11Th Graders Attitudes Towards Their Teachers Written Feedback.pdf

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES  NGUYỄN BÍCH HIỀN 11 th GRADERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS THEIR TEACHERS’ WRITTEN FEED[.]

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES  NGUYỄN BÍCH HIỀN 11th GRADERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS THEIR TEACHERS’ WRITTEN FEEDBACK (Thái độ học sinh lớp 11 phản hồi dạng viết giáo viên) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Hanoi, 2016 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES  NGUYỄN BÍCH HIỀN 11th GRADERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS THEIR TEACHERS’ WRITTEN FEEDBACK (Thái độ học sinh lớp 11 phản hồi dạng viết giáo viên) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111 Supervisors: Assoc.Prof.Dr Le Van Canh Hanoi, 2016 DECLARATION OF AUTHORSHIP I, NGUYỄN BÍCH HIỀN, hereby certify that this thesis, which is entitled “11th graders’ attitudes towards their teachers’ written feedback” is entirely my own work in the fulfillment of the requirement for the Degree of Master of Arts at Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi It has not been submitted for assessment at any other university Hanoi, 2016 Nguyễn Bić h Hiề n i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost, I am profoundly beholden to my supervisor, Assoc.Prof.Dr Lê Văn Canh, for his great expertise and unfailing support, without which the thesis would not be completed I owe a great debt of gratitude to all the lecturers of the Faculty of PostGraduate Studies, Hanoi University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, whose transfer of knowledge to me has made me grow more professionally I would like to express my sincere thanks to my course members for their sharing in times of uncertainty and for their giving my thesis a close reading My special thanks go to the English language teachers and students at Chu Van An Gifted High School of Lang Son Province for their cooperation during the data collection process I am deeply indebted to my family members for their wholehearted backing all along the way ii ABSTRACT The study explores 11th graders‟ attitudes towards written corrective feedback in an English class Data were collected by means of a Likert-scale questionnaire, which was administered to 314 students of 11 th grades, 38 of whom were English-specialising students and 276 of whom were non-Englishspecialising students The questionnaire elicited information on the students‟ attitudes towards teachers‟ utilisation of various corrective feedback types Results show that the students had a positive attitude towards corrective feedback, be they English-specialising or non-English-specialising The results of this study can be viewed as a valuable contribution to existing research findings in the realm of corrective feedback Previous studies have examined the efficacy of particular corrective feedback types in certain educational environments This study provides unique findings from a unique learning environment, namely a high school for gifted students The results presented in this paper support previous findings that in certain circumstances corrective feedback works Additionally, the results reinforce the need to continue scholarship on corrective feedback and student perceptions of its use The thesis concludes with some suggestions for teachers‟ implementation of written corrective feedback on their students‟ writings iii TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION OF AUTHORSHIP i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF TABLES vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vii PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale of the Study Aims of the Study, Research Questions and Scope of the Study 2.1 Aims of the Study 2.2 Research Questions 2.3 Scope of the Study 3 Method of the Study Significance of the Study Structure of the Thesis PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW Attitudes Definitions of Feedback Types of Feedback 3.1 Direct Corrective Feedback 3.2 Indirect Corrective Feedback 3.3 Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback 3.4 Focused versus Unfocused Corrective Feedback 11 Effects of Corrective Feedback 11 Students‟ Attitudes towards Teachers‟ Corrective Feedback 14 CHAPTER II: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 17 Research Method 17 Data Collection Instrument 17 Research Site 18 iv Participants 18 Data Analysis 18 Chapter III: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 20 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Written Corrective Feedback 20 1.1 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Direct Corrective Feedback 20 1.2 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Indirect Corrective Feedback 22 1.3 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback 23 1.4 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Unfocused Corrective Feedback 24 1.5 Teachers‟ Frequency of Use of Focused Corrective Feedback 25 Students‟ Preference for