A Study On Oral Error Correction In College English Class For Non-English Majors

In the acquisition of a foreign language, there will definitely be errors. So far numerous linguists have explored deeply in the field of the correction of errors. In history clashes in the conceptions of the subject have never come to a halt. Nevertheless in the past decade, a growing tendency arises that more and more linguists came to realize the functions and necessity of the correction of errors in the process of learning a foreign language, and the research related to it is increasingly conducted in the classroom English teaching. Effective techniques and models have been proposed for investigating the correction of oral errors in English classes by some linguists, say, Lyster, Ranta, Long, Chaudron, etc. Just based on the five-question model Chaudron brought forward, this thesis is to tackle the discrepancies, if any, between teachers' and students' perspectives of the correction of oral errors in English class. The survey involved 218 first-year non-English majors and 66 English teachers from three of the universities in Xi'an, and was conducted mainly by means of questionnaires and personal interviews. The questionnaires were created in accordance with Chaudron's five-question model, one for teachers and the other for their students. The findings of the study reveal that students do keep different perspectives from their teachers about many specific aspects of the correction of oral errors in English class for a variety of reasons. Accordingly, a few implications for English teaching are offered in the last part of the thesis. Selecting technique to correct oral errors, teachers ought to take into account a lot of factors, such as their students'specific language proficiencies, personalities, preferences, and the effects of the correction, etc. Teachers should bear in their mind all the time to adopt the most appropriate attitudes towards the students committing them, being positive, respectful and friendly, It's also advised that teachers catch up on the theoretical advancement of the subject, and conduct field research of their English classes, thus improving their English teaching further...