Error Correction (and student demands)

I have a stack of article summaries, written by upper-intermediate level ESL students, awaiting my attention as soon as I finish this blog post. I’m probably going to pick up my pen, give each student a check mark for effort, and then circle or correct one or two patterns of error per summary.

These stances on error correction are difficult—I have a pretty set position when it comes to correcting spoken errors, but I’m not as decided with written errors. I found my own experiences in line with Casanave’s observation: “Not surprisingly, more students report that they want and appreciate teachers’ commentary, but in particular they claim to want help with grammar and vocabulary and may feel that a teacher who does not correct these language errors is not doing her job” (87). As I’ve said in class, my students often demand error correction from me. Casanave explains that students “tend to believe” that this type of correction helps, and although the studies presented in her chapter are generally pointing to an opposite direction or are inconclusive, there seems to have been at least some instances in which certain aspects of writing have improved with certain types of feedback and correction (pgs. 90-1).

Ferris reports that student opinions regularly show that they think error correction is a key aspect to their success (55). If students believe correction is essential, how do we incorporate these findings and change their views? They enter a class with these strong perceptions, and as Casanave even points out, we might only have a semester to work with them. Ferris suggests that we might need to raise student awareness about why correction is important (or, I suppose, depending on your own opinions, not important) (55). But in an L2 classroom that’s not always going to be practical—especially if students already have certain beliefs.

If writing can improve without local or careful correction, what does that say about the reverse? That is, does correction harm in any way (besides taking extra time and effort on the teacher’s part, though I’d argue that sometimes it takes less effort to red-pen mechanical and grammatical errors)? As Ferris says, “…if the existing longitudinal studies do not reliably demonstrate the efficacy of error feedback, they certainly do not prove its uselessness either” (55). That is, if the studies don’t conclude that correction is good, that doesn’t mean we can assume it’s bad. Truscott argues that it can give a bad impression to the students (Casanave 88), but in my experience that doesn’t hold true for many students who want and demand correction.

So what about the internal factor—the attitude or motivational changes due to error correction? Truscott, as cited in Casanave, says that it can be “discouraging” (88), but I don’t think that’s the only case. Some students seem to thrive on it. What if I make corrections to pacify the students, which boosts their confidence in me as a teacher, which then might in turn boost their motivation and confidence in their own writing? This will not happen with every student, of course, but part of my point is that each learner is unique (even if we can classify them by styles) and it’s possible that different learners respond in different ways: perhaps some are discouraged by error correction and perhaps others try to (even if they actually don’t) correct or revise future writing because of it.

Did any of the studies cited seem to really show that correction can be detrimental? And if not, does that mean that it is okay to continue correcting, or is that just teacher apathy and unwillingness to change an established system?