ERRORS AS PROCESS AND AS PRODUCT

ERRORS AS PROCESS AND AS PRODUCT For the purpose of this assignment, a distinction between ‘error’ and ‘mistake’ as suggested by Corder (1973) will not be made. The generic term ‘error’ will be used instead. Errors will not be classified into types either, such as ‘formal, discourse, or cross-cultural’(Archibald, 1998), since the focus of this assignment is rather on why and not what kind of errors are committed. Introduction As a language teacher I have always avoided correcting errors in texts and returning them to the students as it did not feel very constructive or productive. Instead I have always tried to elicit problems with learners’ texts, either individually, in small groups or as a class. This is to make the students think about why they might have committed an error or rather ‘arrived’ at one, which I consider a less punitive term. In other words, look at the text and the errors in it as constructive companions on a linguistic journey during which different paths might have been followed to arrive at destination –ERROR-. A linguistic journey where errors are considered as part of the recursive process of writing which Zimmermann (2000: 88) explained as: “[…] during formulating there are occasional looks back into planning and, during planning, forward to formulating […] the act of writing is often interrupted to check a formulation […] evaluating can probably intervene at any time”. During this process errors can be materialised during formulating, realised and altered during evaluation and thought of during planning. Participants and researcher will be retracing the steps that led to errors in a constructive way, rather than considering them as “inevitable by-products of the process of learning a language about which the teacher should make as little fuss as possible” (Corder, 1967: 19). Errors as product in writing research Among the areas covered by writing research and as outlined by Archibald & Jeffery (2000), errors analysis falls into the product of writing category, analysing errors as a product and not as process. If as suggested by Corder (1967) and pointed out by Archibald (1994) errors in second language learning (SLL) can help us understand the processes involved in learning a second language (SL), then why consider errors as a mere product and not as process as well?. Whilst it has been said that contrastive analysis is process oriented (Archibald, 1994) it departs from a set of pre-established principles which are micro applied grammatically, therefore missing macro aspects of the text such as discourse or pragmatic issues. Errors can provide us with information, either about first language(s) (L1) and second language(s) (L2) when considered as unconscious transfer from mother tongue to target language in contrastive linguistics or according to the interlanguage hypothesis as an indication of different learning levels useful for pedagogical feedback (Spillner, 1991). The contrastive analysis hypothesis can fail to predict some errors or overpredict them and both hypotheses can over-generalize (Choroleeva, 2009) either with regards to the source of errors or to the learning levels. At the same time and as remarked by Archibald & Jeffery (2000) both approaches have been applied at a sentence level to establish grammatical accuracy, whether to establish types and plausible sources or learner performance (Archibald, 1994). A mix of both hypotheses, as well as a broadening of typology of errors considered without over-generalization or pre-established principles, might help better account for the why and not only what in an effort to consider errors as a tool for learning rather than as Corder (1973: 259) considered them, unacceptable utterances or breaches or the code. The point of departure The point of departure for this assignment was Zimmermann (2000) since it focuses on ‘formulating’ (generating the text itself by putting thoughts into words) being, as he puts it, at the heart of the writing process. It is not intended here to emulate Zimmermann’s study but to take it as a departure since it is while formulating when errors are materialised into written words (brewed or conceived during planning, and realised, revisited and corrected, during revision). I consider that trying to find out what the L2 learner thought to get to materialise the error and to find out how “[…]writers come to grips with problems during formulating […]” (Zimmermann, 2000: 76) (without typification or pre-established categories) is considering an error as a process and not as a product. After outlining major aspects of the writing process in L1 and L2 with formulating as a focus, Zimmermann gives an overview of some influential models of the writing process, considering Hayes & Flower (1980) as the precursor, in one way or another, of subsequent models. He then looks at narrative data in L1 and L2 provided by advanced German learners of English as well as at their thinking aloud protocols with the intention of establishing which of the three major components of writing, namely planning-formulating-review, absorbed most of the participants’ time. He concludes that writers switch easily between these three components, which confirms the concept of writing as a recursive process. Zimmermann finds little evidence in his data for writing as translating L1 formulations into the L2, but rather for instances of reflections in L1 on what and how to write. But isn’t reflecting in L1 what to write and then writing it part of the translating? For the participants in this assignment, that was the case; as Manchón et al. (2000) explain, L2 learner’s L1 is used as a problem solving device. Consciously or unconsciously the participants’ L1 was used as a source for L2 formulations for the most part. In my own personal foreign language (FL) teaching experience, only very advanced learners to proficient ones might stop thinking in their L1 and then formulate directly on their L2. The focus of this