Further Questioning Oral Communication Strategy Instruction From a Different Perspective: Is Implicit Learning Possible?

Abstract

This study aims to investigate whether it is possible to learn communication strategies (CSs) implicitly through EFL teachers' modeling. In the context of EFL classrooms, non-native EFL teachers are supposed to use CSs through which they are also supposed to model the CSs in their classes. Although the literature has an agreement on the fact that strategy training should be explicit, there is no empirical study found focusing on implicit strategy training. Therefore, this study aims to investigate to what extent EFL teachers' use of different communication strategies in the classroom predicts the communication strategies by students. The data of the study was collected by means of quantitative and qualitative data. As for quantitative data, participants were asked to fill into Oral Communication Strategy Inventory (OCSI). For the qualitative data, on the other hand, data was collected through structured interviews. The results indicated that EFL teachers do not model CSs because their strategies in use are rather teaching strategies like simplifying the language. When specifically analyzed, the only CSs explained by EFL teachers' use was message abandonment strategy. The implication of the study is that explicit training strategy training should be provided for students' acquisition of these strategies, which is consistent with the literature.