COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND LANGUAGES

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

ASSESSING TEACHERS’ PRACTICES OF WRITTEN CORRECTIVE

FEEDBACK AND STUDENTS’ PREFERENCES: GRADE 11 TEACHERS
AND STUDENTS AT MAYTSEBRI SECONDARY SCHOOL IN FOCUS

BY
FISHATSYON GETACHEW

August, 2020
Aksum, Ethiopia

ASSESSING TEACHERS’ PRACTICES OF WRITTEN CORRECTIVE

FEEDBACK AND STUDENTS’ PREFERENCES: GRADE 11 TEACHERS
AND STUDENTS AT MAYTSEBRI SECONDARY SCHOOL IN FOCUS

BY
FISHATSYON GETACHEW

ADVISOR
BERHE TAFERE (PhD)

A THESIS SUBMITTED TOTHE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
PRESENTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN TEACHING ENGLISH
AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE (TEFL)

AKSUM UNIVERSITY, AKSUM

August, 2020
 AKSUM UNIVERSITY
COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES AND LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE
AND LITERATURE

This is to certify that this thesis prepared by Fishatsyon Getachew entitled “Assessing
teachers’ practices of written corrective feedback and students’ preferences: grade 11
Teachers and students at Maytsebri secondary school in focus” and submitted in fulfillment
of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign
Language) complies withthe regulations of the university and meets the accepted standards
with respect to originality and quality.

Signed by the Examining Committee:

Advisor Signature Date

__________________________ _____________ ___________
Examiner Signature Date
_________________________ ______________
___________
Examiner Signature Date
_________________________ _______________ _____________
 Acknowledgment
Above all and everything, thanks to God, the Almighty for all the blessings of my life. First of
all, I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to my advisor Berhe Tafere (PhD)
who kindly provided me with a great deal of valuable feedback on nearly every aspect of this
paper. His enthusiasm, guidance, and support helped me in all the time of research and writing
of this thesis. Without his encouragement and support this study would not reach the finish
line.

I want to extend my gratitude to all the participants (EFL teachers and students of Maytsebri
secondary school) for giving up their invaluable time to participate voluntarily in the study.
Also, thanks are due to the principals and department heads of English language who
facilitated the collection of data which is the corner stone of the study.

Thanks also are due to my father Getachew Debalkew and my spouse Masho Asmamaw who
stood by my side throughout the research process by providing necessary materials for this
research.

Table of content
Acknowledgment...........................................................................................................................i

i
List of Tables...............................................................................................................................iv

Acronyms and Abbreviations.......................................................................................................v

ABSTRACT..................................................................................................................................vi

Chapter One: Introduction............................................................................................................1

1.1 Background of the Study...............................................................................................1

1.2 Statement of the Problem...............................................................................................3

1.3 Objectives of the Study..................................................................................................5

1.3.1 General Objective.......................................................................................................5

1.3.2 Specific Objectives.......................................................................................................5

1.4 Significance of the Study...............................................................................................5

1.5 Delimitation of the Study...............................................................................................6

1.6 Limitations of the Study.................................................................................................6

1.7 Definition of Operational Terms....................................................................................7

Chapter Two: Review of Related Literature.................................................................................8

2.1. The Concept of Written Feedback and Corrective Feedback.............................................8

2.2 Overview of Feedback in Learning Theories......................................................................9

2.2.1 Krashen’s Monitor Model...........................................................................................10

2.2.2 Pienemann Teachability Hypothesis...........................................................................10

2.2.3 Noticing Hypothesis of Schmidt.................................................................................11

2.3 Product Writing.................................................................................................................12

2.4 Process Writing.................................................................................................................12

2.5 Controversial Issues on the Effectiveness of Feedback....................................................14

2.6 Importance of Feedback in the Teaching of EFL Writing.................................................16

2.7 Types of Feedback.............................................................................................................17

2.7.1 Direct Feedback..........................................................................................................17

2.7.2 Indirect Feedback........................................................................................................18

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 2.7.3 Focused Feedback.......................................................................................................18

2.7.4 Unfocused Feedback...................................................................................................19

2.7.5 Content VS Form........................................................................................................20

2.8 Actual Teachers’ Practices on Feedback............................................................................20

2.9 Students’ Preferences........................................................................................................21

2.10 The Role of Teachers in Providing Effective Feedback for EFL Students......................22

2.11 Review of Empirical Studies Related to the Study.........................................................22

2.12 Participants in the Correction Process.............................................................................23

2.12.1 Teacher Correction....................................................................................................23

2.12.2 Peer Correction.........................................................................................................24

2.12.3 Self-Correction..........................................................................................................25

Exchange the order of 2.11 and 2.12

Chapter Three: Research Methodology......................................................................................26

3.1 Research Design................................................................................................................26

3.2 Research Method...............................................................................................................26

3.3 Location of the Study........................................................................................................27

3.4 Data Sources......................................................................................................................27

3.5 Sample size and Sampling Techniques.............................................................................27

3.6 Instruments of Data Collection.........................................................................................28

3.6.1 Questionnaire..............................................................................................................28

3.6.2 Interview.....................................................................................................................28

3.6.3 Document Analysis.....................................................................................................29

3.7 Data Collecting Procedures...............................................................................................29

3.8 Methods of Data Analysis.................................................................................................29

Chapter Four: Data Presentation, Analysis and Discussion.......................................................31

4.1 Presentation and Analysis of the Students’ Questionnaire................................................31

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4.2 Presentation and Analysis of Data from Teachers’ Interview...............................................38

4.3 Presentation and Analysis of Data from Documents............................................................42

4.4 Discussion of the Results???

Chapter Five: Summary, Conclusions and Recommendations...................................................44

5.1 Summary...........................................................................................................................44

5.2 Conclusions.......................................................................................................................45

5.3 Recommendations.............................................................................................................46

References..................................................................................................................................47

Appendix A.................................................................................................................................51

Appendix B.................................................................................................................................54

Appendix C.................................................................................................................................57

Appendix D.................................................................................................................................58

List of Table

Table 1: Students’ Preferences for Written Corrective Feedback (WCF)...................................30

Table 2: Teachers’ practice of written corrective feedback........................................................33

iv
Acronyms and Abbreviations
WCF-------Written Corrective Feedback
TEFL---------Teaching English as a foreign Language
EFL----------English as a foreign Language

v
 ABSTRACT
The purpose of this study was to assess teachers’ practices and students’ preferences for
feedback on EFL writing. A descriptive survey design with mixed methodology was employed
to conduct the study. Data were collected from 80 randomly selected grade 11 students through
questionnaire and interview from purposively taken 5 EFL teachers of Maytsebri secondary
school. In addition, secondary data were collected through document analysis. Data were
collected via close-ended questions and analyzed using frequency, percentage and mean. A
mixture of Qualitative and qualitative methods were employed to analyze data gathered
through interview from EFL teachers. This research included a discussion session under
headings to answer two basic research questions. The findings revealed that EFL teachers
provide direct and unfocused feedback focusing on all aspects of students’ writings. They also
giave attention to major, repeated and meaning interfering errors. Data about student
preferences also revealed that students, preferred corrective feedback for grammar and
mechanics. At the same time, the students preferred indirect and focused feedback to their
written errors. The students also preferred teacher correction with comments for their written
errors. Besides the students showed negative preference towards self-correction and peer-
correction.

Key words: error; corrective feedback; EFL writing; Types of feedback; students’ preferences;
teachers’ practices.

vi
vii
 Chapter One: Introduction
1.1 Background of the Study
Providing corrective feedback to EFL students is a fundamental task for EFL teachers.
Researches revealed that one of the most challenging tasks which make teaching writing difficult
is giving corrective feedback. Because errors are common in EFL students’ writings and it
demands the teachers to treat them effectively. Ferris (2002) asserts it is inevitable that EFL
students make errors in almost all of their writing works. Hence error free writing from those
students is unthinkable. Around three decades ago, Touchie(1986) pointed out the inevitability
of errors in EFL writing classes by saying that language learning, similar to other kinds of human
learning is accompanied by committing errors. In addition, authors like Dulayand Burt (1974)
consider error making as inevitable and necessary to language learning. This implies that errors
are evident in EFL writing classes.

Because of its importance, much attention has been given to written corrective feedback in the
last twenty years (Hyland, 2006). The practice of providing feedback has been widespread
among EFL teachers for various reasons. Corrective feedback helps to create supportive learning
and provides one form of socio-economic interaction among students and teachers, it enhance the
intimacy between teachers and learners to create conducive environment for learning and
teaching process when teachers spent a lot of time with their students on commenting and
correcting tasks, their relationship can be improved highly (Zaman, 2012). Lee(2008) explains
that many teachers believe that their written comments will help student writers improve their
writing; some teachers provide written comments to justify the grades they assign; others feel
obliged to provide students with written comments to show appreciation of students’ efforts; still
others try to provide more comments because it is known that many EFL students greatly
appreciate written commentary from their teachers and strongly want to be corrected as often as
possible. The importance of corrective feedback forced universities and colleges to give
attention to equipping teacher trainees with the necessary options of providing feedback to their
students’ written assignments. This has also been true in the Ethiopian universities and college.
They have incorporated the idea of giving feedback in the curriculum

1
.

Despite the common agreement on the presence of errors in EFL writing classes, controversies
continued on whether those errors should be treated or not and on the appropriate ways of
providing feedback to students’ writing work. Ferris (2002) claims that errors in secondlanguage
class room should be treated. Hendrickson (1978) also stands in favor of giving feedback to
students’ writing. He claims that learners are not always able to identify their own mistakes and
thus they need a more expert source to help them find those mistakes. In addition, Zhu (2010)
asserts that errors are even considered as symptoms to show that the learner is in the
developmental process of learning and internalizing the rules of the target language and,
therefore, feedback on such errors is essential to learn a language. It is also claimed, “Providing
language learners with clear feedback plays a crucial role in developing learners’ language
abilities and helping them direct their learning” (Alavi and kaivenpanet, 2010:181). Similarly,
Pica et.al (1996) claims that feedback positively motivates learners as it reveals them the degree
or lack of learning, giving them opportunities to discriminate between accepted and
unaccepted forms of language.

On the contrary, some scholars strongly oppose the idea of providing feedback to EFL students’
writing. For example, Truscott, the strong opponent of error feedback, (1996) doesn’t believe in
the benefits of error correction and he argues that error correction on EFL students writing is
harmful to students’ fluency and their overall writing quality and it should be abandoned. He
advises teachers to adopt “correction-free” approach in their classroom. Truscott adds “teachers’
feedback may be incomplete, inconsistent and inaccurate.” (p. 327). Lee (2003) supports this
idea by saying “To date there is no research evidence to show the more error feedback would
lead to better or faster development of grammatical accuracy in writing.”

Although researches reveal that feedback plays a key role in second language writing pedagogy
and influences both teachers and learners greatly, a great deal of the researches on different
aspects of feedback have presented a conflicting results and opinions. Teachers often find
themselves in dilemma in deciding whether they need to focus on form or content in the student
writers’ compositions. Touchie (1986) asserts that teachers should not correct all students’ errors
since it could be disruptive in their learning process and discourage them from communicating.
He agrees on correcting errors which interfere learners’ understanding of the message and affect
communication. In addition, Huntley (1992) stands in favor of the provision of such kind of
feedback and avoidance of feedback on form. An early article by Hendrickson (1980) perceived
the risk of over-correction and tried to encourage EFL writing teachers to take four learner
factors into account when correcting written errors. These factors are the students’ aims and
communicative goals for writing, students’ written proficiency types of errors made and
frequency of appearance, and awareness of students’ attitudes to error correction and
their degree of confidence.

Ferris (1999) claims that many L2 learners and teachers highly value teacher corrective
feedback; however, the effectiveness of written feedback to help students develop their writing
remained controversial. The best way to respond to student writing has been the most
challenging subject in recent years and controversies have been occurred frequently. Several
studies have investigated the effects of various types of teacher feedback in students’ writing
skills, but little research has explored instructors’ and students’ preferences for feedback and
error correction. This controversy led to the focus that EFL teachers should consistently reflect
up on their long lasting beliefs concerning their own feedback practices. Much has been said
about written feedback so far; however, little has been discovered through researches about the
relationship between teachers’ practices and students’ preferences and perceptions towards their
teachers’ feedback. Previous researches done by Carepenter et al (2006); Henderickson,
(1978); Lyster,(1998) and Panova(2002) investigated teachers’ preferences for and the
effectiveness of corrective feedback in second language acquisition. However, none of them has
made an investigation about the differences between teachers’ practices and students’
preferences for error correction (Panova, 2002). Also to the researchers’ knowledge,
no studies have been conducted in our context to investigate this. Therefore, this research
becomes different from the others in that it attempted s to figure out the discrepancies
between teachers’ practices and students’ preferences of corrective feedback on EFL
writing.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

A number of years have passed since corrective feedback became an issue in second and foreign
language learning. Many researchers have investigated the effects of various types of
teachers’feedback on students’ writing skills, but little research had explored teachers’
preferences for feedback and error correction. It is possible for EFL and ESL students to have
different opinions and preferences towards how to have their errors corrected in the EFL writing

3
classroom. The knowledge of these preferences can help teachers to keep the interest of their
students. According to Katayama (2007) discrepancies in the learning style of students will affect
the learning environment by either supporting or suppressing their intentional cognition and
active involvement. Katayama adds students will feel more inspired by doing things they like
and prefer. In the classroom, teachers can use this information as a tool to motivate students and
help them improve their learning process.