Teacher Corrective Feedback Types 25 2.1 Students‟ Preference for Direct Corrective Feedback 26 2.2 Students‟ Preference for Indirect Corrective Feedback 26 2.3 Students‟ Preference for Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback 28 2.4 Students‟ Preference for Unfocused Corrective Feedback 29 2.5 Students‟ Preference for Focused Corrective Feedback 29 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Various Forms of Corrective Feedback 30 3.1 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Direct Corrective Feedback 31 3.2 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Indirect Corrective Feedback 32 3.3 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback 33 3.4 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Unfocused Corrective Feedback 34 3.5 Students‟ Perception of Usefulness of Focused Corrective Feedback 35 Discussion 35 PART C: CONCLUSION 38 Concluding Remarks 38 Implications 39 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Study 39 REFERENCES 41 APPENDIX I v LIST OF TABLES TABLES Table 1.1 A typology of written corrective feedback Page Table 3.1 Students‟ self-reports on teachers‟ use of direct corrective feedback 20 techniques Table 3.2 Students‟ self-reports on teachers‟ use of indirect corrective feedback 22 techniques Table 3.3 Students‟ self-reports on the teachers‟ use of metalinguistic corrective 23 feedback techniques Table 3.4 Students‟ self-reports on teachers‟ use of unfocused corrective feedback 24 techniques Table 3.5 Students‟ self-reports on teachers‟ use of focused corrective feedback 25 techniques Table 3.6 Students‟ preference for direct corrective feedback techniques 26 Table 3.7 Students‟ preference for indirect corrective feedback techniques 27 Table 3.8 Students‟ preference for metalinguistic corrective feedback techniques 28 Table 3.9 Students‟ preference for unfocused corrective feedback techniques 29 Table 3.10 Students‟ preference for focused corrective feedback techniques 29 Table 3.11 Students‟ perception of usefulness of direct corrective feedback techniques 31 Table 3.12 Students‟ perception of usefulness of indirect corrective feedback techniques 32 Table 3.13 Students‟ perception of usefulness of metalinguistic corrective feedback 33 techniques Table 3.14 Students‟ perception of usefulness of unfocused corrective feedback 34 techniques Table 3.15 Students‟ perception of usefulness of focused corrective feedback techniques vi 35 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS L2: Second language CF: Corrective Feedback WCF: Written Corrective Feedback EFL: English as a Foreign Language vii PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale of the Study Feedback has been acknowledged as an essential component in the learning cycle, providing stimuli for reflection and learner development Alerting students to their strengths and weaknesses can provide the means by which they can assess their performance and make improvement to future work Feedback is also described as an effective means of encouraging greater student autonomy (Kirkwood 2000) Teacher feedback helps learners move from otherregulation provided by the teacher to self-regulation and greater independent control over target language forms Despite the acknowledged benefits of teacher feedback, teachers not always know whether and how their feedback is perceived by their students Although a few studies have examined students‟ perspectives on written corrective feedback in general, very few have investigated students‟ perceptions about the specific feedback types they have received (Karim, 2015) As far as my knowledge is concerned, this issue has yet to be researched in the high school where I have been teaching This study, therefore, sought to address this matter Using a questionnaire survey strategy, this study investigated the students‟ attitudes towards teachers‟ different types of written corrective feedback, their perceptions of the usefulness of teacher feedback to their learning to write in English Also, the study is aimed at finding out whether the students‟ proficiency in English affects their attitudes and perceptions regarding teacher written feedback or not In order to achieve the second purpose of the study, two different groups of 11th grade students, i.e English-specialising students and non-English-specialising students were selected It was assumed that the former was more proficient in English than the latter Structure of the Thesis The thesis is composed of three main parts as follows: Part A – Introduction – imparts information on the rationale of the study, the aims, the research questions, the scope, the methodology and the significance of the study Also presented in this part is the organisation of the thesis Part B – Development – consists of three chapters The first chapter reviews relevant literature on attitudes, feedback and its types, the effects of feedback, and the students‟ attitudes towards feedback The second chapter deals with the research methodology The findings and discussion are presented in the last chapter Part