ABDULLA ORIPOV HAYOTI VA IJODI

ABDULLA ORIPOV HAYOTI VA IJODI

Accuracy and Correcting Mistakes

Accuracy and correcting mistakes are key elements in effective English language teaching. Helping students speak and write accurately not only builds their confidence but also improves communication and comprehension. In this article, we will discuss why accuracy is important, how to achieve it, and how to correct mistakes effectively.

Why Accuracy Matters

Accuracy in language use is essential for both the speaker and the listener. Even when the meaning is clear, incorrect spelling, grammar, or pronunciation can distract the listener and lower the quality of communication. From different perspectives:

• From the listener’s view: inaccuracy may cause confusion and reduce respect for the speaker.
• From the speaker’s view: repeated errors can lower self-confidence and self-respect as a language user.
• From the teacher’s view: professionalism requires teaching correct and appropriate language use.

How to Achieve Accuracy

Research shows that language accuracy is best developed through a balance of communication, form-focused work, and practice. The optimal approach combines communicative tasks with focused grammar work and practice exercises. This is often referred to as task-based learning or focus on form.

To build accuracy, learners need:

• Plenty of communicative language use (fluency practice);
• Explicit attention to form, grammar, and pronunciation;
• Regular, guided practice activities that reinforce correct usage.

Balancing Accuracy and Fluency

Language teachers must balance two main goals: fluency (speaking naturally) and accuracy (speaking correctly). Here are four typical teaching approaches:

1. Communication only: Students use the language freely to express ideas without correction. It builds confidence but may lead to fossilized errors.
2. Accuracy only: Lessons focus on grammar, vocabulary, and drills. This builds knowledge but limits real communication.
3. Accuracy + Communication: A mixed approach, where mechanical practice leads to communicative tasks (e.g., debates, role plays).
4. Communication + Accuracy: Task-based instruction where communication comes first, but teachers pause (“time out”) to correct key forms.

Examples of Accuracy Practice

Grammar exercises can progress from simple to communicative:

• Step 1: Mechanical drills (e.g. “A car is faster than a bicycle.”)
• Step 2: Meaningful comparison tasks (e.g. comparing people or objects).
• Step 3: Communicative tasks such as debates (“Computers are better than books”).

Such sequencing allows students to move from controlled to free practice while maintaining accuracy.

Error Correction: What Works Best?

Correcting mistakes helps students notice gaps in their knowledge and refine their language use. However, research (Lyster & Ranta, 1997; Lyster, 1998) shows that different correction methods have different effects:

• Recasts — repeating the correct form — are the most common but often unnoticed by students.
• Explicit feedback — explaining what was wrong and why — results in better understanding but may interrupt fluency.
• Negotiated feedback — involving the learner in self-correction — gives the best long-term results.

The Correction Paradox

If teachers correct mistakes too softly, learners may not notice them. But if correction is too direct, it can disrupt communication. The solution lies in professional judgement — choosing the right moment and method based on:

• The lesson’s goals;
• The importance and frequency of the error;
• The student’s proficiency level and personality;
• The overall motivation and classroom atmosphere.

Conclusion

Accuracy and correcting mistakes should not be seen as opposite to communication. The best teaching combines both — enabling students to use English confidently and correctly. By balancing fluency and accuracy, and by using thoughtful correction, teachers help learners become both expressive and precise language users.