Since written Corrective Feedback has an essential role in developing the writingskill of second
language learners, teachers consider providing feedback for students as their professional
responsibility (Hyland and Hyland, 2001). Unless the feedback that EFL teachers provide meets
students’ needs and preferences, teachers’ investment of time and energy is useless (Ferris,
Brown, Liu and Stine, 2011). This means a mismatch between the feedback provided by teachers
and the feedback preferred by students cannot lead to a desirable result.

Several researches have been conducted focusing on either teachers’ perception and attitude or
those of students. Little attempt was made to compare both despite the recent calls to conduct
studies on students’ and teachers’perceptions and the actual feedback of teachers (Ellis, 2009).
Researchers conducted in the UAE revealed some results regarding perceptions about feedback
giving. For example, Hammoudi (2007) investigated high school students’ perceptions about
teachers’ feedback on their writing. Another researcher, Al Shamsi (2013), investigated teachers’
perceptions regarding providing corrective feedback on grade (4-8) students writing by
employing a quantitative research design. Neither of these researches attempted to compare
teachers’ practices and students’ preferences regarding corrective feedback to students’ writing.

In addition, the researcher informally observed the condition of feedback provision for about five
years that EFL teachers do not seem to be interested in varying their feedback provision
mechanisms to their students’ writing. Besides, the researcher felt that the teachers do not show
interest to know their students’ preferences for the different types of corrective feedback to their
writing. If teachers’ practices of providing corrective feedback does not match with students’
preferences, students’ may not like the corrective feedback and they are less likely to utilize it.
As a result the students’ writing skill will not develop. In addition, EFL teachers usually
complain that their students do not use the comments they provide and they do not see any
improvement in their writing. This may be because of mismatch between the teachers’ practices

4
 and the students’ preferences. The researcher found it necessary to conduct a research to fix this
problem.

Therefore, the present study comes up with comprehensive investigation that included teachers’
practices and students’preferences to ensure that teachers use the mosteffective and efficient
methods of written corrective feedback and students’ needs are being met in EFL writing classes
in the Ethiopian context.

Consequently, this research intended to answer the following basic research questions:

1. What are students’ preferences for different types of error correction feedback in EFL writing
class rooms?
2. What types of Written Corrective Feedback are often applied by teachers to correct students’
errors in their writing in the EFL classes?

1.3 Objectives of the Study

1.3.1 General Objective
The general objective of this study was to assess student’s’ preferences and teachers practice of
written corrective feedback in EFL writing classes.

1.3.2 Specific Objectives

The following were the specific objectives of this study were to:

1. Find out the students’ preferences for different types of error correction feedback in EFL
writing class rooms.
2. Identify the types of written corrective feedback practiced by teachers in EFL writing
classes.

1.4 Significance of the Study

This study attempted to assess the practices of EFL teachers in giving feedback to their students’
writing tasks and the students’ preferences on the types of feedback given by their teachers.
Quality provision of feedback to EFL students’ writing helps the students to improve
theirwriting. Thus, this study is believed to bring the following benefits:

5
1. It informs EFL teachers about the effect of their feedback giving system on their students’
work and it enables them to use appropriate feedback giving mechanism according to the
context.
2. It helps EFL students to get their written works corrected based on their preferences and
this, in turn, will help them to internalize the correction and uptake the things to be
improved
3. It also helps the wereda tselemty education office to take a measure in training teachers to
be effective feedback providers and fill their gaps.
4. Finally, this research may serve as a starting point for other researchers who want to
conduct research in the area of corrective feedback.

1.5 Delimitation of the Study

There are a numerous factors which can influence the development of students’ writing skills.
The provision of effective error correction is one of the factors, which has a vital role to students
writing development. Therefore, it would be helpful if the study covered other areas of study.
However, this study will be restricted to investigate on students’ preferences and teachers’
practices of written error correction and feedback.

The case why the researcher selects the high school is because he can easily earn more reliable
data from the society of the school as the researcher member of the school and the school is
found in the town where the researcher work. More ever, the researcher observed that there is a
gap in providing error correction and feedback in that school while he is teaching there. The
participants of the study were grade 11 teachers and students. The focus of this study was
investigating the students’ preferences and teachers’ practices of written error correction.

1.6 Limitation of the Study

Researches seldom become free from limitations. The current study is believed to have certain
limitations. Primarily, it is worth keeping in mind that the sample size of the study was limited to
only 5 teachers and 80 grade 11 students. Probably, this often creates danger to make
generalization on the study. Therefore, it would have been better and more effective if a good
number of schools and participants were included in the study to gather sufficient information to
obtain better result. Beside to this, the out breaking of the covid-19 was challenge to collect

6
sufficient data from the participants home to home. Although the researcher was threatened the
out breaking virus, he has attempted to find out the data as much as he could.

1.7 Definition of Operational Terms

 EFL writing: in this research, EFL Writing is used to represent all the activities and tasks
done during a writing lesson in English as foreign language classes.

 EFL teachers: the researcher, by EFL teachers, means that the teachers who have taken
the necessary training in teaching English as foreign language and who are involved in
teaching English to English as foreign language.
 Corrective feedback: corrective feedback is used to refer to the responses of EFL
teachers to the writing tasks of their students with the aim of helping the studentscorrect
their mistakes and enabling them become better writers.
 Teachers’ practices: in this study teachers’ practices is used to refer to all the actions
that teachers make to give feedback to students writing in EFL classes.
 Students’ preferences: this, in this study, refers to the way the EFL students want their
written work to be corrected and the way they want their teachers to react to their writing
tasks.
 Types of Feedback: in this research, types of feedback is used to refer to the different
ways that EFL teachers approach their students’ writing aiming at correcting the errors
that appear in the writing.

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 Chapter Two: Review of Related Literature
This chapter is a review of literature that sheds the light on the importance of the Written
Corrective Feedback in teaching and learning and introduces viewpoints of proponents and
opponents to giving feedback.

2.1. The Concept of Written Feedback and Corrective Feedback

The concept of feedback is widely used in language learning since it is a way of
concerning errors. Nuru (2000:66) describes the concept of feedback as follows:
The notion of feedback has remained at the heart of research efforts aimed at
understanding the process of language as it occurs both in natural settings and in
the class room.This is because feedback has been regarded as a critical variable
in language acquisition research. Part of the interest in feedback emanates from
the assumption that feedback represents one of the language environments to
which the learner is exposed.
Feedback is input from a reader to a writer with the effect of providing information to the writer
for revision, usually in the form of comments, questions, and suggestions (Keh, 1990). Sadler
(1989) cited in Nicol (2009) added that “feedback is an information about the gap between what
the student did (actual performance) and what was expected (the assignment outcomes),
information that is intended to help the student close that gap.” Moreover, the writing feedback
contains enough information that provides suggestions to facilitate improvement and provides
opportunities for interaction between the teacher and the students (Hyland & Hyland, 2006). This
feedback can be defined as writing extensive comments on student texts as a teacher’s response.

On the other hand, feedback is a word we use unthinkingly and inaccurately. We write ‘B’ at the
top of paper and consider it feedback, but feedback is something different. It is useful
information about performance…it is not evaluation. Feedback is value neutral help on worthy
tasks. It describes what the learner did and did not do in relation to her/his goals. It is actionable
information, and it empowers the student to make intelligent adjustment when she applies it to
her/his next attempt to perform (Wiggins, 1997; cited in, Bruke&Pieterick, 2010:27). Brookhart
(2008:31) defined. “Written feedback is a genre in its own- it deals with word choice and tone
matters.” Ur (1991) added that in the context of teaching in general; feedback is information that
is given to the learner about his or her performance of a learning task, usually with the objective

8
of improving this performance.
Moreover, teacher written feedback is any comments, questions or error corrections, praises and
so on (Mack, 2009; cited in Razali&Jupri, 2014). Hattie and Timperley (2007) underpinned
feedback should be the “consequence” of performance. They added “feedback reduces the
discrepancies between the current performance and desired goal.” Hyland and Hyland (2006)
also defined teacher written feedback as purely informational with its position as a medium for
the teacher to channel response and advices in assisting students’ improvement.
Finally, Nelson &Schunn (2009) reviewed that feedback has three definitions from different
perspectives: the first is in its motivational meaning, feedback, like praise, could be considered a
motivator that increases a general behavior (e.g., writing or revision activities overall). The
second is in a reinforcement meaning; feedback may specifically reward or punish very
particular prior behaviors (e.g., a particular spelling error or particular approach to a concluding
paragraph). The last one is in an informational meaning: feedback might consist of information
used by a learner to change performance in a particular direction (rather than just towards or
away from a prior behavior).

2.2 Overview of Feedback in Learning Theories

When students demonstrate their writing skills, they normally commit mistakes. Furthermore,
language learning happened through committing errors especially at the beginning (Krashen,
1982). Edge (1989) supported that students’ errors are “learning steps”. Also researchers like
(Bartram and Walton, 1991, Widdowson, 1978) added that teachers know how much students
achieve in the target language by using errors as evidence of progress. Then, making errors is a
healthy and natural part of the second language learning process. All learning theories consider
feedback as a significant component in learning and teaching instruction because feedback
fosters the student’s cognitive skills, but each theory adopted certain views on when, how and
how much Written Corrective Feedback should be given. The instruction of feedback has been
influenced by major learning theories and hypothesis such as Krashen’s (1982) who
distinguished between competence and performance in writing in his early works, assuming that
competence is subconscious, mostly acquired through reading while performance in writing is
the application of language rules that have been tackled and practiced thoroughly in the
classroom. Later, Krashen, (2003) explored how writing helped in cognitive development; he
showed that activities such as note-taking and writing summaries are important facilities for
learning.

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2.2.1 Krashen’s Monitor Model
Krashen is known for his five hypotheses with regard to language learning: Acquisition/learning
hypothesis, monitor hypothesis, natural order hypothesis, input hypothesis, and affective filter
hypothesis. In his Acquisition/learning hypothesis, Krashen (1982) distinguishes between
acquisition and learning. According to Krashen, acquisition is sub-conscious process while
learning is conscious. Hence, as Krashen (1982) error correction has little or no impact on the
language acquisition as it happens in an environment of meaningful, daily communication.
Krashen advises teachers to be skillful in explaining grammar in a way easily understood. In
addition, Krashen (1988) suggests written corrective feedback teachers provide their students’
needs so that the ultimate goal can be met.

Again, in his monitor hypothesis, (Krashen, 1982) dismisses the use of grammar lessons unless
they are used in a context. Minor grammar errors can be corrected by the students themselves
and the task of the teacher should be providing models. Krashen(1985) also asserts that the i+1
that is provided to students should be explained in detail so that students will not need further
teacher explanation or corrective feedback. This shows that Krashen doesn’t believe in corrective
feedback. Nevertheless, Ellis (2008) argues against Krashen’s monitor model by explaining that
input of implicit knowledge should be supported by many resources to help them acquire L2
such as extensive reading and feedback to maintain their performance. In addition, Ellis (2005)
ited in Al Mohammedi(2016) believed that corrective feedback is important to all students and
teachers and need to be clear and consistent in providing feedback because the more explicit the
feedback is the higher level of repair results.

2.2.2 PienemannTeachability Hypothesis

Pienemann, (1982) claimed that the L2 learner acquires the target language in a particular
sequence of stages whenever he fully acquires the stage he can move to the next. Pienemann,
(1989) assumed that students break up language features into small units that follow a fixed
order through a fixed order of stages. Therefore, various grammatical structures can be acquired
in strict order, and students can acquire only structures that are suitable for their developmental
readiness. Accordingly, when the student commits an error it means that the structure is beyond
his stage of development and his internal mechanism cannot meet the instructional requirement.
Therefore, some interested researchers such as Wang&Jaing, (2015) interpreted Pienemann’s
view about Written Corrective Feedback that it is not beneficial to repeat grammar features more

10
than once as the students did not comprehend the structure at the first place in its developmental
stage or the error is in a structure beyond his stage. Pienemann (1984) argued that Written
Corrective Feedback is essential only when students are able to internalize the feedback. That’s
why; Pienemann encouraged focused feedback at the beginning to help students build their
processing capacity. Related to the same point Ellis, (2009) noted that students’ age, proficiency,
memory, motivation, and cultural background must be taken into account in teaching instructions
focusing on specific features that help the students’ gradual development in acquiring the target
language.

