Investigating Learner Variability
The Impact of Task Type on Language Learners' Errors and Mistakes
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11139/cj.28.1.21-34Keywords:
CALL, Learner Variability, Error AnalysisAbstract
In a project-based approach to teaching a foreign language at the university level, students are often required to participate in several task-based writing activities. In doing so, language learners not only write incorrect forms, but also correct forms of the same structures, both of which provide useful information on their strengths and weaknesses. There is variability in language use and such variance may be due to a large number of factors such as the task type or the conditions under which the task is carried out. However, information drawn from direct observations of learners' texts only enables inferences to be made about learners' performance. This paper argues that making a distinction between errors and mistakes, where errors represent gaps in the knowledge and mistakes occasional lapses in performance, provides a better insight into learner variability in terms of the learners' ability to use their knowledge. Following an overview of the instruments used to discriminate between errors and mistakes, this paper investigates, through a case study approach conducted over a 3-month period of time, whether errors and/or mistakes are produced in one written task but not in another. A preliminary focus on a variety of task-based writing activities produced by one learner of French language is analyzed and presented.
References
Aljaafreh, A., & Lantolf, J. P. (1994). Negative feedback as regulation and second language learning in the zone of proximal development. Modern Language Journal, 78, 465-483. doi:10.2307/328585
Beck, J. E., & Chang, K.-m. (2007). Identifiability: A fundamental problem of student modeling. In C.
Conati, K. McCoy, & G. Paliouras (Eds.), User Modeling 2007: 11th international conference, UM 2007, Corfu, Greece, Proceedings (pp. 137-146). Berlin: Springer Verlag.
Cohen, J. (1960). A coefficient of agreement for nominal scales. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 20, 37-46. doi:10.1177/001316446002000104
Corder, S. P. (1967). The significance of learners errors. International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 5, 161-170.
Ellis, R. (1994). The study of second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ellis, R. (1997). Second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ellis, R. (2008). The study of second language acquisition (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Engeström, Y. (2007). Putting Vygotsky to work: The change laboratory as an application of double stimulation. In H. Daniels, M. Cole, & J. V. Wertsch (Eds.), The Cambridge companion to Vygotsky (pp. 363-382). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gass, S., & Selinker, L. (2008). Second language acquisition: An introductory course (3rd ed.). New York: Routledge.
Gregg, K. R. (1990). The variable competence model of second language acquisition, and why it isn’t. Applied Linguistics, 11, 364-383. doi:10.1093/applin/11.4.364
Heift, T. (2004). Corrective feedback and learner uptake in CALL. ReCALL, 16, 416-431. doi:10.1017/S0958344004001120
Heift, T. (2008). Modeling learner variability in CALL. Computer Assisted Language Learning, 21, 305-321. doi:10.1080/09588220802343421
Krippendorff, K. (1970). Bivariate agreement coefficients for reliability of data. Sociological Methodology, 2, 139-150. doi:10.2307/270787
Lantolf, J. P., & Thorne, S. L. (2007). Sociocultural theory and second language learning. In B. VanPatten & J. Williams (Eds.), Theories in second language acquisition: An introduction (pp. 201-224). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Lightbown, P. M., & Spada, N. (1999). How languages are learned. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Poehner, M. E. (2007). Beyond the test: L2 dynamic assessment and the transcendence of mediated learning. The Modern Language Journal, 91, 323-340. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4781.2007.00583.x
Reason, J. (1990). Human error. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rogers, C. B. (1995). The spider chart: A unique tool for performance appraisal. Annual Quality Congress, 49, 16-22.
Rothman, J. (2007). Sometimes they use it, sometimes they don’t: An epistemological discussion of L2 morphological production and its use as a competence measurement. Applied Linguistics, 28, 609-614. doi: 10.1093/applin/amm035
Schmid, H. (1994, September). Probabilistic part-of-speech tagging using decision trees. Paper presented at the Proceedings of International Conference on New Methods in Language Processing, Manchester, UK.
Selinker, L. (1972). Interlanguage. International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 10, 209-231.
Tarone, E. (1983). On the variability of interlanguage systems. Applied Linguistics, 4, 142-164. doi: 10.1093/applin/4.2.142.
Tarone, E. (1985). Variability in interlanguage use: A study of style-shifting in morphology and syntax. Language Learning, 35(3), 373-403. doi:10.1111/j.1467-1770.1985.tb01083.x
Tarone, E. (2007). Sociolinguistic approaches to second language acquisition research—1997-2007. The Modern Language Journal, 91, 837-848. doi:10.1111/j.1540-4781.2007.00672.x
Tarone, E., & Parrish, B. (1988). Task-related variation in interlanguage: The case of articles. Language Learning, 38, 21-44. doi:10.1111/j.1467-1770.1988.tb00400.x
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.