assignment is rather on why and not what kinds of errors are committed. I suggest that changing the focus from correcting types of errors (considering them as a product) to eliciting problems and possible corrections and asking why the learner made that mistake, what was the train of thought that made him/her arrive at the error, is to consider errors as a process. This is what was attempted with the participants in this assignment. The study The participants were asked to write a text by hand. As researched by Mangen & Vilay (2010) or Longcamp et. al. (2005), writing by hand strengthens the learning process. It also prevents them from getting distracted by other tasks or messages on the computer, the temptation of using automatic corrections and it makes them focus more on the actual creation of the text itself. The text had to be about what they had done in their lives and what they would like to do in the future. They were asked to write it in their own time, at home to minimize pressure or stress that could be present in typical classroom situations and could also contribute to arriving at errors. The text did not have to be neatly presented, so they were asked to make any amendments on the sheet since that may provide extra error processing information. After the text was done I met with each of them separately to read it together and try to elicit corrections from them or correct it together; notes were taken about their comments, reflections and corrections. They were also asked to write about what went on in their heads when they were writing the text in order to find out if they could backtrack in the processes that they went through for writing the text; we could call this ‘writing down protocol’, believing that this might provide more clues as to why they arrived at their errors. Excerpts from some participants are commented on. The subjectivity which might be involved in determining whether an error is indeed one or not, dissolves to a certain extent when, without pre-established goals or categories, it is mostly the writer him or herself who reconsiders the text and reflects on why errors might have materialised or if indeed something feels wrong or not. At times possible corrections or errors-spotting were induced from the participants through prompts such as -confirmation and clarification checks, clarification requests or recasts- (Pica, 1994; Gass, 1997; Mackey, 2006). While it might seem that the approach to correcting the text is very much sentence based, it reflects however the items that the learner considered more saliently wrong. Although the texts could have been improved from a discursive point of view (which would have required longer time spent with the participants), being a descriptive and not argumentative task this was not considered crucial, the texts achieved the purpose of the task which was expressing what they had done in the past. The texts are provided in the appendix. A comprehensive account of errors or corrections is not provided since as pointed out the focus is on why and not what. Participant 1 A female pre-university student who has studied Spanish up to her A-levels and wants to become a FL teacher. This participant googled some terms in English either to check for false friends and the right translation or gender for: Creativo, materiales, realizé, aplicarse a, la idioma (changed to el idioma after checking). Realizé and aplicarse a were not corrected by this participant after checking because they were translated in the search as those words she had written, however they did not fit the contextual meaning, where they were indeed false friends which the participant did not realise. Rather than just substituting the term for the right one, talking about why allowed the researcher and the participant to discuss important issues such as context and meaning and the need to be careful when doing internet searches to translate text. We gave some attention to a language structure with a meaning focus. The student knew that her ‘English brain’ was on, that is why she looked up for possible false friends. When I asked her to substitute realise she was encouraged saying that she knew it and was able to look for it in her ‘Spanish brain’; immediately she came up with dar(se) cuenta, the right term. She admitted to all of her text being dictated by her ‘English brain’, sentence by sentence, hence some errors resulting from literal translations, with some of them self-corrected when she realised and appealed to her stored Spanish linguistic knowledge, her ‘Spanish brain’. Other errors such as the wrong tense were also self-corrected when she realised the wrong rule had been applied. It could be concluded that the great majority of her errors were formulated with her English brain, her stored linguistic knowledge about her L1. From personal experience with other learners, this is something that happens especially at lower levels. That might be the reason why Zimmermann (2000) found little evidence in his data for writing as translating L1 formulations into the L2, because of the much higher competence of his participants. The participant admitted to the usefulness of this kind of feedback and when writing future texts she would try to think differently and spend more time in her repair/revision phase, which is where Zimmermann (2000) pointed out the students should shift their efforts to. Participant 2 A female MA student who has lived in Spanish-speaking countries and could be considered as having a very high degree of proficiency. This participant, most probably due to a much higher competence than the previous one, switched her Spanish brain on, as she admitted in her writing down protocol: “[…] I found myself thinking in Spanish much of the time […] Several times words were on the tip of my tongue. I could almost hear them so I may have pulled out words that sounded similar to the correct version”. However when she did not know a word: “[…] I guessed, used a direct translation or left