2.2.3 Noticing Hypothesis of Schmidt

Highlighting the Noticing Hypothesis of Schmidt’s (1990) that noticing is an essential tool to
convert input to intake, students need to notice the relevance between the structures provided by
the teacher and the surrounded environment by drawing students’ attention to an aspect of form.
Simply, noticing as Schmidt, (1994) claimed are the students’ brains registering the new
information even if it is not fully understood. Moreover, Schmidt, (1994) argued that when the
noticing happened the more the students learn L2. According to Ellis (1997) when students
recognize the difference between what they really have and the new noticed feature, that feature
will be included in the developing language acquiring system. Similarly, Schmidt (1990) pointed
out that input to become intake needs more than noticing only, students need to draw a
comparison between the input they observe with features the already exist in their memory to
notice the difference and fill the gap through consciousness raising. The implication of this
hypothesis on the Written Corrective Feedback emerges that when the students’ attention is
drawn to error corrections his brain will register new aspects regarding the target language.
Therefore error correction here is acting as a noticing factor that directs students’ attention to the
error itself so that it will not be committed in the future and a new aspect (the correction) that can
be acquired. Specifically speaking, responding to all errors committed by students promotes their
noticing by reviewing a wider range of errors.

2.3 Product Writing

Product writing is a traditional way of teaching writing through which students are asked to
produce a final piece of writing similar to a model essay provided by the teacher. Furthermore,
product writing is an exact application of habit formation learning in which students are
encouraged to imitate an organizational design of specific writing genre, presented and explained

11
previously by teachers (Silva, 1990).

The main focus of the product approach is to sustain accuracy of students by exercising simple
sentences to produce grammar free errors text (teachingenglish.org). According to Nunan, (1999)
creating a text emerges in stages: presenting and explaining the model text for example formal
letter genre. Secondly, the teacher provides students with some isolated structures to be
memorized such as “I would be grateful if you …” Practicing a controlled and guided writing is
the third stage. Finally, students transform what they have learned in their text. In addition to
that, Ivanic (2004) noted that students work on sentence level not on text level, which is
important is spelling and grammar but not content. Ferris and Hedgocock, (2005) indicated that
students’ proficiency determine the approach of writing, they assured that beginners need to copy
and imitate model text and practice-guided exercises to improve their accuracy as the main focus
of the product approach is to minimize errors in spelling and grammar. Furthermore, Ivanic,
(2004) mentioned some points in favor of product writing in that it increases students’
confidence, is a good way of focusing on specific grammatical features and copying a model text
means committing few errors. However, writing in this approach is unrealistic, repetitive, boring
and there is lack of creativity and independency.

2.4 Process Writing

Traditionally writing is considered to be a product composed by the student and graded by the
teacher. Like all the procedures of language learning the view to writing also changed from being
a product to a process. During the 1970s a shift took place from the product writing which
mainly cares about the final draft only to the process writing with increased attention to content
(Wingate, 2012). Before that date Ferris (2008) stated that teachers used Written Corrective
Feedback in writing to justify the marks given for the final written text. In the process writing
approach the teacher’s role shifted to be a facilitator who provides step by step guidance to help
students to produce a well-structured composition. Moreover, Hyland (2003) stated that the
process approach of teaching writing considers the student as an independent producer of texts,
and it goes further to negotiate that teachers should do to help learners perform in writing a task.
Additionally, Badger & White (2000) highlighted that students in the process of writing go back
over their texts many times and the stress is on their skills of planning and drafting rather than
their grammar knowledge. Badger & White (2000) also pointed out that students’ improvement
in writing skills is supposed to be unconscious while Pennington,(1996) indicated that process

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writing is an innovative activity which provides various forms of input that contribute in
changing the students’ awareness and attitude toward being ‘intake’ , this is the idea that was
elaborated before by Krashen, (1982) in his monitor model when a comprehensible input
changed into editor for students and Schmidt, (1994) who assumed that input in L2 learning
changed into intake by noticing. According to Joe (1992) the writing process has to pass four
stages: planning, drafting, revising, and editing. Throughout all these stages of composing the
teacher attends as a facilitator and a co-participant to help his students to produce a meaningful
and coherent piece of writing. Moreover, Matsuda and Silva (2002) argued that teachers must
clearly understand the strategies of writing so that they can correctly teach writing and not
teaching about writing. Ferris (2003) also added that learning a second language is a very
complicated process in which the students need a great deal of help to develop their writing
skills. Regarding the stage in which teachers are preferred to provide feedback, Ferris (1995)
investigated 155 students’ opinions about the amount and the time of effective feedback. The
study revealed that students preferred receiving corrective feedback during writing and the
revising process because according to their views the feedback on the final product is not
effective in the progress of the writing proficiency. Therefore, the process approach is an ideal
chance of supporting students’ language acquisition through making use of ideas in depth and
teacher’s suggestions. Several studies were conducted regarding the process writing and its
stages. For example, Zamel (1985) suggested a multi-stages writing process in which she
recommended that teachers revise the content of the writing after drafting to encourage students
to write their ideas freely and to avoid engaging them with grammatical problems. The next stage
is to edit the form drawing the students’ attention to notice their errors regarding grammar,
vocabulary, and punctuation. However, results of a study conducted by Fathman and Whalley
(1990) showed no differences in effectiveness of using feedback on content or on form
separately or in a mixed way. This was a project that was applied on 72 college students to
investigate the effectiveness of feedback on rewriting the compositions more than once in
different stages: drafting, revising and editing. Another study was conducted by Ashwell (2000)
on 50 EFL students at a Japanese university, to investigate the benefit of feedback on content and
form in multi-stages writing. The participants were divided into 3 groups. The first group got
feedback on content at the first draft and feedback on form at the second draft. The second group
had an opposite pattern feedback on form first and feedback on content later on. The third group
got a mixed way of having feedback on content and form at the same draft. Findings of the study

13
revealed that there were no significant differences in form scores or content scores at the final
test. Therefore, Ashwell (2000) recommended having two stages of writing; drafting and
revising/ editing. He justified his recommendation by saying that in a L2 classroom several
chapters should be covered as each of them has a writing task related to the chapter topic. So
two-stage writing would be enough and can be managed in a practical way by both teachers and
students.

2.5 Controversial Issues on the Effectiveness of Feedback

An extended debate emerged between opponents of the Written Corrective Feedback provision
led by Truscott and the proponents of providing feedback led by Ferris. Both groups try their best
to justify their opinion regarding the effectiveness of feedback. Written Correction Feedback in
the second language writing is considered to be the teachers’ essential instrument to respond to
students’ writings. Therefore, Hyland (2003) defined the feedback giving to be a significant and
central part of the learning process in general and of writing in particular. Additionally, Written
Correction Feedback provides important information to extend writing skills and develop a
general understanding of writing procedures (Hyland, 2003). Truscott (2006) led an argument
that writing correction is time consuming for the teacher and useless for the students as
correction leads them to “avoidance behavior”. According to the view of Truscott (2006) students
tend to write short passages to avoid committing many mistakes. Supporting this view Sheppard
(1992) conducted a study and the findings reported that the group which received holistic
correction notes performs better than those who received corrective feedback. In addition to that,
students of the corrective feedback regressed over time. Furthermore, findings of studies such as
(Truscott and Hsu, 2008) showed that error correction is not only ineffective in improving
accuracy, but it is harmful and damaging. Truscott (1996) supported his claim of Written
Corrective Feedback ineffectiveness by adhering to Peniemann’s (1984) Teachability Hypothesis,
when Truscott stressed that students should acquire grammatical rules in consistent order within
the learning process and should not to be treated in isolation in the writing tasks which aligned
with the Teachability Hypothesis that recommended teaching the L2 according to the
developmental readiness of the students. Additionally, Truscott (1996) asserted that providing
grammar correction is useless and he supported his claim by stating Krashen’s Monitor
hypothesis, which was based on the idea that exposing the student to a comprehensible input is
enough for acquiring a second language. Additionally, Kepner (1991) conducted an experimental
study with two groups one received Written Corrective Feedback and a control group that

14
received no feedback. The findings of Kepner’s, (1991) study revealed no significant differences
between the two groups in their performance in writing. The results of this study acted as another
supporter to Truscott’s claims. Later, Truscott and Hsu (2008) conducted a study on 47 students
to explore the effectiveness of Written Corrective Feedback. The results again enhanced their
negative view, despite the fact that errors reduced after students’ revision. Truscott and Hsu did
not suggest it to be evidence of learning development. In an attempt to refute Truscott and
colleagues claim (Bitchener, 2008; Ferris, 2002; Hendrickson, 1978) argued that students are
developing writers still in the process of acquiring their lexicon, morphological and syntactic
systems, they need the intervention of their teachers. Additionally, Hendrickson (1978)
highlighted that written feedback helps students to find out the functions and the limitations of
grammatical structures and lexical forms of the target language. However, some researchers like
Cohen (1987) stated that although errors correction prevents students from being misunderstood,
feedback can be irritating. While Ferris (2002) discussed, to avoid error irritation teachers have
to be selective meaning that correcting several important kinds of errors at a time not all errors.
Therefore, selectivity of errors is seen to be a significant way to avoid the negative effects of
corrective feedback. Subsequently, this method of correction was called by researchers such as
(Sheen, Wright, &Moldawa, 2009) as “Focused Feedback” through which the teacher focuses on
correcting some grammatical errors for specific period of time. According to Sheen, et al. (2009)
selective feedback helps students to observe their written work concerning their grammatical
problems. On the other hand, “Unfocused Feedback” overloads students (Lee, 2003). Moreover
Lee, (2003) pointed out that unfocused correction is tiring for teachers and disappointing for
students. Then it is the teachers’ responsibility to choose the errors that may affect delivering the
message of the writing text. To decide what to correct is related to other things like the students’
level and needs. Therefore, knowing students’ preferences by the teacher is a significant factor,
(Shine, 2008).
Drawing on the literature conducted on Written Corrective Feedback, several researchers
(Brown, 2007; Ferris, 2002; Lee, 2003 & Shine, 2008) pointed out that there are many issues on
which teachers have to make decisions about while correcting errors. Teachers have to decide if
they: correct the errors or not, give the location of errors or not, and in case they decide to
correct, will they correct (directly) or (indirectly. Furthermore, Brown (2007) assured that L2
teachers consider providing Written Corrective Feedback a need to help students learn.
Ferris, (1999) was not satisfied with Truscott’s claims. Therefore, she reexamined all the

15
previous studies used to prove that Written Corrective Feedback is ineffective. This led to a
further debate and many researchers conducted studies to investigate the issue, such as Bitchener
(2008) who conducted a study that lasted for two months on 75 low intermediate students in New
Zealand to investigate if the corrective feedback improves accuracy over this period of time. The
participants were divided into four groups; the first group received direct feedback with written
and oral explanation while the second group received direct feedback with written explanation.
For the third group they received direct feedback only, the control group received no feedback.
The target feature was indefinite and definite articles. Bitchener, (2008) found that the accuracy
of students receiving the written corrective feedback in the immediate post-test outperformed
those in the control group.

2.6 Importance of Feedback in the Teaching of EFL Writing

The importance, the effectiveness, and the vital role of feedback in English as a Foreign
Language (EFL) have been dominant issues in many studies in writing teaching (Paltridge,
2004). Feedback recently became the interest of many researchers who produced a large number
of studies focusing on the various types of feedback and their impacts on students’ performance
in writing. This can be clear evidence that feedback plays an influential part in writing process
(Cardell and Corno, 1981; Ferris, 2006, Lee, 2004, Lee 2008, Paltridge, 2004). Furthermore,
Carless (2006) assured that those who receive feedback while processing writing have a clearer
sense about their performance. Subsequently, they can modify their thinking and behavior toward
their writing and increase their focus on the specific purpose of their text. Feedback increases the
students’ understanding of the informational and linguistic expectations of the reader
(Hedgocock and Lefkowitz, 1994). Moreover, feedback in writing can enhance explicit
knowledge which is according to Williams’, (2005) description, the knowledge of language rules
that students as writing producers should know and provide reasons for their application.

