Error Correction in Foreign Language Teaching: Recent Theory, Research, and

Practice

James M. Hendrickson

The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 62, No. 8. (Dec., 1978), pp. 387-398.

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 Error Correction in Foreign Language
Teaching: Recent Theoy, Research,
and Practice *
JAMES M . HENDRICKSON,Lansing Community College, Michigan

An Historical Perspective of Learner ~ r r o r s '

Audiolingualism and Error Prevention language students, but some of them regarded
second language errors from a somewhat puri-
T HROUGHOUT the 1950s and well into
the 1960s, the audiolingual approach to
teaching foreign languages was in full swing.
tanical perspective. For example, in his book,
Language and Language Learning, which be-
came a manifesto of the language teaching pro-
Language students were supposed to spend many
fession of the 1960s, Nelson Brooks (1960) con-
hours memorizing dialogs, manipulating pattern
sidered error to have a relationship to learning
drills, and studying all sorts of grammatical
resembling that of sin to virtue: "Like sin, error
generalizations. The assumed or explicit aim of
is to be avoided and its influence overcome, but
this teaching method could be called "practice
its presence is to be expected" (p. 58). Brooks
makes perfect," and presumably some day, when
suggested an instructional procedure that would,
students needed to use a foreign language to
ostensibly, help language students produce
communicate with native speakers, they would
error-free utterances: "The principal method of
do so fluently and accurately.
avoiding error in language learning is to observe
We now realize that this was not what in most
and practice the right model a sufficient number
cases occurred. Some highly motivated students
of times; the principal way of overcoming it is to
from audiolingual classrooms managed to be-
shorten the time lapse between the incorrect re-
come fairly proficient in a foreign language, but
sponse and the presentation once more of the
only after they had used the language in com-
correct model" (p. 58). If students continued to
municative situations. Predictably, most stu-
produce errors using this stimulus-response
dents who could not or did not take the effort to
method, inadequate teaching techniques or un-
transfer audiolingual training to communicative
sequenced instructional materials were to blame
use soon forgot the dialog lines, the pattern
drills, and the grammatical generalizations that *The author wishes to thank the following people for their
helpful comments in the preparation of this paper: Robert
they had studied or practiced in school. Put H . Bentley, George R. Bramer, Andrew D. Cohen, S. Pit
simply, the students had learned what they were Corder, Gerard L. Ervin, John F. Fanselow, Victor E. Han.
taught - and soon forgot most of it. zeli, Elizabeth G. Joiner, and Linda R. Peckham. The
Not only did many supporters of audiolin- author alone assumes responsibility for any errors or misin-
gualism overestimate learning outcomes for most terpretations herein.
'The definition of an "error." a word derived from Latin
JAMES M. HENDRICKSON (Ph.D., The Ohio State Univer. errare meaning "to wander, roam or stray," depends on its
sity) is Assistant Professor of Spanish and English as a Second use for a particular purpose or objective. For the purpose of a
Language at Lansing Community College, Michigan. He has discussion on error correction in foreign language teaching,
conducted numerous teacher workshops, published articles this writer defines an error as an utterance, form, or struc-
on travel and error analysis, and recently co-authored (with ture that a particular language teacher deems unacceptable
Angela Labarca) The Spice of Life: A n Intermediate because of its inappropriate use or its absence in real-life
ESL/EFL Reader (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1979). discourse.
388 THE MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL

