i

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT STUDENTS’ PREFERENCE ON THE

TYPES OF WRITTEN CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree of

Sarjana Pendidikan

Yoan Ida Ringu Paubun

112011090

ENGLISH TEACHER EDUCATION PROGRAM

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

SALATIGA

2015

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ENGLISH DEPARTMENT STUDENTS’ PREFERENCE

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ON THE TYPES OF WRITTEN CORRECTIVE

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TABLE OF CONTENT

Approval Page ....................................................................................................... i

Copyright Statement ............................................................................................. ii

Publication Agreement Declaration ...................................................................... iii

Table of Content ................................................................................................... 1

List of Table……………………………………………………………………..2

ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... 3

Key Words ............................................................................................................ 3

INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................ 3

LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................................... 6

THE STUDY ........................................................................................................ 9

A. Context of the Study ................................................................................. 9

B. Participants of the study ............................................................................ 9

C. Instruments of Data Collection ................................................................. 10

D. Data Collection Procedure ........................................................................ 11

E. Data Analysis Procedure……………… ................................................. ..12

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ........................................................................ ..12

The type of WCF preferred by ED students………………………………..........13

Reasons behind the students’ preference of Metaliguistic WCF…………..........16

CONCLUSION ................................................................................................... ..22

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ................................................................................. ..25

REFERENCES ................................................................................................... ..26

APPENDIX ......................................................................................................... ..29

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LIST OF TABLE

Table 1 Total Students’ responses on each type of WCF………………………13

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ENGLISH DEPARTMENT STUDENTS’ PREFERENCE

ON THE TYPES OF WRITTEN CORRECTIVE

FEEDBACK

Yoan Ida Ringu Paubun

ABSTRACT

This study aims at investigating the students’ preference on the

types of Written Corrective Feedback provided by the teacher and their

reasons behind those preferences. Six types of written feedback proposed

by Rod Ellis (2008) such as (1) Direct, (2) Indirect, (3) Metalinguistic, (4)

Focus of the feedback, (5) Electronic, and (6) Reformulation were

investigated in this study. The data were collected through a Focus Group

Discussion with four groups of 18 students of English Department. The

findings show that all the participants preferred to have Metalinguistic

Written Corrective Feedback in their writing. The reasons were because

firstly, besides it was easy and understandable, this feedback at the same

time forced them to put some efforts in making the revision instead having

the revised draft given by the teacher. Secondly, perceiving themselves as

adult learners, the students preferred to have a more challenging feedback

and this type is found to be their ideal type compare to other types of

feedback. Thirdly, the students’ great of exposure and experiences in using

this feedback made them preferred to have this type of feedback.

Keywords: students’ preference, Written Corrective Feedback,

Metalinguistic Written Corrective Feedback.

INTRODUCTION

Many studies have examined the usefulness of Corrective

Feedback, written and oral. Specifically, for both ESL and EFL

classrooms, students and teachers find the usefulness of Written

Corrective Feedback (WCF) to improve the students’ writing because it

can help them to correct their writing errors (e.g., Diab, 2005; Ferris &

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Roberts, 2001; Montgomery & Baker, 2007). Some investigations that

have been done before exploring a variety of factors influenced the

effectiveness of corrective feedback (CF) for foreign language (FL),

especially on grammar learning.

Two of the factors that may contribute best are the mode of

feedback; oral or written (Doughty & Varella: 1998) and the other one,

that is specified in this study is the types of Written Corrective Feedback

(Ellis 2008). In short, some researchers may find CF was useful for

students and some may not. After all, Truscott (1996) argued against

corrective feedback’s ‘usefulness’ through his article “The case against

grammar correction” that was published in 1996. Since this article was

published, there have been some controversial issues continued arguing

whether WCF in classes were useful or not (Ferris, 1999; Truscott, 1999).

But then, there was also a growing of empirical evidence showing that

WCF can successfully target some types of linguistic errors (e.g.,

Bitchener & Knoch, 2008a; Chandler, 2003), that showed the usefulness

of WCF itself. This research has important implications for language

learning and teaching because students’ preference on certain types of

written corrective feedback is one of the factors that contribute best in the

students’ writing improvement, even though Elis (2008, p 10) said “of

course the type of CF is only one of several variables influencing the

effectiveness of written CF”.