2.7 Types of Feedback

Due to writing being complex in nature Widdowson (1978) described writing as annoying
activity. There are different kinds of Written Corrective Feedback forms that cause different
levels of development in different writing areas. According to Ferris (2002) errors are caused by
the lack of proficiency. Ferris, (2002) also asserted that L2 students cannot write like native
people and language learning takes a long time. Therefore, students need feedback on errors to
improve. Types of feedback have been investigated to make firm conclusions about which one of

16
these types is the most effective to students. Accordingly, many would say that teachers’ way of
giving feedback should be determined by empirical data that proved the most beneficial way.
Subsequently, some teachers would use direct feedback as recommended by studies such as
(Bitchener&Knoch, 2008; Bitchener, 2012), others use indirect feedback in accordance with
(Bitchener, 2012 & Ferris, 2004) or using focused feedback like in (Bitchener, 2012 & Ellis et. al
2008) or Unfocused Feedback (Mohebbi, 2013; Sheen, 2007 &Bitchener, 2012). Different types
of feedback will be detailed and discussed as follows:

2.7.1 Direct Feedback

According to Ferris (2003) Direct Written Corrective Feedback or as it is also called explicit
feedback is provided when the teacher indicates the error and provides the correct form instead.
Teachers usually place the correction above the error or near it. Additionally, Direct Feedback
can be in a form of crossing out errors or inserting the missing words. Another way of providing
Direct Written Corrective Feedback is to reformulate the awkward sentences, but keeping the
original meaning that was intended by the writer a consensus of opinions among (Nunan, 1995;
Brown, 2000 & Ur, 2006) is that there are different types of feedback, Direct Feedback, Indirect
Feedback, Focused, Unfocused, Content Feedback and Form Feedback. Direct feedback is very
clear that students can see and through which the teacher provides his students with the exact
structure to correct their errors. If the teacher does not understand what the student wanted to
write he provides the correct ways of writing, which will be a good model for the student to
follow (Edge, 1989). Edge, (1989) argued if the teacher was wrong about expressing the students
intended ideas, that will be encouraging for the students to clarify their ideas and what they
actually meant when they wrote it earlier. To investigate the effectiveness of direct feedback,
Carroll and Swain (1993) conducted a study with 100 Spanish learners at low intermediate level.
The target structure was verbs. The participants were divided into four groups, A received direct
feedback and B indirect feedback, group C received recast and group D which served as control
group received no feedback. All the groups performed better than the control group while group
A which received direct feedback outperformed them all. Another study conducted by Nassaji
and Swain’s (2000) concluded that direct correction tendency is more useful than indirect.
Moreover, Carroll, Swain and Roberge’s (1992) conducted a study that supports the effectiveness
of the direct feedback. An important study was conducted on lower intermediate participants by
Ellis, Loewen and Erlam (2006) investigating the effectiveness of direct and indirect forms of
providing corrections to errors in respect of verb tenses. Results showed that direct feedback is

17
more effective.

2.7.2 Indirect Feedback

Indirect Feedback can be also termed as implicit feedback which means that teachers indicate the
error by underlining, circling or providing some codes (e.g. VT- verb tense) or give the number
of errors on the margin with the intention of selfcorrection (Ferris, 2003). Depending on their
studies findings some researchers argued that providing students with direct feedback does not
improve the target language learning (Hammerly, 1991; Haswell, 1983 & Hendrickson, 1980).
According to Hammerly(1991) students should experience the intellectual process of discovering
the right forms and structures and using them correctly. Apparently indirect feedback lays the
responsibility of learning on students’ shoulders and helps them to improve their selfediting
skills as well. Furthermore, indirect technique saves teachers’ time compared with the direct
technique. Similarly, Haswell (1983) confirmed that when students committed unquestionable
errors such as errors in punctuation, spelling, capitalization and grammar, they are able to correct
sixty to seventy percent of their errors by themselves after these errors have been underlined by
teachers. Therefore teachers should not spend much time providing correct forms. Specific
correction techniques are only demanded when students are not able to manage their errors by
themselves (Hendrickson, 1980).

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2.7.3 Focused Feedback
The name itself is evident that focused feedback is the form that refers to the correction of a
limited number of errors that are thoroughly tackled in the classroom or chosen by the teacher to
meet his students’ needs (Ellis et al., 2006 cited in Al Mohammedi, 2016). Research evidences
showed that focused feedback is helpful to improve students’ writing skill. For instance, Cohen
(1987) confirmed in his research with 117 EFL students that the students preferred focused
grammatical feedback to overall comments. In addition, Lee (2003) conducted a study on
teacher’s beliefs and practices in providing corrective feedback and the findings revealed that
EFL teachers preferred providing focused feedback despite they tend to correct many errors in
practice. Moreover, a study by Ellis (2008) points out that focused feedback is easy to handle for
both EFL teachers and students. Ellis (2008) conducted an experimental research with three
groups and found out that the group which received focused corrective feedback outperformed
those who received unfocused feedback and no feedback. The findings of Ellis (2008) were also
supported by Bitchener’s (2008) findings.
Despite many findings to advocate focused feedback, Ferris (2010) rejected the idea of
correcting one or two errors by saying that students commit many errors in their writings that
need immediate treatment by the teacher. Ferris believes that it is beneficial for students’
development to correct several errors at once. Sara (2015) also reviewed that focused feedback
lacks tackling a great variety of errors.

2.7.4 Unfocused Feedback

Unfocused Feedback, which is also called comprehensive or extensive written corrective

feedback, is a kind of corrective feedback, which involves the teacher correcting most of the
errors in students’ writing (Ellis, 2009). Unfocused Feedback indicates that teachers correct all
the errors committed by students in their writing without paying attention to their categories.
Unfocused Feedback also is time consuming and creates a burden on teachers on one hand and
on the other hand de-motivate students when they see their writing is covered with red (Ferris,
2002) Lee, (2004) conducted a study to compare teachers’ beliefs and attitude with students’
preferences and attitude regarding the Written Corrective Feedback. Lee, (2004) found that both
teachers and students agreed on the unfocused type of correcting.

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2.7.5 Content VS Form
Regarding with whether EFL teachers should focus on content or form when providing feedback,
there has been a continuous debate. Scholars fall into two stands. Teachers also have different
preferences to give feedback to their students (Al Mohammedi, 2016). While some researchers
recommended corrective feedback on content rather than form (Ellis, 2005; Ferris, 1997; Kepner,
1991), others suggest teachers’ feedback to focus on form rather than content (Long, 1991;
Semke, 1980). Research conducted by Ellis (2005) reveals that written corrective feedback is an
important instrument that strongly relates to form. On the other hand, Long (1991) attempted to
falsify this by saying L2 instructions should mainly focus on meaning. According to Long,
grammatical features should be explained explicitly when demanded by communicative
necessity. Ferris (1997) also provided similar idea to Ellis’s. She said she had conducted research
on advanced students and found out that those who received corrective feedback on form were
proved to have made more revisions than those who received feedback regarding meaning.

2.8 Actual Teachers’ Practices on Feedback

Findings of previous studies revealed that teachers consider the Written Corrective Feedback an
important pedagogical tool. However, they provide feedback in varying ways that may be
affected by experience, context, students’ needs, or following rubrics provided by the school
(Cohen &Cavalcanti, 1990; Hyland and Anan, 2006; Lee, 2009; Montgomery &Baker, 2007 ).
Additionally, some of the studies showed the mismatch between what teachers prefer and what
they actually employ in the classroom in respect of the Written Corrective Feedback. By
reviewing the literature, one can notice the urgent need for further research to explore teachers’
preferences, practices and their students’ preferences regarding Written Corrective Feedback.
However, it is worthy to mention here a study conducted in a context similar to the UAE, Al
Shahrani&Storch, (2014) investigated preferences of 45 university students and 3 of their
teachers in a university in KSA. Results indicated that teachers preferred indirect feedback (with
codes) focused feedback and when compared to their actual practice there were some
mismatches, moreover the practices did not align with students preferences of direct, unfocused
and on form feedback. Another study was conducted by Corpuz, (2011) exploring teachers’
preferences, practices and students’ preferences, findings showed that both, teachers and students
preferred direct feedback and the practice of teachers revealed that they used direct feedback and

20
indirect through codes, underling and circling.

2.9 Students’ Preferences

To gain the complete benefits of feedback, teachers should be aware of their students’ needs and
preferences. The more the teachers consider their students’ desires regarding Written Corrective
Feedback the more positively they will react to the correction for example, Leki (1991) study
which investigated 100 students’ preferences in respect to Written Corrective Feedback provided
by their teachers. Data was collected through questionnaire instrument by which the researcher
measured the extent of students’ concern about having error correction of their writing tasks and
the best way they think to have these errors responded to. Results showed that students were
highly concerned about the number of error which they aspired to minimize and most of the
students of this study preferred the indirect way of Written Corrective Feedback with using
codes. Another study was conducted by Ferris (2001) to explore students’ preferences regarding
Written Corrective Feedback. All the participants appreciated having their errors corrected
indirectly with the use of codes. Furthermore, Ferris, (2002) stated that students commit errors
due to lack of proficiency and feedback is necessary for them to improve. Generally, students
prefer a type of feedback they can understand and use easily (Lee, 2004 and Montgomery &
Baker, 2007). Moreover, Amrhein and Nassaji (2010) conducted a study in Canada investigating
students’ and teachers’ preferences regarding Written Corrective Feedback and the reasons
behind their preferences. 64 participants were included, 33 students and 31 teachers. Data was
collected by employing mixed method research instruments. Results revealed that students
preferred unfocused, indirect correction concentrating on form rather than on content and
organization. Additionally, a case study of university students from China was conducted
recently by Chen, Nassaji& Liu, (2016) to explore 64 students’ perceptions and preferences in
respect of Written Corrective Feedback across three levels of proficiency (intermediate,
advanced intermediate, and advanced) by exposing them to extensive questionnaire and
interviews. Findings referred that students preferred direct feedback on content and they like to
practice some self-correction through interactive activities. Ninety three elementary level
students were subject to a quasi-experimental study in one of the Turkish universities to
investigate their preference regarding Written Corrective Feedback type. Results indicated their
preference to content over form and the focused over unfocused (Kahraman&Yalvac, 2015).

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2.10 The Role of Teachers in Providing Effective Feedback for EFL Students
According to Barkaoui (2007) cited in Srichanyachon (2012), teachers need to motivate students,
model effective revision strategies, raise students’ awareness about the importance of (re)seeing
their texts from the teacher’s perspective, encourage students to reflect on and self-assess their
own writing, and use appropriate tasks and activities for teaching and assessment. “As far as
students are concerned, feedback can serve as guidance for eventual writing development”
(Hyland, 2003). Based on this teachers are supposed to give chance for their students to self-
assess their writings by providing indirect feedback on students’ grammatical errors. Research
finding by Chandler (2003) reveals that formal accuracy of student writing improved
significantly if the participants were required to correct their errors if they were not.

Ellis (1994, cited in Tribble, 1996) claimed that marking mechanical errors is not enough since it
can be frustrating to students. Therefore, corrective feedback should be combined with plenty of
classroom discussions and peer cooperation. Ellis (1994), open questions result in more meaning
negotiation and more complex results. Accordingly, Ellis suggested that teachers should focus on
feedback that involves students’ as help seekers. Findings of Rae and Cochrane (2008) on a
study about the student perspective of written assessment feedback discovered that students
required the assessment item and assessment criteria to be clearly stated and presented before
they proceed to doing their assessment. They also required clear direction on how to use the
corrective feedback they receive from their teachers. Therefore, teachers are expected
to provide specific guidance to help EFL students improve their ability to revise their
assessments based on the corrective feedback they receive.

2.11Review of Empirical Studies Related to the Study

As the researcher understood, this shows that Krashen doesn’t believe in corrective feedback. He
believes that if they students have the knowledge to write a text effectively, no need of correcting
their texts, they are going to correct themselves. Ellis (2005) believed that corrective feedback is
important to all students and teachers and need to be clear and consistent in providing feedback
because the more explicit the feedback is the higher level of repair results. Based on the above
theories, the researcher tends to Pienemann theory, because students need feedback to their
written work so as to better performance with focused feedback on major errors. Having said this
much about the noticing hypothesis of Schmidt, it is important to explain its connotation to

22
corrective feedback. Accordingly, this hypothesis suggests that when students’ attention is
drawn to error correction, they start to register new information about the target structure. Briefly
speaking the more the students are directed towards error correction, the more they learn aspects
of the target knowledge.

As researchers conducted research towards written corrective feedback found out different. Some
of them, the present researcher has tried to mentioned. As Rosdiana (2011) found out that most
of the participants replied, written corrective feedback was considered helpful and was more
appreciated. 94% of the participants preferred to receive comprehensive written corrective
feedback. Another researcher, Semke (1980) conducted a study that a finding showed that
feedback on content was more useful than that on form.

2.12 Participants in the Correction Process

The debate on the provision of feedback does not stop on what type of feedback should be given
and what aspects of language should be corrected; it continues on who should participate in the
feedback process. Accordingly, some scholars highly value teacher correcti

on and some value self-correction; still others value peer correction. The three participants in
correction process are discussed below.