(Corder 1967, p. 163). Appearing one year later Politzer and Ramirez 1973, Richards 1973a,
in 1961, The Teacher's Manual for German, 1973b, Burt 1975, Hanzeli 1975, and Hendrick-
Level One, prepared by the Modern Language son 197713).
Materials Development Center (1961), provided
specific guidelines for correction of student Communicative Competence and the Value
errors. The Manual states that teachers should of Errors
correct all errors immediately (p. 3, 17, 21, 26), Since the late 1960s studies in transforma-
and that students should be neither required nor tional-generative grammar, first language ac-
permitted to discover and correct their own mis- quisition, and especially cognitive psychology
takes (p. 28, 32). have contributed to a trend away from audiolin-
Many foreign language educators never ques- gualism and toward making language teaching
tioned the validity of this mechanistic approach more humanistic and less mechanistic. Foreign
to error prevention and error correction. In fact, language teachers have begun to respond to this
well into this decade some of them continued to attitudinal change by examining the learning
endorse it. The following statement, for styles of their students and by stressing the use of
example, is found in the introduction to an ele- language for communication. These new direc-
mentary English course published in 1970: "One tions in language teaching are gradually chang-
of the teacher's aims should be to prevent mistakes ing the focus of foreign language learning objec-
from occurring. In the early stages while the tives, instructional materials, and pedagogical
pupils are wholly dependent on'the teacher for strategies. Instead of expecting students to pro-
what they learn, it should be possible to achieve duce flawless sentences in a foreign language, for
this aim" (Lee 1970). Similar advice was given to example, many of today's students are encour-
aged to communicate in the target language
teachers in a first-year Spanish textbook, pub-
about things that matter to them. As Chastain
lished four years later. Under the rubric "Sugges-
wrote in 1971, "More important than error-free
tions for classroom procedure," the authors list
speech is the creation of an atmosphere in which
suggestion No. 5: "Whenever a mistake is made, the students want to talk" (p. 249).
the teacher should correct it at once and then re- This positive perspective toward second lan-
peat the correct pattern or question for the bene- guage errors is based partly upon analogy to the
fit of the entire class" (Hansen and Wilkins 1974, fact that children evervwhere ~ r o d u c enumerous
p. xvii). errors while acquiring their first language-
Structural linguists introduced another errors that their parents expect and accept as a
mechanism for helping language teachers deal natural and necessary part of child development.
with students' errors. This mechanism, called Many language educators propose that foreign
contrastive analysis, assumed that interference language teachers also should expect many
from students' first language caused errors to errors from their students, and should accept
occur in their target language speech. Many lin- those errors as a natural phenomenon integral to
guists believed that once a teacher had a syste- the process of learning a second language. When
matic knowledge of the differences between the teachers tolerate some student errors, students
two languages, he or she could begin developing often feel more confident about using the target
appropriate instructional techniques and mate- language than if all their errors are corrected.
rials that would help students avoid producing Teachers are reminded that people make mis-
errors. However, considerable empirical evi- takes when learning any new skill, but that
dence indicates that although interference from people learn from their mistakes when they re-
students' native language is the major source of ceive periodic, supportive feedback.
phonological errors, interference errors are only Not only do all language learners necessarily
one of many types of errors found in the lexicon, produce errors when they communicate, but sys-
syntax, morphology, and orthography of stu- tematic analyses of errors can provide useful in-
dents' utterances in the target language (Wolfe sights into the processes of language acquisition.
1967, Falk 1968, Wilkins 1968, Duikov$ 1969, Because errors are signals that actual learning is
Selinker 1969, Buteau 1970, Ervin-Tripp 1970, taking place, they can indicate students' progress
Grauberg 1971, Hussein 1971, George 1972, and success in language learning (Corder 1967,
 ERROR CORRECTION INFOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING 389

Zydatiss 1974, Lange 1977, and Lantolf 1977). Despite these limitations, a sufficient body of
Studying students' errors also has immediate literature on error correction exists to merit a
practical applications for foreign language systematic review. The information reported
teachers (Corder 1973, p. 265): herein addresses five fundamental questions:
Errors provide feedback, they tell the teacher some- 1. Should learner errors be corrected?
thing about the effectiveness of his teaching mate- 2. If so, when should learner errors be cor-
rials and his teaching techniques, and show him rected?
what parts of the syllabus he has been following 3. Which learner errors should be corrected?
have been inadequately learned or taught and need 4. How should learner errors be corrected?
further attention. They enable him to decide 5. Who should correct learner errors?
whether he must devote more time to the item he
has been working - on. This is the day-to-day value Should Learner Errors Be Corrected?
of errors. But in terms of broader planning and
Before correcting student errors, teachers
with a new group of learners they provide the infor-
mation for designing a remedial syllabus or a pro-
need to consider whether the errors should be
gramme of reteaching. corrected at all, and, if so, why (Gorbet 1974,
p. 55). When students are not able to recognize
T o summarize, over the past three decades their own errors, they need the assistance of
there has been a significant change in foreign someone more proficient in the language than
language methodologies and materials. There they are (George 1972, Corder 1973, and All-
has also been a shift in pedagogical focus from wright 1975). A recent survey on college stu-
preventing errors to learning from errors - a fact dents' attitudes toward error correction reveals
that is reflected in George's (1972) statement that the students not only want to be corrected,
that, "It is noteworthy that at the beginning of but also they wish to be corrected more than
the sixties the word 'error' was associated with teachers feel they should be (Cathcart and Olsen
correction, at the end with learning" (p. 189). 1976) All teachers probably provide some means
Education is becoming increasingly oriented of correcting oral and written errors, just as
toward meeting the needs and interests of indi- parents correct their childrens' errors in a
vidual learners. Many foreign language teachers natural language learning environment. Cor-
already have responded to their students' needs recting learners' errors helps them discover the
by implementing innovative methods and mate- functions and limitations. of the syntactical and
rials that encourage creative self-expression and
lexical forms of the target language (Kennedy
by not insisting on error-free communication. 1973). Error correction is especially useful to
Furthermore, the results of many studies in first
adult second language learners because it helps
and second language acquisition have important
them learn the exact environment in which to
implications for teaching foreign languages effi-
apply rules and discover the precise semantic
ciently and for developing effective instructional
range of lexical items (Krashen and Seliger
materials.
1975).

