A constructive perspective of speaking errors

Abstract

Errors are and will always be a part inherent to human beings. They may occasionally represent an evolutionary step to better conditions, but unfortunately, they have been regarded throughout the times as a punitive excuse, especially in learning processes, and even more in foreign language learning. This unsuitable management that teachers usually give to errors, mainly the ones related to oral competence, leaves a sense of frustration in students, who restrain their desire to learn a foreign language and the possibility to develop the speaking ability successfully. The purpose of this Project is to persuade teachers to change their conception about errors in learning, providing them with alternatives to consider oral errors from a constructive perspective and effectively assume their role in correction. To accomplish this expectation, it is necessary to assume an analytic attitude towards errors and correction, considering both the nature of oral errors and the role of correction in the learning process. In response to this interest in oral error and correction, we have decided to take this topic as the core subject of our research project, hoping to solve our doubts about it and discover new options to assume the error.