Phone-based Interaction and Development of L2 Oral Fluency

Abstract

Whereas the telephone has been employed as an alternative pedagogical device in many East Asian countries (e.g., Korea, China, the Philippines etc.), the impacts of telephone communication to development of adult second language (L2) learning have been rarely investigated (e.g., Kim, 2012 an exception) in the field of second language acquisition (SLA). Acknowledging the absence of empirical research, this paper examines benefits of phone-based interaction (PBI) to a learner’s development of L2 performance, particularly, L2 oral fluency. The study observed systematic and dynamic development of oral L2 fluency from an adult learner’s speech data, who participated in the two-month PBI exclusively in English. Oral fluency was measured by temporal variables (e.g., speech rates and pause rates) and hesitation phenomena (e.g., repetition, self-correction, and false starts) over time. The results of the study illustrated that the learner achieved faster speech rates and lower pause rates after the two-month period of PBI, which is an indication of development of L2 fluency. The learner’s development of L2 fluency was also supported by a decrease of repetition, self-correction, and false starts after two months. Therefore, the study suggests that PBI positively affects adult learners’ L2