An investigation into teacher feedbacks on 11th grader’s writing peformance

ABSTRACT Although teacher feedback to students’ writing plays an important role in teaching and learning writing, both teachers and students at high school do not pay much attention to t

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

VINH UNIVERSITY

LE PHUONG THAO

AN INVESTIGATION INTO TEACHER FEEDBACKS

ON 11th GRADER’S WRITING PERFORMANCE

MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

VINH UNIVERSITY

LE PHUONG THAO

AN INVESTIGATION INTO TEACHER FEEDBACKS

ON 11th GRADER’S WRITING PERFORMANCE

Field: Theory and Methodology of English Language Teaching

Code: 60.14.01.11

MASTER’S THESIS IN EDUCATION

Supervisor: Dr Nguyen Thi Kim Anh

Nghe An, 2017

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

I hereby acknowledge that this study is my own work The data and findings discussed in the thesis are true, used with permission, and have not been published elsewhere

Author

Le Phuong Thao

ABSTRACT

Although teacher feedback to students’ writing plays an important role in teaching and learning writing, both teachers and students at high school do not pay much attention to this problem To get much more information about this reality, the researcher make an effort to investigate into teacher feedbacks on 11th grader’s writing performance at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic high school This thesis is implemented with co-operation of 50 students and 4 teachers of English with the combination of some survey instruments Firstly, questionnaires were delivered for students and teachers Next, an interview with a list of questions was carried out between the researcher and the other teachers After that, some samples from students’ writing drafts were collected and analyzed These sources of data collection will provide new insights into teachers’ feedback giving practice The findings of the study revealed that there existed a lot of problems concerning teachers’ responding methods, their feedback focus, their frequent types and forms as well as their help for students’ comprehension of teacher feedback The results also showed the misfit between what the teachers often give, what the students would like to get as well as give out some solutions for the giving teacher feedback on students’ writing with the hope to help the teachers and students to change the current condition and make students to be more and more interested in writing skill

Additionally, I also would like to thank all the teachers of English and my students at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic high school who help me much to collect the important data for the research

Finally, my special thanks also go to my lecturers, my friends, my classmates and especially my beloved family for valuable comments and criticism, their interest and encouragement

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i

ABSTRACT ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS … ……….… …….………iv

LIST OF CHARTS vi

LIST OF TABLES vii

LIST OF ABBRIVIATIONS viii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale 1

1.2 Aims of the study 2

1.3 Scope of the study 2

1.4 Methods of the study 3

1.5 Research questions 3

1.6 Design of the study 3

CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 5

2.1 Writing 5

2.1.1 Definitions of writing 5

2.1.2 Types of writing 7

2.1.3 The importance of writing 8

2.1.4 The importance of writing skill to students of high school 8

2.1.5 Teaching Writing 9

2.2 Feedback 11

2.2.1 Definitions of feedback 11

2.2.2 The importance of feedback 13

2.2.3 Strategies for writing feedback 15

2.2.4 Approaches to feedback giving 17

2.2.5 Types of feedback 18

2.3 Focus on Teacher Feedback 21

2.3.1 Forms of teacher feedback 22

2.3.2 Types of teacher feedback 22

2.3.3 Issues in the teachers' written feedback 23

2.3.4 Principles of teacher feedback 25

2.3.5 Major issues in giving teacher feedback 26

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ………28

3.1 The context of the study 28

3.2 The textbooks 29

3.3 Participants 30

3.4 Instruments for Data Collection 30

3.4.1 Questionnaire for Students 31

3.4.2 Questionnaire for Teachers 31

3.4.3 Follow-up Interview 32

3.4.4 Document analyses of teacher feedback 32

3.5 The instruments 33

3.6 Data collection methods 33

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 35

4.1 Data analysis 35

4.1.1 Data analysis of questionnaire for students 35

4.1.2 Data analysis of questionnaire for teacher 47

4.1.3 Analysis of the interview 52

4.1.4 Observation of teacher commentary on the students’ drafts 54

4.2 Findings and discussion 56

4.2.1 Findings 56

4.2.2 Discussion 59

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 63

5.1 Conclusion 63

5.2 Recommendations 63

5.3 Suggestions for further studies 65

REFERENCES 66

APPENDIX : 70

LIST OF CHARTS

Page

Figure 4.1 The students’ interest toward writing skill 35

Figure 4.2 The students’ attitude towards topics of writing in textbook 36

Figure 4.3 Amount of time a day students spend on writing 36

Figure 4.4 The most difficult problem encountered when studying writing skill 37

Figure 4.5 Things students do before writing 38

Figure 4.6 The students’ attitude towards the time of studying writing skill in class 39

Figure 4.7 People who correct students’ writing task 40

Figure 4.8 The importance of teacher feedback on students’ writing 40

Figure 4.9 Students' expectation for frequency of teacher feedback on each assignment 41

Figure 4.10 Students’ expectation for teacher feedback types 42

Figure 4.11 Students’ expectation for the focus of teacher feedback 42

Figure 4.12 Students’ expectation for teachers’ indication of errors in the writing 43

Figure 4.13 Students’ expectation for teachers’ treatment if there are many errors in the writing 44

Figure 4.14 Students’ comprehension of teacher feedback 45

Figure 4.15 The reasons for not understanding teacher feedback 45

Figure 4.16 The solutions for the problems 46

Figure 4.17 Frequency of teacher feedback to each assignment 47

Figure 4.18 Treatment with errors in the student writing 50

Figure 4.19 Teacher’s consideration about students’ comprehension of teacher feedback 51

LIST OF TABLES

Page Table 4.1 The purpose of teacher’s giving feedback 47 Table 4.2 Frequency of teacher feedback types 48 Table 4.3 Focus of teacher feedback 49

