The Effect Of Oral Output On Noticing And Second Language Acquisition

This study is intended to explore the noticing function of output hypothesized by Swain (1993, 1995, 1998), who claims that the activity of producing the target language may prompt L2 learners to recognize their linguistic problems and bring relevant aspects of the L2 to their attention. Two research questions are posed: 1) Do oral output activities facilitate the noticing of linguistic features in subsequent input? 2) Do these output-input activities result in improved production of the target form?The subjects for the investigation are 40 sophomores of a non-English major of Yangzhou Educational College. They are divided into two 20-member groups, namely EG and CG. In the treatment, the experimental group was required to do production task. First, they completed the guided picture-narration (Output 1) and then were presented with a model text including the target form (Input), the hypothetical conditional. At the same time, the control group was only required to do comprehension exercises instead of production. First, they read the same text and answered the true-false and multiple-choice questions (Input 1). Afterwards, they were exposed to the passage again (Input). In order to test their noticing of the target structure, both the EG and CG were asked to underline any part of the sentences that they thought were "key and particularly important" for them to finish their production and comprehension tasks. Finally, the two groups correspondingly repeated their narration and reading comprehension task.From the quantitative results were drawn the following findings:1. The experimental group underlined a higher percentage (45.47%) of target items out of the total items underlined than the control group (37.85%). Their noticing was more form-focused than the CG.2. After being exposed to the input of the model text, the experimental group made more attempts to produce the target grammar and achieved more accurate use of it than they did in their first output. In Output 1, 20 EG subjects made an average mean of 1.1 attempts to use the target structure. While in Output 2, almost all the subjects attempted to use it and made mean attempts of 3.15. In terms of the accuracy of their use, the average of the correctly formulated target sentences increased from 0 in Output 1 to 1.2 in Output 2. And in the target-like use, the percentage augmented from 0 to 38.1%.3. On the posttest, the experimental group attained higher accuracy of the targetform use than the control group on the cloze and translation items, which were intended to test productive knowledge. The EG's scores averaged 7.2 and 6.45 respectively while the CG's, 5 and 4.25. On the other hand, the two groups showed less significant differences in the gains on the multiple choice and error correction formats for the purpose of testing the receptive knowledge.4. Despite the different test results, both the EG and CG scored higher in the posttest than in the pretest. The EG's average scores improved from 18.75 to 27.95, and the CG's, from 19.2 to 22.3. This fact demonstrated that either output treatment on the EG or the input enhancement treatment on the CG facilitated the subjects' acquisition of the target form.What's more, the data from the retrospective questionnaire immediately after the treatment supplied more definite and convincing answers to the research questions.First, the EG subjects' statement demonstrates that language output did help them to concentrate their attention on the relevant linguistic form and to internalize it more effectively. Therefore, they could achieve the form-meaning-function connection in mind, which is necessary for language acquisition. Besides, the other two functions of learner output put forward by Swain were evidenced in the questionnaire: 1) hypothesis testing function, that is, the activity of production gives learners opportunities to experiment on their target language; 2) metalinguistic function, which means that language output causes learners' conscious reflection on their interlanguage system.Second, the CG's account indicat...