Examples Of Correction Codes

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4. Correction codes
It has been shown that Second Language Acquisition (SLA,) takes time and occurs in stages (Ferris, 1995). In addition, second language (L2) learners go through various stages of acquisition of different elements of the second language and they may make errors. These errors may be caused by inappropriate transference of first language patterns or by incomplete knowledge of the L2 (Ferris, 1995).
Thus, correction symbols, as many teachers see it, seem to be a useful strategy for second language learners. Riddell (2001) states that teachers can use correction symbols (correction codes) to feedback to students on their writing (2001, p 157). Teachers can underline the errors to signify the mistakes and write the symbols for these mistakes in the margin. Then students can correct the mistakes by themselves (p. 157). Hedge (1988) suggests that teachers can indicate “and error and identify the kind of error with a symbol, e.g. wo = wrong word order” (p.151). This means that teacher can use correction codes when feeding back on writing tasks and the students should find out the errors they made from the symbols and re-write it again with the corrected mistakes. This strategy “encourages learner independence” (Riddell, 2001, p 152), and students become more responsible for their learning. Also it seems that L2 learners can learn better from their mistakes and when they correct their work by themselves (Ferris, 1995). Furthermore, several research studies have demonstrated that errors feedback can help students to improve their accuracy in the short term (Ferris, 1995). For example, it was found that ESL student writers were able to successfully correct errors during revision after receiving teacher feedback. A numbe...

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...e the others in the class to perform better.
As Brumfit (1980) sited, there are a number of advantages in students' correcting their own work after they have undergone certain steps in doing so. Firstly, when learners doing the correction instantly after the written work, this will provide and give more meaningful learning since the points studied are still fresh in the learner's mind (Guenette, 2012). Also, when students correct their classmates written work, they practice to look for mistakes in other students' work. This step enables the learners to identify mistakes in their own work (Guenette, 2012). Furthermore, using correction codes in the classroom is a constructive way for the reason that it encourages the students to become active learners rather than writing drafts and give them to the teacher to correct the drafts for them (Burnett & Mandel, 2010).

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