it in English, knowing I was not being graded. […]”. Interestingly, she also concedes: “[…] I’m not happy with the grammar and structures. It felt like I was rambling and somehow thinking in English first as I grappled for what I wanted to say, then attempting perhaps too literal a translation […]” As she explains she was ‘pulling out’ words which she ‘could almost hear’ in Spanish but at the same time thinking of what she wanted to say before hand in English (which echoes what Zimmermann (2000: 87) found in his data: “reflections in L1 on what and how to write”), and resorting to literal translation when hesitating about the ‘correct version’. So she was switching back and forwards between her L1 and L2 brains, and despite her high level of competence she still resorted to translating L1 formulations into her L2. She admitted to liking seeing written correction in text and she preferred this kind of feedback or joint correction where self-correction is achieved by “someone reminding you of what you might already know”. Participant 3 A female Spanish national with ESL who did a degree in English in Business and Human Resources and who has been living and working in the UK for the last 10 years. Prior to writing the text she said that when speaking or writing she thought in English all the time and not in Spanish anymore; but while analysing her errors she came to realise that in fact most of the mistakes, as in the case of the first participant and despite of her high competence in English, had been arrived at because of unconscious literal translation from her L1 into her L2. She might have thought that she only thought in English because, after prolonged use without correction, the erroneous utterances had been fossilised so they were indeed formulated and thought of directly in her L2 without the need to resort to conscious translation, she was unconsciously pulling out, as we might call them, fossilised translations into her L2. As Ferris (2004: 54) pointed out and according to second language acquisition (SLA) research “adult second language acquirers in particular need their errors made salient and explicit to them so that they can avoid fossilization and continue developing linguistic competence”. Also and as in the case of participant 1, other errors such as the wrong tense were self-corrected when she realised the wrong rule had been applied. No signs of punctuation at all had been used in the text. She said “I don’t know how to do it in English” and was under the impression that signs of punctuation in English were completely different from Spanish. Participant 4 A former male student of Spanish who did GCSE Spanish and lived in Spain for a few months. His Spanish is “a bit rusty”. He admitted struggling with the task since he had not written in Spanish for a long time and especially since some of the task required the use of the past tense. This participant translated back the text into English word by word as we re-read it. Sometimes he tried to recall a L2 rule unsuccessfully: […] I also wasn’t sure at one point after the word –cuando-whether to attempt the subjunctive […]”. Other times he made an error because previously in his text, he had already formulated it from English –met each other: se conocieron- and so the next time he uses the L2 verb in the reflexive form without realising it is not the case and so he formulates “me conocí”(I met myself) for – I met- . Most of the errors were self-corrected, the most difficult part being the past verb endings, when he would pull out the L2 infinitive first and then try to work out the correct past verb ending. He thought about what to write in English, so again we find formulations in L1 being translated into L2. In “Mi padre se hacío hombre”and “Mi madre se hacío mujer” he translated ‘to become’ into Spanish which can sometimes be –hacerse- although not in this context where the correct term would be –crecer- (to grow up). Having reflected in L1 and attempted to translate into L2 he pulls out the Spanish linguistic item which is available to him and then formulates. The same happened when he formulated “me gustaba” instead of -me hubiera gustado-: “[…] I tried to express something which in English is ‘I would have liked’ but I couldn’t remember how that tense was constructed so I used another way of expressing it. […]”. These errors allowed us, as in the case of participant 1, to talk about meaning and form at the same time. Discussion For all participants, the processes leading to an error took place while planning and formulating. Errors were found during ‘backtracking’ (Manchón et al. 2000) or revision (when more errors can arise). As Schoonen et. al. (2003: 170) explain, when writing in L1, “words and grammatical structures may be readily available in an automatised way”. Those words and grammatical structures are the ones that seem to be pulled out first by the participants. Their L1’s way of processing syntax is transferred to L2, and only the utterances which have been automated through use and repetition are pulled out directly in the L2, when one specific one is not found (as in part 4 case) another automated L2 option is used. As remarked by Pinker (1994: 411) “[…] a language refers to the process whereby the different speakers in a community acquire highly similar mental grammars.” The participants’ mental grammars, the result of their L1 computational systems, juggle with words responding to connotations, rules and patterns already well imprinted and they look automatically for quasi mirror reflections in their L2. The process of writing involves making decisions and choices (Flower & Hayes, 1981). In the case of the four participants, for the most part those decisions and choices made during writing were governed by their stored linguistic knowledge in L1, by the L1 mental grammar. It seems that the participants approached writing the text sentence by sentence as opposed to planning it as a whole, while this might be an issue at higher levels