The Role of Class Participation Structure in the Effectiveness of Incidental Form-focused Instruction

Document Type : مقالات علمی پژوهشی

Authors
K. Shabani 1
R. Vahedi 2
1 Associate Professor, Department of English, Faculty of Economics & Administrative Sciences, Allameh Mohaddes Nouri University, Nour, Iran
2 MA Graduate, Department of English, Faculty of Economics & Administrative Sciences, Allameh Mohaddes Nouri University, Nour, Iran
10.52547/LRR.13.6.6
Abstract
A significant issue in L2 context is the role of class participation structure in the occurrence of incidental form-focused instruction (FFI) for teaching grammar (Lehrer & Palincsar, 2004; Nassaji, 2010 & 2013). This study aimed at investigating the occurrence of FFI in different teacher-student classroom participation structures and its efficacy in the students' learning of the past tense of regular/irregular verbs during dictogloss tasks. To this end, 32 pre-intermediate students from a total of 70 participants ranging in age from 15 to 20 were recruited and subdivided into three groups (i.e., whole class, small group, and individual). Dictogloss tasks were used as the classroom activity. The interactions between teachers and learners lasting for two and a half months were observed, audio-recorded, and coded. Finally, an individualized posttest was employed one week after each classroom observation. The focus on form episode (FFE) was utilized as the unit of analysis. The results indicated that EFE occurrences were not equal across classroom participation structures and that the majority of FFEs took place in individual interactions, which were predominantly teacher-initiated. The group-independence Chi-square showed a significant relationship between the type of participation structure and the occurrence of FFEs. Further analysis indicated that although the majority of FFEs took place in individual interactions, the small-group participation structure benefitted the most and the reactive FFEs and preemptive FFEs were found mostly effective in the small-group and whole class participation structures, respectively.



1. Introduction

Surfing the literature on L2 instruction, Long (1998) has identified three main options for teaching the grammar namely: focus on formS, focus on meaning, and FonF. Focus on formS was a traditional approach in which the teachers draw students’ attention to the grammatical forms and linguistic forms. Focus on meaning emphasized the pure meaning-based activities with no attention to form. But, as the last movement, Focus on form or FonF overtly draws students’ attention to linguistic elements as they arose incidentally in lessons whose overriding focus was on meaning or communication. The present study was prompted to investigate the role of different types of student–teacher participation structure (i.e., whole class, small group, individual) in the effectiveness of incidental FonF instruction on the acquisition of regular and irregular past tense during dictogloss tasks.



Research Question(s)

To address the main concerns of the study, the following research questions were raised:

1. How often does incidental FonF occur in Iranian pre-intermediate EFL classes?

2. Does the occurrence of incidental FonF vary according to the type of student teacher participation structure (i.e., whole class, small group and individual) in the performance of dictogloss tasks in Iranian pre-intermediate EFL classes?

3. Does the effectiveness of incidental FonF on Iranian pre-intermediate EFL classes in using regular and irregular past tense forms vary according to the type of student–teacher participation structure in the performance of dictogloss tasks?



2. Literature Review

Nassaji (2013) examined the relationship between participation structure (i.e., whole class, small group, and individual) and incidental FonF in adult ESL classrooms at three levels of language proficiency, that is, beginner, intermediate, and advanced. The interaction between teacher and students were audio-and video-recorded. The results indicated that both the occurrence and effectiveness of incidental FonF varied according to the three different types of participation structure. Following the model suggested by Nassaji (2013), in this study the researchers intended to know whether the occurrence of incidental FonF varies according to the types of student–teacher participation structure (i.e., whole class, small group and individual) in the performance of dictogloss tasks. In addition, the study investigated the effectiveness of incidental FonF across contexts in using regular and irregular past tense forms.



3. Methodology

A qualitative-quantitative descriptive research design was used to provide answers to the research questions. There were three types of teacher-student participation structure: whole class, small group (three), and individual. The interactions between teachers and students in all three classes were audio-recorded, transcribed, categorized and compared. Finally, an individualized posttest based on each FFE was employed to each student one week after each classroom observation and the target structure was the regular and irregular past tense forms.



