Students Perceptions Towards The Effective Feedback Practices in PDF

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Theses and Dissertations
5-2013
Students' Perceptions Towards the Effective

Feedback Practices in the Large EFL Writing Class
Based on Participants, Gender, and English
Proficiency Level
Rini Susanti
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Gender, and English Proficiency Level" (2013). Theses and Dissertations. Paper 1182.
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STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS TOWARDS THE EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK
PRACTICES IN THE LARGE EFL WRITING CLASS BASED ON PARTICIPANTS,
GENDER, AND ENGLISH PROFICIENCY LEVEL
A Thesis
Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies and Research
in Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
Master of Arts
Rini Susanti
May 2013
© 2013 Rini Susanti
All Rights Reserved
ii
School of Graduate Studies and Research
Department of English
We hereby approve the thesis of
Rini Susanti
Candidate for the degree of Master of Arts
April 10, 2013_____________ Signature on file_______________________

David I. Hanauer, Ph.D.
Professor of English, Advisor

Sharon Deckert, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of English

Gloria Park, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of English
ACCEPTED
Signature on file_______________________ _____________________

Timothy P. Mack, Ph.D.
Dean
School of Graduate Studies and Research
iii
Title: Students’ Perceptions towards the Effective Feedback Practices in the Large EFL
Writing Class Based on Participants, Gender, and English Proficiency Level
Author: Rini Susanti
Thesis Chair: David I. Hanauer, Ph.D.
Thesis Committee Members: Sharon Deckert, Ph.D,
Gloria Park, Ph.D.
Motivated by my own experience in teaching and learning academic writing in a
large class of more than 50, I aim to find out the students’ perceptions towards the
effective feedback practices in a large EFL writing class of undergraduates in Indonesia.
There were 150 students participating by answering the 26 closed-ended questions in the
questionnaire. The data was analyzed by using SPSS based on participants, gender, and
English proficiency level (the students’ TOEFL scores).
The findings showed that based on participants, gender, and English proficiency
level, the students had the same perception that feedback from their lecturers is effective
when it is given in written form, while from their peers, it should be in oral form.
However, students had different perceptions towards direct and indirect feedback and
which draft to receive feedback on. In addition, the students perceived similarly that
correction on the surface level errors is the most important to get.
iv
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It would not have been possible to write this master thesis without the help and
support of the kind people around me, to only some of whom it is possible to give
particular mention here. First of all, this thesis would not have been possible without the
help, support and patience of my thesis adviser Dr. David I. Hanauer, not to mention his
advice and unsurpassed knowledge of writing the thesis. You make my way to
quantitative study which was a nightmare for me before. I am now a fan of statistic
because of you.
I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to my other committee members
Dr. Sharon Deckert for her thoughtful and valuable guidance and support and Dr. Gloria
Park for her intellectual and emotional support during this thesis writing and my
academic journey in Indiana University of Pennsylvania. I wish to thank to Dr. Smith
who have encouraged me to write the thesis and Dr. Savova for the knowledge you have
shared. I also express my gratitude to all the faculty members, staff, graduate students
and my wonderful cohorts in the TESOL and Composition program who helped and
supported me.
My special thanks are for the Fulbright scholarship for granting me the
opportunity to come to the United States of America which makes my dream come true. I
am grateful to the people in AMINEF who helped me with all the stuffs. This thesis
would not exist without my participants’ willingness to participate in my study; I would
like to thank them for this. Additionally, I am especially appreciative of Prof. Indawan
Syahri, Miss Tri Rositasari, Finza, and Dwi Rara to help me collecting the data.
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Above all, I would like to thank my husband Deddy Apriady, ST., M. Msi for his
personal support and great patience at all times. Thank you for putting up with me first of
all. I am so far from perfect, and so far from being the wife I want to be for you. Thank
you for reading to the children every night, and for helping with bath-time to give me a
“break” to focus on my thesis. I LOVE YOU. Thanks to my children (Ghibran, Ghina,
and Ghaniah) for your smile every time I need new spirit. This is not my success, but this
is your success; my husband and children.
I am greatly indebted to my sister (Tina), my brother (Alm. Didi), my parents in
law (Rifai and Launiah) who have given me their unequivocal support throughout, as
always, for which my mere expression of thanks likewise does not suffice. To Umar
Abdullah whom helps me all the way since the process of scholarship application to life
adjustment in the U.S. I would also thank to all my classmates in MA TESOL program
for the friendship, supports, and everything. Thanks to Dr. Kustim Wibowo, Suwarni
Wibowo, Mbak Indah, Fikri, Ilus, Dr. Nurhaya Muchtar, and Tati for all supports and
encouragement. For all my colleagues in Muhammadiyah University of Palembang,
especially the president of the university (Mr. Idris) thanks for the supports.
Finally, I would like to thank to my parents (Ningyu Angkut and Ahmad Ansjori,
M). I know, you do not need this thank you, but I am doing it for myself. I never said it
before, but you are the best parents one could ever get. Lucky me! You really mean the
world to me. You gave me the wings to fly away to reach the star to get my dream. Thank
you very much for the love, care, and affection you showered me with. I may not be able
to ever return that to you, I just want to say I love you! Hope I can make the rest of your
life happy and proud.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter Page
One INTRODUCTION............................................................................................. 1
The Use of Feedback in Indonesian Education………………..………………1