of proficiency or academic context, for this task it was not. As Schoonen et. al. (2003: 171) assumed, the L2 writer may mainly confront and concentrate on “word finding and grammatical structures” and not on “strategic aspects of writing “. After all a sentence by sentence approach makes sense if we abide by Chomsky’s (1957, 2002) idea of a language being indeed a set of sentences, finite in length and built out of a finite set of elements. All participants admitted to wanting to have their errors corrected and appreciating error feedback in general, to sound correct when speaking or writing. While there has been research on the positive effects of written error correction looking at learner’s views on written error feedback where the students valued it to be successful (Ferris, 2004), the learner’s errors seem to be corrected and interpreted for them. As also pointed out by Ferris (2004) ‘error treatment’ (2004: 57), which sounds rather an illness related term, or better ‘feedback schemes’ (2004: 57), including feedback by teachers, are necessary in L2 writing instruction and learners who are given error feedback are more likely to have the motivation and will for subsequent self-corrections. However Ferris (2004: 54) also argued “the cognitive investment of editing one’s text after receiving error feedback is likely a necessary, or at least helpful, step on the road to longer term improvement in accuracy”. Perhaps as Walter (2004) held, the process of engaging with others to reflect on one’s own learning, which is what was attempted with the participants, is more effective for learning. At levels of L2 proficiency where the linguistic competence allows it, rather than just trying to self-edit texts on receiving teacher feed-back as a problem solving activity, I suggest it would be more beneficial to make the student think and engage consciously in the cognitive processes that led to making an error, why did his/her error materialise as opposed to only focussing on what errors were committed. This could be done with a whole class where the learner can engage with peers and the teacher, leading to a more collaborative learning. If as Ohta (1999) argues, learners can notice and correct other learners’ speech errors more easily, perhaps the same could apply to written errors. Writing down protocols or writing about writing in L2 might be useful to help teachers identify areas of weakness for specific students and additional clues as to why he or she arrives at errors. Doing this kind of research could be part of a more exploratory practice as explained by Allwright (2003 & 2005), one where learners and teachers can be partners in research and where data collection is very close to pedagogic activities. Conclusion Although one cannot overgeneralise from the evidence of this small study, I am persuaded that looking at errors as process and product raises awareness of them, beyond what might be considered as a narrow “grammatical conciousness” (Naenini, 2008: 121) or -isolation from a communicative context- (Long, 1996). It would be beneficial for the learner to promote a greater self- awareness of errors, one which is constructive and positive, as well as an awareness of other learners’ errors in order to help each others’ learning process and discovering of L2. This step would be a further movement towards ‘strategy instruction’ (Archibald, 2006), to a view of the teacher as a counsellor rather than as an instructor. Considering errors as a process and not solely as a product which is what happens traditionally in the SL classroom, might prove more useful to the learner in acquiring strategies for a more conscious, independent and at the same time collaborative language learning among peers. Listening to what the learner has to say about his or her text, might lead to writing for learning and not writing to be corrected, and not to be -wannabe native speakers- (Cook, 2012) but to the speakers and writers that the learners want to be…. In the search for a “model of the learner’s internal SLA process” (Mitchell & Miles 2004: 192), errors are probably one of the key factors to consider and therefore it makes sense to approach also as process and not just as product. Afterthoughts Are the mechanisms involved in the process of making errors universal or idiosyncratic? To what extent are errors due to a learner’s floundering or to their poor hypotheses about the SL? If, as Hulstijn (2005) remarked, errors make us stop and think about explicit learning and about input, can they then provide us with an insight into what instruction is doing from the learner’s point of view? As discussed by Archibald (1994), often studies of learners’ errors are often restricted to the form of the sentence. There might be however a reason for this: the way L2 learners process language, especially in the early stages, in a –combinatorial- way (the way language in general is processed as explained by Pinker, 2008) which mirrors the L1. To apply a more discourse-oriented approach to errors such ‘contrastive pragmatics’ as also explained by Archibald (1994) might be more appropriate and beneficial at higher stages of L2 proficiency or at academic levels, when retrieval of form and meaning in the L2 has been automated, and utterances are pulled out directly in the language being learned. If SLA research considers the analogy of SL acquisition with L1 acquisition inappropriate (Cook, 2012) why is it that language immersion programmes (where conditions of L1 learning are replicated) are the most successful and speedy approaches to learn a FL fluently? APPENDIX Participant’s 1 text Participant’s 2 text Participant’s 3 text Participant’s 4 text BIBLIOGRAPHY Allwright, D. (2003). Exploratory practice: Rethinking practitioner research in language teaching. Language Teaching Research, 7, pp. 113-141. Allwright, D. (2005).Developing Principles for Practitioner Research: The Case of Exploratory Practice. 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