International Conference on TaskBased Language Teaching University of Leuven Leuven, Belgium Septemb

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International Conference onTask-Based Language
TeachingUniversity of LeuvenLeuven,
BelgiumSeptember 21-23, 2005
Modified Output during Task-based Pair
Interaction and Group Interaction
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Modified Output during Task-based Pair
Interaction and Group Interaction

• Ali Shehadeh (PhD)
• Aleppo University, Syria
• King Saud University, Saudi Arabia
• College of Languages and Translation
• King Saud University
• PO Box 87907
• Riyadh 11652
• Saudi Arabia
• e-mail ashhada_at_ksu.edu.sa

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1. Current view of roles of output

• Not only
• -it is the product of acquisition that has
  already taken place,
• -it enhances fluency in the TL,
• -it provides feedback and generates more
  comprehensible input,

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Current view of roles of output (contd)

• But also
• it plays an important role in the acquisition
  process. According to Swains Comprehensible
  Output Hypothesis (1995, 2000), output plays 3
  functions in SLA-it promotes noticing,
• -it serves as a metalinguistic function for
  language learners (negotiating about target
  language form), and-it serves the L2 learning
  process through hypothesis testing (for a review,
  see Shehadeh, 2002).

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2. Output, noticing, modified output, and L2
learning

• output notice the gap in ones
  IL
• -internal noticing self-initiation
• -external noticing other-initiation
• modified output
• L2 learning

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3. Contexts examined

• 1. Dyadic interaction (NS-NNS and NNS-NNS).
• 2. Learner-individual tasks (e.g., think-aloud
  protocols).

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4. Purpose

• Group interaction (3 learners or more) ?
• -is common interaction-type in many EFL/ESL
  classrooms.
• -is central in task-based approaches to language
  learning and language instruction (e.g., Edwards
  Willis, 2005 Ellis, 2003 McDonough, 2004
  Skehan, 2003).
• -Collect data from NNS participants only in both
  interaction patterns which is a more common
  situation in the worlds classrooms.

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5. Significance

• 1. Theoretical implications
• We do not know if something very different
  happens in the group condition from the pair
  condition in terms of processing and negotiation.
  E.g., we do not know whether group interaction
  provides quantitatively fewer opportunities than
  pair interaction, but the take-up of those
  opportunities -or the number of MO instances
  resulting from other- or self-initiation in
  relation to the number of opportunities arising-
  would be higher than in pair interaction.
  Examining the effect of group, as against dyad,
  interaction on opportunities for MO is therefore
  important to further substantiate the theoretical
  claims underlying Swains output hypothesis.

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Significance (contd)

• 2. Pedagogical implications (consequence for
  language pedagogy)
• This might enable us to have a principled basis
  for the usefulness of task-based group work and
  pair work in the second/foreign language
  classroom.

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6. The study

• Participants
• 32 NNSs of English, 17 males and 15 females.
• 13 different L1 backgrounds.
• intermediate level.
• Communication Task (decision-making)
• two-way task
• equal opportunities for talk and for supplying
  and requesting information
• a convergent task participants have shared
  goals, must reach unanimous decisions thus task
  forces participants in their output.

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Communication Task

• STATE OF FREEDONIA
• Meeting of the Grand Revolutionary Council
• YOU are the members of the GRAND REVOLUTIONARY
  COUNCIL OF FREEDONIA, which has just won its
  independence after a revolutionary struggle with
  its colonial masters. You have met here today to
  draw up part of the CONSTITUTION OF FREEDONIA.

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Communication Task (Contd)

• You must decide which propositions to accept,
  which to reject, and which you wish to amend.
  Your final decisions must be unanimous. Remember
  that the future and fate of FREEDONIA is in you
  hands. It has already been agreed that one of the
  members of the council (i.e., one of you) will be
  chosen PRESIDENT of FREEDONIA.
• You have to decide on the following questions
• 1. Who will be elected a President.
• 2. The President will be elected for life or for
  a period of seven years.

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Communication Task (Contd)

• 3. Following the first Presidency, all other
  Presidents will be elected
• (a) by the GRAND COUNCIL
• or (b) directly by the people
• or (c) by a parliament of Freedonia.
• 4. The decisions of the President will be supreme
• or The decisions of the Grand Council and the
  President will be supreme
• or The decisions of the Freedonian parliament
  will be supreme.

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Communication Task (Contd)

• 5. All persons who supported the colonial
  administration of the enemies of Freedonia will
  be
• (a) executed
• or (b) exiled until be pardoned by the President
• or (c) given a general and immediate amnesty.
• 6. FREEDONIA will remain forever neutral in
  military and political affairs, and will join no
  alliances.

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7. A model for self- and other-initiated modified
output
Indicator Other-initiation
Trigger Trouble-source
Response (Outcome)
Reaction to Outcome
Indicator Self-initiation
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Operational definitions

• A trouble-source or trigger any linguistic
  problem (phonological, morphosyntactic, or
  lexical) the learner runs into during his/her
  output or performance in the L2, leading to
  other- or self-initiations.
• Other-initiations cases in which interlocutors
  request clarification, make an explicit statement
  of non-understanding, or request explanation,
  expansion, paraphrase or elaboration.
• Self-initiations cases in which NNSs
  self-initiate an attempt to clarify an utterance
  when they notice that their utterance or part of
  it was not understood or misunderstood by
  interlocutor(s), or that the utterance is/was
  ill-formed in some way. 