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Rationale

Language is the means of expressing people’s thoughts, ideas, views and a medium of communication with the whole world and English is considered as not only an international language but also a medium of communication in this age of globalization In Vietnam, English is a foreign language and is a compulsory subject

at schools Students are expected to be communicatively competent in English Moreover, English plays an important role for people to find a good job not only in Vietnam but also in many others countries in the world It becomes a second language to many people To use English fluently, the learners are expected to pay attention to four skills: reading, writing, listening and speaking Of four skills, writing seems to be the most difficult skill to many learners Different from the rest, this skill requires not only the learners to have good knowledge of grammar but also plentiful source of vocabulary to write a good paragraph as well as a complete essay In writing English, writers always have to pay attention to such factors as tenses, sentence structures, parts of speech, conjunctions, and punctuation marks Thus, this requires much patience and constant practice And, the role of teachers in writing lessons, from guided to free writing tasks cannot be denied Therefore, helping students enhance their writing skills is one of the teachers’ responsibilities However, not all of the teachers find that it is easy for them to give students corrective feedback and make their students more interested in writing skill

It is obvious that one of the most meaningful and important methods of teaching writing is the use of written feedback However, during a lesson of forty five minutes, the teachers hardly have sufficient time to pay attention and give correction to every student’ writing performance According to Susan M Brookhart (2008), good feedback gives students information they need so they can understand where they are in their learning and what to do next- the cognitive factor Once they feel they understand what to do and why, most students develop a feeling that they have control over their own learning - the motivational factor

During four years working as a teacher of English at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic high school, I see that most of my students encounter a great number of difficulties in completing a writing task A majority of them find writing skills challenging In each lesson, students are usually asked to write a paragraph of approximately 100- 120 words based on the topic of the lesson to revise what they have learnt Such writings not only help them revise the vocabulary and grammar but also give them a chance to get used to writing and expressing ideas in English However, the students are afraid of writing lessons They are not aware of how to arrange ideas in a paragraph, in an essay or even in a letter In addition, in English written tests, writing skill has been concerned with many forms such as: finishing the sentence in such a way that it means the same as the given sentence, writing a letter, writing an essay… Moreover, teachers of English have many difficulties in giving written feedback to students’ writing paper They do not know how to use effectively teacher feedbacks in order to improve students’ writing skill

All of these motivated me to conduct a research titled “An investigation into teacher feedbacks on 11th grader’s writing performance” with the aim at improving writing skill of 11th graders students at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic high school

1.2 Aims of the study

This study is designed to obtain the two primary aims:

- Investigate teacher feedbacks given to 11th form students’ writings: their responding method, the feedback focus, feedback types and forms, as well as their problems in responding to the students' writing

- Propose some recommendations for teachers in order to help students write more effectively

1.3 Scope of the study

Feedback in writing is such a broad topic including self-editing, peer feedback and teacher feedback Within the framework of thesis, this study focuses only on the teacher feedback on students’ writing performance at a high school in Nghe An province The research is carried out with the hope that the results of the

study will provide significant insights into both what teachers have actually done as they respond and how the students react to these responses This may lead to suggestions for improving teacher feedback and helping the students to utilize it more successfully in their writing revision

1.4 Methods of the study

To realize the aims, the following quantitative and qualitative methods were employed to obtain adequate information for the study

Firstly, questionnaire for students and teachers were delivered to 50 students from 5 classes of grade 11 and four teachers of English Next, an interview with a list of 5 questions was carried out between the researcher and the other teachers After that, some samples from students’ writing drafts were collected and analyzed

These sources of data collection will provide new insights into teachers’ feedback giving practice and the students’ reactions towards the feedback they received On this basis, some measures were applied to improve the teacher feedback so that the teacher responds to the students’ writing more properly

1.5 Research questions

This research is designed to investigate teacher feedback techniques applied for 11th graders at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic high school to improve and enhance students’ writing skills In order to achieve the mentioned aims above, the following research questions will be included in the study:

1 What are students and teachers’ attitudes toward feedback?

2 How do the teachers respond to the students’ writing?

1.6 Design of the study

The study includes 5 chapters:

Chapter 1 Introduction: presents the rationale, aims, method, scope and

design of the study

Chapter2 Literature review: gives the theoretical background of writing and

giving feedback to students’ writing tasks

Chapter 3 Methodology: includes the description of Nghe An No 2

Boarding Ethnic high school context, English textbook and the study (the

instruments, the participants and the research questions)

Chapter 4 Data analysis and findings: describes the data of the

questionnaires and interviews, then gives some findings through the data analysis

Chapter 5 Conclusion and Recommendations: suggests some solutions to

the current problems, focuses on the conclusions of the thesis, some limitations and recommendations for further study

CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 Writing

2.1.1 Definitions of writing

A language is used for many kinds of purposes Thus, it has many functions

as well Furthermore, there are two macro skills of a language; they are receptive and productive skills Writing skill is one of the productive skills that should be mastered in using a language It is because writing skill has significances in improving a communicative competence of learning the language

Students learn and acquire language through both written and spoken ways

so that they can improve their communicative competence In the process of communication, ideally students know the rules on how to communicate to others, how to get information, and how to communicate about the language itself When the students understand the knowledge of the language, it means that they have a language competence In line with this, Brown (2000, p 31) states the definition of

a language competence as “one’s underlying knowledge of system of a language its rules of grammar, its vocabulary, and all the pieces of language and how those pieces fit together” Furthermore, Bachman (1990, p 87) divides the language competence into two parts: organization competence and pragmatic competence Organization competence is ability to comprehend and form correct sentences, understand meaning of sentences and pour theses sentences into a text Based on this statement, it can be concluded that writing is one part of the competencies

The definitions of writing are variously stated by some experts According to Rivers (1981, p 294), writing is conveying information or expression of original ideas in a consecutive way in the new language Brown (2001, p 336) also claims that writing is a thinking process Besides, he states that writing can be planned and given with an unlimited number of revisions before its release In addition, Elbow (1973) in Brown (2001, p 336) also says that writing is a two-step process The first process is figuring out the meaning and the second process is putting the meaning

into language Writing represents what we think It is because the writing process reflects things, which stay in the mind Students who are reluctant to write things down often suffer for this activity The students find difficulties when they start looking for some reasons to write and producing written sentences

