Suggestions for ESL teachers to write feedback in ESL learners’ writing

For this importance, I am really interested in investigating the effective ways of giving feedback in second language learning ESL learners’ writing.. Therefore, it is high time for me t

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO TỈNH VĨNH PHÚC TRƯỜNG TRUNG HỌC PHỔ THÔNG CHUYÊN VĨNH PHÚC

BÁO CÁO CHUYÊN ĐỀ

Suggestions for ESL Teachers to Write Feedback

in ESL Learners’ Writing.

Tổ bộ môn : Ngoại Ngữ Người thực hiện : Nguyễn Thị Thanh Nhân Điện thoại : 0912.468.689

Vĩnh Yên, tháng 5, năm 2015

TABLE OF CONTENT

Chapter I Introduction

Chapter II Literature review

2 Corrective feedback in second language acquisition 5

3 Teachers’ written corrective feedback 6

4 Corrective feedback in writing: some related issues 4.1 Accuracy and fluency in writing 6

4.2 Teacher response to students’ writing 6

4.2.1 Form and content 7

4.2.2 Direct feedback and indirect feedback 7

4.2.3 Timing of feedback and correctives 7

4.3 Corrective feedback in writing: Teachers’ beliefs and practices 8

4.4 Corrective feedback: students’ preferences 8

Chapter III Methodology. 1 The selection of subjects 9

2 Data collection instruments 9

3 Data collection procedure 9

Chapter 4 Findings and Discussion 10

Chapter 5 Recommendation and Conclusion 12

Appendices 14

Reference 17

Chapter I Introduction

1 Background

Vinh Phuc Gifted High School where I work as a full-time teacher is well-known for its education quality with about 900 students who are selected into 30 classes majoring in 10 subjects – Mathematics, Informatics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, History, Geography, Literature, English and French All of the students who come from different parts of the province have to take part in the high school entrance exam and a special exam for selecting gifted students which are held in July every year So Vinh Phuc Gifted High School is home to develop the talented

In Vietnam, English is a compulsory subject and nowadays all people are aware

of its importance in the modern life At Vinh Phuc Gifted High School, English is taken under much consideration Beside the major subjects, all of our students are required to study well in three main subjects- Maths, Literature and English , hence, it is undeniable that our students’ attitude toward English as well as their English proficiency is rather good and they are really interested in learning English In conclusion, Vinh Phuc Gifted High School is a good environment to learn and teach English

I am in charge of teaching grade 10A8- a gifted class of English There are 33 students in my class and their attitude toward English as well as their English proficiency is rather good Because of being a gifted class of English, my students have

to master four basic skills of English at advanced level Among four skills, writing seems to be the most difficult but important Hence, helping students enhance their writing skills is one of the teachers’ responsibilities This can be done in numerous ways, but feedback is considered crucial for stimulating and consolidating learning and its significance has been recognized by those who work in the field of second language learning especially in second language writing For this importance, I am really interested in investigating the effective ways of giving feedback in second language learning (ESL) learners’ writing

2 Rationale

Feedback plays a very crucial role in motivating further learning as it informs learners about the degree of their learning or their needs for improvement Brown (1994) considers feedback as one of the key to successful learning process Many researchers such as Chiu (2008), Zhang (2008), Min (2006) or Paulus (1990) have proved that feedback which is employed in both forms of verbal and written commentary constitutes an important aspect of fostering the improvement of writing Obviously, feedback is an essential component of any English language writing course According to Saito (1994) students prefer teacher written feedback to alternative forms such as oral and peer feedback Mostly students from cultures that see a teacher

as the only source of authority value teacher revision more highly than other methods because they have confidence in the teacher’s knowledge and skill in English Teacher written feedback or handwritten commentary is a primary method to respond to

students’ essays to assist students’ writing development; teacher written comments on the students’ drafts indicate problems and make suggestions for improvement of future papers Through feedback teachers can help students compare their own performance with the ideal and to diagnose their own strengths and weaknesses Therefore, it is high time for me to do a research on “Suggestions for ESL Teachers to Write Feedback in ESL Learners’ Writing.” with the hope that my students can improve their writing skill via my feedback and the findings of the research might be used by other teachers in giving feedback to students’ writing