The Change of Higher Education System in Indonesia………………………. 2
Higher Education in Indonesia……………………………………………….. 4
Private University in Indonesia………………………………………….. 5
English Study Program in the Faculty of Teacher Training and Education….. 6
Researcher Positionality……………...………………………………………..8
My Undergraduate Degree Learning Experiences…...…………………...8
My Teaching Experiences ………………………………………………10
My Learning Experience in the USA …………………………………...11
Purpose of the Study …………………………………………………………12
Research Questions …………………………………………………………..13
Significance of the Study ……………………………………………………13
Overview of Upcoming Chapters ……………………………………………14
Two LITERATURE REVIEW ……………………………………………………15
Defining Feedback …………………………………………………………...15

Sources of Feedback …………………………………………………………17
Teacher Feedback ………………………………………………………17
Peer Feedback …………………………………………………………..20
Kinds of Feedback Practices in Writing……………………………………...23
Feedback on the Writing Features……………………………………… 23
Direct and Indirect Feedback…………………………………………... 26
Oral and Written Feedback…………………………………………….. 29
Feedback on the First and Final Draft………………………………….. 31
The Importance of Feedback to the EFL Students’ Writing………………… 32
What is the Effective Feedback? ………………………………………. 33
Defining Large Class………………………………………………………... 36
Studies about Feedback in Large Class …………………………………….. 38
Conclusion ………………………………………………………………….. 42
Three METHODOLOGY………………………………………………………….. 43
Research Design……………………………………………………………...43
Sampling Method……………………………………………………………. 43
The Data Collection Method………………………………………………… 45
Data Collection Procedures…………………………………………………..46
Pilot Testing…………………………………………………………………. 47
Data Analysis………………………………………………………………... 48
Summary ……………………………………………………………………. 49
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Four RESULTS ……………………………………………………………………50
Description of the Program …………………………………………………..50

Participant Demographics …………..……………………………….………51
Data Interpretation …………………..………………………………………53
Research Question 1................................................................................. 54
Perceptions about the Effective Feedback Practices based on
Participants………………………………………………...………. 54
Oral and Written Feedback……………………………………. 55
Direct and Indirect Feedback …………………………………. 56
Feedback on the First and Final Draft …………………….…...56
Gender……………………………………………………………... 58
Feedback on the First and Final Draft ……………………… 61
English Proficiency Level…………………………………..……. 63
Feedback on the First and Final Draft …………………………67
Research Question 2……………………………………………….....….71
The Most Important Writing Features based on Participants………71
The Most Important Writing Features based on Gender……….…..73
The Most Important Writing Features based on English
Proficiency Level ……………………………………..……………74
Conclusion ……………………………………………………....………….. 77
.
Five CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION…………………………….. 80
Summary of the Research Findings…………………………………………. 80

Students’ Perceptions about the Effective Feedback in
the Large EFL Writing Class ………………...………………………...81
Participants …………………………………………………………81
Gender ………………………………..…………………………. 84
English Proficiency Level ………..………………………………...87
Students’ Perceptions about the Most Important Writing
Features to be Responded to by……………………………………... ...91
Participants …………………………………………………………91
Gender …..…………………………………………………………92
English Proficiency Level ………………………………………… 93
Conclusion of the Findings …………………………………………………. 96
Implications of the Study ………………………………………………….. 101
viii
Recommendations …………………………………………………………..102
Minister of Education in Indonesia…………………………………...102
Curriculum Designers…………………………………………………102
Classroom Practitioner………………………………………………...103
Future Researchers…………………………………………………….104
Limitations of the Study…………………………………………………….105
Final Comments …………………………………………………………… 106
REFERENCES………………………………………………………………...………. 107
APPENDICES………………………………………………………………..………... 121
Appendix A - IRB Forms …………………………… ………………….………. 121

Appendix B - Informed Consent Form……….…………………………….……. 126
Appendix C - Questionnaire …...………………………………………….……...128
Appendix D - Research Topic Approval …………………………………..….…. 134
Appendix E - Institutional Review Board (IRB) Approval…………………..….. 135
Appendix F - Direct Recommendation of the Students’ Perceptions towards
Kinds of Feedback for Writing in a Large Class …………………..136
Appendix G - Table of Data Sheet…………………….…………......................... 137
Appendix H - SPSS-Two Way ANOVA-Participants ………………………...….142
Appendix I- SPSS-Three Way ANOVA-Gender………………………………..147
Appendix J- SPSS-Three Way ANOVA-English Proficiency Level .....…….….155
ix
LIST OF TABLES
Table Page
1 Studies in the Nineties about Feedback on the Surface Level Errors ……………26
2 Gender of Participants ………………………………………………………….. 51
3 English Proficiency Level of Participants………………………………………. 52
4 Feedback Sources ………………………………………………………………..54
5 Written and Oral Feedback based on Participants………………………………. 56
6 Direct and Indirect Feedback based on Participants ……………………...……...56
7 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Participants……………..……...57
8 Two Way ANOVA Participants-Question…………………………………….. 58
9 Levene’s Test of Equality of Error Variances…………………………………... 58
10 Feedback Sources based on Gender……………………………………………... 59
11 Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender……………………59
12 Written and Oral Feedback from Peers based on Gender……..………………… 60
13 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender……………..….. 60
14 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on Gender…………….……...... 61
15 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Gender……………………...…. 61
16 Three Way ANOVA Gender-Participants-Question……………………………..62
17 Feedback Sources based on English Proficiency level………………………..….63
18 Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency