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The purpose of this study is to investigate the type of WCF

preferred by ED students and their reason(s) why they prefer certain type

of WCF compare to the others. Therefore, it is conducted to answer these

two research questions:

1. What are the types of written corrective feedback that English

Department students prefer to have in their Guided Writing

class?

2. Why do ED students prefer particular types of Written

Corrective Feedback?

This study is important to be conducted because students’

preference on the type of WCF is believed as an important factor that can

help them to correct their writings’ errors. Because the context of this

study is in English Department students (ED) of Satya Wacana Christian

University, it is important to know the students’ preference on the types of

WCF and their reason(s) behind their preference. Therefore, to investigate

their preference(s), there are six types of WCF used for this study based on

Ellis (2008) typology of WCF. This study is also important in case that it

can make the Writing courses teachers of ED teachers to know the kind of

correction that their students want or prefer to have. Since students’

opinions and preferences for certain types and amounts of WCF affect

their use of it for learning, it is important for the writing teachers to

recognize the students’ preference. For example, if a student prefers or

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believes that one type of WCF is more useful, then he or she would be

more likely to pay more attention to the correction and use it for learning

than if he or she does not believe in its effects on their writing (Schulz,

2001, Ashwell, 2000; Chandler, 2003). Therefore, knowing the students’

preference and their reason(s) behind it is very important to the teachers to

help their students to make a piece of writing with lack of grammatical

errors.

LITERATURE REVIEW

As the researchers’ belief through many studies that have been

done before, WCF has a positive effect on students’ writing. In their study

about ‘The Role of Feedback in Second Language Writing’, Khaled Karim

and Dr. Hossein Nassaji (2012) summarized that in early research, some

studies even claimed to have found the positive evidence to support the

usefulness of WCF and almost all the recent studies found the positive and

significance effects of WCF for students’ writing. However, due to the

significance of WCF, studies (Amrhein & Nassaji, 2010; Diab, 2006;

Halimi, 2008) have showed that teachers are not very aware of students’

opinions and needs about the corrective feedback, what the students really

prefer or want to have. Whereas, Schulz (2001) said that if students’

specific expectations about corrective feedback are not met, then language

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learning could be disturbed. Therefore, Freedman (1987) believes that if

students fail in writing well, further feedback is necessary to help them to

take correct actions about their writing in order to improve it and reach an

acceptable level of performance.

In giving feedback for the students’ writings, the teachers usually

decide the type of feedback that they would use to help the students to

correct their writing errors. Therefore, there are some types of written

corrective feedback that teachers often use in giving feedback for the

students. Ellis (2008) in his study about Typology of Written Corrective

Feedback proposed six types of WCF. These types refer to kinds of WCF

that students often get from the teacher with different context and

examples served in each type. The first type is Direct CF. In this type, the

teacher will provide the student the feedback with correct form. It contents

an explicit guidance about how to correct their errors, i.e. crossing out an

unnecessary word, phrase or morpheme, inserting a missing word, phrase

or morpheme, inserting a missing word or morpheme, and writing the

correct form above or near to the erroneous form; related study’s example

for this type is related to Robb et al. (1986). The second type is Indirect

CF. In this type, the teacher indicates that an error exists in the students’

writings but does not provide the correction. The teachers would simply

indicate and locate the errors of students writing by underlining and use of

cursors to show omissions in the students’ writing. The second one is

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Indication only that takes the form of an indication in the margin that an

error or errors have taken place in a line of text.

The third type is Metalinguistic CF. In this type, the teacher

provides some kind of Metalinguistic clues as to the nature of the error,

like (1) The use of error code, where the teacher writes codes in the

margin (e.g. WW ¼ wrong word; art ¼ article). This type is related to

various studies that have examined the effects of using error codes (e.g.

Ferris and Roberts 2001; Chandler 2003). (2) Brief grammatical

descriptions, where the teacher numbers errors in text and writes a

grammatical description for each numbered error at the bottom of the text.