=== Taqdimot 1 ===
ACCURACY AND CORRECTING MISTAKES
=== Taqdimot 2 ===
This talk:
How important is it for our students to be accurate in their language use?
How can we achieve accuracy?
How does error correction help?
Summary and conclusions
How important is it for our students to be accurate in their language use?
=== Taqdimot 3 ===
What do you think?
Would you agree or disagree with the following statements?
It’s not important for students to spell English words correctly, as long as their meaning is clear
It’s not important for students to pronounce like a native speaker, as long as they are easily comprehensible.
It’s not important for students to use correct grammar, as long as they are getting their message across
If you answered ‘disagree’ to any of the above – can you say why?
=== Taqdimot 4 ===
Accuracy is important because…
…From the point of view of the hearer/reader, inaccuracy, even if it doesn’t affect meaning, is distracting ‘uncomfortable’ may lower respect for the speaker/writer
And because…
… from the point of view of the speaker/writer, inaccuracy may lower self-confidence lower self-respect as a language user
And because…
…from the point of view of the teacher, professionalism means teaching the language as best we can, not compromising on careless or unacceptable usage.
=== Taqdimot 5 ===
B. Achieving accuracy
Research indicates that to achieve accuracy, learners need…
communicative language use
+
some explicit discussion of form or rules
+
practice
Probably the optimal teaching model combines these
Communicative tasks, with ‘time out’ for focus on form, including practice exercises
Focus on accuracy: rule explanation, leading into both ‘mechanical’ and communicative practice
=== Taqdimot 6 ===
But also time for:
Communication on its own
Focus on accurate form on its own
Communicative tasks (fluency)
(on their own)
Language work (accuracy)
(on its own)
Communication (+ accuracy):
Task-based instruction
=== Taqdimot 7 ===
The basis of the lesson is a communicative task.
We may teach bits of grammar / vocabulary / spelling before, during or after: but the focus is always on the communicative task.
A communicative task
Discuss how far you agree with the following statements
The teacher should correct me when I make a mistake.
=== Taqdimot 8 ===
Agree …………………………………………….Disagree
The teacher should ask other students to correct me when I make a mistake.
Agree …………………………………………….Disagree
The teacher should get me to correct myself.
Agree …………………………………………….Disagree
The teacher should make me rewrite essays after she’s corrected them.
Agree …………………………………………….Disagree
The teacher should not only correct me, but also explain why what I said was wrong.
Agree …………………………………………….Disagree
Communication (+ accuracy)
=== Taqdimot 9 ===
Communication / Fluency:
Reading and understanding the sentences and their meanings
Discussing how far we agree.
Coming to a consensus.
(Possibly: rewriting the statements so that we all agree with them)
Then, for accuracy:
Learning the vocabulary (e.g. use of make with mistake, get so.to, make so. do sth) Work on grammar (e.g. modal should, reflexive pronouns like myself)
=== Taqdimot 10 ===
Comment:
Based on authentic language use
Puts communication first, accuracy as a means to an end
Fashionable (task-based learning)
But:
Difficult for learners who need to feel ‘safe’
May not, in the long term, lead to coverage of the most important language items.
=== Taqdimot 11 ===
We start with a language point
We do some ‘mechanical’ exercises
We then progress to more communicative work.
2. Accuracy (+ communication)
=== Taqdimot 12 ===
Grammar practice 1:
Conventional form-focused exercises
A. Discrete items
1. A car is ……… than a bicycle. (Fast)
2. Chinese is …………………. than english. (Difficult).
3. A lion is ……………. than a dog. (Big).
B. Full text
Glenda: I don’t know which dress to buy, the red or the green!
Sally: well, the red one is …………. (expensive), the green one is much ….. (cheap).
Glenda: yes, but the red one is much ………….. (pretty). Which do you think suits me …………(well)? …
=== Taqdimot 13 ===
Grammar practice 2: Moving towards meaning
Compare the people in this family.
Use the adjectives big, fat, thin, small, big, tall, short, old, young.
Alex is taller than Jill. Karen is smaller than ………
Jill is……………than Karen.
Ben is …………than Alex.
Alex is ………………………Karen.
Jill is …………………………Ben.
=== Taqdimot 14 ===
Grammar practice 3:
Focus on meaning
Choose one of these pairs of items. How many different ways can you think of comparing them? Use the comparative form of the adjective.
A radio and a computer
A rabbit and a snake
Playing football and reading a book
Harry Potter and Professor Dumbledore
=== Taqdimot 15 ===
Grammar Practice 4:
Focus on communication
Debate
Debate based on comparison. e.g. discuss the following motions:
‘Computers are better than books’.
Or
‘It’s better to live in the town than in the country’.
Comment:
Based on ‘inauthentic’ language use
Old-fashioned (‘PPP’)
Puts accuracy first, communication second
BUT:
Appropriate for learners who need to feel ‘safe’
Based on a systematic language syllabus
=== Taqdimot 16 ===
3. Communication only
Just getting learners to use the language for understanding or conveying messages.
No following language work.
Receptively:
listening to stories,
listening and responding,
reading stories,
reading and responding,
watching movies…
=== Taqdimot 17 ===
Productively:
talking, communication games
exchanging information,
creative or transactional writing…
Comment
‘Authentic’ and communicative
Often fun and interesting, motivating
BUT
Very variable amount of learning
Virtually impossible to check how much learning has taken place
Some activities are not appropriate for pupils who like clear-cut and structured tasks
=== Taqdimot 18 ===
4. Accuracy only
Talking ‘about’ the language or doing activities that focus on ‘getting it right’:
Examples:
‘Tip of the day’ – isolated language points.
Grammar explanations
Learning lists of vocabulary for a test
Dictations
Drills
Pronunciation work
Comment Inauthentic
May be boring
Leads to ‘theoretical’ knowledge of the language
No direct contribution to fluency.
=== Taqdimot 19 ===
BUT:
Leads to understanding of how the language works
Satisfying for some pupils
Very easily assessed
Indirect contribution to communicative ability Interim conclusions
If we wish our learners to become both accurate and fluent in English, we need to provide
both explicit and implicit teaching/learning;
both meaning- and form-focus;
both unthinking and cognitively demanding language production;
And we need to organize these within a balanced methodology that includes different teaching processes because
=== Taqdimot 20 ===
Even the same learner may learn in different ways at different times
Language items are different
How does error correction help?
What different kinds of correction are there?
And which is the most effective?
Which types of correction, on the whole, lead to better uptake? (Lyster and Ranta, 1997; Lyster, 1998)
Learners are different
=== Taqdimot 21 ===
RESULTS
Simple ‘recast’ was most often used, but least ‘uptake’!
Recasts may not be perceived as correction at all!
The best results are gained from corrective feedback + some negotiation.
The correction-during-communication paradox
If we correct during communicative work unobtrusively so as not to harm communication – the correction may be ineffective.
If we correct more effectively using explicit feedback and ‘processing’ – we may damage the communicative value of the activity.
=== Taqdimot 22 ===
What’s the answer?
Professional teaching judgement, taking into account:
The overall goals of the course
How crucial / important the error is
The frequency of the error
The level of the student
The personality of the student
The motivation of the class overall to learn.
=== Taqdimot 23 ===
Thank you for your attention!

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