Students’ and Teachers’ Beliefs about Written Corrective Feedback: Perspectives on Amount, Type, and Focus of Feedback in an EFL Setting

Abstract

Many writing teachers believe that giving written corrective feedback (WCF) is an important part of learning to write. Equally, students like to receive it. However, most previous research on WCF has looked at its overall effectiveness, with less attention paid to the differences of opinion between students and their teachers, and the implications of these differences. Accordingly, our aim was to investigate further these differences by carrying out a partial replication of Amrhein and Nassaji (2010). Using a combination of multiple-choice questions, Likert scale items, and open-ended questions, we sampled the beliefs of 469 undergraduates and 40 of their teachers at two public Thai universities. Our findings revealed significant differences of opinion between both groups when it came to the ideal amount of WCF, preferred type of WCF for grammatical errors, and the most useful WCF for specific error types. Qualitative comments also highlighted the affective side of WCF, the realities of the task-at-hand for teachers, and a misalignment between theory and practice. Based on our findings, we make recommendations for teacher development, cross-cultural awareness in teaching writing, increased communication between students, teachers, and theorists, and the importance of assessment rubrics in the feedback process.