The fourth is the focus of the feedback. This type concerns whether

the teacher attempts to correct all (or most) of the students’ errors or

selects one or two specific types of errors to correct. For example, the

teacher could have chosen to correct just article errors; related study Sheen

(2007). The fifth one is Electronic Feedback. In this type of feedback, the

teacher indicates that an error occurs and provides examples of correct

usage (Milton: 2006). The last one is Reformulation Feedback where this

consists of a native speaker’s reworking of the students’ entire text to

make the language seem as native-like as possible while keeping the

content of the original intact. For this type, Sachs and Polio (2007)

compared the effects of direct correction and reformulation on students’

revisions of their text.

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THE STUDY

Context of the study

This study was conducted in ED of Satya Wacana Christian

University (SWCU) Salatiga, specifically in Expository and

Argumentative Writing class. As a writing course for intermediate writer-

students, this course focuses more on the products or writing that the

students make and then the teacher will give them feedback to correct

mistakes that they made in their writing, like the grammatical error,

punctuation, conjunction, relevance of the content, and the

interconnectedness of the paragraphs. During the semester, the teacher

gives students some topics to write and they have to make up story and

write it as their own story. Then in each meeting teacher gives the students

feedback for their writings and after that the students have to revise the

drafts based on the feedback from the teacher. Lastly, the very last draft

should be submitted based on the feedback that they get.

Participants of the study

18 ED students who joined Expository and Argumentative class

participated in this study, both are male and female. These 18 students

were chosen because they have joined two writing classes like Guided

Writing, Narrative & Descriptive Writing classes before that, and at the

time they were experiencing Expository and Argumentative Writing class.

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With these three classes that they have joined, therefore the students

should have had more exposure about Corrective Feedback as they have

experienced it in those classes. Therefore, the participants of this study

were chosen with purposive sampling (Patton, 1990) as the specific

criteria have been set above. This happened because especially by the

time, the participants experienced the writing class together.

Instrument of Data Collection

In this study the researcher provided information sheets for the

participants to help them to recognize six types of WCF. This study used

Focus Group Discussion (FGD) as the instrument of data collection since

it has benefits that suit to the atmosphere of the interview. As mentioned

in Zacharias (2013), in a FGD, the participants can “spark” when

discussing certain issues and it provides ‘safe’ atmosphere in which to

share opinions and a supportive environment. After doing the focus group,

then the collected data was analyzed descriptively. The reason of using

this kind of instrument was that the students can be more flexible and free

to express their opinion and give their reasons due to their preference

about the types of WCF. During the discussion, the tape recorder was used

to record the process of the discussion since it could help the researcher to

recall the interview process with the participants due to the transcribing

process of the data.

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Data Collection Procedures

After doing the pilot interview to check whether the information

sheets and the questions were problematic or not, then in the main study,

firstly the researcher met the lecturer of Expository and Argumentative

course to ask permission to do the research on the class that she was

teaching. Secondly, the researcher put the participants in four different

groups and arranged the time to do the interview in form of Focus Group

Discussion. Thirdly, the researcher gave the information sheets to the

participants a week before the focus group discussion was held, so they

would have time to read it.

Furthermore, in the meeting with each group, before starting the

discussion, the researcher explained the six types of WCF on the shared

information sheets. To make the participants felt free and comfortable in

sharing their ideas, the researcher then told the participants to be flexible,

whether they want to use English or their mother tongue ‘Indonesian’ for

the interview. The interview process itself was recorded for more detail

explanations and the questions on the discussion were added with some

additional questions to clarify the participants’ answers and to find the

expected data.

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Data Analysis Procedure

After doing all the discussions with the groups, then the researcher

transcribed the collected data using clean transcription that focuses on the

content of the interview, where it does not provide any extra information

as to the manner in which the content is communicated (Zacharias, 2013).

Since the language used for the discussion was Indonesian, therefore in

showing the results, the researcher translated the transcription into

English. The researcher combined each type of the WCF with another

types and found both the same and different reasons behind the students’

preference on the type of WCF. Next, the researcher did the coding

process for the transcription that has been translated. This coding included

highlighting the opinions about their preference and their reasons behind

it. Then the researcher described the students’ preference and their reasons

in the findings.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

As the research questions proposed for this study, this section

discusses about the students of Expository and Argumentative class’

responses about the type of WCF that they prefer to have and their reasons

behind their preference based on the types of WCF proposed by Rod Ellis

(2008). In general, the finding shows that the students have various

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reasons in showing their preference(s). Furthermore the students

themselves have the WCF that they prefer the most, WCF that they do not

prefer at all, and WCFs that they do not prefer yet to have.