Level.......................................................................................................................64
19 Written and Oral Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level….... 64
20 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency

Level……………………………………………………………………………...65
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21 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency
Level……………………………………………………………………………...66
22 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level..... 66
23 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level ….67
24 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores

Ranging from 200 to 400 ………………………………...………………………67

Ranging from 401 to 500 and above…………………………………………….. 67

Ranging from 200 to 400…………………………………………………….….. 68

Ranging from 401 to 500 and above…………………………………………….. 68
28 Three Way ANOVA English Proficiency Level-Participants-Question …...…. 70
29 Multiple Comparisons (Post-hoc Test)………………………………………….. 71
30 Feedback on the Writing Features ……………………………………………… 72
31 Feedback on the Writing Features from Lecturers …...…… ……………………73
32 Feedback on Writing Features from Peers ……..……………………………….. 74
33 Feedback on Writing Features from Lecturers

(TOEFL Score 200 to 400)……………………………………………………… 75
34 Feedback on Writing Features from Lecturers

(TOEFL Score 401 to 500 and above)………………………………………… 76
35 Feedback on Writing Features from Peers

(TOEFL Score 200 to 400) ……………………………………………………... 77
36 Feedback on Writing Features from Peers

(TOEFL Score 401 to 500 and above)………………………………………… 77
37 Summary Table of the Source of Feedback based on

