The Study of Turn-taking Processes through Focus on Form and Focus on Forms Instructions: Incidental Grammar Acquisition

The present study aimed at examining whether the turn-taking processes in focus on form and focus on forms teaching contexts were similar or different. Turn-taking refers to ‘how each of the interlocutors in an interaction contributes to the conversation’. Both lessons were designed to teach some words but they also provided opportunities for incidental acquisition by exposing them to the two target structures, namely, plural s and copula be. The FonF lesson was of planned while FonFs lesson employed present-practice-product (PPP) methodology. Forty-five beginner Iranian students were non-randomly divided into three groups of fifteen, namely, FonF, FonFs and control group. They received eight repeated lessons during six weeks. Two tests for receptive knowledge of plural-s, and one test for productive knowledge of copula-be were used to measure the acquisitions of target features in terms of the differences in interactions that takes place in the two instructional approaches and consequently opportunities for noticing of target structures. The study used a quasi-experimental design through pre-tests, immediate post-tests and delayed post-tests. Then the statistical analysis was run through one-way repeated measures ANOVAS. Conversation analysis (CA) was employed by utilizing seedhouse’s ‘form and accuracy’ and ‘meaning and fluency’ framework to investigate classroom interactions. The analysis revealed that the interaction in the two groups differed in organization of turn-taking, occurrence of different kinds of repair, and the frequency and function of private speech. Overall, it was revealed that the interaction in the FonF lesson was ‘conversational’ while that in the FonFs lesson was ‘pedagogical’.  

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Key words: turn-taking , Focus on Form , focus on forms , incidental acquisition , Iranian EFL learners