2.12.1 Teacher Correction

Teachers have more expertise knowledge than students on FL and many students want their
papers to be corrected by their teachers (Saito, 1994; Sengupta, 1998). Despite Truscott’s (1999)
argument for correction-free approach, most researchers consider teacher correction a central
practice in EFL and ESL contexts. The researchers (Hyland and Hyland, 2006; Zhang, 1985)
have also proved teacher’s correction effective. According to Zhang’s (1985) findings, teacher
correction was more effective for improving grammar errors than peer and self-correction.

In addition, Hyland and Hyland (2006) point out that EFL teacher are now convinced about the
potential of teacher feedback for helping to create a supportive teaching environment, for
conveying and modeling idea about good writing and for improving familiarity with new literacy
practices. Speaking about the role of feedback Hyland and Hyland (2006:83) describe feedback
as “A key element of the scaffolding provided by the teacher to build learner confidence and the
literacy resources to participate in target communities”. In addition, Richards and Lockhart
(1996) assert that teacher written feedback can serve as a powerful tool to improve students in

23
the writing process if done well. “To support effective written feedback, teachers should keep
in mind that positive feedback is considered ‘positive reinforcement’ whereas negative
feedback is considered ‘punishment’ (Bookhart, 2010: 11). Thus teachers should be polite and
mitigate their written feedback.

2.12.2 Peer Correction

Liu &Hansen (2002 cited in Hyland and Hyland, 2006) present that strong justification for the
use of peer correction is found in four theoretical stances: process writing, collaborative writing,
Vygotskian learning theory, and interactionalist theories of L2 acquisition. According to Hansen
and Liu (2005), peer review consists of students assuming the role of trained peer reviews with
the goal of providing their classmates with comments on the writing in either written or spoken
form. As described by Bruffee(1984a), collaborative learning theory encourages students to
’pool’ their resources and both complete tasks they could not do on their own, learning through
dialogue and interaction with their peers. Long and Porter(1985) also elaborated
Vygotskianlearning theory and they mentioned Vygotskian approaches underline the importance
of social interaction with peers as Vygotsky’s (1978) theoretical construct of the zone of
proximal development suggests that writing skills can emerge with the mediation and help of
others. In addition, interactionist perspectives, though not directly driving interest in peer
feedback, offer an important theoretical foundation for it by suggesting how
opportunities to negotiate meaning through group work are a means of encouraging more
effective acquisition of the language (Long &Porter, 1985). Peer correction approach is
considered emotionally, cognitively and linguistically beneficial to students’ writing
development (Berg, 1999; Hu, 2005; Min, 2005).

Assessment has also been made through research about the effectiveness of peer feedback.
Findings by Mendoca& Johnson (1994) reveal that peer feedback is seen as a way of giving
more control and autonomy to students since it involves them actively in the feedback process as
opposed to a passive reliance on teacher’s feedback to fix up their writing. Because student
reviewers believe that other students encounter similar difficulty in writing that they do, peer
feedback may also lead to reduction in writer apprehension and help them to develop their
autonomy and self-confidence as writers (Chaudron, 1984; Curtis, 2001; Cotterall& Cohen,
2003). On the other hand, studies have questioned EFL students’ ability to offer useful feedback
to each other and queried the extent to which students are prepared to use their peers’ comments

24
in their revisions. For instance, Mendoca& Johnson’s (1994) study found out that students
were very selective about using peer comments in their revisions. Furthermore, Connor
&Asenavage(1994) confirmed through their findings that peer feedback made only marginal
difference to student writing, finding that only 5% of revisions could be directly linked to
peer comments compared to 35% related to teacher comments.

Further researches have also been done on ways to improve peer correction. Suggestions for this
indicated that careful preparation and training are essential for successful peer response (Stanley,
1992). (Stanley, 1992) also found that a group of university EFL students trained in peer
evaluation offered more feedback and couched it more tactfully than an untrained control group
and that student writers were more likely to use the feedback in their revisions. Researches also
show that training is also likely to benefit student reviewers themselves as they are then in a
better position to view their own texts from a reader’s perspective (Hyland, 2003; Ferris, 2004).

2.12.3Self-Correction

Another alternative for providing feedback to students’ writing is self-correction. Researches

indicate that students can correct their own errors by themselves. Many researchers propose self-
correction as the most effective strategy of feedback (Pishghadam et al., 2011; Ibarrola, 2009).
Pishghadam et al. (2011) cited in Sara (2015) point out that once learners are capable of self-
correcting, they already know the right form or at least they have it as an option in mind.
Self-correction is defined by Wanchid (2013: 158) as “a strategy according to which students
read, analyze, correct, and evaluate their own writing by using guided questions or checklists,
both form-focused and meaning focused”.

Some of the advantages to self-correction, according to Yang (2010), are the increased
independence of students from the teacher, the students’ retention of their own mistakes, their
awareness of their own learning process (including strengths and weaknesses) and the time-
saving factor. Moreover, this approach to feedback helps students concentrate better on their own
errors and diminish dependence on the teacher, fostering thus students’ autonomy and self-
determination (Ancker, 2000). Apart from this independency from the teacher, Pishghadam et al.
(2011: 958) include that learners are “given an opportunity to consider and activate their
linguistic competence, so that they can be active participants”.

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Overall: General questions and comments:
- What contributions did you make on the review of the related literature?
(Or, did you simply copy and reported others works?). Think about this.
-Which model (theory) of needs analysis is your study based up on? Why? Show
this in the literature.

Chapter Three: Research Methodology

3.1 Research Design

26
The research design used in this research was descriptive survey. The goal of this study was to
assess the practices of EFL teachers in providing feedback to their students’ writing tasks in an
EFL class and the preference of students towards their teachers’ feedback on their writing.
Descriptive survey was the research design employed for this research. The rationale behind this
was that descriptive survey is appropriate for studies focusing on the description of existing
conditions and prevalence of something among groups. Using this design is supported by Best
and Kahn (1999).Descriptive survey helps to describe the attitude, belief, cognition,
preference, practice and awareness of a particular group towards some discipline or field of
knowledge. In addition, Cohen and Manion (1994) claimed that survey inquiry gathers data at
a particular point with the intention of describing the entire nature of existing conditions in
generalizability. Since the purpose of this research was to assess the current practices of EFL
teachers in providing feedback to their students’ writing and the students’ preferences on the
forms of feedback given by their teachers, descriptive survey would be effective.

3.2 Research Method

A mixed method was employed to answer the research questions. This is a method whereby the
quantitative and qualitative methods are separately used under the analysis part but
simultaneously in the discussion part (Creswell and Clark, 2007). A methodology choice is
dependent of the nature of the research being conducted. This research is descriptive and it
utilized both qualitative and quantitative data. Therefore, the quantitative method was used to
analyze and interpret the close-ended questions of the students’ questionnaire where as the
qualitative method was employed to analyze and interpret data from the teachers’ interview and
document analysis.

3.3 Location of the Study

Maytsebri Secondary School is found inMaytsebri town,North West of Tigray Regional State of
Ethiopia. The rationale behind selecting the school as a study site was the following reasons.
First, the researcher identified the problem in this school through informal observation and

27
discussion with colleagues. Second, the researcher is familiar with the teachers and other
participants of the study and its immediacy and ease access to the needed information. Finally,
no similar research has been conducted in that school.

3.4 Data Sources

To answer the two research questions, both primary and secondary sources of data were used.
The primary data was collected using questionnaire and interview while the secondary data was
collected using documentary analysis. Sample student writings which were marked by the EFL
teachers in the school were analyzed and interpreted.

3.5 Sample size and Sampling Techniques

The target population of this study was were English teachers and grade 11 students of Maytsebri
secondary school. In this study, in the sample high school, grade 11 students were purposively
taken with the assumption that they could provide relevant data representing the other grade
levels. The researcher selected 80 students to grade 11social science studentsand natural
science using simple random sampling method.This means the researcher applied lottery method
to select the sample among the population. There were 10English teachers in the school and 5 of
them were taken purposively with the assumption that they were the best options among the
teachers in the school who could give relevant data for the research. This was because their size
was manageable and they were the ones who actually taught writing and gave feedback to the
tasks done by students. Hence the total sample size of the study included 80 students and 5
English teachers in the school.

3.6 Instruments of Data Collection

The data gathering tools used in this research was were questionnaire, semi-structured interview
and document analysis. The researcher assumed that employing multiple data collection
instruments would help to combine the strength and to complement the inadequacies in any of
the data gathering tools.

28
3.6.1 Questionnaire
Questionnaire was used as a major instrument to gather data from student respondents. The
researcher adapted close-ended questions used by Hamouda (2011: 138-141). The close-ended
questions were prepared in order to reduce students’ confusion while filling out the questionnaire
It is also believed that questionnaire is a popular means of collecting different types of data in
research and it is an appropriate instrument to obtain information about conditions, practices and
problems for relatively large sample studies (Best and Khan, 1996).

In conducting the research, the questionnaire was translated into Tigrigna for making it easily
understandable by students. Then, the translated questions were given to the advisor and two
EFL teachers who have got masters degree in TEFL and they gave their constructive comments
on the appropriateness of the translation and improvements were made according to the
comments .The questionnaire was encompassed of 2 parts and 21 questions (see the
questionnaire in Appendix A). The first part is about students’ preference for feedback, and the
second part is teachers’ practice of error correction and providing feedback in EFL writing
class rooms. 11 of the questions are preference questions, and 10 of them are questions related
to teachers’ actual practices. All of the questions of the questionnaire are closed-ended types of
questions. They are scaled on the basis of Likert system with a five point-scale ranging from (5)
Strongly Agree, (4) Agree, (3) Neutral, (2) Disagree, and (1) Strongly Disagree.

3.6.2 Interview

In addition to questionnaire, the required data was gathered through semi-structured interview
with EFL teachers who have been teaching grade 11 students. This technique helps the
researcher to get the teachers’ practices in providing corrective feedback to students. The
rationale for using semi-structured interview, as Burns (1999) cited in Cherie (2003) claimed, is
that semi-structured interviews can help the researchers to get themes and topics which may not
have been anticipated while designing the interview. The interview questions were intended to
achieve the desired objectives of the study; and the items were designed in line with the literature
review. To check the strength of the items in responding the objectives, the drafted items were
given to one TEFL graduate, Amberbir Desta, and one colleague, Adane Ayenew. After
receiving their comments and suggestions and after the advisor’s serious comment on the
items, the researcher modified and changed some items. Finally, the interview was carried out.

29
3.6.3 Document Analysis
Some sample students’ writing assignments marked by the EFL teachers were also taken by the
researcher. This helped the researcher to cross check what the teachers claim to practice and
what they have actually done with the students’ work.16papers were taken from 8 sections of
the particular grade 11.

3.7 Data Collecting Procedure

In order to conduct the research in the particular high school, the researcher first visited the
school and asked the school principal for permission. Then the school principal arranged things
for the researcher to meet the students and EFL teachers. Next, the purpose of the study was
communicated to the teachers and students and the researcher asked their willingness to be
involved in the study.Because of the pandemic virus, the researcher searches the students home
to home and let them to fill the questionnaire individually at their home. Interview was also
made with the EFL teachers at their home using face mask and sanitizer so as to safe from the
out breaking virus. Sample documents of EFL teachers’ feedback for their students were also
accessed following to the interview with the teachers.

3.8 Method of Data Analysis

The data that was were gathered through questionnaire, interview and document analysis were
analyzed in both quantitative and qualitative ways. The quantitative data which were collected
through questionnaire were analyzed using frequency, percentage and mean scores. On the other
hand, data gathered through semi-structured interview and document analysis were analyzed
qualitatively.
The data analysis consisted of Linker-type scales for each specific objective. Each scale was
represented in numbers. According to Taylor (1973) as cited in Beyene (2008), likert assigned
numerical values to responses and the numerical representation (the coding) of the items went
through ‘strongly agree’=5; ‘agree’=4; ‘undecided’=3; ‘disagree’=2; and ‘strongly disagree’=1.
To analyze the response of the questionnaire the raw data entered in to computer to be analyzed
using SPSS version 20. The tables were presented before the analysis and interpretation.
After that, the data was were first presented in frequency, percentage and the mean was were
calculated. Finally,, based on the mean value each item was presented. Thus, the higher mean
value are meant to indicate greater preference and practice and lower mean value indicate lower

30
preference and practice towards the item. Students’ preferences and teachers’ practices were
compared using the mean value.

Overall: General comments and questions:

1) What was the main data collecting instrument? Why? Explain this.
2) Which data collecting instrument was used to answer which research question? This needs
carification.
3) What modifications did you make on the adapted questionnaire and self-prepared interview
questions? You need to support this by evidences.
4) The criteria you used to assess corrective feedbacks given by the English language teachers is
not indicated. Tell on what basis you analysed the 16 collected papers.
5) Tell why questionnaire for students and teachers and interview for only teachers.
6) Questionnaire-Interview-Document Analysis= (Tell why in this order.)