Another definition of writing skill is also defined by Urquhart and McIver Urquhart and McIver (2005, p 5-6) state that writing is a recursive process, which means students revise throughout the process, frequently moving back and forth among the stages Then, students should learn strategies for invention and discovery, and teachers should help students generate content and discover a purpose Also, it is stated that readers, purpose, and occasion define all types of writing and effective writing fulfills the writer’s intention and meets the readers’ needs It means that writing is a complex process and it seems reasonable to expect, then, that the teaching of writing is complex as well Moreover, Harmer (2004) states that writing encourages students to focus on accurate language use It is because students consider the language use when the students engage in their writing process This activity will provoke language development because the students resolve problems what writing puts in students’ minds

Based on the definitions above, a definition of writing skill can be obtained Writing is a productive process done through some stages Firstly, exploring and transmitting ideas, thought and feeling into written form Secondly, conducting a number of revising process carry out a grammatical and orderly texts The writing productions are in the forms of readable texts which should be meaningful to everyone who reads the writing

Furthermore, based on those definitions, it can be stated that writing skill is a complex activity in producing a qualified writing This complex activity consists of stages as the steps in writing To improve students’ writing skill, the teaching and learning process of writing needs to be done well with developed input and effective activities As a result, teachers need to consider the teaching of writing skill well based on their student’s needs, ability and capacity

Argumentation includes debate and negotiation, which are concerned with reaching mutually acceptable conclusion It is used in law, for example in trial, in preparing an argument to be presented to court, and in testing the validity of certain kind of evidence

2.1.2.3 Description

Description is one of four rhetorical modes (also known as modes of discourse) It is often found in fiction, though it can make an appearance in nonfiction as well (for example, memoirs, first-hand accounts of events, or travel guides) When an author writes in a descriptive style, they are painting a picture in words of a person, place, or thing for their audience The author might employ metaphor or other literary devices in order to describe the author’s impressions via their five senses (what they hear, see, smell, taste, or touch) But the author is not trying to convince the audience of anything or explain the scene - merely describe things as they are

2.1.2.4 Narration

Narration is some kind of retelling, often in words (though it is possible to mime a story), of something that happened (a story) Narration recounts events,

perhaps leaving some occurrences out because they are from some perspective insignificant, and perhaps emphasizing others Narration thus shapes history (the scene of events, the story of what happened)

2.1.3 The importance of writing

Mastering writing ability is important since writing is one of the ways to communicate with other people The ability to write is required in many parts of people’s life Harmer (2004) states that writing is a basic language skill just as important as speaking, listening, and reading The ability to write is also required in many jobs such as writing application letters, business proposal, reports and memos

So, there are many several ways in writing which are important in lives:

Firstly, as a contribution to the development of a person, no matter what the person’s background and talents Writing is a highly complex act that demands the analysis and synthesis of many levels of thinking

Secondly, writing develops the initiative In reading, everything is provided

In writing, the learner must supply everything such the right relationship between sounds and letters, their form on the page, the topic, information, question and answer

Thirdly, writing develops courage At no point is the learner more vulnerable than in writing

In addition, writing, more than any other subject, can lead to personal breakthroughs in learning

Moreover, writing can contribute to reading from the first day of school Writing, someway, is active, where as reading is passive

Finally, writing contributes strongly to reading comprehension as children grow older

The ability to revise writing to greater power and economy is one of the higher forms of reading

2.1.4 The importance of writing skill to students of high school

In the school setting, writing plays two distinct but complementary roles First, it is a skill conducts the use of strategies (such as planning, evaluating, and

revising text) to accomplish a variety of goals, such as writing a report or expressing

an opinion with the support of evidence Second, writing is a mean of extending and deepening student’s knowledge; it acts as a tool for learning subject matter (Sperling & Freedman, 2001) Writing is one of the ways to transmit thoughts or ideas to the other people Writing is also the important skill in studying English, which need great investment from the students Many students in high school are not aware of the importance of writing, so they only spend a certain amount of time

on it It is not true because being good at writing can help them study other skills in English more effectively Besides that, practicing writing skill will help students get acquainted with new types of writing as well as consolidate their writing skill For example, students study writing skill from low to high, from basic to advance At grade 10, students mainly study writing one paragraph or a small part in essay It provides students some background knowledge before studying writing tasks at 11thgrade Similarly, writing tasks in 11th grade will prepare students essential skills to help them write well at higher level of 12th grade 11th grade writing tasks play an important role because students are well-prepared with grammar points, content, vocabulary, and especially techniques and skills to write a paragraph or essay before they study carefully at 12th grade

Nowadays, writing is also the key to success in college and university Most contexts of life (school, the workplace, and the community) call for some level of writing skill, and each context makes overlapping, but not identical, demands proficient writers adapt their writing flexibly to the context in which it takes place Otherwise, almost colleges or universities require their students to get foreign language certificates for graduated qualification, and writing is indispensable in these exams Being good at writing can ensure students a good job At present, many foreign companies need people with high writing skill level to be responsible for writing contracts or documents in English

2.1.5 Teaching Writing

Writing skill is one of language skills which are taught to students Also, writing skill determines the students’ communicative competence in English

Teaching how to write effectively is one of the most important life-long skills teachers impart to their students When teaching writing, the teachers must be sure

to select resources and support materials that not only aid them in teaching how to write, but that will also be the most effective in helping their students learn to write

So, on the functional level, students are able to communicate adequately both in the spoken and written form to complete daily activities Moreover, students are able to create some monologue short functional texts and essays in the form of procedure, descriptive, recount, narrative, and report The other target on the functional level is students can develop their linguistic competence (using grammar and vocabularies)

A writing process is a complicated process, because the writing process needs cognitive abilities in recognizing some segments of languages to produce a qualified writing In general, writing process is done through two stages: exploring ideas and processing the ideas into readable texts Rivers (1981, p 294) claims that writing in the language becomes a complicated activity because writing involves meaningful segments of language: words, sentence, grammar, and how to transfer those segments into written forms