The type of WCF preferred by English Department students

Overall, the table below shows the total responses that the students

gave for each type of WCF when they were asked about their preference

on each type of these Written Corrective Feedback types.

Table 1: Total students’ responses on each type of WCF

No.

Type of WCF

Students’ Responses

Prefer Not Prefer Not Prefer

Yet

1.

Direct WCF

14

4

-

2.

Indirect WCF

-

18

-

3.

Metalinguistic WCF

18

-

-

4.

Focus of the feedback

6

7

5

5.

Electronic WCF

10

6

2

6.

Reformulation WCF

8

5

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As the result of the study, Metalinguistic WCF was found to be the

feedback type that the students prefer the most. All students who

participated in this study prefer to have this type of feedback used by the

teacher to correct their drafts. Furthermore, the students elaborated various

responses related to this type, like;

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“type ini lebih menantang karena kita dikasih clue yang

jelas misalnya art* apa atau prep* apa, jadi bisa mikir apa

yang harus diganti di writing kita.”(Student C)

(This type is more ‘challenging’ because we were given clear clues like

for example *art or *prep, so we can think about what we should revise

in our writing.)

“type ini bagus karena kita diajari untuk belajar dan

berpikir juga. Selain itu Metalinguistic ini cukup detail.”

(Student I)

(This type is good because it teaches us to think and study. Besides

that, it is detail enough.)

“Kalau menurut saya, yang metalinguistic ini lebih

membantu. Type ini cukup ringkas. Penjelasannya cukup

jelas kayak Direct feedback tapi cukup singkat juga kayak

Indirect feedback.” (Student Q)

(I think this type is more helpful. This type is brief enough. The

explanation is clear enough like the Direct WCF type but it is also short

enough like Indirect WCF.)

“Hampir sama menantang kayak feedback lainnya. Bagus

kalau dalam writing kita ada clue-cluenya itu. Jadinya kita

bisa belajar juga dengan feedback ini.” (Student O)

(It is challenging enough like those feedbacks. It is good if there are

such clues for us. We can study too with this feedback.)

In giving their views, student C, I, Q, and O elaborated positive

responses about Metalinguistic WCF. As they have experienced using this

type, these students valued this type as their ideal type of feedback that

they would have. To the students, Metalinguistic WCF was a challenging

type of feedback since it provided clearer clues that lead them to the

revision, and the clues were not confusing compare to some other types of

feedback. Then, those clearer clues that require further processing gave the

students enough sources of correction to make revision. Besides that, this

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feedback provided a chance of self- learning, where the students could

study from the mistakes that they have made. Furthermore, they valued

this type of feedback was brief and clear enough. Besides that it also

provided details correction for the students to make revisions.

As mentioned in the Table, 14 out of 18 of the students preferred

Indirect WCF type as the second most preferred feedback to have. But, in

giving their ideas about this type, some students who prefer it were still

doubtful about their preference. Even though they viewed this type was

easier and helpful, this type seemed to have significant weakness for the

sake of the students’ improvement in their (future) writing. Therefore, in

showing their preference(s), student H elaborated his idea like;

“Iya, prefer ini, soalnya yang salah langsung dikasih tanda

dan langsung diberikan koreksinya jadi tinggal nulis ulang

tapi kita jadinya gak ada effort dan gak belajar karena

tinggal nulis ulang.”

(Yes, I prefer this type (Direct WCF) because the wrong parts are

already crossed and the revisions are given directly. But the problem is

we would have no effort to correct our mistakes and no further study

from the mistakes because we would just need to write the revised

revision.)

And furthermore student R compared the Metalinguistic and Direct WCF

like;

“Ini hampir sama kayak yang pertama tadi, Direct Written.

Tapi ini lebih membantu, misalnya Art, WW, Prepositions

salah, kita jadi bisa belajar lagi, spesifik ke article atau

preposition.”

