EFL undergraduates’ perceptions of the use of screencast feedback in an online writing course

Abstract

This paper is written based on action research in which screencast feedback was adopted as an alternative to traditional writing feedback in a 15-week fully online academic writing course due to the Covid-19 breakout. The data were collected from 89 second-year English majors at a public university in central Vietnam via an online survey to explore their perceptions of this feedback-giving method. The findings reveal that the surveyed students generally showed a positive attitude toward screencast feedback as this novel kind of giving feedback is said to be necessary and helpful for their writing improvement. Students also favored screencast feedback over traditional written feedback as it is more informative, understandable, interactive, and beneficial for mutual learning among students. However, they also pointed out that time consumption, a limited number of writing pieces receiving feedback, and overloaded information to retain are some major drawbacks to screencast feedback being given synchronously in online lessons. Therefore, adjusting screencast feedback delivery from synchronous to asynchronous mode, sharing both screencast feedback videos and documents on LMS for students’ revisits at their convenience, and maximizing students’ opportunities to receive feedback are some recommended ways to improve the effectiveness of using screencast feedback in online writing courses.