Instruction Effects of Teaching Relative Clauses on Comprehension and Production in Korean EFL Classes

This study investigates the effects of three different types of instruction, namely form-based, comprehension-based, and production-based on the development of Korean university students' (n=137) comprehension and production of English relative clauses (RCs). The extent of improvements was analyzed by administering pre-and post-tests consisting of two comprehension tests (selecting the right form of RCs and the right picture descriptions) and one production test (combining two sentences). Findings of this study suggest that all three types of instruction increased participants' comprehension and productions of RCs. However, there appeared differential effects by the instruction type. It was found production-based instruction was most effective in promoting comprehension, followed by comprehension-based instruction. Comprehension-based instruction worked best with the development of production, suggesting that the effects of comprehension training did not only work for increasing comprehension skills, but also transfer to production skills. The type or level of tasks employed for each instruction appeared to play an important role in causing such results. Form-based instruction displayed the lowest improvements in both comprehension and production of RCs. A sentence-combination task employed for form-based instruction appear to result in mere explicit rule explanations without chances to notice rules in context or use their knowledge in practice.