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Processing Perspectives on Task Performance
Edited by Peter Skehan
[Task-Based Language Teaching 5] 2014
► pp. 129–154

Chapter 5. Get it right in the end

The effects of post-task transcribing on learners’ oral performance

| Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, China
Given the small body of existing research concerning focus on form at the post-task stage in task-based language teaching, the present study uses a post-task transcribing condition as a focus on form activity and explores the effects of transcribing under various conditions. Eighty participants, divided into four experimental groups and one control group completed four tasks with a one-week interval between each task. Different experimental groups were assigned various post-task activities respectively. No post-task activity was adopted in the control group. Task performance was measured in terms of complexity, accuracy and lexical performance. The findings are multifaceted. First of all, the adoption of post-task transcribing, in general, was found to be efficient for different formal aspects of task performance. In the second place, pair-based transcribing led to more syntactically complex language, whereas the individual-based transcribing at the post-task stage led to an improvement in lexical sophistication. Thirdly, further revision after transcribing had mixed effects on accuracy and complexity. The findings are discussed in light of the concepts of noticing and attention, interaction theory and other related SLA theories. Based on the theoretical discussion, pedagogical implications are proposed.
Published online: 30 April 2014
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tblt.5.05qia
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Skehan, Peter
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van de Guchte, Marrit, Martine Braaksma, Gert Rijlaarsdam & Peter Bimmel
2016. Focus on form through task repetition in TBLT. Language Teaching Research 20:3 ► pp. 300 ff. DOI logo

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