Introduction

This article aims to consider briefly a number of issues related to the correction of students' oral mistakes, and offers some advice as to what errors to correct, how and when. As a starting point, the view of language learning embraced is one which involves rule formation and hypothesis testing, in which errors, rather than being deplored, are expected and accepted.

Contrary to the impression given in many teaching handbooks that students should be able to produce language items accurately after initial presentation and controlled/further practice, there is often a significant time lag between 'knowing' a rule and being able to produce language correctly on the basis of it.

Considerations to take into account when responding to students' oral errors

When deciding how to respond to students' oral errors there are a number of questions we need to ask ourselves. First of all, 'Should learners' errors be corrected?'.

There are wide differences of opinion here, but perhaps one of the most compelling reasons for carrying out correction is that many learners expect their errors to be corrected and can feel disappointed or resentful if they are ignored. Secondly, there is the danger that by leaving errors untreated, the defective language might serve as an input model and be acquired by other students in the class. Thirdly, the provision of corrective feedback can significantly speed up the process of language learning by providing information about rules and the limits of language use, which would otherwise take students a long time to deduce on their own. Despite the potential benefit of feedback and correction, however, it will only be effective if students are amenable to the idea and are willing to take on board teachers' comments. Hence, in order to ensure that students are receptive to error treatment, it is necessary to find out their preferences and attitudes towards correction and feedback, as well as how sensitive or resilient they are to the same.

Having agreed with the principle of correction, the next question to ask is, 'Which oral errors should be corrected?'.

One answer is that we should treat those errors which are regularly repeated by one or more students and also we should attend to those we consider to be the most serious. For supporters of the Communicative Approach who give emphasis to the importance of fluency over accuracy, this tends to be those errors that hinder communication of the speaker's message. Arguably, however, this has lead to an increase in the number of students who though capable of communicating freely, continue to make a significant number of grammatical errors, sometimes even at higher levels. Interestingly, if students were asked about this situation, they would probably claim that their aim was to learn to speak accurately and fluently at the same time.

Another consideration when deciding whether or not to respond to errors is the nature of them and how ready or capable students are of dealing with particular errors. In the case of slips of the tongue, for example, it would seem wisest to overlook them, unless they are frequent, or result from carelessness. With regard to errors resulting from faulty or insufficient knowledge of the language, however, the situation is more complicated and if students have not been exposed to a language form or are not ready to learn a particular structure, then it could be argued that there is little point in intervening and giving feedback. Having said this, supposedly more complex language can be contextualised and given to the students in the form of chunks, e.g. encouraging them to say 'I've finished' and not 'I am finished', which is not likely to be too demanding, even for beginners.

Moving on to the question 'When should learners' errors be corrected?", it is necessary to consider first of all, the nature of the activity being undertaken. If, for example, students are being drilled in order to practise pronunciation of a word or phrase, then they should be stopped immediately when they make a mistake, otherwise they will continue repeating defective language, which is pointless. This said, if the teacher wants to encourage the student to self-correct, they must give them sufficient time to do so, and it has been found that increasing wait-time by an extra second or two enables learners to self-correct 50-90 per cent of their mistakes. With regard to fluency activities, the usual advice is to delay feedback until the end of the activity so as to avoid interrupting the student's flow of speech. However, in the course of everyday conversation between native speakers it is normal for the listener to signal (via means of nods, facial expressions or quiet utterances such as 'mmm', or 'yeah') that they understand what is being said, and a lack of responses of this kind is likely to cause the speaker discomfort.

The next question on the list, 'How should learners' errors be corrected?" is inextricably linked to a further, final, question 'Who should correct students' errors?'.

As we may have found, efforts to correct students' mistakes can have little or no effect on their output, and it needs to be borne in mind that for correction/feedback to work, there must be a need or desire on the part of learners to attend to their errors, which assumes that they recognise that their performance is flawed. Hence, instead of merely pointing out that an error has been made and correcting it, the teacher should therefore try to help learners notice the difference between their output and that which a native speaker would produce. The best way to do this is indirectly via strategies such as problem-solving tasks, because it can be difficult getting students to pay attention to what they have to say, and this type of approach will encourage them to be active processors of information, and not just passive receivers.

Furthermore, a self-discovery approach reduces the likelihood of students becoming dependent on external assistance. However, learner independence is not something that can be achieved overnight and initially students will require the support of someone with more knowledge than themselves, in order to become aware of, and/or correct their errors. Gradually, teacher intervention should be reduced and students encouraged to pick up on each others' mistakes and provide feedback. A natural and non-threatening way of doing this is to encourage them to make use of a number of strategies when they are talking to each other, for example, clarification requests (What did you mean by . . . .?), requests for repetition (Sorry, can you say that again.?) and the use of questioning looks. Not only will this persuade the speaker to try and reformulate and improve their message, but will hopefully develop their ability to detect their own errors and mistakes, as well as the ability to self-correct.