The Three Independent Variables………………………………………………..97
38 Summary Table of Feedback based on Participants……………………………...98
xi
39 Summary Table of Feedback based on Gender ………………………………….99
40 Summary Table of Feedback based on English Proficiency Level……………..100
xii
LIST OF FIGURES
Figures Page
1 Distributions of the 3,016 Higher Education……………………………………. 4
2 Survey Result about Students’ Writing Problem…………………………………11
3 Pie Chart of Gender of the Participants ………………………………………….52
4 Pie Chart of English Proficiency Level…………...…….………………………..53
5 Bar Chart of Kinds of Feedback Practices based on Participants …...…………. 55
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CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
This study was designed to explore the students’ perceptions about the effective
feedback in a large EFL writing class in a private university in Indonesia. In this chapter I
describe the overall content of this thesis project. First, the background of the study is
described. It illustrates what the research is about and proposes some underlying reasons
on why I am interested in conducting the research. Next, purposes of the study and the
research questions are explained, and the significance of the study is presented. Finally,
the chapter is concluded by describing the content of each chapter in this thesis.
The Use of Feedback in Indonesian Education
Every teacher intentionally or unintentionally provides their students with
feedback when teaching. The feedback can be positive and negative. To this, feedback is
defined as the teachers’ reaction to students’ learning attitude and performance. It can be
given as positive feedback when the students do good job, or it can be given as negative
feedback when the students do something wrong (Waring & Wong, 2009). These kinds
of feedback are used by most of teachers in Indonesia starting from early school stages to
higher education.
Feedback is defined differently when it aims to help the students with the writing
problems, because the position of English as a foreign language in Indonesia requires
learners to adjust their L1 writing to their EFL writing. In addition, feedback in writing is
defined as the corrections given by teachers to the students towards the errors or mistakes
in their writing. Commonly in Indonesia, feedback is given by teachers to their students
due to the cultural issue that teachers are the people who are educated to teach and correct
1
their students’ assignments while students are people who have to receive the corrections
and obey every instruction from their teachers.
At first, when a teacher centered approach was used in Indonesia, feedback only
came from the teacher. Then, when Student Active Learning (SLA) approach in which
the teaching and learning processes are focused on the students’ active roles is used,
teachers start to ask the students to read their friends’ English writing, then correct as
many possible mistakes as they find in their friends’ writing. Teachers start to apply peer
feedback in correcting the students’ writing. Although at the end the teachers will review
the students’ correction to their friends’ writing, at least students have tried to do an
independent exercise.
Khalid (2011) used feedback as one of the teaching writing techniques in
Indonesia. In his research, he reported that the combination of teacher and peer feedback
in teaching writing resulted in better writing. As the matter of fact, teacher feedback is
mostly used for the elementary and junior high schools while peer feedback is started to
be applied as a primary feedback in the senior high schools and higher education levels.
The reason is because in those levels, the students’ knowledge about writing components
has been established.
The Change of Higher Education System in Indonesia
The change from the rule number 2 (1989) 1 to rule number 20 (2003)2 by the
Department of Education, which is about higher education autonomy, brought a new
1
Rule number 2 (1989) is a rule from the department of education in Indonesia about the centralization
of higher education institutions/university in which everything relates to higher education was regulated
by the government (Imron, 1995).
2
Rule number 20 (2003) is the new rule to replace rule number 2 (1989) in which the educational
centralization is changed to decentralization in which the higher education institutions/university can
regulate their own system (Daulay, 2005).
2
paradigm from a traditional one to the modern one in which higher education is ruled
base on autonomy, accountability, and quality assurance (Daulay, 2005). Since then, rules
and policies among higher education have been different from one rule to another. Each
higher education has an authority to make and manage the rules includes the number of
students in one classroom. That is why large class is one of the issues for Indonesian
higher education.
Some universities, especially public universities, will limit the number of students
in one class between 20 to 30 students. However, some others have the minimum number
of 50 students and maximum 100 students which is categorized as a large class.
According to Kumar (1992), “A large class is generally perceived as one which has
anything between 35 to a 100 students, and on account of its size is said to pose
insurmountable problems for the teacher” (p. 30).
The economic crisis in 1998 changed the economic system in Indonesia. The
regional autonomy system/decentralization was started in 1999 instead of the
centralization system, the condition in which the economy is managed and ruled by the
central government, which was used before the economic crisis. The regional autonomy
expects each area to get the better financing. Each area can manage the financing with
accountability, transparency, and independence (Azhar, 2008). The change of economic
system from centralization to decentralization also gives great impact to the education in
Indonesia, especially the higher education. Badrudin (2008) stated that the law about
regional autonomy in 2001 resulted in a fast growth and the uneven of the number of
higher institutions in some areas because each area competes to have as many higher
institutions as possible (p. 199).
3
Higher Education in Indonesia
Indonesia has been independent for 67 years which is four years earlier than the
existing of the higher education system. Starting with only 200 students after the World
War II, now there are more than three million students. Data from the General Director of
Higher Education (Direktur Jendral Pendidikan Tinggi / DIKTI, 2009) recorded that there
are 3,016 institutions for higher education in Indonesia. 83 of them are public and 2,993
are private. Figure 1 describes the distributions of the 3,016 higher education.
Figure 1. Distributions of the 3,016 Higher Education. Source: Indonesian Department of
Higher Education.
Directorate General of Higher Education manages both private and public higher
education in Indonesia. Basic rules and policies such as the requirements of lecturers,
4
assistant lecturers, and professor are set centrally. While private higher education is
separately controlled by the Coordination of Private Higher Education (Koordinasi
Perguruan Tinggi Swasta / KOPERTIS) which coordinates twelve areas.
Private University in Indonesia
The fast growth of the public higher education due to the regional autonomy
causes public higher education to be more expensive than the private ones because
government gives funding only for the operational cost while for other necessities, public
higher education must pay for other necessities by using the students’ tuition. In contrast
to the public higher education, private higher education does not get any help from the
government at all. Private higher education has to manage the funding by themselves
from the tuition and money contributed by the students with the amount decided by the
institution itself.
Since public higher education is financed for the operational cost by the central
government, the students’ tuition and other fund are allocated for the quality
improvement of the public higher education, such as to finance the educators’ study to
earn masters’ or doctoral degrees and provide the complete facilities. However, private
higher education has to manage the double financial dependence because of having no
funding from the central government. That is the first reason why public higher
institutions are more qualified than private higher institutions. Secondly, parents tend to
register their children for public higher education rather than the private ones, and finally,
companies put people who graduate from the public higher education as the first priority
to get the job because of their good quality.
5
In addition, the public higher education only accepts a limited number of students
per academic year. The national entrance test for all higher education in Indonesia is held
at the same time once a year which is known as National Selection of Public Higher
Education Entrance (Seleksi Nasional Masuk Perguruan Tinggi Negeri/SNMPTN). Right