Objectives of the teaching of writing skill can be achieved through some approaches According to Harmer (2001), there are two approaches in teaching writing They are focusing on the product of writing process and focusing on the writing process itself He states that focusing on the writing process leads those who advocate a process approach in writing However, teachers have to pay attention to the various stages of any piece of writing process

The writing approaches, including a process approach, are applied to get the objectives of study in writing skill They enable students to understand the materials and help them to express their ideas grammatically and orderly in English In addition, Nunan (1991) says that a process approach in writing sees the act of composition from a different perspective, or focusing as much on itself He also states that the process approach focuses on the steps involving drafting and redrafting a piece of work In other words, on this process approach, the important

one is not only in the product, but also in the writing process Therefore, the process approach can be developed through writing practices routinely with effective activities also a better input to improve the students’ writing skill

A writing process is done through some stages On each stage, students engage in a certain activity to construct their writing Furthermore, Richard and Renandya (2002, p 303) state that the process of writing consists of planning, drafting, revising and editing On the planning stage, the students are encouraged to write The drafting stage is focusing on the fluency of writing and is not pre-occupied with grammatical accuracy or the neatness of the draft Next, on the revising stage, the students re-write their text on the basis of feedback given in a responding stage The students, on editing stage, are engaged in tidying up their texts as they prepare the final draft for evaluation by the teachers

2.2 Feedback

2.2.1 Definitions of feedback

As far from now, responding to student writing, including giving feedback, is one of the most controversial topics in second language instruction and theory As the importance of feedback, it is considered a fundamental element of a process approach to writing Therefore, there have been attempts to define the term

“feedback”

Various researchers define the term “feedback” in different ways, among which the one put forward by Keh (1990) is one of the most comprehensive Keh considers feedback as “any input from a reader to a writer with the effect of providing information to the writer for revision” In other words, when giving feedback, the reader gives the writer comments, questions and suggestions with an aim to help him/her revise the writing Through feedback, the writer may learn the reader’s confusion caused by the writer’s insufficient information, illogical organization, poor development of ideas, or even inaccurate usage and choice of words and tense Students are motivated to continue a series of revisions especially through positive feedback According to Chaudron (1984), feedback which is

contrasted with the narrower notion of correction is therefore “an evitable constituent of classroom interaction” and “from the teacher’s point of view, the provision of feedback is a major means by which to inform learners of their accuracy of both their formal target language production and their classroom behavior and knowledge”

Feedback is probably the best-tested principle in psychology It is the most effective method when it is timely, perceived as relevant, meaningful and encouraging, and offers suggestions for improvement that are within a student’s grasp ( Brown, Bull & Pendlebury, 1997)

Feedback is any response made in relation to students’ work such as an assessment task, a performance or product It can be given by a teacher, an external assessor or a student peer It is usually spoken or written

Thus, feedback can be considered as an effective means to communicate to the students about their writing Through feedback, the student knows whether he or she has misled or confused the reader by not supplying sufficient information, illogical organization, lack of development of ideas, or something like inappropriate word-choice or tense (Keh, 1990)

However, this information is much more helpful if it is provided on preliminary and intermediate stage, rather than on the final one Seow (2002) claims that feedback is regarded as teacher’s quick initial reaction to the students’ drafts Added to this, Richards and Rynandya (2002) state that if students write only one draft which is then graded by the teacher, feedback on what is wrong in the composition comes too late This means feedback should be provided in the process

of writing rather than in single act of producing a text as Raimes (1983) notes,

“Responding to students’ writing is very much a part of the process of teaching writing” That means feedback is very necessary for the success of the writing According to Susan M Brookhark (2008), writing good feedback requires an understanding that language does more than describe our world, it helps us construct our world R Douglas (2007) supposes that effective feedback not only

tells students how they perform, but how to improve the next time they engage the task Effective feedback is provided in such a timely manner that the next opportunity to perform the task is measured in seconds, not weeks or months

2.2.2 The importance of feedback

A number of studies on this aspect have been done and a debate about the value of providing feedback on L2 writing has been prominent in recent years

According to Taylor (1997, p.65) “feedback is an area which causes students considerable anxiety” and there is a need for great care to be taken in relation to issues as timing, location, participation, attitudes, outcomes and so on Also, Truscott (1996), based on their respective reviews of the literature, stated that substantial research evidence suggests that correction of surface level errors is futile and may not be worth the instructor’s time and effort Truscott (2004) even concluded that this type of correction should be abandoned in second language writing classes because it can have harmful effect This point of view is shared by other studies in various second language contexts investigating the effect of different types of feedback on student writing skill in the case that explicit error correction seems to be generally ineffective

However, there have been a number of the researchers who support the importance of feedback in teaching English as a second language They believe in giving corrective feedback to students to improve their written accuracy In Schulz (1996) students’ beliefs about what constitutes effective feedback on writing and their expectations regarding teacher paper-making techniques may influence the effectiveness of such feedback Hedge (2000, p.13) shared an agreement in the case that “getting feedback from the teacher and from other students in the class enables learners to test hypothesis and refine their developing knowledge of the language system.” In this case, good feedback not only stimulates students for revision but also motivates them to maintain their interest in writing In addition, provision of comments helps individualize writing instructions in which students will be able to get individual attention to have their own needs or problems rightfully addressed (Reid, 1993) In this

way, feedback is an important step towards the learner centeredness

2.2.2.1 Feedback is integral to formative assessment

Feedback on performance, when effective, is widely considered to be integral to learning People learn faster and more deeply if they know what the strengths and weaknesses of their performance are and most importantly, how to improve future performance

One of the most valuable contributions anyone can make to another person’s learning is constructive feedback As a student or as a teacher, each of us has the capacity to provide useful information to other people, which will help them

to learn more effectively This potential to influence future performance is known as feed forward In order to generate feed forward, feedback must not only identify the learner gap between actual and desired performance (by indicating the standard achieved on any given criterion for example) but also provide information needed to close that gap It is this additional information which is so important in making assessment formative What’s more, when specific guidance is provided to close the gap, the feed forward effect is even greater and the focus of feedback quickly becomes learning rather than marks

