The Study On The Effects Of Oral Output On Chinese College Students’ Noticing And Acquisition Of The Target Linguistic Form

Although output has long been viewed as an essential and indispensable part in language teaching and learning, whether and how it contributes to language learning are not seriously considered before Canadian linguistic Swain’s paper (1985), in which the Output Hypothesis was first proposed. According to Swain’s Output Hypothesis, comprehensible input is not an only necessary condition for learners to fully develop their language proficiency. Both comprehensible input and comprehensible output are needed for the sake of promoting second language learning better. Output Hypothesis proposed by Swain (1995,1998) claims that output plays an important role in SLA. Based on Output Hypothesis, Merrill Swain elaborated three functions of output, namely, the noticing function, the hypothesis-testing function and the metalinguistic function. The study investigates the noticing function of output, that is, the activity of producing the target language can promote language learners to recognize their linguistic problems and deficiencies in their interlanguage and bring them to seek subsequent input with more focused attention and thus lead to what they need to discover about the target language. It can enhance the accuracy of learners’language use.The dozens of experimental studies of noticing function have been carried out to explore this function overseas and home over the past twenty years, however, most of the studies either use the written form or use small samples in the experiments. The present study aims to explore the noticing function of oral output on noticing and acquisition of grammatical form, adopting a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods. By comparing the effects of output task and listening comprehension task, the current study explores whether oral output produces a positive impact on L2learners’noticing and acquisition of the past hypothetical conditions in English. The research questions are:1). Does oral output promote the learners’noticing of the target grammatical form embedded in the aural material in the subsequent input?2). Does input-output activity improve the learners" output of the target grammatical form?3). Do the learners of output group outperform those of the non-output group, who only engaged in comprehension activity in learning the target form? 70subjects in the study are sophomores majoring in marketing and sales from two parallel classes in Wuhan University of Science and Technology City College. The experimental group (n=35) accomplished oral re-telling of the passage while the control group (n=35) accomplished the comprehension task. Both groups took part in the pretest, two posttests and delayed posttest.There were two experimental phases in the study, and the experimental procedures were exactly the same. The only difference consisted in the input materials in the two phases. All the participants were informed with the procedures before each experimental phase began.Firstly, all participants were required to listen to the same listening material and wrote down the linguistic forms or content that they thought important for the following activity at the same time. Then, EG were asked to retell the story while CG to finish the comprehension questions. Next, all the subjects listened to the same input material again and took notes at the second time. Then, EG were asked to retell the story while CG to finish the comprehension questions again. After the first phase, both EG and CG were provided with immediate posttests. The procedures of phase two were exactly the same with those in phase one. Two weeks later, a delayed posttest was conducted. The data from two note-takings of both EG and CG, two outputs of EG in each of the two phases and four tests were processed by SPSS. A questionnaire and interview were employed in order to lend some support to the results.The major findings of the study are as follows:1). It did not show significant differences between EG and CG on note-taking in phase1. However, the EG showed greater noticing on the target form than that of the CG in phase2. Output activity resulted in significant increase of noticing of EG on target form.2). It did not show significant differences in accurate use of the target form between the two outputs in phase1. However, the EG showed significant differences in accurate use of the target form between the two outputs of phase2. It’s indicated that EG could immediately incorporate the target form into their output after the second exposure to the input material.3). It did not show significant differences in the results of delayed posttest, indicating that the effect of output task in the current study on acquisition was limited in a short-term. Thus, various and effective tasks should be taken to maintain the effect.In the light of the above findings, some pedagogical implications could be drawn. First, we should attach more importance to output. Students should be the centre of class teaching and be endowed with more opportunities of output activities. Teachers should be equipped with the notion that let students learn and master English by using it for the sake of improving their language proficiency. Next, when designing an output task, teacher should take into consideration various factors, namely, the difficulty of task demand, students’language proficiency, the feasibility of conducting the activity and the cognitive processes that the output tasks are likely to involve. Thus, the potential noticing and learning function of output can be greatly maximized. Third, teachers" feedback in terms of content and grammar are of great importance in maintaining the effect. The backwash effect of the output test should be fully utilized.