after the announcement, then the entrance test for the private higher education will be
held in order to give a chance to all people who are not accepted in the public higher
education to register. Different from the public one, the private higher education tends to
accept as many students as possible by lowering the acceptance standard. That is why the
private universities in Indonesia tend to have the large class while the public universities
maintain the quality with the small class size.
English Study Program in the Faculty3 of Teacher Training and Education
The aim of the Faculty of Teacher Training and Education (FTTE) is to educate
the students who are preparing to be teachers in the future. There is a gender issue which
influenced by the culture in Indonesia about whom is good to be teachers. Females are
encouraged to be teachers than males because the society perceived that females have
better understanding about how to educate people, how to transfer the knowledge, and
patience. Another reason is because of the sense of motherhood make females tend to be
more suit the teachers’ profession. That is why the female which dominated FTTE. There
are more female than male students.
In the FTTE, there are Math, Biology, English, Physics, History, and Indonesia
study program in which the students are prepared to be teachers in that specific program.
For example, in the English study program, the students are expected to be the teachers of
3
Faculty is a term used in Indonesia for a division within a university comprising one subject area, or a
number of related subject areas
6
English. Although it is an English study program, there is no TOEFL in the entrance test
which should have been a determining point to determine the students’ English
proficiency level as it is since early 1960s, TOEFL test has been used and recognized by
8.500 colleges, universities, and agencies around the world as a form of test to define
peoples English proficiency levels (ETS, 2011). According to Puspawati (2012) “the
main purpose of the TOEFL test is claimed to assess the English proficiency of second
language speakers of English who intend to study in institutions where English is the
language of instruction (p. 1).”
The absence of the TOEFL test as one of the requirements in the entrance test
results in the classes consisting of multiple English proficiency levels. This condition
makes the large class even harder to be managed and assessed. Lecturer4-student
interactions are dominated by the students with the higher English proficiency levels,
while the students whose English proficiency levels are low commonly remain silent due
to their lack of English ability.
Moreover, due to the combination reasons of multiple English proficiency levels
and a large number of students in one class, the lecturer often experiences difficulty in
assessing the students’ writing. In addition, it is even a problem for lecturers to figure out
how to increase the students’ writing skills, especially the students with the lower English
proficiency levels. Grading the students’ writing will not make the students to be able to
analyze what areas of their writing need to be improved. On the other hand, providing the
students with the feedback from the lecturer also frustrates the lecturer because not all of
4
Lecturer is a person who teaches in the higher education in Indonesia, and has a master degree or at least
as a students in a graduate school. Some institutions and universities allow the students with the highest
GPA to be an assistant lecturer right after graduation from undergraduate degree.
7
the 50 to 90 students’ writing will be able to be provided with feedback from the lecturer
per week since she or he teaches more than one writing class per week.
Altering the feedback from the lecturer with other kinds of feedback, such as peer
feedback, seems works for some students in that large class. Again, the reason is because
they consist of multiple English proficiency levels. The lecturer also finds the difficulties
on what areas she/he should really pay attention to the feedback she/he gives to his/her
lower, intermediate, and higher English proficiency students. Realizing these problems,
which were experienced directly by the researcher as one of the assistant lecturers in that
university, she decided to figure out what solutions can be used in order to solve this
problem. Furthermore, the following is other reason why I am interested in doing this
research for my thesis about the students’ perceptions toward the effective feedback
practices in the large EFL writing class based on participants, gender, and English
proficiency level.
Researcher Positionality
Being an assistant lecturer in the same university where I used to be a student
from 2003 to 2007 gives me a deeper understanding about the complexity of the writing
problems faced by both lecturers and students at the university. Below I explain my
learning experiences and teaching experiences consecutively.
My Undergraduate Degree Learning Experiences
In the English Study Program, Writing is divided into four courses; Writing 1,
Writing 2, Writing 3, and Writing 4. From 2003 to 2007, Writing 1 was taught in
semester one, Writing 2 was taught in semester two, Writing 3 was taught in semester
three, and Writing 4 was taught in semester four. Writing 1 is about the introduction to
8
what a sentence is while Writing 4 is about what an essay looks like. When I was a
student, the lecturer used to respond to the assignments by grading the paper with A, B,
C, D, and E or 100 to 0. Most of the time, my friends and I did not get our paper back
with the grades or comments. So we did not know about the mistakes, weaknesses, and
strengths of our writing.
One day, in Writing 4, my lecturer asked us to correct and comment on our
friends’ writing. We were asked to exchange our writing with a friend who sat beside us.
We underlined, circled, and marked the paper in order to show the mistakes. When we
returned the paper back to the writer, my friends and I realized that we made many
mistakes and errors in our writing. Since I was not familiar with that method, I kept
asking myself why my friends and I still made many mistakes and errors although we
were done with Writing 1, 2, and 3.
In 2006, an English institution where I taught sent me to attend the seminar about
teaching writing in a small group. I found this teaching strategy good to be applied to my
class which consisted of 20 students. I tried this strategy with my students in the English
course and found that they were excited and motivated in the writing process. It gave me
an idea to do research on teaching writing through free-writing activities in a small group
for my BA thesis.
I made it as an experiment by teaching writing with this method to one class while
I did not use this method with the other class. I did the research with experimental and
control groups for two months. The results showed that the experimental group had a
significant increase in writing quality because they had an opportunity to warm up,
received peer feedback, and had a small group discussion during their writing process
9
while the control group just started the writing process without warming up, peer
feedback, and discussions. This research resulted in me getting an A for my BA thesis in
2007 which inspired me to do more research specifically about how to improve students’
writing skills.
My Teaching Experiences
After my graduation day in August 2007, I was asked to teach in the university
where I completed my BA in English. It was like repeating all the memories in my head
of what I had and what I have to do for my students based on my own experiences there. I
proposed to teach Writing 1 because I wanted to apply what I got from my research so
that my students will never have a problem in writing as I had during my program before.
I felt that my strategy to do free-writing activities in small groups gave the students not
only motivation to write, but also awareness in writing.
In 2009, when I was assigned to teach Writing 4 to the same students whose
Writing 1 was taught by me, I found that instead of improvement in writing, their writing
was unorganized and not understandable. So, in November 2009, I decided to do a survey
with the 70 students in Writing 4 to know what their basic problems were. The results
showed that they had difficulties in how to start writing, organize their ideas, and being
aware of the errors. Besides this, the previous lecturers who taught Writing 2 and 3 never
taught them with a special strategy and the feedback did not meet their expectations and
needs (Figure 2). Knowing this, I reviewed my research and concluded that free-writing
activity in a small group is good for teaching writing in the large class, but it is not the
solution to the students’ problems. They need more than writing strategies, they need
something which can decrease the errors, make their writing meaningful, identify the
10
strengths and weaknesses of their writing, and which areas from their writing are needed
to be improved. I am sure that the answer is “feedback”.
Students’ Writing Problem