2.2.2.2 Feedback produces learner autonomy

One of the most valuable aspects of effective feedback is its ability to foster learner autonomy Students tend to become self regulated learners when they are provided with detailed feedback on performance as well as guidance for future improvement Evidence of this self-regulatory process can be seen in an increasing ability to align aspects of thinking, motivation and behavior with assessment criteria, standards and learning outcomes as well as learning goals established by the learners themselves

A similar effect can be produced in students’ written work Feedback which specifically identifies weaknesses in aspects of student writing, such as structural and language issues, and then offers guidance in addressing these can better equip the student to proofread and self-correct in the future Feedforward then results in

less dependence on support from lecturers and tutors Even better, self-regulated learners are often more successful learners, being more resourceful, tenacious and confident

2.2.2.3 Feedback aligns teaching and learning

Feedback can also play an essential role in aligning teaching, learning and assessment When explicitly linked to assessment tasks, learning outcomes and marking schemes, feedback functions to create and maintain meaning for teachers and students alike through a reinforcement of the purpose of assessment and how it relates to learning outcomes (Dunn et al, 2004) Conversely, the absence of effective feedback reduces assessment to a post-script for learning and teaching and little more than a means of justifying the awarding of a particular grade (Orrell, 2006)

2.2.2.4 Feedback directly impacts student experience

Whether intended or not, feedback affects the self-esteem and motivation of students All lecturers and tutors are seen by students to possess power Poorly worded or overly judgmental comments on assessments can easily damage student confidence This can lead to a student with low self-esteem interpreting all future feedback personally (as a judgment on their ability) On the other hand, constructive, well-written feedback contributes to positive self-esteem and an ability

to interpret feedback, be it positive or negative, more objectively As positive esteem and self-belief increase motivation to learn and improve performance, effective feedback has a flow on effect on student outcomes through increased success and retention

self-In conclusion, giving and receiving feedback helps students to develop their sensitivity and their own writing style In other words, feedback is a fundamental element of a writing approach when it pushes the students through the writing process on to the eventual end-product

2.2.3 Strategies for writing feedback

2.2.3.1 Feedback is a process

Writing loses its potency when it becomes a onetime event instead of an ongoing process Students should be writing multiple drafts and improving their work each time with the help of a writing guide Given the chance, most students will "engage in an iterative discourse about their writing "which promotes engagement, time on task, and meaningful student learning

Too often, students are given just one shot at an assignment for a grade But this does not give them the opportunity to take the advice given and improve their writing skill There is little room for risk taking, experimentation and practice

Instead, students need to be given opportunities to close the gap between current and desired performance This means giving students a chance to improve through revisions guided by appropriate feedback

2.2.3.2 Feedback must be prompt

Most importantly, this revision cycle needs to happen as rapidly as possible When it takes a week or two to get feedback to students, the flow of the learning process breaks and students tend to lose interest in the assignment

Prompt feedback guides students when they can still recall what they did and thought at the time they wrote the paper In addition, they are then still motivated to improve their work

2.2.3.3 Feedback should be timely

It is also important for the revision cycle to occur before the unit is over Students should receive feedback on their paper about photosynthesis before the photosynthesis unit is over Otherwise, the learning that occurs as a result of the writing activity can not be applied anywhere else

The feedback is of great use to the teachers Having your students write is one

of the best ways to get inside their heads and assess their level of understanding By providing feedback to students before a topic is over, you give yourself the chance to adjust content or teaching strategies based on actual learning needs

2.2.3.4 Feedback has consequences

Feedback is not helpful unless the student is forced to respond to it It is not

uncommon to correct the same errors on a particular student's work over and over again This is because the student is not taking your advice, or not being required to

do so Sometimes students are lazy or just do not get it To solve the problem, teachers can take steps to make feedback consequential, forcing students to address your comments When a student submits a revision, it might be a good idea to have him/her explain exactly how the revision addresses the previous feedback

Making this process transparent to the class as a whole can help students learn from their peers as well

2.2.4 Approaches to feedback giving

2.2.4.1 The single-draft approach

This approach is popularly used in traditional classes where teacher's written feedback seems straightforward The teacher returns their compositions with a grade and errors marked in red, and perhaps with few notes of students' performance Next, the students quickly switch to a new type of writing lesson; they will write a new paper and repeat this process According to Sommers (1982), this kind of response is too general, too incentive, confusing, arbitrary, and idiosyncratic To support her view, Chenoweth (1987) points out that such type of feedback only cracks the surface of the student writing, but does not “directly address the writers' main problems, which are more related to the way in which they accomplish a given writing task" (p.25) Keh (1989) also criticizes that one-shot commentary provides little information for the students to improve their papers in terms of coherence or content Their overall ideas suggest that such practice does little or nothing to improve the student writing, either in the short or long term In other words, this approach proves to be ineffective to the student revision

2.2.4.2 The multiple-draft approach

The multiple-draft approach is applied in “process writing" classes where students may write several drafts which are read and commented on or edited by the teacher Then students are required to re-write, using the feedback offered by teacher Undoubtedly, the process approach to teaching writing not only leads

students to write multiple drafts, but also encourages teacher to respond to student writing as a process The process approach to feedback giving is therefore better than asking students to submit the final piece for evaluation for the following reasons First, it enables students to practice through several revision cycles Second, it gives writers more chances to develop and present their ideas, to improve both the form and content of their compositions effectively based on teachers’ feedback It sends the message to students that writing is the process of improving through revising based on teacher feedback, rather than a single act of producing one and also the final draft for grading

2.2.5 Types of feedback

The types of feedback are varied Feedback can be classified into elements: The performer/ the provider of feedback (teacher, peer and self), the timing of feedback (delayed or immediate feedback), the form of feedback (direct and indirect feedback), the method of performance of feedback (oral and written feedback), the concentration on a specific item in feedback (grammar, spelling and etc), the stage

of process writing feedback and the effect of feedback (feedback in revising, editing stages) For the purpose of this study, much attention will be given to the provider

of feedback: self- editing, peer feedback and teacher feedbacks

Teachers' feedback can be conducted in many ways: dialog journals, written comments on students' draft or student-teacher conferences However, the author

of this study addresses some types of teacher's written feedback and how these types influence the student revision