(It is almost the same as Direct WCF but this type (Metalinguistic) is

more helpful. For example, if art, wrong word, or the prepositions are

wrong, then we can study about the use of article or preposition

specifically.)

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At this point, the students valued Direct WCF made them became

‘too easy’ and they got nothing since the correct revisions were already

there and they only have to revise it. Furthermore, this feedback does not

provide reflection towards their writing products. Therefore,

Metalinguistic WCF was valued as the right feedback that can make them

learn from the mistakes that they have made, but they also would not feel

that easy or difficult in revising the drafts as well.

Reasons behind the Students’ Preference of Metalinguistic WCF

Following to the students’ preference part above, in this part the

researcher discusses the findings around the students’ reasons behind their

preference of Metalinguistic WCF. In this part, the researcher categorizes

and elaborates three main reasons behind the students’ preferences.

Firstly, compare to other types of feedback, the students found

Metalinguistic WCF as a very helpful feedback to them. It was not only

because it helped them in case that it was easy and understandable but this

feedback at the same time gave them courage to put some efforts in

making the revision.

These ideas of this 1st reason were presented by Student I and student F,

like;

“prefer type ini. Type ini bagus karena kita diajari untuk

berpikir dan belajar juga. Selain itu, Metalinguistic ini

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cukup detail. Kita juga diajari buat mikir, kalau yang

pertama kan, dosennya kadang pake direct tapi jarang.

“(Student I)

(I prefer this type (Metalinguistic) because with this feedback we are

taught to think and study. Besides that this type is detail enough .we are

taught to think with this type. Well sometimes the lecturer uses Direct

WCF but it is very rare. )

“Ya, mending punya feedback kayak gini. Jelas karena kita

tau kita buat kesalahan dan tau yang salah verbnya, article

atau apa. Gak kayak Direct Feedback, kita tetap ada effort

dan tetap tau salahnya apa. Karena misalnya dibilang ganti

articlenya jadi langsung tau kalo ‘art’nya salah. Jadi lebih

fokus.” (student F)

(Well, it is better to have such a feedback like this (Metalinguistic

WCF). It is clear because we notice that we made mistakes and we

know that the verb or maybe the article is wrong. Unlike Direct

Feedback, we still show our effort and know the mistakes. For example

like if we are asked to change the article, we would directly know that

the article is wrong, so we can be more focus)

At this first reason, the students valued Metalinguistic WCF as a

helpful feedback because it provided reflection to the students’ writing

processes, where they became more aware of the process in learning from

the mistakes and made revision based on the correction. At this point, as

stated in Miller (2002), feedback lets students know how they are doing

and extend learning opportunities seems true. With this type of feedback,

the students can also see the progress in their writings based on the

mistakes recognition served by this type, whether they have performed

well or not, and they can also learn from this type of WCF. Furthermore,

since this type provided room for them to revise and not simply editing the

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draft like some other types because it required more effort to make

revision with this type.

Secondly, from the students’ perspective, they valued themselves

as adult learners who would be better to have a more challenging

feedback. As mentioned before, Metalinguistic WCF was valued as a

challenging feedback, where the students would need efforts to make

revision with this type. In short, from any aspects, this type was valued as

the best type of feedback to the students. Therefore to represent this idea,

student E significantly stated,

“saya tidak sepaham sama teman-teman karena kalau buat

mahasiswa, kalau langsung dikasih revisian kayak gini

langsung, kita jadinya gak mikir dulu. Sudah langsung

dapat koreksiannya. Padahal ada kemungkinan kita bisa

membuat kesalahan yg sama lagi nantinya. Jadi ini tidak

cukup membantu untuk lain kali lebih teliti, oh ini pake ‘a’

atau ‘the’ gak ya, gitu. Kurang menantang.”

(I am not at the same idea with others (prefer to have Direct WCF)

because for University students, if such a revision like this is given

directly, we would not think about the correct form that we should use

because we have got the revision, whereas there is a possibility that we

will make the same mistakes in our future writing. This is not help us

enough to be more aware next time whether we should use article ‘a’ or

‘the’. It’s not challenging enough.)