A Review of the Literature on When Should Learner Errors Be Corrected?

Error Correction Perhaps the most difficult challenge of lan-
A review of the literature on error correction guage teaching is determining when to correct
in foreign language teaching reveals that (a) no and when to ignore student errors (Gorbet 1974,
current standards exist on whether, when, p. 19). The literature on error correction reveals
which, or how student errors should be corrected clearly that many foreign language educators
or who should correct them (Burt 1975, p, 53), have rejected the obsessive concern with error
(b) there are few widely-accepted linguistic cri- avoidance that generally characterizes audiolin-
teria of grammatical and lexical correction in gually-oriented language instruction (Corder
foreign language teaching (Robinson 1971, 1967, Grittner 1969, Chastain 1971, Holley and
p. 261), and (c) much of what has been pub- King 1971, George 1972, Dresdner 1973, Dulay
lished on error correction is speculative, and 1974, Gorbet 1974, Burt 1975, Krashen and
needs to be validated by a great deal of empirical Seliger 1975, Valdman 1975, Hendrickson
experimentation (Hendrickson 1977b, p. 17). 1977b, Lange 1977, Lantolf 1977, and Terrell
390 THE MODERN LANGUAGE J O U R N A L

1977). These educators hold that producing the cognitive effects of error correction based on
errors is a natural and necessary phenomenon in different levels of language proficiency and rele-
language learning, and they recommend that vant personality factors such as willingness to
teachers accept a wide margin of deviance from take risks. For the present, teachers can consider
so-called "standard" forms and structures of the which student errors should be corrected first
target language. and which ones should be allowed to remain
There appears to be affective as well as cogni- uncorrected.
tive justification for tolerating some errors pro-
duced by language learners. Foreign language Which Learner Errors Should Be Corrected?
educators generally agree that tolerating some An increasing number of foreign language
oral and written errors helps learners communi- educators suggest that errors that impede the in-
cate more confidently in a foreign language. Be- telligibility of a message should receive top
cause language learners take many risks in pro- priority for correction. Powell (1975b) analyzed
ducing incorrect utterances when communicat- speech samples collected in individual oral inter-
ing, teachers need to consider whether or not views of 223 American high school students at
their corrective techniques instill a feeling of suc- the end of their second year of French. She
cess in students. Perhaps teachers should reserve found that the greatest number of errors resulted
error correction for manipulative grammar from reduction, especially in tense markers. In
practice, and should tolerate more errors during sentences that were to be marked for tense or
communicative practice (Birckbichler 1977). A mood, students reduced the marker to the
fairly recent survey of 1,200 university students present indicative in at least 55 percent of the
of foreign language was conducted partly to de- cases. According to Powell, "the fact that reduc-
termine their reactions to having their errors cor- tions seemed to be influenced by the need to
rected by their teachers. It was found that the communicate, suggests that correcting student
"students prefer not to be marked down for each errors in terms of their comprehensibility to a
minor speaking and writing error because this native speaker might result in a more advanced
practice destroys their confidence and forces grammar" (p. 38). Elsewhere, she notes that "if
them to expend so much effort on details that error correction by the teacher results in a more
they lose the overall ability to use language" adult grammar, it is possible that correction in
(Walker 1973, p. 103). In other words, the stu- terms of communication requirements might be
dents who were surveyed believed that it was more fruitful than any other kind, since this
more important to communicate successfully in seems to be important to students" (Powell 1973,
a foreign language rather than to try to com- p. 91). She further suggests that error in word
municate perfectly in it. Stressing the need to order is perhaps the most serious threat to the
consider the "economics of intervention," communication of a message in French (Powell
George (1972) recommends that teachers 1975a, p. 12).
initially determine how likely it is that correcting Hanzeli (1975) agrees that errors that interfere
learners' errors will improve their speech or with the meaning of a message should be cor-
written work, and how strongly the learners will rected more promptly and systematically than
sense their achievement. George suggests that any other. He adds, however, that teachers who
drawing students' attention to every error they are native speakers of the target language would
produce on their written compositions not only have difficulty establishing standard criteria for
wastes time, but also it provides no guarantee distinguishing communicative errors from non-
that they will learn from their mistakes, as evi- communicative errors, because these teachers
denced by similar errors that may reappear on often have learned to interpret their own stu-
their subsequent written work. dents' "Pidgin" (p. 431). The problem of cor-
There has been little empirical evidence to recting student errors consistently according to
suggest when to correct second language errors. their effect on the comprehensibility of students'
More descriptive research is needed to determine messages, would be an ever greater dilemma for
the attitudes of students and teachers toward teachers who are nonnative speakers of the target
producing and correcting errors in the class- language (Powell 1973, p. 92). George (1972)
room. Experimental research should focus on observes that learners will anticipate or correct
 ERROR C O R R E C T I O N INFOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING 391

