Error correction

Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Professional Development Course Error Analysis and Correction Personal Attitudes to Correction Error Analysis Approaches to Errors Techniques Activities Correcting Writing

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 1

What do you understand by the following terms?

• error • mistake • slip • covert error • fossilised error Is the distinction between ‘error’ and ‘mistake’ always so clearcut?

What does the text think?

We believe this distinction is an academic one: in practice, and especially on the spur of the moment in a class, it is impossible to distinguish between the two. How can we tell what a student has ‘learnt’? Does that mean things that the students has met, or things the student has mastered? Maybe the student has been taught a lesson during which the word ‘library’ came up. Did the students learn it? How can we tell?

Maybe he/she understood it at the time, and even wrote it down in a notebook – but does that mean that the student ‘learnt’ it? Equally, we may say that a student has not learnt a word or a structure because it came up in class – but maybe they heard it on the radio the evening before. We are really talking about whether a student has been taught it or not – a completely different matter. When we asked a colleague what did you do with the class this morning? she replied: Well, I did the simple past, but I don’t know if they did! Learning is not the same as teaching!

From Bartram M. and Walton R [1991] Correction – A Positive Approach to Language Mistakes LTP

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 2

What are your personal attitudes to correction?

Consider the following and make notes.

• Is it always appropriate to correct?

• Who corrects?

• When do you correct?

• How do you correct?

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 3

What is the tortoise in the picture doing?

Stage 1

Daddy go to work yesterday

I don’t know anything about the simple past!

Stage 2

Daddy goed to work yesterday

I know something about the simple past!

Stage 3

Daddy went to work yesterday

I know everything about the simple past!

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 4 Reformulation Read the following dialogue and decide what reformulation is.

S: Yes, on Saturday I go to bath on trip.

T: You’re going to Bath? That’ll be nice.

S: Yes, I going to Bath, and we see the Romanic baths.

T: Have you seen the Roman Baths before?

S: No, this is first time.

T: What, the very first time?

S: Yes, I never see before.

T: Right, so Sonia’s going to bath to see the Roman Baths… And what’s anybody else doing?

How is reformulation beneficial to learners compared with other correction techniques?

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 5 What do you correct in written English?

• Content • Organisation • Punctuation • Style • Grammar • Register • Layout • Word Order • Spelling • Lexis How do you correct? Do you use a code? Tell you partner(s) about how you usually correct your students’ writing. Do you do some of the things mentioned in the box below?

Considering Written Feedback 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

Did you use a red pen for your comments? Or another colour?

Or a pen or pencil? Can you account for your choice?

For which of the assignments, if any, did you give some kind of assessment at the end (‘Good’ for example)? Why or why not?

Did you correct all the mistakes? If so, why? If not, on what did you base your decision which to correct and which not to?

Those mistakes you corrected: did you write in the correct form? Give a hint what it should be? Simply indicate it was wrong? Why? Did you note only what was wrong, or did you give some kind of indication of what was right or particularly good?

Did you provide any kind of informative feedback other than mistake correction and overall assessment. designed to help the student improve? (e.g. ‘This was good because…’, or ‘Take care when you…’)

When responding to the assignment that entailed expression of personal opinion, did you provide a response of your own to the content? (I agree with this point’, ‘Yes, but have you considered…?)

Did you require the student to redo any of the assignment? Can you say why, or why not?

Finally, try rereading your corrections imagining you are the student: what do you think the student will feel about them?

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction Copyright: Ur P [1996] A Course in Language Teaching CUP

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Handout 6 Correct the following composition. There are about 20 mistakes.

My name is Luis Gonzalves, and I come from Mexico. I Born in Mexico City.

When I was six years I went to the nursery school, and I enjoyed it very much. When I was eleven I’ve moved to Brazil, because my father is diplomat, so all my life I live in differents countries. After school, I was for four years in a business college, and I got a degree in business administration. I working for a company that products small calculator. It’s a good work, and I’m very interesting for computors. I want to learn english because my father and I will start our own business in America soon.

Luis From: Soars L Headway Students’ Book OUP

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Suggested Corrections

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Overseas Teachers of English Error Analysis and Correction

Here is a sample code: Writing correction code - Try - Activities Š BBC | British Council 2007

Writing correction code Code Use Example WW Wrong word As our plane flew on the mountains we saw snow.

WT Wrong time As our plane flew over the mountains we see snow.

WF Wrong form As our plane flew over the mountains we was seeing snow.

WO Wrong order As our plane over the mountain flew we saw snow.

SP Spelling As our plane flue over the mountains we saw snow.

P Punctuation As our plane flew over the mountains; we saw snow.

X Extra word As our plane flew over to the mountains we saw snow.

MW Missing word As our plane flew over the mountains saw snow.

R Register As our plane flew over the mountains we observed snow. ? Not clear As our plane flew over the mountains we saw snow. ! Silly mistake! As our plane flew over the mountains we seed snow.

RW Try re-writing O ur vehicle flies, we snow find, over mountains you saw it.

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Overseas Teachers’ Course / ICELT Module 1 Error Analysis and Correction

Error

Possible Reasons for Error

Means of Correction

Priority (1-5)

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