50
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
can't get the difficult to use hard to the don't know no problem
paper started the same organized the instruction is the mistakes
topic ideas not clear of their
writing
Figure 2. Survey Result about Students’ Writing Problem
My Learning Experience in the USA
In June 2011, I had my pre-academic program in Rochester Institute of
Technology for two months. I learned about American culture and English skills. In my
writing class, after we submitted our writing, the instructor gave us comments and
corrections (feedback from instructor) in which she corrected all about the grammar
errors and asked for clarification on the unclear ideas written in our paper. The comments
and corrections were written on our papers and also discussed in a 10 minute conference
with the instructor. I found that the corrections and comments, which were given in both
written and oral forms, helped me a lot in learning how to write academic English. I kept
in mind that I am going to apply giving feedback to my students when I teach in
Indonesia.
11
Then, in Fall 2011, when I started my first semester at Indiana University of
Pennsylvania for MA TESOL, in ENGL 643: TESL/TEFL Methodology, the professor
assigned a reading from Rula L Diab (2005) entitled “EFL University Students’
Preferences for Error Correction and Teacher Feedback on Writing”, I found this article
very interesting and it illustrated what I am looking for about feedback studies. I found 20
articles in ENGL 625: Introduction to TESOL class when the professor assigned us to do
a “Trends Project” to collect 20 articles under one theme which could be used for our
thesis. The twenty articles were not mine, they belonged to my friend, but since the
professor provided us with all of our classmates’ articles, I had a chance to read them all.
That was the starting point for me to think about feedback as the topic for my MA thesis.
Since the university where I teach has a large class, I came up with an intention to do
research on feedback in large classes.
Purpose of the Study
This study aims at investigating the students’ perceptions about the effective
feedback practices for their writing in a large class. By investigating the students, who
experience studying writing in a large class, the study aims to shed light on how the
participants in this study perceive their understanding and apply their experience in
receiving the feedback from their lecturers or peers in a specific writing area and types of
feedback. This study also intends to examine the students’ understanding of their
perceptions about feedback. It is about what the students expect to get from their lecturers
or peers. In addition, it is also about in which specific writing areas the students need
their lecturer and peer to pay more attention to when correcting their mistakes. The
participants are 150 students who study writing in a large class in one of the private
12
universities in Indonesia. Each participant has taken writing 1, 2, 3, and was taking
writing 4 when this study was conducted (in 2013). These participants were given
questionnaire consisting of closed ended questions with the Likert scale.
Research Questions
The main goal of this study is to know about the students’ preferences in relation
to the effective feedback practice and the kind of responses they expect from their
lecturer and peer. I analyzed the results from students’ answers in the questionnaire given
to them. The questionnaire uses a Likert scale with 26 questions: 13 questions about
feedback from lecturer/instructor and 13 questions about feedback from their friend/peer.
The questionnaire and the statistical analyses are expected to answer the two research
questions in this study, which are set up as follows:
1. What do university students perceive as effective feedback in a large EFL writing
class?
2. What features of their writing do university students believe are the most important
to be responded to?
Significance of the Study
The results of this study may help lecturers as well as teachers, who experience
teaching EFL writing in a large class, provide their students with the effective feedback
to their writing. Besides, the results of this study will be useful for the class which
consists of multiple English proficiency levels. The reason is because the results of this
study will address what the students expect from their lecturers and peers when
correcting their writing based on their English proficiency levels. In addition, the result of
13
this study will also benefit the lecturers whose classes have been categorized based on the
students’ English proficiency levels.
This study will also be useful for the education systems in which there is a
separation between female and male students in the classroom, where they do not study
in the same class. In addition, this study also will enable the lecturers to give the accurate
feedback to the students based on their gender.
Overview of Upcoming Chapters
Chapter two describes the literature related to the study. This chapter gives the
definition of feedback, explains the sources of feedback, discusses students’ preferences
on the areas of their writing features which need to be responded to, and finally defines
what a large class is, and discusses some studies focusing on feedback in a large class.
Chapter three presents the methodology I employed for this research. It describes the
research design, participants of the study, data collection methods, procedure, and data
analysis I use in this study. Chapter four presents the findings of this study. Themes
related to research questions will be presented and interpreted, while the conclusion of
the finding is provided at the end of the chapter. Finally, Chapter five presents the
summary of the research findings, the implications of this research, recommendations for
further study, and limitations of the study.
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CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
This study aims at investigating the perceptions of students about the effective
feedback on writing in large class. In order to frame the issue, this literature review
presents some important aspects addressed in the study. First, this chapter gives the
definition of feedback. Secondly, it focuses on the sources of feedback. Third it discusses
students’ preferences on the areas of their writing features which are needed feedback.
Fourthly, it defines large class, and discusses some studies about feedback in large class.
Finally, it summarizes points of this chapter.
Defining Feedback
Writing is not only about putting the letters together to form words, then
combining them to make sentences, and arranging them to become paragraphs, but it is
about choosing the appropriate vocabulary, forming the meaning, and organizing the
ideas. According to Sokolik as cited in Eksi (2010) “Writing is the mental work of
inventing ideas, thinking about how to express them, and organizing them into statements
and paragraphs that will be clearer to the reader” (p. 33). Good writing will be
understandable both by the writer and the readers. It is the way to communicate ideas in
written form.
The EFL students’ writer will not only deal with the differences of the language,