their errors according to the response they expect cal knowledge, misuse of prepositions and pro-
from the person who is listening to them or who nouns, and seriously misspelled lexical items.
is reading their work. Although he endorses the Most local errors were caused by misuse and
priority of correcting communicative errors, omission of prepositions, lack of subject-verb
George believes that teachers often overestimate agreement, misspelled words, and faulty lexical
the degree to which such errors impair com- choice (Hendrickson 197713). Burt (1975) argues
munication. He hypothesizes that native persuasively that the global/local distinction is
speakers would be able to understand the ma- the most pervasive criterion for determining the
jority of students' deviant sentences. Indeed, communicative importance of errors (p. 58). She
there is some empirical evidence to support this claims that the correction of one global error in a
assumption. An experiment was conducted to sentence clarifies the intended message more
determine which deviations in passive voice sen- than the correction of several local errors in the
tences produced by 240 adolescent Swedish same sentence (p. 62). Furthermore, she states
learners would most likely be misinterpreted by that limiting correction to communicative errors
native Englishmen. It was found that the allows students to increase their motivation and
Englishmen understood nearly 70 percent of the self-confidence toward learning the target lan-
1,000 utterances, and that generally, semantic guage. Burt suggests that only when their pro-
errors blocked communication more than syn- duction in the foreign language begins to be-
tactic ones (Olsson 1972). come relatively free of communicative errors,
should learners begin to concentrate on re-
An attempt has been made to distinguish com- mediating local errors, if the learners are to ap-
municative errors from non-communicative proach near-native fluency (p. 58).
errors. Burt and Kiparsky (1972) classify stu-
dents' second language errors into two distinct A number of language educators suggest that
categories: those errors that cause a listener or errors that stigmatize the learner from the per-
reader to misunderstand a message or to con- spective of native speakers should be among the
sider a sentence incomprehensible (global first corrected Uohansson 1973, Richards 1973a,
errors), and those errors that do not significantly Sternglass 1974, Corder 1975, Hanzeli 1975, and
hinder communication of a sentence's message Birckbichler 1977). Undoubtedly, attitudes
(local errors). On the basis of how errors affect toward language influence human behavior. As
the comprehensibility of whole sentences, one Richards (1973a) points out, for example,
could build a local-to-global hierarchy of errors "deviancy from grammatical or phonological
that would potentially guide teachers to correct norms of a speech community elicits evalua-
students' mistakes (Burt 1971, Burt and tional reactions that may classify a person un-
Kiparsky 1972, and Valdman 1975). In an inves- favorably" (p. 131). This hypothesis has been
tigation on the effects of error correction treat- substantiated by a great deal of research on
ments upon students' writing proficiency, this stereotyped judgements made on various fea-
writer modified Burt and Kiparsky's global/local tures of Black English (Labov 1972a, 1972b,
error distinction. He defined a global error as a Williams and Whitehead 1973). Furthermore,
communicative error that causes a proficient sociolinguistic research in first language acquisi-
speaker of a foreign language either to misinter- tion indicates that grammatical features tend to
pret an oral or written message or to consider the elicit more unfavorable reactions than phono-
message incomprehensible with the textual con- logical variables (Wolfram 1973). This writer
tent of the error. On the other hand, a local found several recent studies that relate to native
error is a linguistic error that makes a form or speakers' reactions toward the errors of second
structure in a sentence appear awkward but, language learners. In Guntermann's study
nevertheless, causes a proficient speaker of a (1977) thirty native speakers of Spanish listened
foreign language little or no difficulty in under- to a tape recording of 43 sentences containing
standing the intended meaning of a sentence, errors that American students most frequently
given its contextual framework. It was found produced on an oral test. The native informants
that most global errors included in compositions were asked to interpret each sentence according
written by intermediate students of English as a to what they thought the speaker had meant to
second language resulted from inadequate lexi- say, Of the 1,290 interpretations given, 22 per-
392 THE MODERN LANGC'AGEJOC'RNAL

