              At this point, some definitions are in order. Brown (1994:205) offers the following distinctions. A mistake, he says, 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 her native language. Errors, on the other hand, are problems that a native speaker would not have. Brown defines an error as "noticeable deviation from the adult grammar of a native speaker, reflecting the interlanguage competence of the learner."
              The key term in this definition is "interlanguage." As someone learns a foreign language, the errors he/she makes indicate his/her level of proficiency. Clearly, the errors of a beginner are different from the errors of an advanced student, and what were once errors can become mere mistakes.
             Edge (1989:9-11) offers simpler definitions, which are especially important for classroom teachers to keep in mind. He says a slip is what a learner can self-correct, and an error is what a learner cannot self-correct. An attempt is a guess or when neither the intended meaning nor the structure is clear to the teacher.
            This distinction between error and mistake, or between error and slip, is reason enough for teachers to abandon the practice of immediately correcting students. Often, a brief pause or a nonverbal cue is sufficient for students to recognize and then correct mistakes they make while speaking. The teacher simply has to allow that pause to occur. Errors and attempts are different, of course, because students cannot correct themselves, but that doesn't mean the teacher must.
Errors occur for many reasons. One obvious cause is interference from the native language. A learner may make errors because he or she assumes that the target language and his/her native language are similar, when in fact they are different. This kind of overgeneralization is also the cause of many mistaken guesses. Another obvious cause is simply an incomplete knowledge of the target language. A third common cause of errors is the complexity of the target language. Certain aspects of English (e.g., the s in the third person singular present tense) are difficult for all students, no matter what their native languages. Spelling is also problematic for nonnative speakers of English (and for many native speakers, too!). Finally, fossilization occurs when an individual reaches a satisfactory level of competence in the L2 and does not worry about persistent mistakes he or she may make, which may not inhibit communication. (See Brown 1994:203-225, and Ellis 1994:47-71, for a thorough discussion of causes of errors.)
              Recent theory on language acquisition and teaching methodology supports the position that not all errors should be corrected, and those that are corrected should usually not be "treated" immediately (Krashen 1987:74-76, 116-119; Doff 1988:186-192; Lewis 1993:164-179; Nunan and Lamb 1996: 68-80; Ur 1996:246-249). This position is based on the fact that errors are normal and unavoidable during the learning process. Also, current theories of how we learn languages recognize that habit formation is only one part of the process.

             References:
- Brown, H. D. (1994). Principles of language learning and teaching, 3rd ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall Regents.
- Burnham (1986) cited in Reid, J. M. (1993) Teaching ESL Writing Chapter 8' Responding to student writing; New Jersey; Prentice Hall Regents.
- Doff, A. (1998) Teach English. Teacher's Workbook. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Edge, J. (1989). Mistakes and correction. London: Longman.
- Ellis, R. (1994). The study of second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Jarvis, J. (1996) Responsiveness in the Primary Classroom in D. Allen (Ed), Entry Points: Papers from a Symposium of the Research, Testing and Young Learners Special Interest Groups. Kent: International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language.
- Keh (1990) cited in Reid, J. M. (1993) Teaching ESL Writing Chapter 8' Responding to student writing; New Jersey; Prentice Hall Regents.
- Krashen, S. (1987). Principles and practice in second language acquisition. Hemel Hempstead: Prentice Hall International.
- Lewis, M. (1993). The lexical approach: The state of ELT and a way forward. Hove: Language Teaching Publications.
- Lynch, T. (1997) Communication in the Language Classroom. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Malamah- Thomas, A. (1987) Classroom Interaction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Nunan, D., and C. Lamb. (1996). The self-directed teacher: Managing the learning process. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Peacock, C. (1990) Classroom Skills in English Teaching. London: Routledge.
- Reid, J. M. (1993) Teaching ESL Writing Chapter 8' Responding to student writing; New Jersey; Prentice Hall Regents.
- Sinclair, J. and Brazil, D. (1982) Teacher talk. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Thompson, G. (1997) Training teachers to ask questions, ELT Journal 51/2
- Thornbury, S. (1996) Teachers Research Teacher Talk. ELT Journal. 50/4
- Tsui, A. B. M. (1995) Introducing Classroom Interaction. London: Penguin
- Ur, P. (1996). A course in language teaching: Practice and theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.