but also with the different writing styles. For student writers, they have to be aware of
surface level errors (e.g., grammar, spelling, punctuation, and vocabulary choice) and
deep level errors (organization, writing style) (Eksi, 2010). That is why assessing English
as a Second Language (ESL) and English as Foreign Language (EFL) students’ writing is
15
more complicated than the native speakers’ writing (Johns, 1991; Thompson, 1990). ESL
and EFL students need to know what the strengths and weaknesses of their writing are
(Song & August, 2002) which will help them improve their writing quality.
As one component of the writing processes, feedback (corrections and comments)
is needed to support students’ writing development and build their confidence in writing.
Specifically, according to Hyland (2003) “feedback helps the writer work out the text’s
potential and to comprehend the writing context, providing a sense of audience and an
understanding of expectations of the communities they are writing for” (p. 177). As
English learners who use English as a Foreign Language (EFL), writing means
communicating with the readers by making the communication understandable in both
ways. Since every language has its own style in writing, the input from the readers is very
helpful as a way of communicating the ideas and writing components. Teachers can use
feedback as a way of communicating the strength and the weaknesses of their students
(Mcgrath, Taylor, & Phycyl, 2011).
Having anyone give any comments or correct the mistakes will be very helpful
because sometimes there seems to be no mistakes in our writing until other people read it;
M. Yang, et al (2006) correctly stated that “two heads are better than one.” Feedback can
be used for students to promote their writing. It is true that after receiving the feedback,
the writers or learners are going to be able to realize the weaknesses of the writing,
organize the ideas, restructure the sentences, and most importantly the feedback will last
forever since it will come up with the memory and more understanding.
According to Alexander et al (1991), “feedback is information with which a
learner can confirm, add to, overwrite, tune, or restructure information in memory,
16
whether that information is domain knowledge, meta-cognitive knowledge, beliefs about
self and task, or cognitive, tactics and strategies” (as cited in Winne & Butler, 1995, p.
275). Although feedback will not result in the students’ writing perfection (Bitchener,
2008), feedback is able to raise the students’ awareness of making mistakes when writing
(Barnawi, 2010).
Sources of Feedback
Who should give feedback to the students’ writing is a crucial question often
asked both by the students and teachers. It is true that this question seems easy to be
answered. In practical thinking, both students and teachers are going to say that feedback
given by the teacher will be the best in improving students’ writing quality (Tsui & Ng,
2000). However, it is not true at all, because students also preferred to get feedback from
their peer rather than their teacher (Rollinson, 2005; Hu, 2005). In addition, a study from
Saito and Fujita (2004) about feedback provided to the EFL students in a Japanese
university showed that students rated peer and teacher feedback in the same way. To
these, I would like to address some studies related to peer and teacher feedback as the
sources.
Teacher Feedback
Research showed that teacher feedback has some benefits to the students’ skills
development because students have the responsibility on what to do to the feedback they
got from their teacher. It builds the students’ learning autonomy and controls their
initiation towards the correction. Most of the studies revealed that feedback from teachers
is preferred feedback source because of the teachers’ ability in providing feedback, and
the impact on the students’ writing (Hyland & Hyland, 2001; Stern & Solomon, 2006).
17
A comparative study by Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006) reported that students
viewed teacher feedback worth more than feedback from a peer. The reason is because
the students perceived teachers as the only one who has knowledge on writing aspects to
correct the mistakes. It is assumed because the teacher’s correction is trustworthy,
professional and experienced in that field. Besides recognizing the value of teacher
feedback, this study also reveals peer feedback as helpful for the students’ writing
improvements. This finding is especially addressed by 38 students who were in peer
feedback class. It is because they found the positive value of peer feedback after they
experienced it in that class. They could ask questions, clarify their writing, and negotiate
the meaning of their writing with their peer.
A similar finding is reported by Cresswell (2000) in the study titled “Self-
monitoring in student writing: Developing learner responsibility.” This study mentioned
the reason why teacher feedback is the most preferable than peer feedback and self
feedback. It is because the students assumed that the teacher is the one who knows what
specific areas their students need to improve and pay attention to. According to Cresswell
(2000) “the advantages of teacher feedback are first, intervention, teacher response to
students’ questions annotated in the margin of writings, is directed to students’ ideas in
the developing of essays. Teacher feedback is exactly what student writers need in terms
of global content (theme, purpose and readership) and organization (argument structure,
main and supporting points). Second, teacher response can be more accurately targeted at
the levels of students’ language proficiency” (p. 238).
A similar research finding is also reported by Lin (2009), whose case study was
conducted in a large multilevel EFL writing class towards multiple feedback interaction
18
(self, peer, and teacher feedback). The 43 participants’ English proficiency consisted of
three levels. Some were at the level of a score of 520 of the TOEFL test, others were 470,
and the rest were 400. The interview results showed that the participants in this study
valued teacher feedback as the first preference of feedback source. They said that the
teacher would give one definite correction to their writing, as participants stated:
H: Why do you rank the teacher feedback as number one?
C: I think the teacher can give us more constructive suggestions by saying that
something is obviously wrong because of so and so. My peers can only tell me
that there is something strange but fail to tell me what and why. Therefore, it
only makes me more confused. (Lin, 2009, p. 240)
Although this study combined self, peer, and teacher feedback, these multilevel of
English proficiency students put teacher feedback as the most important. It means that
their English proficiency level did not make them chose the feedback sources differently.
Similarly, Tsui and Ng (2000) also found their participants, who were students in
Hong Kong secondary school, chose feedback from the teacher over feedback from their
peer. They said that they believed their teacher corrections were totally true which they
would never question them. Besides, correcting the students’ errors/mistakes was the
teachers’ right not the students’ right. Although this study revealed the same result with
