| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立屏東教育大學 === 英語學系 === 99 === ABSTRACT
The purpose of the present study is to investigate errors types, the patterns of error correction and the influence of corrective feedback on learner uptake in the EFL classroom context at the elementary level in Taiwan. In addition, the teachers and students’ preferences of corrective feedback were explored. Besides, students’ learning attitudes after responses to corrective feedback and the influence of anxiety on learner uptake are explored.
The subjects of this study were three classes from Guong-Hua Elementary School in Kaoshiung City, Chiang-chin Elementary School in Kaoshiung City, and Bin-Mou Elementary School in Taitung County. The three English classrooms were observed and recorded for eight sessions. Then, the researcher analyzed the linguistic data of speaking errors, types of corrective feedback, and learner uptake. Afterwards, the students answered a questionnaire on their attitudes to types of corrective feedback. Teachers’ perspectives on corrective feedback were then interviewed and compared with students’ attitudes toward corrective feedback. Finally, the researcher analyzed the influence of students’ learning attitudes on learner uptake.
Based on the data analyses, the findings of the study are summarized as follows. First, the most frequent speaking errors by students are phonological errors, followed by lexical errors, silence, factual errors, morphological errors, and syntactical errors. Second, teachers tended to use recast and metalinguistic clues to correct phonological errors; elicitation and repetition for lexical errors; as for correction following factual errors, morphological errors, syntactical errors, and silence (no responses from students), this study can’t offer more data to explain which corrective feedback is the most frequently used by teachers but offered the way of solving factual errors, morphological errors, syntactical errors, and silence. Third, explicit correction, elicitation and peer correction can lead to 100.00% success rate of learner uptake. Fourth, teachers’ first preference for corrective feedback is recast. Fifth, students express neutral opinions toward anxiety about corrective feedback. They were not sure about how they reacted to corrective feedback. In addition to the findings of the research questions, the finding of the difference between the teachers’ cognition and real application to oral correction revealed that teachers were not sure what they used in class.
Based on the results of the study, the researcher proposed four pedagogical implications for elementary English teachers. First, English teachers are supposed to offer encouragement when facing students’ silence. Second, English teachers should adopt appropriate corrective feedback based on the types of speaking errors, the efficacy on correction, or even students’ preference. Third, teachers should care about successful learner uptake after students receiving corrective feedback rather than worry that the corrective feedback will bring anxiety to students. Fourth, teachers should put the teaching theory into their practice.
For further research, a larger number of teachers and a longer period of experiment time are recommended. Before investigating students’ learning attitudes to corrective feedback, it is suggested that the researcher know the proficiency of students. In addition, the problem of students keeping silence needs to be investigated deeply. Last but not least, more groups of participants of different ages can be included to compare the effect of corrective feedback on adults and children.
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