cent were inaccurate. The least comprehensible gested that high-frequency errors should be
sentences were those containing multiple errors among the first errors that teachers should cor-
(32 percent misinterpreted), especially sentences rect in students' oral and written communication
that contained multiple errors of the same sub- (Holley and King 1971, George 1972, Dresdner
type. It was found that among the highest fre- 1973, Bhatia 1974, and Allwright 1975). Re-
quency errors produced by American students of search is needed to determine which errors occur
Spanish, errors in article omissions were more most frequently at various stages of second lan-
acceptable to native speakers than errors in guage learning among learners of varying native
article agreement. The results also revealed languages. The results of this research could
that person errors were generally less acceptable serve as a basis for building hierarchies of lan-
by native speakers than the other two categories, guage learning features; these hierarchies would
and tense errors were generally preferred. An- have multiple applications including the estab-
other recent study on the acceptability of second lishment of priorities for correcting errors se-
language utterances was conducted by Ervin lectively and systematically. It has also been sug-
(1977) who investigated how proficient speakers gested that errors relevant to a specific peda-
of Russian would accept (i.e., comprehend) lan- gogic focus deserve to be corrected before other
guage communication strategies used by Ameri- less important errors (Cohen 1975), and that
can students based on their oral narrations of errors involving general grammatical rules are
picture stories. Although there were no statisti- more deserving of attention than errors involving
cally significant differences in the informants' lexical exceptions (Johansson 1973). Interest-
rankings of the students, there were systematic ingly, language learners appear to have differing
differences in the judges' numerical evaluations: priorities of error correction than do language
The non-teacher native speakers of Russian were educators and teachers. Recently, a group of 188
most accepting of the narrations of the mid- and college students were asked which errors they
high-proficiency students; the teachers of Rus- thought were the most important to correct. Stu-
sian who were native speakers of English were dents at all levels of proficiency agreed that pro-
most accepting of the narrations of low profi- nunciation and grammar errors ranked highest,
ciency students; and the teachers of Russian who with pronunciation slightly higher than gram-
were native speakers of Russian were the least ac- mar errors (Cathcart and Olsen 1976).
cepting of the narrations overall. T o sum, there appears to be a consensus
There are excellent social motivations for among many language educators that correcting
teachers' drawing their students' attention to three types of errors can be quite useful to second
errors that appear to have become a permanent language learners: errors that impair communi-
rather than a transitional feature of nonnatives' cation significantly; errors that have highly stig-
speech and writing (Richards 1973a, Valdman matizing effects on the listener or reader; and
1975). These so-called "fossilized" errors should errors that occur frequently in students' speech
be corrected based on their degree of incompre- and writing. A great deal more research needs to
hensibility and unacceptability as judged by be conducted to determine the degree to which
native speakers. Clearly, a great deal of research errors actually impede communication, which
is needed in these two important areas of socio- errors carry more social stigma than others, and
linguistics. Researchers need to investigate the which ones students produce often.
degree of stigma that native speakers attach to
lexically, grammatically, phonologically, and How Should Learner Errors Be Corrected?
orthographically deviant forms and structures Teachers need to be keenly aware of how they
that nonnative learners produce frequently in correct student errors and to avoid using correc-
their speech or writing. Moreover, it would be tion strategies that might embarrass or frustrate
worthwhile to determine whether or not the de- students (Holley and King 1971). However, most
gree of stigma would differ depending on the teacher training programs fail to prepare
social status of native speakers. teachers to handle the variety of errors that
Several additional criteria have been sug- occur inevitably in students' speech and writing
gested by language educators for establishing (Burt 1975). Nevertheless, the literature on error
priorities of error correction. It has been sug- correction does contain some information on re-
 ERROR CORRECTION IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING 393