3 Research questions

Searching effective ways of giving feedback in ESL learners’ writing, I really want

to find the answers for the two questions below

1 What are my students’ preferences when receiving feedback?

2 What are effective ways of giving feedback in ELS learners’ writing?

4 Scope of the study

It is the fact that, feedback in writing is such a huge topic that it attracts much consideration from many ESL researchers From a purely practical demand, this study

is conducted to investigate the needs of students in teacher written feedback and provide some suggestions for ESL teachers to give feedback effectively

Chapter II Literature review

In this part, all the aspects concerning the hypotheses inspiring the research will

be discussed The review is drawn from previous studies done by famous applied linguists

1 Definition of feedback and correctives

Feedback is information given back to individuals about the adequacy of their actions Feedback is a reaction to a stimulus by the others Feedback also serves a regulatory function in that it prompts individuals to keep on tracks towards a specified goal and Cole & Chan (1994) indicated that the aim of feedback should be to make individuals think about giving better responses

Correctives are extended from feedback According to Cole & Chan (1994), correctives include augmented feedback given to students as well as instructional procedures intended to rectify errors and inadequacies in learning They also include prompts, hints, suggestion regarding strategy use, reminders about methods, further demonstrations and explanations to abandon inefficient strategies Therefore, correctives are often necessary in classes

2 Corrective feedback in second language acquisition

There are various terms used in identifying errors and providing corrective feedback in the SLA literature Among them, Long’s points (1996) is the most comprehensive In Long’s view, the environmental input can be thought of in terms of two categories that are provided to the learners about the target language (TL): positive evidence and negative evidence Long defines positive evidence as providing the learners with models of what is grammatical and acceptable in the TL; and negative evidence as providing the learners with direct and indirect information about what is unacceptable This information may be:

Explicit (e.g., grammatical explanation or overt correction) or implicit (e.g., failure to understand, incidental error correction in a response, such as a confirmation check, which reformulates the learners’ utterance without interrupting the flow of the conversation- in which case, the negative feedback simultaneously provides additional positive evidence- and perhaps also the absence of the items in the input

(p.413)

3 Teachers’ written corrective feedback

There are many feedback modes in writing corrective feedback including peer feedback, self-monitoring, computer-mediated feedback, teachers’ written corrective feedback and teacher-student conferencing Due to the limitation of the study, only teachers’ written corrective feedback is concerned

According to Li (2009), many teachers have a notion that it is necessary for them

to write substantial comments on writing papers to provide reader reaction to students’ effort, to help them improve as writers and to justify the grade given

One important point of using written feedback is that it serves as the motivation factor in the ESL writing process Ellis (1994) reminds that students’ motivation is closely linked to language acquisition In order to motivate students, the writing teachers can include comments of praise and encouragements in their written feedback which can help students clarify meaning in their rewriting Additionally, the teachers’ use of referential or open questions may result in more meaning negotiation and more complex learner output

However, Hyland (2006) also pointed out some challenges that teachers can encounter while writing feedback in students’ writing Early research on native English speakers (L1) suggested that much written feedback was of poor quality and was frequently misunderstood by students Written response was considered vague, inconsistent and authoritarian, overly concerned with error and often functioning to appropriate, or take over, students’ texts by being too directive

Li (2009) declared that in Chinese EFL writing context, there is usually no variety in teacher feedback technique Teachers find it time-consuming and labor-intensive when marking and correcting students’ writings; therefore, they often ignore reviewing students’ writing word by word and correcting every single problem of students That is the reason why students seldom reflect on the mistakes they have made and the teachers’ great efforts are not fully valued Literature on how to make this conventional feedback mode benefit students better will be discussed further in subsequent parts of this thesis