Student E’s response emerged the idea of ‘challenging’ feedback,

where feedback that suit to University students should not be easy. At this

point, the student’s response bears a resemblance to Ferris’ statement,

where Ferris (2002) stated that direct CF is appropriate for beginner

learners. Furthermore, other students added that Direct WCF was too

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simple and they cannot learn much if they use this type of feedback. At

this point, a ‘too easy’ feedback like what the students have mentioned

may not raise their awareness of the mistakes in their writing and

furthermore it did not facilitate their self -correction for their coming

writing. So, in this case, self –correction which was meant to make the

students learn not to repeat their errors in the future had a very significant

role, but it might not happened especially when the feedback like Direct

WCF promoted the correct revision directly.

Thirdly, the researcher found that students’ exposure about the

WCF became one of the significant factors that influenced the students in

showing their preference. In short, their experiences using this type of

feedback for the class and in some previous classes became the reason

why they prefer to have Metalinguistic WCF, the same as what student N

and F said in the interview like;

“Kurang lebih sama sih. Karena lebih familiar sama ini

juga jadi prefer. Selama ini juga pakenya ini. Untuk

betulin-betulin revisinya jadi lebih enak kalau pake kayak

gini. Yang pertama tadi enak sih, tapi lebih prefer pakai

yang ini” (Student N)

(More or less it is almost the same. I prefer this type because it is more

familiar to me. During this time we have used this and it is nice to

make revision with this type. The 1st one (Direct) is good but I prefer

this (Metalingustic.))

“Yah sama sih karena kita milih ini jg mungkin karena kita

sudah terbiasa sih dari awal belajar Writing sampai

sekarang masih pakai ini juga.” (Student F)

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(Ya, it is the same with my friends. Besides that we choose this type

because are already accustomed to use this type since we join Writing

class until now.)

When the students were asked whether they were familiar with this

type or not, all of them answered yes they were. Therefore in gaining the

information, mostly all the students are actively participated in giving their

view and opinion about this type compare to another types. In this case,

the researcher found that the lack of exposure for certain types of feedback

influenced the students’ preference(s). A great deal of students’ exposure

toward this feedback became the reason behind their preference. Besides

that, even though feedback types like Focus of the feedback, Electronic

WCF, and Reformulation caught the students’ attention but lacking of

exposure of these types of feedback made the students not prefers to have

those types yet. Therefore as the result, not many ideas were shared or

elaborated in the discussion about these types.

Furthermore, when the students were asked about their views about

Indirect WCF, in contrast to Metalinguistic WCF where all of the students

preferred to have it, none of the students preferred to have this type of

feedback because they found it difficult and confusing to understand the

correction with this type, especially since the ‘clues’ were confusing and

not clear to them. Therefore, student O commented,

“kalau dari mahasiswanya sendiri pasti lebih susah dari

sebelumnya karena hanya simbol kayak gini sih.

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Revisiannya susah untuk dipahami, untuk cari yang benar,

misalnya X = MW, Missing Wordnya gak jelas yang mana

yg hilang.”

(For the students themselves, this type would be more difficult compare

to the previous one (Direct WCF) because it only gives symbols like

this. The correction is difficult to understand, to find the correct form,

for example X = MW, it is not clear what exactly the word missed

there.)

and student B further assumed,

“Maybe this type is useful for advance learners because

they have sufficient knowledge about this compare to those

beginner or intermediate learners”

At this point, clear and understandable clues given in the revision

played a significant role for the students to show their preference. The

students needed a feedback which is clear and not confusing but not too

easy as well. Therefore, Indirect WCF was not the appropriate type that

can meet the students’ needs to make revision with it, especially since the

students valued that this type would be more appropriate for advance

learners with sufficient knowledge to understand the symbols.

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CONCLUSION

The aim of this study is to investigate the students’ preference on

the types of Written Corrective Feedback and their reasons behind their

preferences. The findings of the study showed that all the participants

prefer to have Metalinguistic WCF in their writings. As the findings, the

students’ preference was influenced by three main reasons. Firstly,

compare to another types of feedback, the students found Metalinguistic

WCF as a very helpful feedback to them. It is not only because it helps

them in case that it is easy and understandable but this feedback at the

same time gave them courage to put some efforts in making the revision.

