Application Of Task-Based Focus On Form To Grammar Teaching In Primary School EFL Classroom

Grammar is indispensable in English learning. It is not only the footstone for learners to comprehend and utilize English more accurately, but also one of the efficient ways to improve their English proficiency. While how to teach and how to learn English well is enduringly discussed in linguistic field. Focus on Form first put forward by Long in 1991. Since the 1990 s, researchers abroad and at home both paid much attention on it. There are numerous theoretical and empirical studies of Focus on Form abroad, but most of them implemented within the ESL(English as a Second Language) context. Studies in China mainly focus on the theoretical aspect. The majority of the empirical studies are post graduate theses, and the subjects of these studies are students with higher English proficiency. Therefore, the students from primary school were chosen as the subjects in current study, and the target form is English simple past tense. The current study is aimed at figuring out the influence of Focus on Form in pre-task(namely, FonF in pre-task) and Focus on Form in post-task(namely, FonF in pre-task) to immediate grammar acquisition and long-term grammar retention.To clarify the issues mentioned above, totally 92 students of two natural teaching classes from Yanchangbu Primary School in Lanzhou Gansu Province were selected as the subjects. There are 46 students in each class. The results of pre-test indicated that there is no significant difference between the two classes. Thus they were random selected as EC1 and EC2 in the experiment. EC1 is the FonF in pre-task group and EC2 is the FonF in post-task group. After the experimental treatments, an immediate post-test and a delayed post-test were conducted to the two experimental groups respectively. In addition, in order to get a further comprehension of the two different teaching methods from the participants' point of view, an informal interview was conducted. The interviewees were selected according to their participation in class and achievements in tests.With the aid of SPSS17.0, the results of this study are as following: 1) both FonF in pre-task treatments and FonF in post-task treatments are effective for assisting learners in acquiring the simple past tense, while FonF in pre-task treatments performed better than FonF in post-task treatments on immediate grammar acquisition. 2) both FonF in pre-task treatments and FonF in post-task treatments can enhance learners' long-term grammar retention of the simple past tense, but FonF in post-task treatments proved to be more effective.Based on the results of this study, Focus on Form is manifested to be one of the efficient ways for English grammar teaching for learners who are at the primary level. Therefore, the teachers should combine these two different kinds of Focus on Form efficiently according to different teaching objectives, to help students make substantive progress in both test achievements and grammar acquisition.