THE INFLUENCE OF INPUT ON ORTHOGRAPHIC ACHIEVEMENT OF PHILOLOGY STUDENTS OF THE RUSSIAN LANGUAGE

Abstract

Studies dealing with the effects of input on second language learning achievements in both school and academic contexts attract considerable interest in many countries. However, in our opinion, the area has not been researched to its full potential in Serbia. Thus, this paper sets out to discover factors that influence the orthographic achievements of Russian language students. A total of thirty-three respondents took part in this research and they were all third-year students of the Faculty of Philology at the University of Belgrade. In an attempt to examine input as a factor that can improve students’ orthographic achievements, we formed two student groups – the experimental and the control group, on the basis of their previous exposure to L2 and their results on the initial assessment test. The initial and final testing results were compared to evaluate the role of the input factor in students’ orthographic achievements. Our work further suggests that extended exposure to extracurricular input impacts the orthographic achievement of respondents. Finally, our result has led us to conclude that input in the period preceding the initial testing offered compelling signals for predicting students’ achievement.