Revised Syntax Errors In Chinese Students' English Writing

Learning a foreign language is a step-by-step process, during which errors are to be expected at all stages of learning. Fear of making errors prevents Chinese students from being receptive and responsive. Overcoming fear of errors depends on the way they are rectified.Error correction is an important issue that second language (L2) teachers have to address. Attitudes regarding whether to correct, what to correct, when to correct, and how to correct have changed considerably in the last three decades, which exert great influence on L2 teaching. One of the major changes is that language teaching shifts from a focus on the structural properties of the target language to an emphasis on the expression and comprehension of meaning. In other words, the main concern in second language curriculum has changed from fostering students' grammatical accuracy to enhancing their communicative competence or fluency necessary for real-life communication. A consensus regarding the need for grammar error correction in students' speech and writing has not been reached. Some theorists, however, argue that ignoring errors can be potentially dangerous in that it can have the effect of a positive reinforcer, thus leading the learner to internalize those errors, causing fossilization (Brown, 1994:233). However, Truscott (1996: 327-69) and many more theorists hold that correction does not make any contribution to the development of grammar.The issue of whether to correct grammatical errors or not will be addressed in this paper. The field study done by the author deals with the major issues on the necessity and efficacy of grammar error correction in students' composition of essays, revision of essays and new essays, methods and strategies to deal with errors effectively and the students' attitudes toward error correction. Not much literature can be found addressing these topics. The present study is thus designed to answer these questions and thus contributes to our understanding of EFL learners. Results of the study indicate that grammar error correction sees no obvious improvement in students' writing accuracy and explicit and implicit correction works differently for students with different language proficiency.The paper also discusses a number of previous studies which attempted to investigate the...