cent theory, research, and practical suggestions helping students learn from their mistakes
for correcting students' errors. (Corder 1967, Gorbet 1974, and Valdman
Fanselow (1977) attempted to determine how 1975). They propose that a discovery approach
experienced teachers of English as a second lan- to error correction might help students to make
guage actually treated spoken errors in their inferences and formulate concepts about the tar-
regular classes. After videotaping eleven teachers get language, and to help them fix this informa-
who presented the same lesson to their students, tion in their long-term memories. This writer
transcripts containing both verbal and non- conducted an experiment to determine what ef-
verbal behaviors were made. The analysis of the fects direct teacher correction would have upon
tapes showed similarities among the teachers foreign students' communicative and linguistic
both in the types of errors treated and in the proficiency in English. He found that supplying
treatment used; specifically, the teachers seemed the correct lexical forms and grammatical struc-
less concerned with errors of grammar than with tures of students' errors had no statistically sig-
incorrect meaning, and giving the right answer nificant effect upon the writing proficiency of
was the most popular treatment. The process of either high or low communicative groups of stu-
analysis led Fanselow to develop four alternative dents (Hendrickson 1976, 1977b).
treatments to correcting students' spoken errors There is some controversy on whether or not
for the purpose of reducing students' uncertainty student errors should be corrected in some sort of
about how language works. Fanselow concludes systematic manner. Many teachers correct stu-
that time spent on doing these kinds of feedback dents' written work, for example, so imprecisely
tasks in class "is probably at least as well spent as and inconsistently that it is often difficult for stu-
time spent giving answers alone," and that dents to distinguish their major errors from their
"errors are part of learning-mistaken hypothe- minor ones (Allwright 1975). Indeed, recent re-
ses and wrong connections are normal" (p. 591). search indicates that a major reason that the cor-
Chaudron (1977) developed a structural model rection of students' compositions has no signifi-
for observing and describing the effectiveness of cant effect on reducing errors, is that teachers
teachers' corrections of linguistic errors. The correct compositions inconsistently. It was hypo-
model enables teachers to analyze their own cor- thesized, therefore, that a systematic approach
rective techniques and decide which of these are to error correction would be more effective than
most effective in their classrooms. Robbins random correction (Cohen and Robbins 1976).
(1977) investigated the effectiveness of eliciting Dulay and Burt (1977) see, however, no reason
explanations of incorrect verb forms produced to expect significantly different results with sys-
by students of English as a second language tematic correction techniques. They propose
(ESL). Eight intermediate adult ESL learners that "more selective feedback, tailored to the
were randomly placed into a control group or an learner's internal level of linguistic development,
experimental group. For one trisemester the ex- may be more effective" than systematic feedback
perimental subjects were given weekly error ex- (p
planation sessions during which they attempted
'Interestingly, several researchers have found that second
to locate their errors, correct them, and then
language errors appear to occur systematically in students'
were asked to provide an explanation for each written work. Dukkovi (1969), for example. found that 75.1
error; the control group received other kinds of percent of the errors in the written assignments of Czech uni-
feedback on their errors. Robbins found that the versity students studying English as foreign language were
experimental technique was ineffective in reduc- systematic. More recently, Ghadessy (1976) discovered that
ing the frequency of students' verb errors. She 7 7 . 3 percent of the writings of 370 Iranian university fresh-
concluded that the technique appears to be de- men learning English contained systematic errors most of
which were caused by the lack of reducing sentences by either
pendent on external variables, such as a learner's
conjunction or embedding (p. 80). Ghadessy concludes that
attitude and motivation, personality, and past because the majority of student written errors occur in syste-
language learning history. matic patterns, these patterns could serve as a basis for d r -
veloping instructional materials for individual learners
Many language teachers provide students with ( p 81). .Although written errors produced by second lan-
the 'Orrect form Or structure of their written guage learners may occur systematically, there is no experi-
errors. Some foreign language educators assert, mental evidence to suggest that they should be corrected
however, that this procedure is ineffective when systematically.
3 94 THE MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL

Several scholars recommend that teachers re- and the teacher will then be responsible for for-
cord their students' errors on diagnostic charts in mulating an appropriate corrective technique
order to reveal the linguistic features that are (Lantolf 1977). Several suggestions have been
causing students learning problems (Lee 1957, given for teachers who use "The Silent Way"
Corder 1973, Cohen 1975, and Cohen and method developed by Gattegno. Silent teachers
Robbins 1976). Recently, this writer used Burt may respond to students' oral errors in many
and Kiparsky's global/local error distinction as a ways, preferably those that conform to two prin-
basis for developing an error taxonomy for classi- ciples: "(1) Remain silent if at all possible.
fying, coding, and charting students' oral and (2) Give only as much help as absolutely neces-
written errors systematically. The following error sary" (Stevick 1976, p. 143).
chart reveals one student's major problem areas The literature also contains some specific sug-
based on the coding and tallying of his composi- gestions for correcting students' written errors.
tion errors (Hendrickson, 1977a):= One suggestion is to first identify and record the
error types that each learner produces fre-
Lexicon Syntax Morpholo~ Orthography Total quently. Then, the student reads his or her
written work to search out and correct all high-
Global
Errors frequency errors, one such error type at a time.
Local For example, if a learner's composition custo-
Errors
marily lacks subject-verb agreement, the student
Problem Oinrtrrd
Arra(s) markers letters
is asked to read the composition in order to
identify the subject of the first sentence. He then
puts the index finger of his left hand on the sub-
Error charts are useful not only for diagnostic ject, and moves the index finger of his right hand
purposes, but also for developing individualized until he has identified the verb, and checks for
instructional materials, for building a hierarchy concord. After the student proceeds through the
of error correction priorities, and for learning entire composition in this way, he reads it once
more about the process of second language again to check for other error types that he pro-
acquisition. duces often. It is claimed that correcting errors
Recent literature in foreign language method- in this way is a highly effective technique requir-
ology contains several specific suggestions for ing relatively little time or effort on the part of
correcting students' oral errors. At the University the student (George 1972, pp. 76-77). Another
of South Carolina pre-service teachers are given suggestion for correcting composition errors is to
a partially self-instructional program designed to use different color inks for distinguishing more
sensitize them to different types of oral errors important errors from less important ones (Burt
and to involve them in dealing with these errors and Kipansky 1977, p. 4). It has also been rec-
effectively. The error correction techniques "re- ommended that the teacher discuss each stu-
semble the tactics of a parent who is trying to dent's composition errors on cassette tapes, as a
help a child express his ideas or those of one who means of assuring that students will remember
is helping a foreigner communicate in a lan- the comments (Farnsworth 1974).
guage which he knows imperfectly" (Joiner 1975, Currently, this writer uses a combination of
p. 194). When the teacher cannot decipher a various direct and indirect techniques to correct
student's message it has been suggested that he picture story compositions written by inter-
"either reword the answer in an acceptable mediate learners of Spanish. Some indirect tech-
fashion, in such a manner as adults do with chil- niques are underlining all misspelled words and
dren, or at the end of the activity he may sum- omitted or superfluous affixes; placing a ques-
marize and review the most common mistakes" tion mark above a confusing phrase or structure;
and inserting an arrow (A) to indicate a missing
(Chastain 1971, p. 250). Another oral error cor-
rection method is to make tape recordings article or preposition. Generally, these indirect
- of
student conversations; then each student edits ?The writer has recently this taxonomy so t h a t
his Own tape for If he not recognize teachers can evaluate the quantity and quality of informa.
his mistakes, it may indicate that he has im- tion in studentsb communication samples using an error
properly learned the linguistic concepts at issue, analvsis approach.
 E R R O R C O R R E C T I O N IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING 395

