A Survey of the Effect of Recast and Prompt by Teachers on Iranian EFL Student’s Grammar with High and Low Anxiety Level

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to explore if providing recast and prompt by teacher would have different effects on the grammatical development of Iranian learners of English as a foreign language with high and low anxiety level. In fact, the study investigated the effectiveness of corrective feedback on learners' grammatical achievement. After administering a proficiency test, sixty participants out of eighty-five were selected from the intact classes at two language institutes in Kerman. These selected participants were randomly assigned to three groups namely, prompt, recast and control group each comprising of twenty participants. Before starting the treatment, all participants were given a pre-test to assess their prior level of English knowledge and then Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS), a 33-item questionnaire to find out their degree of anxiety. During a four-session treatment, participants were given corrective feedback (recasts and prompts) while control group did not receive any kind of feedback. Then at the end of the study a post-test was given to participants to assess their knowledge after treatment. The obtained results indicated that participants, who received planned focus on form using recasts feedback, outperformed those students who received planned focus on form in terms of prompts feedback and control group in the post-test.  All in all, the results also revealed that regardless of their anxiety level both groups had similar beliefs about CF and strongly favored receiving frequent CF in English classes when they were made aware of the purpose, significance, and types of CF.