Chapter-7-Processing-Instruction-and-Structured-Input.ppt

1/94Chapter 7Processing Instruction and Structured Input2/94In this chapter we explore:vThe nature of input processingvProcessing instruction:grammar instruction that has structured input at its corevResearch on processing instruction that demonstrates its effectivenessvA set of guidelines for developing structured input activities3/94Input processingvTraditional instruction consisting of drills in which learner output is manipulated and the instruction is divorced from meaning or communication is not an effective method for enhancing language acquisition.vWhat is needed is a new pedagogy of grammar instruction that takes as its point of departure what we know about how grammatical forms and structures are acquired.vThis pedagogy needs to work with input and with the processes learners use to get data from that input.4/94Input processingvOf concern is input processing,how learners initially perceive and process linguistic data in the language they hear.vIn input processing,learners might encounter their first problems in dealing with the properties of the new language.vWe must come to some understanding of what input processing looks like.5/94Intake from inputvInput processing is concerned with those psycholinguistic strategies and mechanisms by which learners derive intake from input.vIntake refers to the linguistic data in the input that learners attend to and hold in working memory during online comprehension.6/94Form vResearch on input processing attempts to explain how learners get form from input while their primary attention is on meaning.vForm here is defined as surface features of language,although input processing is also relevant to syntax.7/94The most complete modelvVanPatten(1996,2003b)presents the most complete model of input processing in SLA.vThe role of working memory is important in this model since some of the principles are predicated on a limited capacity for processing.vHumans develop mechanisms that allow them to selectively attend to incoming stimuli.Without such mechanisms,there would be informational overload.8/94VanPattens PrinciplesvPrinciple 1(P1).The Primacy of Meaning Principle.Learners process input for meaning before they process it for form.P1a.The Primacy of Content Words Principle.Learners process content words in the input before anything else.P1b.The Lexical Preference Principle.Learners will tend to rely on lexical items as opposed to grammatical form to get meaning when both encode the same semantic information.Example:I went to the store yesterday.9/94VanPattens Principles continued P1c.The Preference for Nonredundancy Principle.Learners are more likely to process nonredundant meaningful grammatical form before they process redundant meaningful forms.Examples:I went to the store yesterday.(redundant past)I went to the store.(non-redundant past)10/94Principle 1cvIn this principle,“more”,“less”,and“nonmeaningful”refer to the communicative value that a grammatical feature contributes to overall sentence meaning.vCommunicative value refers to the meaning that a form contributes to overall sentence meaning and is based on two features.+/-inherent semantic value+/-redundancy11/94Communicative valuevA form that can be classified as having inherent semantic value and is not a redundant feature of language,will tend to have high communicative value.vFor example:In English verbal morphology,-ing tends to have high communicative value:1)It has inherent semantic value because it encodes progressive aspect(i.e.,-ing=in progress)2)-ing tends to be high in communicative value because it is seldom redundant in naturally occurring discourse since no lexical information in the utterance co-occurs to provide cues to aspect.12/94Nature of communicative valuevIn order to grasp the semantic notion of“in progress”the L2 learner of English must process the verbal inflection ing in the input.vThe nature of communicative value is important for input processing.vThe more communicative value a form has,the more likely it is to get processed and made available in the intake data for acquisition(P1d).13/94ConverselyvThe less communicative value a form has,the more likely learners are to“skip”it in the input.vFor learners to process forms of little or no communicative value in the input,they must be able to comprehend an utterance such that the act of comprehension does not tie up all their attentional resources.14/94VanPattens Principles continuedP1d.The Meaning-before-Nonmeaning Principle.Learners are more likely to process meaningful grammatical forms before nonmeaningful forms irrespective of redundancy.Example:Los gatos negros.