Chapter Four: Data Presentation, Analysis and Discussion

31
It has been explained in chapter three that data was collected through questionnaire, interview
and document analysis. This chapter is concerned with the analysis and interpretation of the
collected data. Hence the results of the questionnaire that was filled by grade 11 students of
Maytsebri secondary school is analyzed and compared with the data obtained through interview
with English teachers and the document analysis. The first part of this chapter is the analysis of
data collected through questionnaire, interview and document analysis. The second part is the
discussion part. In this part, data collected using questionnaire, interviewand document review
was analyzed and interpreted.

4.1 Presentation and Analysis of the Student Questionnaire

This part of the data analysis presents only the quantitative data gathered through questionnaire.
The main objective of the students’ questionnaire is to gather data on the students’ preferences
and teachers’ for error correction and feedback in the EFL class.

4.1.1What are students’ preferences for different types of error correction feedback in EFL
writing class rooms? (RQ1)

Table 1 presents the descriptive results of learners’ preferences towards written corrective
feedback and contains answers to 11 items of the questionnaire.

32
 Table 1: Students’ Preferences for Written Corrective Feedback (WCF)
Items Frequency
NO

SA A N DA SDA Total Mean

N % N % N % N % N % N %
1 I would like my errors to be corrected by 56 70 16 20 0 0 5 6.25 3 3.75 80 100 4.46
the teacher.
2 I want my errors to be corrected by myself. 21 26.25 35 43.75 8 10 10 12.5 6 7.5 80 100 3.68
3 I would like my errors to be corrected by?? 15 18.75 41 51.25 4 5 10 12.5 10 12.5 80 100 3.5
4 I like direct teacher correction ( the teacher 20 25 8 10 12 15 19 23.75 21 26.25 80 100 2.8
provides the correct answer)
5 I like indirect correction ( the teacher 20 25 25 31.25 8 10 10 12.5 17 21.25 80 100 3.26
signals that there is an error through
coding/underlining)
6 It would be better if my teacher corrects all 8 10 5 6.25 5 6.25 25 31.25 37 46.25 80 100 2.02
the errors ( unfocused)
7 It is significance if the teacher corrects my 40 50 20 25 5 6.25 7 8.75 8 10 80 100 3.96
errors by selecting some errors (focused)
8 I prefer my teacher to correct errors by 8 10 15 18.75 7 8.75 13 16.25 37 46.25 80 100 2.3
underlying/encircling the error and write
comments at the end of the essay.
9 It is preferable if teachers correct errors by 33 41.25 15 18.75 11 13.75 18 22.5 21 26.25 80 100 3.9
crossing out the error and writing in the
correct word or structure.
10 It would be better if my teacher gives more 14 17.5 9 11.25 5 6.25 19 23.7 33 41.25 80 100 2.4
focus on content and organization when
he/she provides me written corrective
feedback.
11 When my teacher provides written 30 37.5 20 25 2 2.5 18 22.5 10 12.5 80 100 3.5
corrective feedback, I want my teacher to
give more focus on grammar and
mechanics.
Grand Mean 3.25
Source?

Where SA=5, A=4, N=3, DA=2, SDA=1

As it is indicated in item 1 Table 1, almost all students(70% strongly agree and 20% agree) have high degree of preference towards teacher
correction. The rest (6.25% strongly disagree and 3.75%) have low degree of preference on teacher correction. As explained earlier the
highest degree of mean (4.46) displays us that almost all of the respondents have high degree of inclinationfor teacher correction.

33
In response to the 2nd item, the great majority of the respondents (70%) replayed that they favor
self correction. Only 20% of them don’t want to correct the errors they made by themselves.
Similar to item 1, Item 2 has high degree of mean (3.68) and this shows us that a great number
of respondents have preference on self correction.

Item 3 of Table 1 shows us that 70% of the respondents preferred peer correction with (18.75%
strongly agree and 51.25% agree). However, a small number of the pupils that is 25% (12.5%
disagree and the same to strongly disagree) don’t have tendency on peer correction.
Consequently, we can deduce that most of the students have preferences on peer correction.
However, this was not supported by the teachers’ interview in which all teachers replied that
students prefer teacher correction although they also highlighted a large number of students have
preference on self correction. In line with the previous studies this finding is equal to the
studies of Hendrickson (1987) and Hamouda (2011) which found students preferred to be
corrected the errors they committed by their teachers.

Item 4 and 5 of Table 1 are mainly concerned with students’ preference on the road to direct
teacher correction and indirect teacher correction 35% (25% strongly agree and 10% agree) of
the total students prefer direct teacher correction, where as 50% ( with 23.75% disagree and
26.25% strongly disagree ) don’t prefer direct correction. On the contrary, 56% of the
respondents have preference on indirect teacher correction.

Items 6 and 7 of Table 1 are about focused and unfocused providing feedback and these two
items show us that 16.25% preferred unfocused corrective feedback and 77.50% half and above
have an aversion to unfocused feedback. Nonetheless, 75% of the participants want teachers to
utilize focused feedback and 18.75% of them don’t want their teachers to focus on focused
corrective feedback. These items highlight that a vast majority of the respondents preferred
focused type error correction.

Responses of learners to item 8 Table 1 showed that 10% of the respondents strongly agreed
and 18.75% of the participants agreed that they favor their teachers’ to correct errors by
underlying/ encircling the error and write comments at the end of the essay. On the contrary,
46.25% of the respondents strongly disagree and 16.25% of them disagreed that their teachers to
correct errors by underlying/ encircling the error and write comments at the end of the students’
assignment.

As revealed by responses to item 9, almost half and above of the participants (60%) reported
they prefer their teacher to correct errors by crossing the error out and writing the exact word/
structure at the end of the provided text, where as 48.75% of them replied they don’t want the
teacher to correct errors by crossing the error out and writing the right word/ structure at the end
of the essay. This shows that students prefer teacher correction which is related with item 1 in
Table 1.

Items 10 and 11 were designed to know learners’ preferences on form based and content based
error correction. As can be seen from the items, 65% of them with (41.25% strongly disagree and
23.75% disagree) didn’t show their preferences on content based error correction, nonetheless
62.5% of the participants with (37.5% strongly agree and 25% agree) displayed that their
preference on form based error correction.

As noted above, the grand mean of Table one, which is 3.25, indicates that majority of the
students have higher degree of preferences for different kinds of written corrective feedback, for
instance great majority of the students have high preferences for teacher correction, indirect
teacher correction, focused and form based types of error corrections.

4.1.2 What types of Written Corrective Feedback are often applied by teachers to correct
students’ errors in their writing in the EFL classes? (RQ 2)

Table 2 presents the descriptive results of teachers’ actual practice of Written Corrective
Feedback and encompasses answers to 10 items of the questionnaire.

Table 2: Teachers’ practice of written corrective feedback

35
N Frequency
O Items SA A N DA SDA Total Mean

N % N % N % N % N % N %
12 While our teacher provides us a writing 41 51.25 15 18.75 14 17.5 5 6.25 15 18.75 80 100 4
assignment, she/he puts all the correct
answers (teacher’s correction)
13 When our teacher provides us a writing 14 17.5 14 17.5 8 10 32 40 12 15 80 100 2.8
task, she/he shows us that we have made
errors and let us correct ourselves (self-
correction).
14 While teacher provides us a writing task, 10 12.5 8 10 18 22.5 24 30 20 25 80 100 2.55
she/he lets our friends correct our errors
( peer correction)
15 Our teacher almost applies focused or 26 32.5 20 25 9 11.25 18 22.5 17 21.25 80 100 3.6
selective( which concentrates on specific
types of errors) type of error correction
16 Our teacher often practices unfocused 18 22.5 15 18.75 12 15 8 10 28 35 80 100 2.87
(which is directed at all or a wide range of
errors in learners’ written work) type of
error correction.
17 Our teacher focuses on content and 19 23.75 10 12.5 10 12.5 20 25 21 26.25 80 100 2.8
organization when he/she provides written
 corrective feedback.
18 When our teacher provides written 32 40 15 18.75 9 11.25 8 10 16 20 80 100 3.48
corrective feedback, he/she focuses on
grammar and mechanics.
19 Whilst our teacher gives us a writing task, 37 46.25 12 15 9 11.25 8 10 16 20 80 100 3.5
she/he corrects the errors by providing the
correct answer (direct correction).
20 When our teacher provides us a writing 16 20 8 10 10 12.5 20 25 26 32.5 80 100 2.6
assignment/test, he/she corrects the errors
by signaling that there is an error through
coding/underlining (indirect correction).
21 Our teacher utilize a correction code in 9 11.25 9 11.25 2 2.5 20 25 40 50 80 100 2.08
marking our paragraphs (i.e. using symbols
like SP, WW, SV, SP, etc., or using colors
to highlight different errors.
Grand Mean 3
Source?
Where SA= 5, A=4, N=3, DA=2, SDA=1

37
As can be seen from Table 2, Items 12, 13 and 14 were used to draw information whether their
teachers use teacher correction (he/she puts all the correct answers), self correction (the teacher
shows them that they have made errors and lets them correct themselves) and
peer- correction (the teacher lets their friends correct their errors). In response to these items,
70% of them (51.25% strongly agree and 18.75%) reported that their teachers use teacher
correction in the writing actual class room. On the contrary, 25% of them replied that their
teachers use self correction and 22.5% of them (12.5% strongly agree and 10% agree) reported
that teachers employ peer correction in correcting errors. This implies that teachers don’t
mostly use self-correction and peer correction, which are very important to shift teacher-to
student-centered teaching learning process and promotes students’ active participation, are
almost ignored by the teachers.

Items 15 and 16 are designed to know whether teachers’practices are focused or unfocused
corrective feedback. Regarding these two items, 57.5% of the students ( 32.5% strongly agree and
25% agree ) highlighted that their teachers practiced focused type of corrective feedback,
conversely, 40% of them ( with 22% strongly agree and 18% agree) replied that teachers employ
unfocused type of corrective feedback.
Therefore, this table tells us that most of the teachers in the school apply focused corrective
feedback. Contrary to the finding of Ferris (2011), the findings found from questionnaire,
interview and students’ sample written texts of this study demonstrate us teachers frequently
practice focused type of corrective feedback in the error correction process.

In items 17 and 18 students were asked if their teachers give more attention on content and
organization or grammar and mechanics. They (36.25%) replied that their teachers give more
attention on content and organization, on the other hand, 58.75% of them emphasized on
grammar and mechanics. Therefore, as can be inferred from the data it is possible to conclude
that not only learners but also teachers have wrong implication on content and organization.

The two items (Items 19 and 20) were designed to identify the types of feedback (direct teacher
corrective feedback and indirect teacher corrective feedback) teachers mostly applied. Most of
the students, i.e., 61.25% of them reported their teachers practiced direct teacher correction,
where as 30% of them replied their teachers employed indirect teacher correction. A similar
conclusion was reached by the teachers’ interview.

The last Item of table 2 tells us that a vast majority of the students, i.e. 75% reported their
teachers don’t use error correction codes when they provide WCF, but only 22.5% of them said
teachers use error correction codes. This result highlights that little is known about the error
correction codes. To conclude, the grand mean of table two(3.08) showed us that teachers have
some practical problems in providing written error correction and feedback in the actual
writing classroom.

39
4.2 Presentation and Analysis of Data from Teachers’ Interview
The main aim of the teacher interview was to find out students’ preferences and teachers’
practice towards WCF. The results of the interview helped the researcher to substantiate the
results obtained from the questionnaire. To this effect, five teachers were asked to answer five
to obtain information about students’ preferences and teachers’ practice of different kinds
of WCF. They were interviewed in English because they are English teachers and degree
holders.

Following to the data collected through questionnaire from students, the researcher conducted
interview with the EFL teachers in Maytsebri school. This section presents the data obtained
through interview and analysis has been done side-by-side to the presentation.

Q1. When you give feedback to your students, do you correct all the students’ writing
errors on the paper at once or you focus on specific errors? Why?

Teacher 1: “yes, I usually correct any error that I find in my students’ errors as I believe that
tolerating some errors and correcting the others would mean that the students will consider the
other part as correct one. This, in turn, will result in repeating the errors in their later writings.”

Teacher 2: “what I usually do when giving corrective feedback to my students is that I do not
focus on a particular error. I simply give correction to errors I find on my way through reading
the students’ texts. I do not tolerate errors and I do not see why I should leave any part of the
students’ writing while I know that it is an error.”