4 Corrective feedback in writing: some related issues

4.1 Accuracy/ fluency in writing

Accuracy/ fluency in writing is controversial issue in ESL/ EFL teaching field River (1968) recognized that sheer accuracy was unreasonable, but without it, academic writing would suffer markedly However, Zamel (1982), stressed on the need of writing

in second and foreign language classrooms as a process of discovery, emphasis on errors and rhetorical forms can inhibit this process For the ESL teachers, it is really confusing and there is something of dilemma Hence, it is suggested to adopt a balanced approach, allowing students to produce their own ideas in written form with guidance from the teacher in order to produce correct form (Brumfit, 1984, cited in Humphired, 1996) He also notes that it is possible to create conditions for group revision and improvement of written work, so the accuracy is turned into something of a conscious but relatively spontaneous exercise, for talking about accuracy may be fluency talk

4.2 Teacher response to students’ writing

4.2.1 Form and content

The second language research on composition has focused much on both how teachers correct form and content In an experimental research study, Fathman and Whalley (1990), students in various classes were randomly divided into four groups Each group received a different kind of teacher feedback on their compositions (no feedback, grammar feedback only, content feedback only, both grammar and content feedback) The results from this study reveal that grammar and content feedback, whether given alone or simultaneously, affects rewriting positively The identification

of the location of errors by the teachers seems to be an effective means of helping students correct their grammar errors Furthermore, grammar feedback by the teachers

in the study had more effect than content feedback This might be due to the fact that the content feedback was not text specific and was more general than the grammar feedback that clearly shown specific grammar errors The results of this study also suggest that when grammar and content feedback are presented at the same time, the content of rewrites improves approximately as much as when the content feedback is only given Focus on grammar does not negatively affects the content of writing This would further affirm that students can improve their writing where content and form feedback is provided simultaneously

4.2.2 Direct feedback and indirect feedback

Direct error feedback is provided when the correct form is written on students’ papers while indirect error feedback is provided if the teachers indicates the location of the error indirectly by underlining, highlighting or circling or indirectly by indicating in the margins that there is an error on that line but without providing correct form (Lee, 2005) Indirect feedback is regarded as coded error feedback if the indication is done by

a symbol representing a specific kind of error such as “Sp” for spelling, “T’ for verb tense If the indication of the errors is done by the kind of error (spelling, verb tense), it

is called uncoded error feedback In indirect feedback, the students are required both to identify the types of errors and to self correct the error meanwhile in direct feedback, what students have to do is transcribe the teacher’s corrections into the paper (Ferris, 2003) and much research evidence indicates that indirect error feedback is more helpful

on long-term writing development than direct error feedback

4.2.3 Timing of feedback and correctives

According to Cole and Chan (1994), teachers should give feedback and correctives after students have made genuine attempts to complete assigned tasks It is vital for teachers to give frequent feedback and correctives during the early stages of learning a new subject matter Student will learn more quickly if regular feedback is available during the initial stages of learning If early errors in the process of acquiring new knowledge are uncorrected, they may interfere with subsequent learning Moreover, when students are allowed to practice errors, inappropriate ways of writing gradually consolidated and such persistent errors can be difficult to eradicate (Cole & Chan, 1994)

4.3 Corrective feedback in writing: Teachers’ beliefs and practices|

In a case study with a view to investigate ESL teachers’ feedback practices, Diab (2005) explored that the teachers in his study seemed to focus on grammar issues including punctuation, spelling and clarity Beside grammar and sentence-level feedback, the teachers in his study also paid attention to correct content-level issues such as structure, organization, development, logic and consistency, attention to audience, and focus on thesis statement For such positive findings, he believed that feedback to content is essential in responding to students’ writing

In Saito’s 1994 survey, she provides more details on teachers’ practices of giving feedback by observing the classes and collecting students’ compositions in three ESL writing classes In the first class, the teacher focused on facilitating rhetorical development throughout particular stages of students’ writing: planning, writing and revising The feedback she gave to the students was thinking prompts For grammatical and other surface errors she just circled or underlined them, no correction was made In the second class, the teacher paid attention to content and organization of compositions She provided both oral and written feedback to individuals while they were writing and the final drafts were usually done at home In the third class, the teacher advised students to do free writing basing on brainstorming ideas, then they were instructed to edit the first draft While students were doing this, the teacher went around the class and gave feedback to individual student After that students were asked to produce the final draft It is clear that teachers seemed to focus on content of students’ writing than the form