(masculine non-meaningful)(plural“s”meaningful)15/94VanPattens Principles continued P1e.The Availability of Resources Principle.For learners to process either redundant meaningful grammatical forms or non-meaningful forms,the processing of overall sentential meaning must not drain available processing resources(i.e.no overload of information).16/94VanPattens Principles continued P1f.The Sentence Location Principle.Learners tend to process items in sentence initial position before those in final position and those in medial position.For example,learners are much more likely to pick up question words and their syntax than object pronouns or the subjunctive,which tends to occur inside the sentence.Example:Hablo espaol.Yo quiero que t hables espaol.17/94An example in FrenchExample:Jean fait promener le chien Marie.(*French causative)Students:*John walks the dog for Mary.Correct:John makes Mary walk the dog.(*Students will incorrectly encode“Jean”as the subject of the second verb and thus delivering erroneous intake to their developing linguistic systems.)18/94VanPattens Principles continuedvPrinciple 2.The First Noun Principle.Learners tend to process the first noun or pronoun they encounter in a sentence as the subject or agent.Example:A Juan no le gusta helado.(*Students will incorrectly encode“Juan”as the subject of the sentence and thus delivering erroneous intake to their developing linguistic systems.)19/94VanPattens Principles continuedP2a.The Lexical Semantics Principle.Learners may rely on lexical semantics,where possible,instead of word order to interpret sentences.(see previous examples)20/94Word ordervWord order is important in Input processing.vP2,the first noun principle,may have important effects on the acquisition of a language that does not follow strict subject-verb-object(SVO)word order.21/94Erroneous inputvResearch has shown that learners do indeed encode such pronouns and noun phrases as subjects,thus delivering erroneous input to their developing linguistic systems.vThey think that Juan is the subject.vIt is not that meaning is gotten elsewhere;it is that meaning is not gotten at all or is gotten wrong.vThe form-meaning connections are not only filtered,they are altered.22/94VanPattens Principles continued P2b.The Event Probabilities Principle.Learners may rely on event probabilities(i.e.whats more likely to happen),where possible,instead of word order to interpret sentences.For example,fluent English speakers would assign the semantic role of agent to the hunger and the role of patient to the lion:The lion was killed by the hunter.Research has shown that learners of English as an L2 incorrectly interpret it as:The lion killed the hunter.23/94VanPattens Principles continuedP2c.The Contextual Constraint Principle.Learners may rely less on the First Noun Principle if preceding context constrains the possible interpretation of a clause or sentence.(see previous example)24/94SummaryvResearch on input processing attempts to describe:What linguistic data learners attend to during comprehensionWhich ones they do not attend toWhat grammatical roles learners assign to nounsHow position in an utterance influences what gets processed.vIntake is grammatical information as it relates to meaning that learners have comprehended(or think they have comprehended.)25/94A remindervAs a reminder,input processing is but one set of processes related to acquisition.vThat learners derive some kind of intake from the input does not mean that the data contained in the intake automatically make their way into the developing mental representation of the L2 in the learners head(i.e.,intake does not equal acquisition).26/94Rethinking grammar instruction:Structured inputvWe now have some idea of what learners are doing with input when they are asked to comprehend it.vWe can begin to develop a new kind of grammar instruction-one that will guide and focus learners attention when they process input.27/94Processing instructionvProcessing instruction consists of three basic components:Learners are given information about a linguistic structure or form.Learners are informed about a particular processing strategy that may negatively affect their picking up of the form or structure during comprehension.Learners are pushed to process the form or structure during activities with structured input-input that is manipulated in particular ways to push learners to become dependent on form and structured to get meaning.28/94Processing-oriented grammar instructionInputIntakeDeveloping SystemOutputProcessing MechanismsFocused Practice29/94An example of relating processing strategies to instruction:Verb morphologyvWe turn to activities that focus learners attention on verb endings;the goal is for learners to use these morphological endings to comprehend tense rather than solely rely on lexical items.vAfter learners receive a brief explanation of how past-tense endings work,they might first practice attaching the concept of past time to verb forms in an activity such as the following.30/94Listening for time referenceListen to each sentence.Indicate whether the action occurred last week or is part of a set of actions oriented toward the present.1.John talked on the phone.2.Mary helped her mother.3.Robert studies for two hours.4.Sam watched TV.5.Lori visits her parents.31/94Structuring