2.2.5.1 Self- editing

Self-editing is an important aspect of re-writing Raimes (1983) supports this when he states that “What students really need, more than anything else, is to develop the ability to read their own writing and to examine it critically, to learn how to express their meaning fluently, logically, and accurately” (p.149) This means students need to be able to find and correct their own mistakes Students’ attempt in language learning is one of the crucial factors towards their success If a learner is aware of self-editing and tries to learn from his own failure, he may

receive more chances of overcoming difficulties in learning than others who do not care why they fail

In order to help students to have success in self-editing their writing, some techniques are designed to help them apply the same critical skills to their own written products at the right stage in the process as all the techniques of reading closely and analyzing the writing help with critical reading In fact, students need to hold the critical skills in check as the ideas are forming at the beginning of the process They also have to know not only how to edit their own writing but when is the right time to do it

However, self editing involves an ability to look at one’s work with an impersonal eye So, the best thing to do is to let one’s completed manuscript sit for a month, then go back and do a final edit In other words, self-editing is more time - consuming than the other types of feedback Also, it is an unsuitable way for students with low English proficiency to revise their writing

2.2.5.2 Peer feedback

According to Bartels (2004), peer feedback means feedback from your fellow students If one student is working on the same assignment as another student, peer feedback can mean exchanging drafts and comments on each other’s drafts Additionally, Hansen and Liu (2005) also state that peer feedback is “the use

of learners as source of information, and interactants for each other in such a way that learners assume roles and responsibilities normally taken on by teachers in commenting and critiquing each other’s performance in both written and oral formats” In the literature on writing, peer feedback refers to many names, for example, peer response, peer editing, peer critiquing, and peer evaluation Each name connotes a particular slant to the feedback, mainly in terms of where along the continuum this feedback is given, and the focus of the feedback Whatever form it may take, this kind of feedback gives students a chance to read each other’s papers and to provide feedback to the writer, possibly based on specific questions the teacher has provided These responses can be oral or/and written

Oral peer response, as presented in Mittan (1989) calls for students to work

in groups of four or five Each student gives one copy of his/her paper to every member of the group Then usually out of class for homework, each group member reads other students’ papers and prepares a response to each of them, using focus questions provided by the teacher In the following class, students give oral comments on each paper they have read, as well as ask and answer clarifying questions Each student then uses this feedback from the other group members to rewrite his/her paper

Bartels (2004) also states that nowadays teachers have changed the ways of conducting peer feedback For example, many teachers now train their students to give positive, useful feedback and give students practice in evaluating written work Stanley (1992) and Zhu (1995) found that untrained students tend to focus on surface errors rather than on organization or style Therefore, instead of having their students give oral feedback to their peers’ writings in group setting, many teachers today have students write feedback, which is then given directly to the author of the paper After receiving this written feedback, students are given time to read it and ask any questions or seek clarification about what their peers have written As in oral peer feedback, this feedback is then used to write the final draft of the paper

2.2.5.3 Teacher feedback

There has been limited literature on the effectiveness or the way in which teachers “correct” students’ compositions (Shrum and Glisan, 2002) It raises the question of whether teachers’ kind of correction and comment match students’ expectations or still presents a mismatch (Charles, 1990) It is necessary to find out the ways to improve the quality of students’ written work

In terms of a mismatch between teachers’ and students’ expectations, Charles (1990) says that students are interested in comments on vocabulary, organization and content as surface-structure problems, meanwhile, teachers prefer to comment primarily on surface level features (Zamel, 1985) In other words, Fathme and Wholly (1990, p.178) state that “much of the conflict over teacher response to written work

has been whether teacher feedback should focus on form or on content” As a result,

to improve the quality of teacher feedbacks, teachers must decide whether to focus on form (e.g., grammar, vocabulary, and mechanics) or on content (e.g., organization and amount of detail) Much of the literature on correcting written errors supports the claim that learners’ writing skills may improve with teacher feedbacks that focuses on content rather on form Besides, in order to make teacher feedbacks more effective, teachers should give students more control over the feedback they receive by underlining the parts of the text they are dissatisfied with.This will enable students to evaluate their own writing and set their goal (Charles, 1990) Hyland (1990) also agreed that this will lead to a high success rate

2.3 Focus on Teacher Feedback

Since the appearance of the process approach as a new means of teaching writing, teacher feedback has been highlighted as a major component of that process Its role is viewed not only as a means to inform students about their errors, but has also been viewed as “a means of channeling reactions and advice to facilitate improvements” (Hyland & Hyland, 2001, p 186) It is generally accepted that teacher’s comments on grammatical errors will help students improve accuracy more effectively However, more evidence of progress and higher quality of the writing as a whole has been observed in groups of students who receive feedback on content only or combination of both content and grammar (Ferris and Hedgcock, 1998) This finding suggests that feedback needs to focus more on content than on form, or a combination of both Similarly, Fathman & Whalley (1990) come to the conclusion that students can develop their writing skills when teacher feedback focuses on both content and form at the same time Form feedback has no effect on developing ideas of writing Whereas, content of feedback helps improve the content of the rewritten product Although there are different ideas about what, when and how to give feedback to students’ writing, the author does support Reid’s (1993) view that teacher feedback should allow the student to revise, see differently and be capable of transferring the change to other pieces of writing

2.3.1 Forms of teacher feedback

According to Ferris (1997), teacher feedback generally operates within four basic syntactic forms: question, statement, imperative, and exclamation, which present different pragmatic aims such as giving or asking for further information, making request for revision, giving positive feedback

