The Effects of Native English Teacher's Corrective Feedback on EFL Learners' Responses in a Korean Elementary English Classroom

Abstract

This study intends to examine the effectiveness of corrective feedback depending on task types based on the theoretical framework of Longs Interaction Hypothesis (1983) and Swains Output Hypothesis (1985). It has been believed that learners can acquire second language through interaction which consists of negotiation of meaning and feedback from negotiation of meaning allows learners to pay attention to linguistic forms and that interactional feedback prompts learners to modify their output. On the ground of those theories, this study seeks to examine the nature of corrective feedback, the differences of corrective feedback across communicative tasks and non-communicative tasks and students overall perception about corrective feedback. The effect of corrective feedback and the role of task have been the important subjects in second language acquisition (SLA) studies. Nevertheless not many studies have investigated the interaction between corrective feedback and tasks. This study places emphasis on the benefits of corrective feedback in carrying out communicative tasks. Corrective feedback offers learners opportunities to interact with their interlocutors as well as to repair their errors. The present study examines the nature of corrective feedback by a native English teacher and 34 students responses observing a Korean elementary English classroom taught by a native English teacher. The participants, 4th, 5th and 6th graders, carried out the tasks in which communicative tasks and non-communicative tasks were composed of for 2 months. Results revealed that corrective feedback had significant effect on students responses to it and the interaction between teacher and students. The effects were larger for communicative tasks than non-communicative tasks. The analysis of corrective feedback demonstrated that recast was the most frequently used, but it produced the least uptake and repair rate. On the other hand, prompts were the least used corrective feedback, but it produced the highest rate of uptake. Finally, explicit correction was frequently used corrective feedback type and it also lead to high uptake rate. Results from analysis of perception on corrective feedback showed that students believe corrective feedback to be beneficial and they have a preference for explicit correction even though they have experiences that they felt inhibited by teachers corrective feedback. Given that the findings, it is expected that the effectiveness of corrective feedback can be increased when communicative tasks are provided and that teachers need to make effort to give plenty of corrective feedbacks since it helps students to modify their non-target-like utterances and it gives opportunities for students to interact with their interlocutors.