In language learning, mistakes are good, correcting them is bad (sometimes)

Let’s talk a little more about correcting mistakes in language learning, since it seems to have attracted a lot of attention here.

I stated earlier that we should not correct unless requested to do so, and even then as little as possible, when a learner is speaking, although we can be a lot more thorough in correcting writing. Corrections while speaking are best provided after the discussion, and in any case the objective is to make the learner attentive, and not to expect instant improvement.

The main benefit of correcting is that it makes the person correcting feel good. There are also learners that feel that if they are not corrected they have not had a lesson. However, I think that correcting has to be done mostly in writing and we have to be realistic about what it can achieve.

Let me explain why I believe this is good advice.

Let’s look at some very obvious errors, ones that are easy to point out and explain, and which rarely result in improvement.

English

1) The third person singular in the present tense in English takes “s”. Most learners know this at some level, and yet continually get it wrong.
2) Learners often say “I listen him” and I point out time and again that it is “listen to” and yet the learner does not change.

French

Gender

Mandarin

Tones

Further examples include Chinese people speaking English, regularly confuse “he” and “she” because there is not such distinction in spoken Chinese. German speakers use “since” like “seit” in German. I can point it out and nothing changes. “It is many people here” say the Swedes,  and the list goes on. Correcting and explaining does not help very much.

I can look at tables of verb or noun endings and while looking at the table think I have learned something, yet when I go to speak I cannot remember a thing.

So what is the solution? In my view it is only through lots of input, lots of listening and reading, lots of noticing, lots of reviewing of phrases, and a little of correcting and grammar review, that we start to develop the right instincts and produce the language more accurately.

When speaking, it is important not to destroy the enjoyment of communicating that the learner is experiencing. That is much more important than any minor correction that the learner will usually forget anyway.

When we look at a written summary of key words and phrases that we have misused in a conversation, or when we look at the correction of our writing submissions, we are not under any pressure and feel no stress. We can concentrate and observe. We can save these key words and phrases for review and then look for them in our listening and reading.

So I say corrections can be helpful if done properly, and that means mostly in writing.

From: http://thelinguist.blogs.com/