C – Conclusion – offers the summary of the study and its implications This part also touches upon the limitations of the study and offers suggestions for further study PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter I: LITERATURE REVIEW Attitudes A student‟ attitude and motivation have been frequently reported to be the most critical factor for success in language learning (Ushida, 2005, p 49) Attitudes can be viewed as a tendency to respond positively or negatively towards a certain thing, idea, person, situation, etc Gardener (1995) defined attitudes as an evaluation to some referent, inferred on the basis of the individual‟s beliefs or opinions about the referent Attitudes towards learning are believed to influence behaviours such as selecting a learning activity, responding to the teaching content and teaching methods Ellis (1994, pp 197201) claims that learners‟ attitudes have been identified as one set of variables of major importance The attitudes are shaped by social factors, which, in turn, influence learner outcomes Attitudes can be negative or positive and they can be changed There are three aspects of attitudes: behavioural, cognitive, and emotional (Kara, 2009) The behavioural aspect of attitude deals with the way one behaves or reacts in particular situations The cognitive aspect of attitude involves the beliefs of the language learners about the knowledge that they receive and their understanding in the process of language learning The emotional aspect of attitude helps learners to express whether they like or dislike the objects or surrounding situations It is agreed that the inner feelings and emotion of English language learners influence their perspectives and attitudes towards the target language (Choy & Troudi, 2006) In this study, only one aspect of attitude, that is the emotional aspect, is examined with a view to identifying the students‟ attitudes towards teachers‟ written corrective feedback (WCF) The reason why this aspect is emphasised is simple According to scholars, “Learning process is an emotional process It is affected by different emotional factors The teacher and his students engage in various emotional activities in it and varied fruits of emotion are yielded.” (Feng & Chen, 2009, p 94) Definitions of Feedback Feedback provides information relating to a specific learning process to assist learners in understanding the what, how and why of what they are learning/learned (Petchprasert, 2012) In addition, feedback makes comment on performance, thus making effective feedback on a learner‟s task/outcome, beneficial to learners (Bitchener, 2008; 2010; Leki, 1991) In this thesis, feedback is defined as written forms of correction on a student‟s progress on a written task This is a conventional practice in an education setting for teachers to provide written corrections either as anecdotal (pointing out strengths and weaknesses in sentences) or as markup, with errors underlined, circled or completely corrected Teachers may vary their frequency of feedback, correcting one, several or all instances of an error/s When reviewing their students‟ text, L2 teachers give feedback on a wide range of issues They might address the content of a text, the way in which its ideas are presented and organised, the appropriateness of the vocabulary that is used, and so on The type of feedback that has received most researchers‟ attention, however, is feedback on linguistic errors Such responses to L2 learners‟ non-targetlike production have been commonly referred to as instances of corrective feedback (Beuningen, 2010) Corrective feedback, therefore, is concerned with any incorrect grammatical or lexical use of the target language It is distinguished from feedback on content, which refers to any comment, suggestion, question, or request for clarification, elaboration, or information provided by the teacher that pertains to the ideas, organization, style, and rhetorical structure of the text (Hyland, K & Hyland, F., 2006) Types of Feedback Written corrective feedback (WCF), which is the focus of this study, is classified into four major types: direct feedback; indirect feedback; metalinguistic feedback; and focused/unfocused feedback (Ellis, 2009) Table 1.1 summarises these four types of feedback Table 1.1: A typology of written corrective feedback types Type of CF Description Studies Direct CF The teacher provides the student with the correct form The teacher indicates that an error exists but does not provide the correction e.g Lalande (1982) and Robb et al (1986) a Indicating and locating the error This takes the form of underlining and use of cursors to show omissions in the student‟s text b Indication only This takes the form of an indication in the margin that an error or errors have occurred in a line of text The teacher provides some kind of metalinguistic clue as to the nature of the error Various studies have employed indirect correction of this kind (e.g Ferris and Roberts 2001: Chandler 2003) Fewer studies have employed this method (e.g Robb et al 1986) Indirect CF Metalinguistic