Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Contemporary Education, Social Sciences and Humanities (ICCESSH 2018)

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A Study of EFL Learners’ Oral English Development in Light of Dynamic Systems Theory

Authors
Juan Zuo, Huiqin Tu
Corresponding Author
Juan Zuo
Available Online July 2018.
DOI
10.2991/iccessh-18.2018.189How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Dynamic Systems Theory (DST); speaking proficiency; dynamic development
Abstract

Based on Dynamic Systems Theory, this study investigated the developmental trajectories of four Chinese EFL learners’ oral proficiency and explored the dynamic correlation among complexity, accuracy and fluency used for measuring oral proficiency. The four EFL learner’s speaking performance was traced and examined every two weeks over a twelve-week span. The data were collected by oral proficiency tests adapted from the oral tests of College English Test Band-4(CET-4) in China and questionnaires on learning background. Instruments including moving min-max graph, scatter diagram and linear regression were applied for analyzing the data. It was found that the learners’ oral complexity, accuracy and fluency showed nonlinear developmental patterns; there was negative correlation between fluency and accuracy in the early weeks while the correlation turned positive in a long term. The developmental patterns and dynamic correlations can provide insights into the interaction among the three variables contributing to oral proficiency in a dynamic system. The findings have valuable implications for theory construction and pedagogical practice of oral English.

Copyright
© 2018, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.
Open Access
This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Contemporary Education, Social Sciences and Humanities (ICCESSH 2018)
Series
Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research
Publication Date
July 2018
ISBN
978-94-6252-528-3
ISSN
2352-5398
DOI
10.2991/iccessh-18.2018.189How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2018, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.
Open Access
This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

Cite this article

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Juan Zuo
AU  - Huiqin Tu
PY  - 2018/07
DA  - 2018/07
TI  - A Study of EFL Learners’ Oral English Development in Light of Dynamic Systems Theory
BT  - Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Contemporary Education, Social Sciences and Humanities (ICCESSH 2018)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 835
EP  - 839
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/iccessh-18.2018.189
DO  - 10.2991/iccessh-18.2018.189
ID  - Zuo2018/07
ER  -