Empirical Study On Output Task Pedagogy

The thesis investigated the effects of output tasks on English grammar teaching and learning. According to the process and control of information flow, tasks can be divided into open task and closed task; the closed task can be further divided into reconstruction task and picture-cued task; open task is answering question task. Participants are non-English major freshmen in a certain Chinese university. The theoretical framework is output hypothesis proposed by Swain in 1995. She proposed three functions of output task. They are noticing triggering function, hypothesis testing function and reflective function. The purpose of the research is to explore the relevant effects of output tasks mentioned above on the noticing and learning of English past counterfactual conditional. The study defined grammar competence as accurate comprehension and usage of functional phrases to reconstruct meaningful and correct sentences. Lexical can be divided into content phrases and functional phrases. In author's view, language learning refers to form-meaning connections of both content phrases and functional phrases on the syntactic and semantic level.The major findings of the empirical study after quantitative analyses by SPSS 14.0 one-way ANOVA are presented as follows:1. Closed task promoted more noticing of the functional phrases of EPCC than open task. It indicated that form-focused task demands played a determining role in promoting noticing of the target form.2. Comparatively speaking, picture-cued task had a significantly better effect on promoting higher level of noticing than reconstruction task and answering question task. But there is no significant difference between closed task and open task on the higher level of noticing. It indicated that several experiments can not lead to the change on the quality of noticing, maybe only partial change at most.3. Closed task promoted better learning of the functional phrases of EPCC than open task. It indicated that form-focused task demands played a crucial role in promoting learning of the target form.4. There is a close relationship between notice and learning. Closed task facilitated learners more noticing the target form, thus led to better learning of the target form.Some additional findings are presented as follows:1. Picture-cued writing task may help learners transfer certain amount of declarative knowledge into procedural knowledge2. Form-focused input material is a prerequisite for the effective attention on the target form.3. Output and immediate correct feedback constructed the major favorable conditions for second language learning. As output may trigger incorrect hypothesis, with timely correct feedback, learners can notice their own language problem and modify the hypothesis.4. People tends to process picture information more quickly than the word information, after meaning is decoded, attentional resources can be effectively shifted onto the form which is essential for the accurate usage of the target form.5. Task demand must match task purpose. If task demand doesn't match the purpose, second language learning must be a failure. For instance, answering question task demand doesn't match the pedagogical purpose, so the effects of noticing and acquisition are the worst one.6. No appropriate output task, no second language learning." Appropriate output task promotes learners noticing their language problem and solving the problems by themselves. Only through this way can learners deeply recognize their language problem, modify and develop the interlanguage system.In experiment, the author created a new criterion to judge different levels of noticing, and divided noticing into three levels:The first level is that both form and meaning are noticed, but when coming into learner's minds, they are different from the target norm.The second level is that the form is noticed and used correctly but the meaning is misunderstood or the meaning is understandable but the form is misused.The third level is that both form and meaning are noticed and used correctly, that is the mapping of the meaning onto the form.