AbstractsThe following represent abstracts of selected research studies:
Strong and Weak Students' Preferences for Error Feedback Options and Responses
This study investigated whether level of achievement and difficulty of task influenced 21 low- (LA) and high-achievement (HA) college students' preferences for feedback options when doing computerized grammar exercises. The feedback options were (a) "right" or "wrong" message (RW), (b) error location (SE), (c) grammatical description of correct response (F), and (c) correct answer (A). An analysis of variance of tallied choices showed that achievement and difficulty of task had no significant impact. All subjects preferred the RW option over SE, F, and A. An analysis of conditional probability of feedback choices revealed that the HA students chose the RW option more often as a follow-up selection to RW, SE, F, and A than the LA students. The study argues that deficiencies in the LA learners' language skills may contribute to lowering their engagement in cognitive and motivational processing. This research study was published by the Modern Language Journal in Sum 1995.
Students' Perceptions of Novice Teaching Assistants' Use of the Target Language in Beginning Foreign Language Classes: A Preliminary Investigation
This paper discusses strategies for comprehensible target language input reported by students in first-year foreign language classes taught by novice TAs and how these strategies relate to appropriate TA training activities. It includes a brief review of selected literature on comprehensible input, a description of the goals of the pilot study, the methodology, results, discussion, and areas for further research.