Teacher 3: “I don’t’ correct all errors at once. I simply correct one group of errors( for
example grammar, mechanics or organization) at a time and ignore the others although I know
that there exist many errors. Why I do this is it helps students to master a particular aspect
of language at a time and the others at other time. ”

Teacher 4: “I give corrective feedback to all errors that exist on my students’ writings. I do not
believe that one error is worth correcting than the other. I give equal value to all errors in
students’ essays. As far as my concern is to help the students write error free texts, I believe
that I should correct all the errors that appear.”

40
Teacher 5: “I correct all errors that I see in my students’ writings. I do not pass any error I see
in my students’ writing. If I do so, I feel that the students will consider me as if I did not notice
the errors and they will think that I do not know. ”

Results of the interview for the first item revealed that most of the EFL teachers in Maytsebri
High School admitted that they provide unfocused feedback to their students. Only 1of the
respondents asserted that he provide focused feedback to his students. From this it can be
concluded that the EFL teachers in the particular school are inclined towards providing
unfocused feedback to their students’ writing.

Q2. Which aspect of the students’ writing do you usually focus when providing corrective
feedback to your students? Grammar, punctuation, spelling, organization, style, or ideas
only? Why?

Teacher 1: “I usually provide corrective feedback to all aspects of students’ writing including
grammar errors, errors relating the ideas expressed, mechanics and the organization of the
written essay. I believe that all of these items are essential in making students better writers.”

Teacher 2: “When I provide corrective feedback to my students, I usually focus on the

grammar and mechanics part. That is what pleases my students. Organization and ideas are
higher level activities that the students can achieve as they go higher to universities and
colleges. Grammar and mechanics are the tools and I have to arm my students with these
tools.”

Teacher 3: “Most of the time, I provide feedback on organization and the ideas expressed
because I want my students to be fluent, not accurate. Accuracy is something that the students
can develop through process. However, I also give attention to grammar and mechanics as
they are the base for writing any essay.”

Teacher 4: “For me organization and ideas are the most important aspects that I should focus
when I provide corrective feedback to my students. That is what I usually do with my students’
texts. Grammar is secondary”

41
Teacher 5: “I usually provide corrective feedback on grammar and mechanics, but not style
and organization. My reason is I want my students to develop their own ideas and style and my
role should be helping them to write correct sentences.”

The teachers’ response to the second question in the interview can be summarized as follows.
While only 2 of the interviewees confirmed that they provide feedback on grammar and
mechanics part only, some of themadmitted that they provide corrective feedback to all aspects
of their students writing. Another of the respondents favored corrective feedback only for ideas
and organization. This shows that the teacher respondents gave equal value to form and content
when giving corrective feedback to their students’ writing.

Q3. Do you grant your students some autonomy by making them figure out their writing
errors by underling or circling their errors? Or do you provide them with a correction
codes list to work on their own? Do you think indirect feedback will benefit to better their
writing skills?

The interview conducted with the teachers with regard to how they provide feedback revealed
that most of the teachers asserted that they provided feedback by directly providing the correct
language form to their students and crossing out the erroneous one. The reason they mentioned
for doing this was that some of them do not know the correction codes; others do not think
providing indirect feedback is helpful and still others firmly claimed that it is time consuming
to teach the correction codes to students and the students are not ready to utilize the correction
codes to correct their writings. Only one teacher from the interviewees confirmed that he
always tries to provide correction codes to the students’ so that they can revise it by
themselves. The other teacher interviewees claimed that they provided feedback by using the
combination of all. They said that sometimes they underline or circle the error and let the
student figure out what the error was; they provided correction code; and they usually provided
the correct form by crossing out the erroneous one. It seems evident that the aggregate
response of the interviewees tended to be direct although there are some indirect ways of
providing corrective feedback by some teachers.

Q4. In the process of providing corrective feedback to your students’ writing, do you
provide the feedback by yourself? Or do you let the students’ correct their own errors by

42
themselves? Do you encourage students’ to read their peer’s writings and provide
corrective feedback? Why?

Teacher 1: “my students do not want to look for their own errors by themselves and they do
not want their friends to correct their errors in their writing. They usually want me to read their
essays and provide them the necessary feedback. Despite this, I insist on peer correction and
self correction. Sometimes, I correct their errors by myself.”
Teacher 2: “I usually correct my students’ errors by myself because they cannot correct their
own errors by themselves. If they can correct their errors by themselves, why could they make
the errors in the beginning? Sometimes I try to make my students swap their essays and correct
any errors, but they do not feel happy with it because their friends tease them for making silly
errors. ”
Teacher3: “I always try to make my students become aware of their own errors and correct
them by themselves by providing hints such as what kind of error it is, underlining it or circling
it. I don’t encourage peer correction because it is destructive. The students end up mocking
each other. I also provide corrective feedback directly by myself. ”
Teacher4: “I believe that peer correction is a good thing to do, but when I try it in my class, I
observed that it created the feeling of inferiority and superiority on my students. However, I
always practice it hopping that finally the students will accept it. I observed some
improvements in their attitude towards self correction and peer correction. Therefore, I usually
encourage self correction and peer correction because I feel that it can help them improve their
writing skill.”
Teacher 5: “I use teacher correction, self correction and peer correction alternatively. But,
most of the time, I correct the students’ errors by myself”

To sum up, the result of the interview revealed that all of the teachers confirmed that they
usually provide corrective feedback by themselves. They valued teacher correction highly. On
the other hand, the interview result for the fourth question showed that many of the teachers do
not use peer correction. The reason they provided for this was it creates feeling of inferiority
and superiority among the students and most of the time the students are reluctant to receive
corrective feedback from their peers. 2 of the teachers supported peer correction and they
admitted that they usually do it in their writing class. It seems true that despite their belief in
peer correction, the EFL teachers in Maytsebrihigh school do not use it for its

43
counterproductive tendency in class. Therefore they highly use teacher correction and they
practice self-correction to some extent.

Q5. What kind of errors do you prefer to correct when you see your students’ writings?
Do you correct all major and minor errors, the major ones only, the repeated ones or
those that interfere with communicating ideas?
Responding to the above question during the interview, almost all of the teachers confirmed
that they usually correct errors that are major and repeated in the students’ texts. They also
focused that errors that affect the message were intolerable for them. The respondents also
claimed that minor errors should be left for the students. On the other hand one of the
interviewees asserted that all errors, major or minor, should be corrected and that was what he
usually did with his students. From this, it can be concluded that Maytsebri high school EFL
teachers correct major, repeated and meaning affecting errors when they read their students’
writings.
Q6. When you provide corrective feedback to your students’ writing, do you simply
provide the correct form? Or do you provide comments? Or the combination of the two?
When they were asked whether they simply provide the correction or provide comments, most
of the teachers pointed out that they simply provide the feedback and nothing else. “I admit
that I simply provide the correct form to my students” said one teacher. Another teacher also
claimed that,” adding comments to the correction I provide is time consuming and I do not see
its benefit.” On the other hand, two of the respondents expressed that they believe the benefit
of commenting students’ works as they felt that it motivates the students to work better;
however, the teachers claimed that it is difficult to do both of them at a time because of large
class size. A follow up question about their practice in providing negative feedback indicated
that the teachers mixed both positive and negative feedback together. “I just appreciate the
positive aspects of the students’ text and criticize the weaknesses so that the student will
improve” said two of the interviewees. In general, the interviewees’ response to the above item
revealed that the EFL teachers in Maytsebri high school usually provided direct feedback
without comments, but they sometimes provided comments to their students’ writings.

4.3 Presentation and Analysis of Data from Documents

The data collected through questionnaire from students and through interview from EFL
teachers came up with results about the different ways of providing feedback practiced by the

44
teachers and the students’ preferences for these feedback giving mechanisms. To make the data
more valid and reliable, the researcher found it essential to triangulate it with another method
of data gathering tool. Hence, looking at the actual students’ papers that were corrected by the
EFL teachers was found crucial. Therefore samples of 16 papers were taken from the
sample students and they were analyzed as follows. Two papers marked by each teacher were
taken. This was done to make the analysis valid as they were going to be used for triangulating
purpose.

More than half of the papers (56.25%) were found to be corrected using direct way of
providing corrective feedback. Similarly, the focus of the correction on the papers was on form
rather than ideas. The teachers simply crossed out the incorrect pattern and they provided
their own correct form. For spelling errors, the teacher simply added some letters by splitting
the words or deleting and replacing. None of the teachers who corrected the papers provided
any feedback on the organization and on the ideas. They did not give any comment
either.

On the other hand, it was observed from 3(18.75%) of the papers that the EFL teachers
attempted to provide hints for their students so that the students can correct their errors by
themselves. The common ways the teachers did this were underlining the erroneous part,
circling it, telling what kind of error it was and asking questions (see appendix c1). In addition
to this, the feedback provision on these papers also incorporated comments to the
performance of the writer. There were phrases like “you did very well”; “Excellent
explanation”; “your essay is interesting, but you need to be very careful with the
grammar”.

Only two of the sample papers (12.5%) included feedback on organization and ideas in
addition to grammar, punctuation and spelling corrections. There were corrective feedbacks
like “you need to state your thesis statement and topic sentences clearly”; “it is better to use
cohesive devices to show smooth transfer from one point to another”. The remaining four
papers were found to be all in red. The teachers seemed to have provided as many corrections
as they could. They gave comments on grammar, spelling, punctuation, organization, ideas and
they were accompanied by comments, both positive and negative.

45
In general, the secondary data about feedback provision indicated that the EFL teachers in
Maytsebri high school provided feedback mostly focusing on form rather than ideas and
organization. They also tended to provide direct and unfocussed feedback as the documents
revealed. Although, there were some indicators of encouragement for self correction, the
teachers’ direct provision of feedback dominates a lot.

General Questions and comments:

1) The analysis and the presentation is ok. However, at the end of
this unit, you should have discussed the findings of your study by
comparing and contrasting with the findings by previous local
studies. You should do this.
2) What new finding have you come up with? In your study, what
new knowledge have you contributed to the literature? Tell us this.

46
Chapter Five: Summary, Conclusions and Recommendations
5.1 Summary
The purpose ofthis research was to assess students’ preferences and teachers’ practices of
feedback for EFL writing with particular reference to Maytsebri high school in Maytsebri
town. The research attempted to address twobasic questions; related to students’ preferences,
and teachers’ practices’ features of writing students’ want to be corrected.
The participants in this study were 80 randomly selected grade 11 students and 5 EFL teachers
who were taken purposively. Both primary and secondary sources of data were used. To
answer the two basic research questions, three types of data gathering tools were employed.
The first type of data gathering tool was questionnaire. It was prepared by adapting close-
ended questions from Rula L. Diab (2005) and Sara orts (2015). The questionnaire was used to
collect data from the student respondents and it was translated in to Tigrigna language for ease
of understanding by the student respondents. Then it was pilot tested and modified for the
purpose of maximizing reliability before it was administered to the student respondents. In
addition, semi-structured interview was employed to gather data from the 5 EFL teachers in
Maytsebri high school. Furthermore, document analysis was used as a third data gathering tool
and it was employed to gather data from secondary sources. Sample papers that had been given
corrective feedback for were taken and the way the EFL teachers provided the corrective
feedback was analyzed.
The data collected through questionnaire were tabulated along with frequency, percentage and
mean value descriptions using SPSS version 20. In addition, data gathered through interview
and document analysis were presented under two headings; analysis of interview data and
analysis of data from documents. Finally the results from the three data gathering tools were
explained and discussed under a separate discussion session. The findings revealed that there
are similarities and mismatches between teachers’ practices and students’ preferences for
feedback on EFL writing. The similarities indicated that EFL students and teachers usually
prefer and practice corrective feedback for errors that are frequent, meaning affecting, and
major ones. In addition, both the teachers and students showed positive practice and preference

47
for corrective feedback on grammar and mechanics. While teachers provide direct and
unfocused feedback, the students’ preferred indirect and focused feedback. Another variation
was that students preferred corrective feedback for grammar and mechanics; however, teachers
gave equal attention toboth form and content.

5.2 Conclusions
Based on the findings of the data analysis made in the fourth unit, the following conclusions
have been made.

Although there are many ways of providing feedback to students’ writing, most EFL teachers
use very limited number. The common ways that the teachers used were direct and focused
teachers feedback and some attempts of encouragement for self correction. This shows that
EFL teachers in Maytsebri high school may not either have sufficient knowledge about the
different types of corrective feedback or they are not committed enough to practice as many of
them as possible.

