Abstract
The aim of the present paper was to investigate the effects of processing instruction and traditional instruction on Iranian EFL learners’ writing ability. Thirty participants who were non-randomly selected out of 63 Intermediate EFL learners, taking English courses in a language institute in Khoy-Iran, participated in this quasi-experimental study. All the participants were female with the age range of 18-24. The participants were randomly assigned into two experimental groups of processing instruction and traditional instruction. Two different instructional packages were used as treatment and two free writing tasks were employed as pre-test and post-test in this study. The results revealed that although both instructions had positive effects on Iranian EFL learners’ writing ability, processing instruction group performed significantly better than traditional instruction. Some pedagogical implications of the findings were presented. The results might be helpful in syllabus design and teaching methodology.
Highlights
1.1 BackgroundAs Ellis (2001) maintains, the model of language acquisition that informs mainstream Second Language Acquisition (SLA) identifies three main processes: intake, acquisition, and language production
Through Processing Instruction (PI), the implication that grammar instruction should be tied to input has gained importance (VanPatten, 2003)
The findings revealed that both types of instructions showed a positive improvement in writing ability of intermediate EFL learners, the effects of PI was more evident than Traditional grammar Instruction (TI)
Summary
1.1 BackgroundAs Ellis (2001) maintains, the model of language acquisition that informs mainstream Second Language Acquisition (SLA) identifies three main processes: intake, acquisition, and language production. VanPatten and Cadierno (1993) argue that instead of trying to change how learners produce language output, instruction should focus on altering how learners process input. They claim that instruction that changes the way input is perceived and processed by the learner is more likely to become intake and have an impact on the developing language system. In PI students are given explicit information about this processing strategy and the correct target language strategy. They are given meaning-focused input-based activities, called Structured Input activities that direct them away from production. They do not engage in production of the target structure
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