the inputvNote that only the very ending encodes tense in the input sentence.vLexical terms and discourse that would indicate a time frame are not present,thereby encouraging learners to attend to the grammatical markers for tense.vThe input has been structured.32/94An example of relating processing strategies to instruction:Adjective agreementvThis time we focus on the following strategy:P1d.Learners are more likely to process meaningful grammatical forms before nonmeaningful forms,irrespective of redundancy.vSome features of language do not have inherent semantic or communicative value.33/94For examplevIn the Romance languages,adjectives must agree in number and gender with the nouns they modify,but this feature of grammar contributes little or nothing to the meaning of the utterance in most cases.vIn the following Spanish-language activity,learners attention is directed toward proper adjective form by a task in which the adjective endings must be attended to.34/94Who is it?Listen to each sentence in which a person is described.Determine which person is being described and then indicate whether you agree or disagree.David LettermanMadonna1.Es dinmica.(Shes dynamic.)2.Es comprensivo.(Hes understanding.)3.Es reservada.(Shes reserved.)35/94vRemember that learners apply a first-noun strategy to determine subjects and objects of sentences(“who did what to whom”)vWith the French causative,this leads to misinterpretation and nonacquisition.vIn this activity,learners are pushed to process correctly;to be sure this happens,sentences with the noncausative faire(faire du ski,“to ski”)that involve two people are also included.An example of relating processing strategies to instruction:The French causative36/94Who is performing?Listen to each sentence.Then answer the question.1.Who cleans the room?2.Who packs the bags?Teachers script Read each sentence ONCE.After each sentence,ask for an answer.1.Claude fait nettoyer la chambre Richard.(Structured)2.Marc fait les valises pour Jean.37/94Research on processing instructionvThere has been ongoing research regarding the effectiveness of processing instruction.vAn important part of this research has examined the relative effects of processing instruction versus those of traditional instruction.vThe study that launched this research agenda is VanPatten and Cadierno(1993).vIt is the most frequently cited study and has been the impetus for a number of replication studies.38/94Research questionsvVanPatten and Cadierno sought to answer the following research questions:Does altering the way in which learners process input have an effect on their developing systems?If there is an effect,is it limited solely to processing more input or does instruction in input also have an effect on output?If there is an effect,is it the same effect that traditional instruction has(assuming an effect for the latter)?39/94Focus of the researchvVanPatten and Cadierno compared three groups of learners:A processing instruction group(number=27)A traditional instruction group(number=26)A control group(number=27)vThe processing group received instruction based along the lines presented earlier.vThe focus was word order and object pronouns in Spanish.40/94Who did whatvIn the processing treatment,learners first received activities with right or wrong answers(“Select the picture that best goes with what you hear”)followed by activities in which they offered opinions.vIn the traditional group,learners received involving a typical explanation of object pronouns and the complete paradigms of the forms.vThe control group did not receive instruction on the target structure and instead read an essay and discussed it in class.41/94AssessmentvAssessment consisted of two tests:a sentence-level interpretation test and a sentence-level production test.vThese were administered as a pretest,an immediate posttest,a two-week delayed posttest,and a four-week delayed posttest.42/94Assessment continuedvThe interpretation test consisted of ten target items and ten distractors.vThe production test consisted of five items with five distractors.vThe interpretation group was based on an activity performed by the processing group(“Select the picture that best goes with what you hear.”)vThe production test was based on an activity the traditional group performed(“Complete the sentence based on the pictures you see.”)43/94Results!vThe pretests yielded no differences among the groups on the two tests prior to treatment.vIn the posttesting phase,the processing group made significant gains on the interpretation test whereas the traditional and control groups did not.vOn the production test,both the traditional and processing groups made significant gains but were not significantly different from each other.vThe control group did not make significant gains.44/94ConclusionsvAltering the way learners process input could alter their developing systems.vThe effects of processing instruction are not limited to processing but also show up on production measures.v