4.4 Corrective feedback: students’ preferences

According to Radecki & Swales (1988, cited in Hyland 2006), surveys of students’ feedback preferences widely indicate that ESL students greatly value teacher written feedback and consistently rate it more highly than alternative forms such as peer and oral correction Meanwhile, in Odalejo’s 2003 survey, the majority of learners in his study agreed that errors of organization of ideas, vocabulary and grammar should be best corrected by the teacher whereas spelling and punctuation mistakes should be taken care of by students themselves

In terms of what aspects in students’ writing should be treated with feedback most surveys show that students want teacher feedback to highlight their grammatical errors, some indicate that they also want teachers to give them feedback on the content and ideas in their writing (Hedgcock & Lefkowitz, 1994) However, in Odalejo’s experiment (2003), errors related to organization of ideas should receive highest attention for correction Grammar treatment rank next in the order of preferences with more than 96% of the learners indicating that this error type deserve high attention or some attention

In Leki’s (2006) research on students’ opinions about the value of written feedback, most students reported that they found feedback very useful but many also

said that they would have liked even more, especially feedback helping them to identify problems and giving them information about academic and disciplinary expectations They also wanted their feedback to have a dual content/ language focus Hence, there must be a need for more investigations to address question on how L2 instructors / teachers can work to meet students’ need

Chapter III Methodology

3.1 The selection of subjects

To answer the questions of the research which aims at obtaining information on what students’ preferences are when receiving written feedback from the teachers and then find some suggestions for teachers to give feedback in teaching writing in second language classes 33 students, mostly females, 18 years old in grade 12A8, Vinh Phuc Gifted High School are chosen Their English proficiency is rated as intermediate with some ranked at upper-intermediate

The secondary structure approach was also chosen while doing this research paper 7 articles relating to the research questions of teacher written feedback on ESL learners’ writing skill were selected for analysis Three of them was retrieved from Journal of Second Language Writing and two from Modern Language Journal, one was taken from Journal of Higher Education and the other from TESL Canada Journal, which are respectively published in by professional disciplinary associations The other internet- based full articles in PDF or WORD format were carefully chosen, basing on website’s reliability as well as the high number of citations The rest came from books written by worldwide well- known authors in my research field such as Brookhart, Ferris, D.R,Hyland, I believe strongly that the selection of all the above writings was significantly contributed toward examining the research paper

3.2 Data collection instruments.

For the purpose of obtaining needed information, questionnaires are employed (see Appendix) The questionnaires include 2 questions The first questions aims at finding students’ preferences in receiving writing feedback, the second question investigates at which stage of writing students prefer getting corrective feedback

3.3 Data collection procedure

The questionnaires was conducted on Friday morning, 6th, September, 2013 on class 12A8, Vinh Phuc Gifted High School with 33 students in total As I am also in charge of being the form teacher of the class, all of my students are eager to engage into

my research

Chapter 4 Results and Discussion

In this part, I present the interpretation of quantitative data and detailed consideration of survey results from 7 chosen articles in relation to relevant published work as well as my personal calculation and estimations The aim of this part is to provide closer look at individual points of view on different aspects related to corrective feedback as a way of finding out some effective ways for teachers to write feedback in students’ writing in order to improve students’ writing skill

Question 1: In your opinion, should your writing be corrected?

N

o.

Strongly disagreed

Disagreed Agreed Strongly

agreed

1 Teachers should correct and

comment your writing in written

feedback

100%

2 Teachers should pay attention to the

organization of your writing when

giving written feedback

3 Teachers should pay attention to the

content of your writing when giving

written feedback

4 Teachers should pay attention to

vocabulary of your writing when

giving written feedback

5 Teachers should pay attention to

grammar of your writing when

giving written feedback

100%

6 Teachers should pay attention to the

punctuation and spelling of your

writing when giving written

feedback

7 Teachers should point out students’

errors directly

8 Teachers should point out students’

errors indirectly

9 When giving feedback, teacher

should provide advice and include

explanations, and employed

open-ended questions

100%