Secondly, viewing themselves as adult learners, the students thought that it

would be better to have a more challenging feedback like Metalinguistic in

their writing. Compare to other feedbacks, Metalinguistic WCF was

viewed as their ideal type of feedback. Thirdly, the researcher found that

students’ exposure about the WCF has become one of the significant

factors that influenced the students in showing their preference. The other

results of this study drew that Focus of the Feedback, Reformulation, and

Electronic WCF were types that the students did not prefer yet since they

had less exposure about these three types. Furthermore, Indirect WCF

became the type of feedback that the students did not prefer to have since

revision was not clear and the students felt confused about it as well.

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The implication of the results in this study for teaching are first,

Writing teachers are supposed to provide Metalinguisitc WCF to students’

writing since this is the most preferable type of feedback by the students,

especially because all of them showed positive views about this type of

feedback. Besides giving explicit correction on the writing, this feedback

is able to enhance the students’ writing ability without using any

confusing symbols. Second, teachers have to think carefully when they

want to provide Indirect WCF because none of the students prefer to have

this type of feedback, despite their opinion that everything depended on

the teacher, whether she or he would use certain type of feedback.

Moreover, all the students showed negative views about this type since the

symbols used there are confusing and it is not understandable. Third, the

Writing teachers can also use Focus of the feedback, Electronic, and

Reformulation corrective feedback because as the finding on this study,

the researcher found that students’ lack of exposure toward these three

types of feedback made them not to prefer it yet. Besides that, despite

lacking of exposure toward these types, students viewed these feedbacks

positively like it is helpful as well. Therefore, it would be nice if the

students can experience different types of feedback.

The finding of this study cannot be generalized to all the FLL

university students because the subjects of this study are not general and

this study is conducted in a university only. Moreover, this study focuses

24

only on the students’ preference and reasons behind it without considering

the teachers’ preferences and reasons as well. Therefore, further research

is needed to find writing teachers’ preferences and reasons behind it since

it can make it easier to find the more effective and suitable type of

feedback for the students in improving their writing ability. Besides that,

further study to investigate how students work on their WCF is necessary,

whether the students do really make the revision based on the correction

given by the teacher or not and the study can also investigate the reasons

why the students do not make the revision based on the correction given

by the teacher as well.

.

25

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It is a genuine pleasure to express my deep sense of thanks and

gratitude to My Jesus Christ for every blessing that He put into my life,

especially for everything that were necessary for me to complete this

study. I owe a deep sense of gratitude to my supervisor Mrs. Athriyana

Santye Pattiwael M.Hum for her timely advice, meticulous security,

scholarly advice and scientific approach that have helped me to a very

great extent to accomplish this study. I wish to express my sincere thanks

to my examiner, Yustinus Calvin G. Mali, M.Hum for the sincere and

valuable guidance and encouragement extended to me. I am also grateful

to Mrs. Anne Timothius as she has helped me during my data collection

time and to the participants who has taken part on this study. It is my

privilege to thank my parents, Susi, Lory, Hans and Jack for their never

ending love and constant encouragement throughout my study period.

Lastly, I am extremely thankful to my beloved friends Femy, Wasty,

Venny, Mira, Ruth, and Eka who always supported and helped me

throughout this venture.

26

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multi-draft composition classroom: Is content feedback followed

by form feedback the best method? Journal of Second Language

Writing, 9, 227–57

Bitchener, J., & Knoch, U. (2008) The value of a focused approach to

written corrective feedback, Language Teaching Research, 12,

409-431.

Chandler, J. (2003). The efficacy of various kinds of error feedback for

improvement in the accuracy and fluency of L2 student writing.

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Diab, R. L. (2005). Teachers' and students' beliefs about responding to

ESL writing: A case study. TESL Canada Journal, 23, 28-43.

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Doughty & J. Williams (Eds.), Focus on form in classroom second

language acquisition (pp. 114-138). Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press.