methods are used whenever it is assumed that tion with foreign learners in various types of free-
students can correct their own errors using a learning situations, compared to what language
good dictionary or grammar book. More direct teachers do in a classroom environment. Many
correction techniques include underlining a other questions remain unanswered: What
word and providing a verbal tip such as "use sub- effects do correction in natural versus artificial
junctive"; crossing out superfluous words; and settings have upon learners' language profi-
supplying the correct form or structure-the ciency? Do native-speaking and nonnative-
most direct and least used technique. When stu- speaking teachers evaluate deviant speech and
dents receive their corrected compositions, they writing differently? If so, how do they correct
rewrite them and turn them in at the next class students' errors, and how do students react to the
session. The few errors that appear on the re- different correction approaches?
written compositions are then corrected by sup-
plying the correct form because it is assumed W h o Should Correct Learner Errors?
that students are not able to correct these errors
Most classroom teachers probably assume the
by themselves. Thus far, these correction pro-
responsibility for correcting their students'
cedures have significantly improved students' ex-
errors. The teacher is expected to be a source of
pression of thought as well as their grammatical
information about the target language and to
accuracy in Spanish. The procedures have also
react to errors whenever it seems appropriate to
contributed to a considerable increase of word
do so (Allwright 1975). One educator believes
output from the beginning to the end of each
that the teacher's function in error correction is
term.4
"to provide data and examples, and where neces-
Finally, Wingfield (1975) points out that the
sary to offer explanations and descriptions and,
teacher should choose corrective techniques that
more importantly, verification of the learner's
are most appropriate and most effective for indi-
hypothesis (i.e., correction)" about the target
vidual students. He lists five techniques for cor-
language (Corder 1973, p. 336).
recting written errors (p. 31 1):
While few language educators would deny the
1 , the teacher gives sufficient clues to enable self- teacher an active role in correcting errors, it has
correction to be made; been suggested that he or she should not domi-
2. the teacher corrects the script; nate the correction procedures. One alternative
3. the teacher deals with errors through marginal approach to correcting written work is to ask stu-
comments and footnotes: dents to correct one another's papers. Peer cor-
4. the teacher explains orally to individual rection would especially help students recognize
students; more grammatical errors than lexical errors; this
5. the teacher uses the error as an illustration for a
process would be reversed when students correct
class explanation.
each other's spoken errors (Cohen 1975, p. 419).
One educator concludes that any error correc- In other words, students would tend to focus on
tion process includes some of the following linguistic forms of sentences when correcting
general features: indication that an error was each other's compositions; but when they would
committed, identification of the type of error, correct one another's spoken utterances, the stu-
location of the error, mention of who made the dents would concentrate on function words such
error, selection of a remedy, provision of a cor- as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Stu-
rect model, the furnishing of an opportunity for dents would also tend to correct each other's
a new attempt, indication of improvement (if spelling and pronunciation, depending on the
applicable), and the offering of praise (Allwright
1975). 'An unexpected finding in a study conducted by the
Very few of the error correction theories and author was the substantial increase (30 percent) in the num-
methods described above have been tested to de- ber of words that students wrote on their composition pretests
termine their effect on facilitating second lan- compared to the number of words they wrote on identical
composition postests after six weeks of practice describing
guage proficiency. Clearly, there is a great need picture stories in writing (Hendrickson 1977b). It may be
to conduct research that deals with this issue. It that writing practice, improvement in writing proficiency,
would be worthwhile, for example, to determine self-confidence in one's own writing ability, and total word
what native speakers do to facilitate communica- output are closely related variables.
396 THE MODERN LANGUAGE JOURNAL