It is true that teachers can use these forms to provide feedback to their students However, they should be aware of the potential problems that each form presents In addition, Hendrickson (1978) suggests language teachers use various direct and indirect techniques when providing feedback to students’ writing Using marking systems is one

of the indirect techniques (underlining all misspelled words and omitted or superfluous affixes; putting a question mark (?) above a confusing phrase or structure; and inserting

an arrow (->) to indicate a missing article or preposition) Generally, these indirect methods are used whenever it is assumed that students can correct their own errors Direct correction techniques which include underlining a word and providing a verbal tip such a “use conjunction”; crossing out superfluous words; and supplying the correct form

or structure are also used as it is assumed that students are not able to correct these errors

by themselves Cohen (1975), suggests that any error correction process includes some of the following general features: indication that an error was committed, identification of the type of error, selection of remedy, provision of a correct model, the furnishing of an opportunity for an attempt, indication of improvement (if applicable), and the offering of praise In other words, teachers should be careful in constructing their own feedback forms, in explaining those feedback forms together with their pragmatic intents to the students, and most importantly, in helping the students process the comments and revise their drafts effectively In addition, when using feedback codes, teachers should be sure that students also understand the meaning of the codes

2.3.2 Types of teacher feedback

The different types of teacher written feedback can have different focuses Hyland (2003) talks about six major focuses of teacher written feedback: focus on language form, focus on content, focus on text functions, focus on creative

expression, focus on the writing process, and focus on genre Focus on language structures, as Hyland explains, implies teachers’ emphasis on checking students’ vocabulary choices, syntactic patterns, and mechanics Second, when teachers focus

on content, they are concentrating on students’ ideas and information The third category, text functions, is concerned with “constructing a functional and fluent text” (Konttinen, 2009, p 9) Fourth, in focusing on creative expressions, teachers are focusing on students’ personal styles of writing and individual ideas Fifth, focusing on the writing process means focusing on how students first plan the essay, define a rhetorical problem, and then present solutions The final focus is on genre This focus, according to Hyland (2003), is very important in order to teach students how to achieve some communicative purposes when they write

Though there is a need to address issues related to accuracy and language in the feedback stage of writing, as it was in the traditional product approach, some research points to the need for teachers to pay attention to content issues Straub (1997) adds that focusing on content allows teachers "to view the student's text in light of the larger contexts that inform the writing, taking into consideration such concerns as the assignment, audience and purpose, voice, the background and experience of the writer, the students' writing processes, genre conventions, and institutional standards"

2.3.3 Issues in the teachers' written feedback

2.3.3.1 Traditional “marking”

Traditional way of teachers’ written feedback which is often provided in the form of “a final grade on a paper and often accompanied by much red ink throughout the essay" (Grabe & Kaplan, 1996, p 318), has not always been beneficial One problem is that some teachers spend more time correcting than their students spend looking at the correction as they tend to compare their grades with others’ However, “marking” is a procedure far more complex than it seems as there are a number of mistakes and errors that the teacher has to point out This ideas stress the purpose of feedback that it should not be single-dimensional but include all aspects involved in writing

2.3.3.2 Appropriating students’ texts

Appropriating students’ text may occur when “teachers’ comments take students’ attention away from their own purpose in writing a particular text and focus that attention on the teachers’ purpose in commenting” (Sommers, 1982, p.149) To put it simply, it is the case when teachers are being extremely authoritative in their response, and resort to techniques such as deletion of whole parts of learners’ text or substitution of the learners’ ideas This technique does not guarantee students’ awareness of errors and their ability to reproduce those language items correctly in future writing Teachers should be careful not to over-correct since this does not get students involved in correcting their own work They are simply given the answers for their errors but the problem is no teacher can be sure if they read the correction or learn anything from it Teachers are also uncertain whether they understand the teachers’ correction or not Besides, some students may want to know why something is wrong more than the correction itself (Byrne, 1991) This is also important because knowing the cause will help students avoid similar mistakes Moreover, students may lose their confidence if the teacher covers the paper with his/her correction of many or all errors, which is often the case in intermediate language classes Thus, teachers’ response needs to be mild and appreciative of the learners' own ideas, style and favorite techniques To fulfill this job, teachers should serve as a sound board to help writers clarify their intention, to see confusions in their text and to explore alternatives that they may not have

considered

2.3.3.3 Overlooking the students’ varying levels of writing ability

Another common problem in teachers' written response is that they often give the same feedback to every students’ writing In fact, learners are different in terms of their language proficiency, competence, ability, creativity, meta-cognition, etc As a result, they are distinct in terms of writing ability as well as comprehension and desire to receive teacher feedback It has been shown that low-ability writers expect to revise from a narrow outlook and make changes addressing the surface

grammatical structure of composition, usually at the level of word, rather than deeper issues of content and organization High-ability students, however, "tend to concentrate on getting the content right first and leaves details like correcting spelling, punctuation and grammar until later” (Hedge, 1990, p.23)

Taking the students' varying levels of writing into consideration is, therefore,

of great importance as it enables teachers to choose the most effective way of giving feedback Additionally, accomplishing this task “gives information not only about individual learners but also the whole class's learning process” (Lewis, 2002, p.1) It leads teachers to see which of the language aspects being introduced are really absorbed into students' language use Ferris et al (1998) recommends that writing teachers should respond somewhat differently to students of varying ability levels

2.3.4 Principles of teacher feedback

Ferris (2003) provides a list of considerations concerning teacher feedback which focuses on communication and process; the most important of which are the following:

+ Feedback should include all the aspects that relate to writing, such as content, structure and grammar This is of importance, as good writing theoretically and philosophically involves several parameters that relate to all the different kinds

of competence that have been discussed in the previous subsection As with every other skill in language learning, learners should be expected to demonstrate a balanced combination of all these aspects that constitute good writing

+ Feedback should be comprehensible and non-appropriative In order for feedback to help the learners’ development, it must be clear and systematic, so that learners’ errors are made obvious in order to minimize ambiguity and vagueness

+ Feedback has to take into consideration contextual variable, especially in the case of second language learners Background knowledge and prior experience will be reflected upon a learner’s text, meaning that there are particular cultural and linguistic norms in the target language that need to be explained Unlike the first two that are a posteriori consideration, that is considerations to be made after the learners have submitted their writing, this third point can also be taken into account

in the priori stage, which is the instruction The more prior experiences leading to particular deficiencies are taken into consideration in the instruction stage, the less there will be traces of incapability to deal with particular forms of writing

