L2 phone-based interaction (PBI) and development of communicative competence: A case study of an adult's English learning in EFL context

While L2 interaction over the telephone is growing method (Hong, 2008) for L2 learning in some EFL countries (e.g., Korea, Japan, China), there has been no research investigating whether and how phone-based speech communication contributes to a learner's L2 speaking ability. The purpose of this case study is to investigate the effectiveness of phone-based L2 interaction (PBI) by examining development of an EFL learner's L2 communicative competence and increase of the learners' willingness to communicate (WTC). In the study, a Korean EFL learner participated in 10 minutes of daily telephone conversations for two months exclusively in English. The learner's development of communicative competence was assessed for the two-month period. To measure the development of communicative competence, the learner's daily conversations were analyzed based on the Canale's (1983) theoretical framework, which includes four criteria assessing communicative competence: grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence. Also, to measure the increase of WTC (McCrosky, 1977; 1992; 1997), the learner's changes in affective variables, such as motivation, L2 anxiety and self-confidence, were taken into consideration. The result of this study suggests that PBI can be effective for developing low-WTC EFL learners' communicative competence and for increasing those learners' WTC.