4. Results

A total of 1,529 FFEs were identified and coded during the observations. Generally, the reactive FFEs were more frequent than the preemptive FFEs.

Table 1

Frequency and percentage of types of FFEs across participation structures





Types of participation structure
FonF

Types of preemptive FFEs


Reactive
Preemptive

Teacher-initiated
Student-initiated


Individual (n= 910)
552 (60.7%)
358 (39.3%)

254 (70.9%)
104 (29.1%)


Small-group (n= 443)
278 (62.8%)
165 (37.2%)

119 (72.1%)
46 (27.9%)


Whole class (n= 176)
90 (51.1%)
86 (48.9%)

61 (70.9%)
25 (29.1%)


Total (n= 1,529)
920 (60.2%)
609 (39.8%)

434 (71.3%)
175 (28.7%)





A group-independence Chi-square test was run to see if the occurrence of incidental FonF varied according to the type of student–teacher participation structure (i.e., individual, small-group, and whole class). The results were statistically significant regarding the occurrence of reactive and preemptive FFEs (X2= 7.31, df= 2, p= .026), with an effect size of w= .069, which is a rather small effect size.

To examine the effectiveness of FonF, the individualized posttests were analyzed. A group-independence Chi-square test was run to see if the effectiveness of incidental FonF varied according to the type of student–teacher participation structure.



Table 2.

Chi-square results comparing the correct test scores on individualized posttests across participation structures





Groups
Pearson Chi-Square
Continuity Correction
Likelihood Ratio
Phi









Val.
Sig. (2-tailed)
Val.
Sig. (2-tailed)
Val.
Sig.(2-tailed)


Correct answer
Individual/small-group
25.29
.000
24.67
.000
25.28
.000
-.153


Individual/whole class
.159
.690
.115
.735
.159
.690
.012


Small-group/whole class
35.28
.000
34.61
.000
35.52
.000
.165





The results were statistically significant between the individual and small-group interaction regarding the number of the correct answers brought by FFEs (X2= 24.67, df= 1, p= .000), with an effect size of phi= -.153, which is a rather small effect size. The results were also statistically significant between the small-group and whole-class interactions regarding the number of the correct answers brought by FFEs (X2= 34.61, df= 1, p= .000), with an effect size of phi= .165, which is a rather small effect size. The results, however, were not statistically significant between the individual and whole-class interactions regarding the number of the correct answers brought by FFEs (X2= .115, df= 1, p= .735), with an effect size of phi= .012, which is a very small effect size



5. Discussion

The first research question dealt with the frequency of types of incidental FFEs in Iranian EFL pre-intermediate classes. The results of the study confirmed that incidental FonF took place quite frequently in all the three participation structure. The second research question dealt with the relationship between the frequency of types of incidental FFEs and participation structure in using dictogloss tasks. The results showed that the majority of incidental FFEs occurred in individual interactions. The final research question dealt with the relationship between participation structures and the effectiveness of incidental FonF dealing with dictogloss tasks. The target feature was regular and irregular past tense forms. The findings indicated that incidental FonF helps students develop their grammatical accuracy.



6. Conclusion

The study showd that incidental FonF and student–teacher participation structures had a significant effect on students’ use of regular and irregular past tense forms during the performance of dictogloss tasks. The results demonstrated that the majority of FFEs took place in individual interactions and the proportions of different types of incidental FonF were not equal across student-teacher participation structures. Moreover, the findings indicated that the effectiveness of incidental FonF would vary across classroom participation structures in terms of students’ use of regular and irregular past tense during dictogloss tasks. Although the majority of FFEs took place in individual interactions, students responded correctly to the higher rate of individualized posttest items that occurred in small-group interaction. In sum, a relationship was found between incidental FonF and different types of student-teacher participation structures in using dictogloss tasks in Iranian pre-intermediate EFL classes.






Keywords

Subjects

منابع

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Language Related Research
Volume 13, Issue 6 - Serial Number 72
January and February 2022
Pages 167-200