Error Analysis

References: Douglas Brown, Principles of language learning and teaching.

SOME MISTAKES CONCEPTS

LEARNING IS A PROCESS THAT INVOLVES THE

MAKING OF MISTAKES

FIRST MISTAKES OF A LEARNING PROCESS ARE BIG ONES, GRADUALLY

DISAPPEAR AS YOU LEARN FROM MAKING THOSE

MISTAKES.

SUCESS COMES BY PROFITING FROM MISTAKES , BY USING THEM TO OBTAIN FEEDBACK FROM THE ENVIRONMENT

ARE THEY USEFULL?

Mistakes provide information and evidence about: How language is learnt. What strategies or procedures the

learner is employing. What strength and weakness learners

have. For these reasons mistakvs need to be analyzed carefully.

MISTAKES AND ERRORS

Mistakes refers to a performance error

that is either a random guess or a «slip». They are the

result of some imperfection in the

process of producing speech.

Errors are the result of one’s

systematic competence(the learner’s system

is incorrect).

ERROR ANALYSIS

It is the examination of errors attributable to all possible sources: Interlingual errors of interference form

the native language. Intralingual errors within the target

language. The sociolinguistic context of

communication. Psycholinguistic or cognitive strategies.

ERRORS IN ERROR ANALYSISTeacher can become so preoccupied with noticing errors that:

The correct utterances in the L2 go unnoticed.

We must beware of placing equal attention of the learner’s progress and

development.

Strategy of Avoidance

A student who for somv reason avoids a particular

sound, word, structure; may be assumed incorrectly to

have no difficulty.

Error analysis can keep us focused on specific languages rather than universal aspects

of language.

IDENTIFYING AND DESCRIBING ERRORS

Vari

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stabili

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• Repeated observation of a learner will often reveal apparently unpredictable or even contradictory data

Overt

ly e

rroneous

utt

era

nce

s • Are unquestionable ungrammatical at the sentence level.

• «does john can sing?»

Covert

ly e

rroneous

utt

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• Are grammatically well formed at the sentence level but are not interpretable within the context of communication.

• «I’m fine, thank you»

CATEGORIZING ERRORS

Errors of addition, omission, subtitution and ordering.

Phonology or orthography errors. Global errors and local errors. Domain errors and extent errors.

ERRORS •GLOBAL ERRORS MESSAGE IS NO CLEAR FOE THE HEARER.

•LOCAL ERRORSTHE HEARER O READER CAN GUESS THE MESSAGE.

LENNON

DIMENSIONS OF ERROR

DOMAIN EXTENT

SOURCES OF ERROR

INTERLINGUAL TRANSFER

INTRALINGUAL TRANSFER

CONTEXT OF LEARNINGContext refers , for example,

to the classroom with its teacher and its materials in the case of school learning or in a social situation in the case of untutored second language learning.

Teacher textbook

Classroom context

Can lead the student to make faulty hypotheses about the language

Richards (1971) called “false concepts’’ Stenson (1974) induced “errors ‘’

Students often make errors:• Misleading explanation from the teacher.• Faulty presentation of a structure or word in a textbook.• Teacher may provide incorrect information. (misleading

definition, word, grammatical generalization)• A pattern that was memorized improperly.

STAGES OF LEARNERS LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT Terms of four stages, based on observations of

what the learner does in terms of errors alone.1.RANDOM ERRORS

in which the learner is making rather wild guesses at what to write.Inconsistencies like “john cans sing’’, “john can to sing’’, and “john can singing’’.

2. EMERGENTstage of learner language finds the learner growing in consistency in linguistic production.

For Example:this is a conversation between a learner (L) and a native

speaker (ns)of English: L: I go New York. NS: you’re going to New York? L: (doesn’t understand) what? NS: you will go to New York ? L: yes. NS: when? L:1972 NS: Oh, you went to new york in 1972. L: Yes, I go 1972.Learner is still, at this stage, unable to correct errors when they are pointed out by someone else.

3.SYSTEMATICstage in which the learner is now able to manifest more consistency in producing the second language. While those rules that are stored in the learner’s brain are till not all well formed.

for example:L: many fish are in the lake. these fish are serving in the restaurants near the lake.NS: (laughing) the fish are serving?L: (laughing) oh, no, the fish are being served in the restaurants!Learner in this stage has ability of correcting their errors when they are pointed out.

4.STABILIZATIONIn this stage the learner has few errors and has mastered , this four stage is characterize by the learner’s ability to self correct.Learners pay attention to these few errors.they correct them, without waiting for feedback from someone else.