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Operational definitions (contd)

• The outcome (the response that can result from
  other- or self-initiation) this can take
  different forms, including ignoring the signal to
  repair, failing to repair, expressing difficulty
  in repairing or communicating the intended
  meaning, appealing for help, inserting new but
  not directly relevant information, switching the
  topic, or successfully reprocessing and modifying
  output toward comprehensibility or accuracy
  (i.e., producing MO).
• The reaction to the outcome this is an optional
  unit of the routine which helps tie up the
  routine in some way before the speakers return to
  the main flow of conversation.

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Illustrating ExamplesSequence 1 (other-initiated
modified output)

• Example 1 illustrates a routine for the
  negotiation of an information unit between two
  NNSs leading to MO
• José I sink the grand council is
  menority (trigger or trouble-source)
• Karen menority? (indicator other-initiation)
• José minority minority in in the
  parliament (response outcome)
• Karen yes, yes (reaction to the outcome)

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Sequence 2 (self-initiated modified output)

• Examples 2 illustrates an instance of IL
  modification or self-initiation leading to MO by
  a NNS
• Student 3 the president must elect emm emm must
  be elect must be elected by by the people of
  Freedonia

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8. Hypothesesi. Quantity of MO

• Hypothesis 1
• Pair interaction would provide NNSs with more
  opportunities for MO resulting from
  other-initiations than group interaction.
• Hypothesis 2
• Pair interaction would provide NNSs with more
  opportunities for MO resulting from
  self-initiations than group interaction.

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ii. Quality of MO

• Hypothesis 3
• The take-up of opportunities for MO would be
  higher in group interaction than pair interaction
  relative to the number of other-initiations
  arising in each situation.
• Hypothesis 4
• The take-up of opportunities for MO would be
  higher in group interaction than pair interaction
  relative to the number of self-initiations
  arising in each situation.

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9. Resultsi. Quantity of MO

• H1 Other-initiated modified output Confirmed.
• There were 42 occurrences (or 67) of all 63
  other-initiated MOs in pair interactions and 21
  occurrences (or 33) in group interactions.
  Differences between the two frequencies revealed
  a level of significance in favour of pair
  interactions.
• H2 Self-initiated modified output Confirmed.
• There were 164 occurrences (or 57) of all 288
  self-initiated MOs in pair interactions and 124
  occurrences (or 43) in group interactions.
  Differences between the two frequencies revealed
  a level of significance in favour of pair
  interactions too.

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ii. Quality of MO

• H3 Other-initiated modified output
  Disconfirmed.
• 79 (or 42 of the 53 cases) of all
  other-initiations in the pair condition resulted
  in MO, and 84 (or 21 of the 25 cases) of all
  other-initiations in the group condition resulted
  in MO. Difference between the two proportions
  revealed a slight but not significant difference
  between both interaction patterns.
• H4 Self-initiated modified output Confirmed.
• 89 (or 164 of the 184 cases) of all
  self-initiations in the pair condition resulted
  in MO, and 96 (or 124 of the 129 cases) of all
  self-initiations in the group condition resulted
  in MO. Difference between the two proportions
  revealed significant differences between both
  interaction patterns in favour of the group
  condition.

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10. Discussion and implicationsi. Theory (two
implications)

• First
• In light of Swains (1998, 2000) and Swain and
  Lapkins (1995) arguments that when NNSs
  reprocess and modify their output toward greater
  message comprehensibility or accuracy, they are
  engaged in some mental processes that affect
  their access to the knowledge base, and that this
  process is part of L2 learning, the findings
  obtained here imply that both task-based pair
  interaction and group interaction promote MO and
  L2 learning, but they do so in different ways
  the former by providing NNSs with quantitatively
  more opportunities for MO the latter by
  providing them with a greater take-up of those
  opportunities in relation to the number of
  opportunities arising from self-initiations.

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i. Theory (contd)

• Second, in view of
• (a) the importance of noticing the gap in ones
  IL and role of MO in L2 learning (e.g., Swain,
  1995, 2000 Swain Lapkin, 1995 Shehadeh, 1999,
  2001),
• (b) the predominance of self-initiated
  self-completed repair in NS-NS interaction more
  favoured and more prevalent in conversations
  (Schegloff, 1979 Schegloff et al., 1977),

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i. Theory (contd)

• (c) the argument that self-initiated
  self-completed repairs as internal
  attention-drawing devices are more facilitative
  of L2 learning than other-initiated repairs as
  external attention-drawing techniques (Izumi,
  2000, 2002),
• we can conclude that group interaction provides
  learners with a good opportunity to notice the
  gap in their IL, produce MO, and learn an L2.

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ii. Language pedagogy (two implications)

• First
• Task-based group interaction should be
  encouraged as a standard learning/teaching
  strategy in the L2 classroom because it provides
  learners with a major opportunity to develop the
  ability to do self-initiated self-completed
  repair, and this, in turn, is BOTH more
  representative of targetlike behaviour AND
  facilitative of language learning.

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Language pedagogy (contd)

• Second
• Self-initiated self-completed repairs should be
  encouraged in the L2 classroom. This is very
  important when we know that some classroom
  studies have observed that students are not given
  sufficient time or opportunity to self-correct in
  a classroom situation (e.g., McHoul 1990).

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Language pedagogy (contd)

• McHoul (1990 375) observed that teachers
  initiated corrections either (a) immediately a
  trouble-source is over, with usually no gap
  occurring or (b) immediately the repairable
  i.e., the trouble-source itself is
  spoken/heard. He goes on to say that The latter
  cases of other-initiations either (i) overlap the
  trouble-source turn or (ii) interrupt it. In
  instances of (i), teacher and student can both be
  heard to be speaking, but very briefly, at the
  same time. In instances of (ii), the student
  immediately yields the floor to the teacher (p.
  375).

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• Thank You