2.3.5 Major issues in giving teacher feedback

As far as teacher feedback in L2 writing classes is concerned, a number of researchers (Ferris, 2003; Reid, 1993) have attempted to give an overview of issues involved in responding to L2 writers’ works In their studies, major issues in responding to L1 writers seem to fall largely into three categories: class goals, teacher role (s), and strategies of teacher feedback

With regard to teacher’s roles in ESL writing classes, Raimes (1983) discussed the difficulty of composing in a second language and of how teacher response can shape and potentially get in the way of that process The main purpose

of the researcher is to suggest that ESL writing teachers need to pay more attention

to the act of writing and less to ESL She claimed that “one remedy for the aguish of composing is to concentrate on the making of meaning, to concentrate on the act of composing instead of peripherals” (p.92) She offered three areas in which teacher can do this: generating assignments for the class, giving feedback, and providing readings In terms of providing feedback, he suggested that corrections are not the only kind of feedback teacher can give and that working on developing grammatical forms should be a parallel activity to composing

In regard to strategies of teacher feedback, Reid (1993) stated “in teachers’ attempt to evade the evils of appropriation taking over their students’ work, many ESL writing teachers have stopped working with their students’ texts altogether” (p.275) Though this withdrawal may Reid argued that teachers need to “accept their responsibilities as cultural informants and as facilitators for creating social discourse community in the ESL classroom” (p.275)

Summary

In summary, this chapter has so far touched upon issues relating to the topic

of the study It has mentioned the definition and the importance of feedback, types

of feedback and the focuses on teacher feedback as well as major issues in giving teacher’s feedback in ESL writing classroom The following chapter will focus on the study - its methodology and findings - under the light of the above discussed theories

3.1 The context of the study

The study was conducted at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic High school, Nghe An province, which has been recognized as a standard national school The school has 15 classrooms, a multi-functioned room which is used for physical education activities and meetings This year, the school has 450 students, with an average of 30 students per class There are five teachers of English and thirty- five others teaching different subjects All of them are young and obtain B.A degrees

Most of the school students come from remote or mountainous areas of the province Their parents are ethnic minority people and most of them are farmers so their living condition is not really good After school, they have to help their mothers with housework and farming They are hard-working and well-behaved students However, most of them have low ability in learning Many of them have low English proficiency and their utterances are in words or short prefabricated phrases Their grammar is mostly inaccurate and their pronunciation requires concentrated listening As a result, they often have a great anxiety in English classrooms With respect to English subject, each class receives three periods a week The teaching equipment includes the textbooks, some cassette players for listening and an audio-visual room The students are taught merely the content prescribed in nationally authorized textbooks Most of them said that they wanted to improve their English proficiency but they could not They only learnt English for examinations As a result, they are mainly provided with grammatical structures, limited vocabulary and language skills which consist of speaking, listening, reading and writing Of the four skills, writing is considered one of the most boring and

difficult to master The writers have to pay attention to skills of planning and organizing as well as spelling, punctuation, word choice and so on The difficulty becomes even more serious because the students’ language proficiency is low

This study is conducted with the hope to raise teachers and students’ awareness of the importance of giving feedback and effective ways to give feedback

on student writing

3.2 The textbooks

The textbooks used to teach English at Nghe An No 2 Boarding Ethnic High school are English Basic 10, 11 and 12 They are developed based on the new national curriculum The books are described to follow “learner-centered approach and communicative approach with task-based teaching” (English 10, Teacher’s Manual: 12) Each book includes 16 units and six review units called Test yourself

Each unit covers a topic and is sub-divided into five sections: Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing and Language Focus Each part is supposed to be taught in 45 minutes

As one of the three textbooks, “Tieng Anh 11” textbook consists of sixteen units, each of which is sub-divided into five sections The writing lesson which is the fourth in each unit is introduced after reading, speaking and listening It is designed in the light of theme-based and task-based approaches Each section consists of some tasks and activities with the aim of helping students improve their writing skills of different topics such as writing personal letters, invitation letters or describing information in a table The writing section may begin with a model, followed by activities that guide students through the writing process such as model analysis, language work, and guided writing After that, students are required to produce texts of 120-130 words on familiar topics based on models or prompts for personal or basic communicative purposes All these activities are carried out in a period of 45 minutes Therefore, students do not have much chance for free writing practice This is quite far from the given goal of teaching writing in CLT that is to enable learners to become more independent and effective writers Furthermore,

teachers do not have much time to give comments on the students’ writings or ask them to write multi drafts

3.3 Participants

The subjects of the study are the two groups of grade 11 with the total of 50 students and 4 teachers who are currently teaching English at the school It may be very difficult to select a random sample of individuals due to a large number of the students in the school (more than 450 students) In this case, instead of randomly selecting individuals, the author randomly selects classes or groups for investigation This method is convenient for me to observe the participants complete the questionnaires in class Moreover, these classes have been assigned with a relative equal proportion of good, average, and poor English proficiency students Of the 50 students, 22 are male and 28 are female Most of these students have learnt English for five or six years Their ages range from 16 to 17 Only 20%

of these students assumed that their English writing performance was fair and the rest (80%) said that they were poor at writing Accordingly, the majority of the study subjects are not good at writing

The four teachers participating in the study are teaching English at school All of them are chosen to be involved in the research Their ages range from 30 to

40 All of them hold a B.A in English All of them have taught English for more than 10 years They all have taught writing for 6 years since the writing section was separated from others in new English text books They are willing to participate in the survey with the hope that the results of the study will help them to have better understanding on students’ preferences for teacher feedback

Access to the teachers and students would not be a problem as the researcher proposed to distribute the questionnaires to those who are learning and working within her own group

3.4 Instruments for Data Collection

In this study, in order to obtain adequate data for the study, three main instruments were used They were questionnaire, follow-up interviews and