VARIATION IN LEARNER LANGUAGE Tarone (1988) focused her research on contextual

variability, that is, the extent to which both linguistic and situational contexts may help to systematically describe what appear simply as unexplained variation.

Tarone suggested four categories of variation:

1. Linguistic context 2. Psychological processing factors 3. Social context 4. Language function

FOSSILIZATION OR STABILIZATION

Fossilization is a normal and natural stage for many learners.

The relatively permanent incorporation of incorrect linguistic forms into a person’s second language competence has been referred to as fossilization.

Fossilization can be seen as consistent reinforcement, need, motivation, self-determination , and others.

Vigil and Oller ( 1976) provided a formal account of fossilization as a factor of positive and negative affective and cognitive feedback.

There are two kinds of information transmitted beween :

Learners ( sources)

audiencesEffective relationship

Cognitive information FactsSuppositionsBeliefs

Effective information

kinesic

Cognitive information

GesturesTone of voiceFacial expressions

Means of linguistic devices

Sounds PhrasesStructuresdiscourse

The feedback learners get from audience

Affective Feedback Cognitive feedback

Positive: keep talking; I’m listening.

Neutral: I’m not sure I want to maintain this conversation.

Negative: This conversation is over

Positive: I understan your massage; it’s clear.

Neutral: I’m not sure if I correctly understan you or not.

Negative: I don’t understan what you are saying; it’s not clear

Errors in the classroom

Vigil and Ollers (1976) communicative feedback model

Affectivefeedback

( )

( 0 )

( + )

XAbort

Cognitive feedback

Continue Continue

Recycle

Figure 9.2 Affective and cognitive feedback

The task of teacher is to discern the optimal tension between positive and negative cognitive feedback.

Hendrickson (1980) advised teachers to try to discern the diference beween global and local errors.

A learner of English language was describing a quain old hotel in Europe and he said:

1 “There is a French widow in every bedroom.”

2 “The different city is another one in the another two.”

The matter of how to correct errors was, historically, and still is, exceedingly complex.

Williams, Jessica, 2005; Doughty, 2003.

It seemed quite clear students in the classroom generally want and expert errors to be corrected.

Cathcart & Olsen, (1976)

In “natural” untutored enviroments, nonnative speakers are usually corrected by native speakers on only a small percentage of errors that they make.

Chun, Day,Chenoweth,& Luppescu, (1982)

CATEGORIES OF ERROR TREATMENT

TYPES OF FEEDBACK:

Recast: implicit corrective feedback.

L: I lost my road.

T: Oh, yeah, I see, you lost your way. And then what

happened?

Clarification Request:

L: I want practice today, today. (grammar

error)

T: I am sorry? (clarificatin request).

Metalinguistic feedback: comments, information or questions.

L: I am here since january.

T: well, okay, but remember we talked about

the present perfect tense?

Elicitation: prompts the learner to self-correct.

L: (to another student) What means this

word?.

T: uh, luis, how do we say thet in english?

What does ….?

L: ah, what does this word mean?

Explicit correction:

L: when I have 12 years old….

T: no, not have, you mean, “when I was 12

years old…”

Repetition:

L: when I have 12 years old….

T: “when I was 12 years old…”

Uptake: it is general term that can have a number of manifestations.

L: (to another student) What means this

word?.

T: uh, luis, how do we say thet in english?

What does ….?

L: ah, what does this word mean?

Repair: Repetition:

Responses to feedback

Effectiveness of FFI

Overgeneralization seems to summarize the findings on FFI, however it is reasonable to consider the following assertions.

Most of reaserch of the last three dacades sujest that “exposure to communicative language instructions in general incease learners’ level attainment.

The rate of acquisition and level in a language is enhanced by instructions.

Error treatment and focus on language forms appear to be more effective when it is into a communicative, learner-centered, and least effective when error trearment is a dominant pedagogical feature “neardenthal” practice occupying the focal attention of the students.

Few reasearch identify which learners are more ready to internalize FFI.

Explicit instructions result more appropriate for easily stated grammar rules and implicit instructions result more successful for more complex rules.

Certain learners clearly benefit more than others from FFI. Analitic, field-dependent, left-brain-oriented learners internalize explicit FFI better than relational, field-dependent, right-brain-oriented learners.

The teacher needs to develop the intuition, through experience and solid eclectic theoretical foundations, for ascertaining what kind of corrective feedback is appropriate at a given moment, and what kind of uptake should be expected.

Should a teacher interrupt learners in the middle of an attempt to communicate?

Should a teacher choose, say, a recast over an elicitation?

Should beginning learners be given less corrective feedback than advanced?

TO DISCUSS