While students prefer feedback on grammar, punctuation and spelling, EFL teachers gave equal
value to grammar, punctuation, spelling, vocabulary, organization and ideas when they gave
feedback for EFL students’ writing. In addition, students preferred indirect and focused
feedback to their writing; however, the EFL teachers tended to practice direct and unfocused
feedback. This shows variation between teachers’ practices and students’ preferences for
corrective feedback on EFL writing. On the other hand, students’ preference for corrective
feedback on major, repeated and meaning interfering errors matched with teachers’ practices to
correct such kinds of errors.In addition, while the most prevalent way of providing feedback of
teachers on students’ writings witnessed by students was by crossing out the wrong word or
pattern and substituting it by the correct one, the students preferred error correction by
identifying where the error is and giving clue about the type of the error.

With regard to the participants in the process of error correction, students preferred teacher-
correction with comments and teacher-student conferencing while teachers usually tended to
focus on teacher correction and self-correction.Students showed negative preference towards
self correction and peer correction. The teachers also confirmed that students do not like such

48
ways in error correction. The negative preference of students towards peer and self correction,
as the EFL teachers mentioned, could be because of misconception on the students’ side.
While the most prevalent way of providing feedback of teachers on students’ writings
witnessed by students was by crossing out the wrong word or pattern and substituting it by the
correct one, the students preferred error correction by identifying where the error is and giving
clue about the type of the error. Finally, the results also revealed that students are not
committed enough to revise their papers once their teachers returned to them.

5.3 Recommendations
Based on the findings discovered and the conclusions made, the following recommendations have
been forwarded.

 To know students’ preferences and to convince students about the useful ways of providing
feedback, EFL teachers should make open discussion with their students. This helps to
create conducive environment in which the students and teachers can work cooperatively to
correct students’ errors on their writing.

 Although direct provision of the correct form by avoiding the wrong form is helpful for
students’ accuracy, it makes students dependent on teachers’ corrections and the
students did not want it. Therefore, teachers should exert their ultimate effort to
indicate the error and provide clue so that students can work hard to find out the right
correction for the error.

 The results revealed that the EFL teachers seemed to lack knowledge of the different
ways of providing corrective feedback to their students’ writing. Therefore, the teachers
should update their knowledge of feedback provision by reading different materials and
discussing with their colleagues.

 EFL students should give special attention to their papers when their teachers return to
them and make necessary improvements by adding their own improvements and
modifications instead of including teacher’s comments only. Moreover, EFL teachers
should try their best to create awareness on their students about the importance of
correction on organization and ideas of their writings.

49
  Most importantly, EFL teachers should exert effort to make students’ attitude positive
towards peer-correction and self-correction.

General comment:
 Recommendations should show. What should be done, who should
do it, and how should it be done. So, you revise the
recommendations in a way they can be put into action without any
confusion.
 Make sure that you have duly acknowledged all materials referred
for this study, and prepare yourself to answer any question by the
examiners during the final defence.

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Nunan, D.(1996). A Language Teaching Methodology. London: Longman

Appendix A
Aksum University
College of Social Sciences and Languages
Department of Foreign Languages and Literature
Questionnaire for Students
Dear students,

First of all, I would like to say thank you for your willingness to fill this questionnaire
sacrificing your precious time. The purpose of this questionnaire is to collect data that will be
utilized for a research on “Teachers’ Practices of Written Corrective Feedback and Students’
preferenceson EFL Writing”. Therefore, your responses will be used for academic purpose only

54
and everything will be kept confidential. Please read each group of items thoroughly and
provide your answers according to each instruction. Remember this is not a test and there no
‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answers.
Read each statement and then decide if you: (5) strongly agree, (4) agree, (3) neutral, (2)
disagree, or (1) strongly disagree. Please put a tick (√) your response in the space provided.
Statements related to students’ preferences
S/ Statements Responses
SA A N DA SDA
N
1 I would like my errors to be corrected by the teacher.
2 I want my errors to be corrected by myself.
3 I would like my errors to be corrected by
4 I like direct teacher correction ( the teacher provides the
correct answer)
5 I like indirect correction ( the teacher signals that there is an
error through coding/underlining)
6 It would be better if my teacher corrects all the errors
( unfocused)
7 It is significance if the teacher corrects my errors by selecting
some errors (focused)
8 I prefer my teacher to correct errors by underlying/encircling
the error and write comments at the end of the essay.
9 It is preferable if teachers correct errors by crossing out the
error and writing in the correct word or structure.
10 It would be better if my teacher gives more focus on content
and organization when he/she provides me written corrective
feedback.
When my teacher provides written corrective feedback, I want
11 my teacher to give more focus on grammar and mechanics.

Statements related to teachers’ practice

S/ Statements Responses
SA A N DA SDA
N
12 While our teacher provides us a writing assignment, she/he
puts all the correct answers (teacher’s correction)
13 When our teacher provides us a writing task, she/he shows us
that we have made errors and let us correct ourselves (self-
correction).

55
14 While teacher provides us a writing task, she/he lets our
friends correct our errors ( peer correction)
15 Our teacher almost applies focused or selective( which
concentrates on specific types of errors) type of error
correction
16 Our teacher often practices unfocused (which is directed at all
or a wide range of errors in learners’ written work) type of
error correction.
17 Our teacher focuses on content and organization when he/she
provides written corrective feedback.
18 When our teacher provides written corrective feedback, he/she
focuses on grammar and mechanics.
19 Whilst our teacher gives us a writing task, she/he corrects the
errors by providing the correct answer (direct correction).
20 When our teacher provides us a writing assignment/test,
he/she corrects the errors by signaling that there is an error
through coding/underlining (indirect correction).
21 Our teacher utilize a correction code in marking our
paragraphs (i.e. using symbols like SP, WW, SV, SP, etc., or
using colors to highlight different errors.

Source?

56
 Appendix B
ዩኒቨርሲቲኣክሱም
ኮሌጅማሕበራዊሳይንስንቋንቋታትን
ትምህርቲክፍሊቋንቋታትወፃኢንስነፅሑፍን
ንተምሃሮዝተዳለወፅሕፋዊመሕተት
ዝኸበርኩምተምሃሮ:-
ካብኩሉአቀዲመኩቡርጊዜኩምሰዊኢኩምነዚፅሑፋዊመሕተትክትመልኡፍቓደኛታትስለዘኮንኩምከመስግንእፈቱ።
እዚፅሑፋዊመሕተት ”ተግባርአዋህባግብረ-
መልሲመምህራንንምርጫተምሃሮንኣብቋንቋእንግሊዝኛፅሕፈትትምህርቲ“ብዝብልርእሲንዝካየድመፅናዕቲዝውዕልሓበሬታን
ምእካብዓሊሙዝተዳለወእዩ።
ዝኾነይኹንእትህብዎመልሲምስጥራውነቱዝተሓለወኮይኑንምፅናዕቲጥራሕዝውዕልምዃኑከረጋግፀልጉምእፈቱ።
ንሕድሕድሕቶብጥንቃቐብምንባብብመሰረትዝቐረበልኩምመምርሒመልስኹምክተቅምጡእላበወኩም።
ኣብሕርያኹምናይ(√) ምልክትተጠቐሙብእሰ- 5 እሰ- 4 ሞን- 3 ኣይ- 2 ብኣይ- 1
ልቢበል-- ብእሰ- ብጣዕሚእሰማማዕእሰ- እሰማማዕሞን- ሞንገኛኣይ- ኣይሰማማዕንብኣይ- ብጣዕሚኣይሰማማዕን
ናይድሌትሓሳባት
ተ/ ሓተታዊሙሉእሓሳባት መልስታት
ብእሰ እሰ ሞን ኣይ ብኣይ
ቁ
1 ነቶምዝሰራሕክዎምስሕተታትመምህረይጥራሕክርመለይእደሊ
2 ነቶምዝሰራሕክዎምስሕተታትባዕለይክእርሞምእደሊ
3 ነቶምዝሰራሕክዎምስሕተታትመሓዙተይክእርሙለይእደሊ
4 ኣብግዘእርማትቀጥታዊእርማትመምህርእቲትኽክለኛመልሲብቀ

57
 ጥታንክምለሰለይእደሊ
5 ኣብግዘእርማትዘይቀጥታዊእርማትመምህረይስሕተትሰሪሐከምዘ
ለኹብምልክትይኹንብምስማርብተዘዋዋሪክወሃበኒእደሊ
6 መምህርኩምናትኩምፅሕፈትክእርምእንተሎንኹሎምዝሰራሕኽ
ምዎምስሕተታትንዝተወሰኑትኹረትብዘይምሃብይመርፅ
7 መምህርኩምናትኩምፅሕፈትክእርምእንተሎዝተወሰኑስሕተታት
ብምምራፅእርማትንዝተወሰኑትኹረትብምሃብክህበኒእመርፅ
8 መምህረይኣብፅሕፈትንዝሰራሕክዎምነቶምስሕተታትብምስማር
ርእይትኡብምፅሓፍእርማትክህበኒእመርፅ
9 መምህረይኣብፅሕፈትንዝሰራሕክዎምስሕተታትነቶምስሕተታት
ብምእካስንወይፈሊኻብምውፃእትኽክለኛመልሲብምቕማጥንእር
ማትክህበኒእመርፅ
10 መምህርኩምንዝፀሓፍክምዎምዓንቀፃትእርማትክህብከሎንትሕ
ዝቶንትኹረትክህበኒእመርፅ
መምህርኩምንዝፀሓፍክምዎምዓንቀፃትእርማትክህብከሎንስዋስ
11 ውንስርዓተነጥብንትኹረትክህብእመርፅ

ናይተግባርሓሳባት

ተ/ ሓተታዊሙሉእሓሳባት መልስታት
ብእሰ እሰ ሞን ኣይ ብኣይ
ቁ
12 መምህረይናይፅሑፍፈተናወይዕዮገዛክህበናከሎነቶምዝፈጠርክዎ
ምስሕተታትትኽክለኛመልሲብምቕማጥእርማትይህበና(እርማት
ብመምህር)
13 መምህረይናይፅሑፍፈተናወይዕዮገዛክህበናከሎስሕተታትሰሪሐከ
ምዘለኹይሕብረኒሞባዕለይንከስተኻኽሎምይገብር(እርማትብባዕ
ለይ)
14 መምህረይናይፅሑፍፈተናወይዕዮገዛክህበናከሎስሕተታተይበዕሩኽ
ተይክእረሙይገብር(እርማትበዕሩኽተይ)
15 መምህርናእርማትክህብእንተሎዝተወሰኑስሕተታትብምምራፅእዩ
እርማትዝህበናዝተወሰኑስሕተታትትኹረት
16 መምህርናእርማትክህብእንተሎንኹሎምዝሰራሕክዎምስሕተታት
ብምእራምእዩእርማትዝህበናንዝተወሰኑትኹረትዘይምሃብ
17 መምህርናእርማትኣብዝህበሉግዘንትሕዝቶውህደትንዝለዓለዋጋብ
ምሃብእዩዝእርመልና
18 መምህርናእርማትኣብዝህበሉግዘንስዋስዋውንስርዓተነጥብንዝለዓ
ለዋጋብምሃብእዩዝእርመልና
19 መምህረይናይፅሑፍፈተናወይዕዮገዛክህበናከሎትኽክለኛመልሲብ
ምቕማጥእዩእርማትዝህበና(ቀጥተኛእርማት)ብምሃብ

58
 20 መምህረይናይፅሑፍፈተናወይዕዮገዛክህበናከሎብምልክትንብምስ
ማርንስሕተትሰሪሕናከምዘለናብምምልካትእዩእርማትዝህበና
(ዘይቀጥተኛእርማት)
21 መምህርናአብእዋንፅሕፈትእርማትክህበናከሎናይእርማትምልክታ
ትማለትከም SP, WO, SV, ወይ WT
ዝኣመሰሉምልክታትይጥቀም

Appendix C
Teachers’ interview
Aksum University
College of Social Sciences and Languages
Department of Foreign Languages and Literature

Interview for Teachers

First of all, I would like to thank you for your cooperation in giving your genuine response to
the questions below.

1. When you give feedback to your students, do you correct all the students’ writing errors
on the paper at once or you focus on specific errors? Why?
2. Which aspect of the students’ writing do you usually focus when providing corrective
feedback to your students? Grammar, punctuation, spelling, organization, style, or ideas
only? Why?

59
 3. Do you grant your students some autonomy by making them figure out their writing
errors by underling or circling their errors? Or do you provide them with a correction
codes list to work on their own? Do you think indirect feedback will benefit to better
their writing skills?
4. In the process of providing corrective feedback to your students’ writing, do you
provide the feedback by yourself? Or do you let the students’ correct their own errors
by themselves? Do you encourage students’ to read their peer’s writings and provide
corrective feedback? Why?
5. What kind of errors do you prefer to correct when you see your students’ writings? Do
you correct all major and minor errors, the major ones only, the repeated ones or those
that interfere with communicating ideas?
6. When you provide corrective feedback to your students’ writing, do you simply provide
the correct form? Or do you provide comments? Or the combination of the two?
(Own Developed?)

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Appendix D

61
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