CF a Use of error codes b Brief grammatical descriptions The focus of the feedback a Unfocused CF b Focused CF The teacher writes codes in the margin (e.g ww = wrong word; art = article) Various studies have examined the effects of using error codes (e.g Lalande 1982; Ferris and Roberts 2001; Chandler 2003) The teacher numbers errors in Sheen (2007) compared the text and writes a grammatical effects of direct CF and direct description for each CF + metalinguistic CF numbered error at the bottom of the text This concerns whether the Most studies have teacher attempts to correct all investigated unfocused CF (or most) of the students‟ (e.g Chandler 2003; Ferris errors or selects one or two 2006) Sheen (2007), drawing specific types of errors to on traditions in SLA studies correct This distinction can of CF, investigated focused be applied to each of the CF above options Unfocused CF is extensive Focused CF is intensive Source: Ellis (2009) 3.1 Direct Corrective Feedback Direct corrective feedback may be defined as the provision of the correct linguistic form or structure above or near the linguistic error (Bitchener, Young, and & Cameron, 2005; Ferris, 2002) It may include the crossing out of an unnecessary word/ phrase/ morpheme, the insertion of a missing word/ phrase/ morpheme, or the writing of the correct form or structure above or near the erroneous form Direct corrective feedback has the advantage that it provides learners with explicit guidance about how to correct their errors This is clearly desirable if learners not know what the correct form is (i.e are not capable of selfcorrecting the error) Ferris and Roberts (2001) suggest direct corrective feedback is probably better than indirect corrective feedback with student writers of low levels of proficiency However, a disadvantage is that it requires minimal processing on the part of the learner and thus, although it might help them to produce the correct form when they revise their writing, it may not contribute to long-term learning However, a recent study by Sheen (2007) suggests that direct corrective feedback can be effective in promoting acquisition of specific grammatical features 3.2 Indirect Corrective Feedback On the other hand, indirect corrective feedback, which has been reported to be favoured by teachers and L2 writing researchers (e.g., Ferris & Hedgcock, 2005), indicates that in some way an error has been made This may be provided in one of three ways: underlining or circling the error; indicating errors in a given line by putting a check/ cross in the margin; or recording in the margin the number of errors in a given line (Ferris & Roberts, 2001; Robb, Ross, & Shortreed, 1986) Rather than the teacher providing an explicit correction, students are left to resolve and correct the problem which has been drawn to their attention Indirect feedback is often preferred to direct feedback on the grounds that it caters to „guided learning and problem solving‟ (Lalande 1982) and encourages students to reflect about linguistic forms For these reasons, it is considered more likely to lead to long-term learning (Ferris and Roberts op cit.) The results of studies that have investigated this claim, however, are very mixed Some studies (for example, Lalande op cit.) suggest that indirect feedback is indeed more effective in enabling students to correct their errors but others (for example, Ferris and Roberts‟ own study) found no difference between direct and indirect corrective feedback No study to date has compared the effects of these two types of corrective feedback on whether they have any effect on accuracy in new pieces of writing In accordance with the general line of argument by Ferris and Roberts, it might be claimed that indirect feedback where the exact location of errors is not shown might be more effective than indirect feedback where the location of the errors is shown as students would have to engage in deeper processing Robb et al (op cit.) investigated four types of feedback including direct feedback and indirect feedback where the number of errors was given in each line of the text They reported no significant difference Lee (1997), however, specifically compared the two types of indirect correction and found that learners were better able to correct errors that were indicated and located than errors that were just indicated by a check/ cross in the margin However, Lee did not consider longterm gains 3.3 Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback Metalingusitic corrective feedback involves providing learners with some form of explicit comment about the nature of the errors they have made The explicit comment can take two forms By far the most common is the use of error codes These consist of abbreviated labels for different kinds of errors The labels can be placed over the location of the error in the text or in the margin In the latter case, the exact location of the error may or may not be shown In the former, the student has to work out the correction needed from the clue provided while in the latter the