modality of communication. Several scholars 1. It appears that correcting oral and written
agree that in a heterogenous class, one student errors produced by second language learners im-
will be able to recognize another's error, espe- proves their proficiency in a foreign language
cially when the corrector has himself just over- more so than if their errors would remain un-
come some grammatical or lexical problems corrected.
(Burt and Kiparsky 1972, Corder 1975, and 2. There appears to be no general consensus
Valdman 1975). Recently Witbeck (1976) ex- among language methodologists or teachers on
perimented with four peer correction strategies, when to correct student errors. Many language
including whole class correction, immediate educators recognize, however, that correcting
feedback and rewriting, problem-solving, and every error is counter-productive to learning a
correction of modified and duplicated essays. He foreign language. Therefore, teachers need to
concludes that peer correction results in a create a supportive classroom environment in
"greater concern for achieving accuracy in which their students can feel confident about ex-
written expression in individual students and pressing their ideas and feelings freely without
creates a better classroom atmosphere for teach- suffering the threat or embarrassment of having
ing the correctional aspects of composition" each one of their oral or written errors corrected.
( p 325). 3. The question of when to correct student
errors is closely related to which errors to correct.
Several language specialists propose that once
Many educators propose that some errors have
students are made aware of their errors, they
higher priorities for correction than other errors,
may learn more from correcting their own errors
such as errors that seriously impair communica-
than by having their teacher correct them
tion, errors that have stigmatizing effects upon
(George 1972, Corder 1973, and Ravem 1973).
the listener or reader, and errors that students
Self-correction would probably be effective with
produce frequently. Procedures for classifying
grammatical errors but would be relatively inef-
and coding specific error types are being de-
fective with lexical errors (Wingfield 1975).
veloped for purposes of building a hierarchy of
It is apparent that the effects of these different error correction; one error taxonomy has already
approaches to who should correct learners' errors been developed to classify errors in communica-
are based more on intuition than experimental tive terms.
research. The effects of the various methodolo- 4. The literature reveals a wide variety of tech-
gies of error correction discussed above need to niques that teachers currently use to correct their
be substantiated or refuted by conducting a students' oral and written errors. Although there
series of carefully controlled experiments before is no experimental evidence to substantiate
correction strategies can be recommended or re- whether any of these methods reduces student
jected as being effective for dealing with stu- errors significantly, some empirical research
dents' written or oral errors. It may well be that indicates that direct types of corrective pro-
the specific effects on a learner's language profi- cedures have proven to be ineffective. Some very
ciency in terms of who corrects his errors will de- recent research has focused on how teachers ac-
pend upon when they are corrected, which ones tually correct student errors in their classrooms.
are corrected, and especially how they are It appears that continued research in this new
brought to the learner's attention. area will contribute to the development of addi-
tional practical methods for correcting errors ef-
fectively and efficiently.
Summary 5. Although teacher correction of learner
The literature on the correction of second lan- errors is helpful to many students, it may not
guage errors is quite speculative and relatively necessarily be an effective instructional strategy
scant. Nevertheless, some general and specific for every student or in all language classrooms.
implications for error correction can be drawn Peer correction or self-correction with teacher
from the information reported herein. The fol- guidance may be a more worthwhile investment
lowing implications respond directly to questions of time and effort for some teachers and
concerning whether, when, which, how, and by learners. However, no empirical research was
whom the student errors should be corrected. found to substantiate these hypotheses.
 ERROR CORRECTION IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING 397

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Error Correction in Foreign Language Teaching: Recent Theory, Research, and Practice
James M. Hendrickson
The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 62, No. 8. (Dec., 1978), pp. 387-398.
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Error Analysis in the Adult EFL Classroom

Marina K. Burt
TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 1. (Mar., 1975), pp. 53-63.
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Error Correction and the Training of Language Teachers

Andrew D. Cohen
The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 59, No. 8. (Dec., 1975), pp. 414-422.
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The Language of Second-Language Learners: The Broader Issues

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Errors and Strategies in Child Second Language Acquisition

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The Cassette Tape Recorder: A Bonus or a Bother in ESL Composition Correction

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Imitation and Correction in Foreign Language Learning

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