What Gets Processed in Processing Instruction? A Commentary on Bill VanPatten’s “Processing Instruction: An Update”

Abstract

In this article we respond to VanPatten’s update of the findings for processing instruction. We begin by questioning the explanatory adequacy of the model of input processing that VanPatten has proposed and that underpins his pedagogic proposals. We question both the validity of the limited–capacity, single–resource model of attention he proposes for second language classroom learning, and also the details of the mechanisms he argues are implicated in second language processing. We then arguefor alternative explanations of the effects found for input processing instruction and against VanPatten’s claim that the studies he reviews are true replications of earlier findings.Throughout we argue that further specification of cognitive resources, processing mechanisms,and conditions of learning operationalized in putative replications areessential if research into input processing instruction is to be explanatory, and cumulative, as VanPatten claims it is.