Feedback, Noticing and Instructed Second Language Learning

Second language acquisition researchers have claimed that feedback provided during conversational interaction facilitates second language (L2) acquisition. A number of experimental studies have supported this claim, connecting interactional feedback with L2 development. Researchers have suggested that interactional feedback is associated with L2 learning because it prompts learners to notice L2 forms. This study explores the relationships between feedback, instructed ESL learners’ noticing of L2 form during classroom interactions and their subsequent L2 development. Interactional feedback was provided to learners in response to their production problems with questions, plurals, and past tense forms. Learners’ noticing was assessed through on-line learning journals, introspective comments while viewing classroom videotapes, and questionnaire responses. Through a controlled pre-test, post-test design, analyses of noticing and learning were carried out for each learner. The results point to an interesting, complex and positive relationship between interactional feedback in the classroom, the learners’ reports about noticing and their learning of L2 question forms.