student needs to first locate the error and then work out the correction A number of studies have compared using error codes with other types of written corrective feedback Lalande (op cit.) reported that a group of learners of L2 German that received correction using error codes improved accuracy in subsequent writing whereas a group receiving direct correction made more errors However, the difference between the two groups was not statistically significant Robb et al (op cit.) included an error codes treatment in their study but found it no more effective than any of the other three types of corrective feedback they investigated (i.e direct feedback and two kinds of indirect feedback) Ferris (op cit.) reported that error codes helped students to improve their accuracy over time in only two of the four categories of error she investigated Longitudinal comparisons between the number of errors in students‟ first and forth compositions showed improvement in total errors and verb errors but not in noun errors, article errors, lexical errors, or sentence errors Ferris and Roberts (op cit.) found that error codes did assist the students to self-edit their writing but no more so than indirect feedback Overall, then, there is very limited evidence to show that error codes help writers to achieve greater accuracy over time and it would also seem that they are no more effective than other types of corrective feedback in assisting self-editing The second type of metalinguistic corrective feedback consists of providing students with metalinguistic explanation of their errors This is far less common, perhaps because it is much more time-consuming than using error codes and also because it calls for the teacher to possess sufficient metalinguistic knowledge to be able to write clear and accurate explanations for a variety of errors Sheen (op cit.) compared direct and metalinguistic corrective feedback, finding that both were effective in increasing accuracy in the students‟ use of articles in subsequent writing completed immediately after the corrective feedback treatment Interestingly, the metalinguistic corrective feedback also proved more effective than the direct corrective feedback in the long term (i.e in a new piece of writing completed two weeks after the treatment) 10 3.4 Focused versus Unfocused Corrective Feedback Teachers can elect to correct all of the students‟ errors, in which case the corrective feedback is unfocused Alternatively they can select specific error types for correction The distinction between unfocused and focused corrective feedback applies to all of the previously discussed options Processing corrections is likely to be more difficult in unfocused corrective feedback as the learner is required to attend to a variety of errors and thus is unlikely to be able to reflect much on each error In this respect, focused corrective feedback may prove more effective as the learner is able to examine multiple corrections of a single error and thus obtain the rich evidence they need to both understand why what they wrote was erroneous and to acquire the correct form If learning is dependent on attention to form, then it is reasonable to assume that the more intensive the attention, the more likely the correction is to lead to learning Focused metalinguistic corrective feedback may be especially helpful in this respect as it promotes not just attention but also understanding of the nature of the error However, unfocused corrective feedback has the advantage of addressing a range of errors, so while it might not be as effective in assisting learners to acquire specific features as focused corrective feedback in the short term, it may prove superior in the long run The bulk of the corrective feedback studies completed to date have investigated unfocused corrective feedback In Sheen‟s study (op cit.), the corrective feedback was of the focused kind (i.e it addressed errors in the use of articles for first and second mention) and, as already noted, that proved effective in promoting more accurate language use of this feature However, to date, there have been no studies comparing the relative effects of focused and unfocused corrective feedback Effects of Corrective Feedback Debates by theorists exist about the effectiveness of written corrective feedback on the intrinsic pedagogical practices of L2 improvement in fluency and accuracy, whilst shaping a student‟s attitude towards more accurate self11 ... that teachers provided on their students‟ writings as reported by the students; - To gain understanding of the students‟ attitudes towards their teachers? ?? feedback on their writings as well as their. .. regarding their attitudes towards their teachers? ?? written corrective feedback types? 2.3 Scope of the Study The study, as a survey study, limits itself to the investigation of the attitudes of the 11th. .. INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES  NGUYỄN BÍCH HIỀN 11th GRADERS? ?? ATTITUDES TOWARDS THEIR TEACHERS? ?? WRITTEN FEEDBACK (Thái độ học sinh lớp 11 phản hồi dạng viết giáo viên)