Ellis, R. (2008). A typology of written corrective feedback types. ELT

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classes. A response to Truscott (1996). Journal of Second

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Language Writing, 8, 1–10.http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S1060-

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Milton, J. (2006). ‘Resource-rich Web-based feedback: Helping learners

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Feedback in Second Language Writing: Contexts and Issues.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Montgomery, J., & Baker, W. (2007). Teacher-written feedback: Student

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performance. Journal of Second Language Writing, 16, 82-99

Patton, M. (1990). Qualitative evaluation and research methods (pp. 169-

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Robb, T., S. Ross, & I. Shortreed. 1986. ‘Salience of feedback on error

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APPENDIX A

Information sheet form

The types of Corrective Feedback and examples by Rod Ellis (2008)

1. Direct written corrective feedback

It provides learners with explicit guidance about how to correct their errors. Teachers

provide correct form, i.e. crossing out an unnecessary word, phrase or morpheme,

inserting a missing word, phrase or morpheme, inserting a missing word or morpheme,

and writing the correct form above or near to the erroneous form.

Example:

Student’s writing:

A boy stole wallet from girl. He escaped with having wallet. When the girl was going

through bridge over the river she found boy in the river.

Teacher’s correction:

a a the

A boy stole X wallet from X girl. He escaped with having X wallet. When the girl was

going

over a a saw a

through bridge over the river she found boy in the river.

2. Indirect written corrective feedback

Involves indicating that the learner has made an error but without actually correcting it.

This can be done by underlining the errors or using cursors to show omissions in the

learners’ text or by placing a cross in the margin next to the line containing the error.

30

Example:

Student’s writing:

A boy stole wallet from girl. He escaped with having wallet. When the girl was going

through bridge over the river she found boy in the river.

Teacher’s correction:

A boy stole X wallet from X girl. He escaped with XhavingX Xwallet. When the girl was

going XthroughX Xbridge over XtheX river she found X boy in the river.

Notes:

X : missing word

X___X : wrong word

3. Metalinguistic written corrective feedback

Provides learners with some form of explicit comment about the nature of the errors they

have made.

Use of error codes, i.e. abbreviated labels for different kinds of errors placed over

the location of the error in the text or in the margin. e.g. art = article, prep =

preposition, sp = spelling, ww = wrong word, t = tense, etc.

Metalinguistic explanations of their errors, e.g. numbering errors and providing

metalinguistic comments at the end of the text.

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Examples:

art. art. WW art.

A boy stole wallet from girl. He escaped with having wallet. When

Prep. art. art. Art

the girl was going through bridge over the river she found boy in the

river.

Art. x 3; WW

A boy stole wallet from girl. He escaped with having

wallet

Prep.; art.

When the girl was going through bridge over the river

she

Art.

found boy in the

river.

4. Focus of the feedback

This concerns whether the teacher attempts to correct all (or most) of the students’ errors

or selects one or two specific types of errors to correct. This distinction can be applied to

each of the above options.

Example:

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(1) (2) (3)

A boy stole wallet from girl. He escaped with having bone. When the girl was

(4) (5) (6) (7)

going through bridge over the river she found boy in the river.

Correction:

(1), (2), (5), and (6) (7)— you need ‘a’ before the noun when a person or thing is

mentioned for the first time.

(3)—you need ‘the’ before the noun when the person or thing has been mentioned

previously.

(4)—you need ‘over’ when you go across the surface of something; you use

‘through’ when you go inside something (e.g. ‘go through the forest’).

So, for the focus of the feedback, in the above examples the teacher could have chosen to

correct just article errors.

5. Electronic written corrective feedback

Extensive corpora of written English can be exploited to provide learners with assistance

in their writing. Electronic resources provide learners with the means where they can

appropriate the usage of more experienced writers.

An example of electronic written corrective feedback

“Mark My Words” (Milton 2006)

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6. Reformulation written corrective feedback

This involves native-speakers rewriting learners’ texts in such a way as ‘to preserve as

many of the writers’ ideas as possible, while expressing them in their own words so as to

make the pieces sound native-like’.

Example:

Original version : As he was running, his knees were shaked.

Reformulation : As he was running, his knees were shaking.

knees shaking

Error correction : As he was jogging his tammy were shaked.

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APPENDIX B

Interview Questions

Interview questions for each type of WCF in the information sheet.

1. Can you recognize this type of Feedback in your Writing?

2. If you are given this kind of feedback, will you prefer this type as your Corrective

Feedback or not? Why?

3. What do you think about this type? Does it helpful for you to recognize the errors

that you make in your writing?

4. Is this Feedback facilitates you to revise your drafts?