Lin (2009), these two studies differ in class types. Lin’s study was conducted in a large
class, but Tsui and Ng’s research was conducted in the smaller class with only 20 to 30
students.
A different study reports problems of teacher feedback. The truth that what the
students are concerned the most about their writing and the feedback they got from their
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teacher is grade/score. They need their teachers’ feedback in order to get a good grade,
not to improve their writing quality. This situation makes them correct their mistakes
based on the feedback given by the teacher because they are only expecting a good
writing to get a good grade. Teacher feedback is found only for a short term benefit not
for long term benefit because the students are not involved in the thinking and learning
process (Muncie, 2000).
Peer Feedback
Peer feedback defined by Kroll (2001) as “simply putting students together in
groups and then having each students read and react to the strength and weaknesses of
each other’s papers” (p. 228). To this, research still agreed and argued about peer
feedback as the effective practice to be applied in ESL/EFL writing classes. To some
points, peer feedback was found to be useful and to improve the students’ writing skills.
Since in peer feedback, the activity is between student and other students, peer feedback
promotes student-centered activity not teacher-centered activity (Hirvela, 1990). Students
Talking Time (STT) will be more than Teacher Talking Time (TTT). Students will be
actively engaged in the learning process, while the teacher is only a facilitator to give
help when it is needed.
A study which promotes peer feedback more than teacher feedback is from
Gielen, Tops, Dochy, Onghena, and Smeets (2010). Almost 50% of the participants in
their research agreed that peer feedback can replace teacher feedback. This study
describes seven beneficial side effects of peer feedback as follows:
1. Peer feedback can increase the social pressure on students to perform well on an
assignment.
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2. Research in higher education shows that students often perceive peer feedback as
more understandable and more useful because fellow students ‘are on the same
wavelength’ (Topping, 2003).
3. Peer feedback increases the students’ ability to understand feedback.
4. Peer feedback is quicker
5. Peer feedback can be part of an increase in the frequency or amount of feedback.
6. The individualization of feedback
7. The association of feedback with power issues, emotions and identity, which may
launch an ‘emotion-defense system’ in students (Higgins, 2000, p. 145-146).
Besides those benefits mentioned above, the form of interaction between the students is
more flexible, and they are not fearful of asking and clarifying compared to when they
interact with their teacher. Critical skills such as critical thinking (Ferris & Hedgcock,
2005) can be explored during the feedback process because they try to negotiate what
they understand and what they do not from their peer’s corrections (Leki, 1990). Another
benefit is that peer feedback in the writing process does not limit the activity only to
writing, but also speaking/communication skills (Forman & Cazden, 1986) which at the
end will build self motivation in producing a good writing. As it is true that some
teachers do not have enough time when they have to deal with more than 20 papers of the
students’ writing from one class, peer feedback will benefit the teacher in reducing the
time workload (Ferris & Hedgcock, 2005).
Second study from Eksi (2012) reported that feedback from peers could also
replace teacher feedback. Applying peer feedback directly in the writing class will be a
stressful time for the students who are not familiar with that. Teachers have to facilitate
21
students by providing them with some guidelines on how to respond and correct their
friends’ writing. Training the students to give their friends’ writing feedback can be one
of the alternative ways (Min, 2006). According to Ferris and Hedgcock, (2005) there are
eight principles for effective peer response:
(1) Making peer response an integral part of the course.
(2) Modeling the process of interaction by the teacher before its implementation.
(3) Building peer response skills progressively throughout free writing (writing quickly
and steadily on the topic without stopping), and preparing the term.
(4) Structuring the peer response task with some open-ended yet concrete questions as
guidance.
(5) Varying peer response activities such as prewriting (brainstorming informal outline,
drafting an introductory passage, first draft, editing, revision, and so on).
(6) Holding students accountable for giving feedback and considering peer response.
(7) Considering individual students’ needs.
(8) Considering logistic issues, including:
(a) the size and composition of the group,
(b) the mechanics of exchanging papers, and
(c) time management and crowd control. (p. 233)
On the other hand, some research found the disadvantages of peer feedback.
Firstly, it is not an easy task for the students to understand about what is going on in their
friends’ writing. Some students will easily understand what the teacher expected during
the peer feedback process, but some others will feel blank or even not know what to do
(De Guerreru & Villamil, 1994). Another thing which concern the students is that the
22
incapable peer who gives feedback to their writing. It is not surprising to find that they
give unclear corrections, unhelpful comments, or even wrong corrections (Leki, 1990).
To the students whose language proficiency is lower, involving them in conversation
about the writing correction will be frustrating and make them remain silent during the
process because of their lack of writing ability. This condition will make them lose their
confidence and motivation instead of getting the motivation during the process (Leki,
1990).
Kinds of Feedback Practices in Writing
Since there are more than two types of feedback practices which can be used to
correct the students’ writing, determining which feedback practices works better for the
students is very important. Some factors such as the time when the feedback should be
given, whether it is the correct feedback for such students, what the purposes of giving
the feedback are, what the students level of proficiency is, and the students’ age can be
used as the consideration (West & Thron, 2001). Below are the studies which have
explored those features of feedback.
Feedback on the Writing Features
Writing features are categorized into two categories; surface level revisions and
deep level revisions (Eksi, 2012). Parts of surface level revisions are “spelling,
punctuation, format and problems of verb tense, agreement, run-on sentences, sentence
fragments, wrong use of collocations, parts that need rewording for better expression,
omission of unnecessary parts and so on” (p. 37). Deep level revisions are defined as
“minor revisions in meaning and macro structural changes such as deletion of irrelevant
sentences, joining sentences for better expression, pointing out incomplete ideas needing
23
more support, reordering sentences or longer text segment” (p. 38). Commonly, deep
level revisions are about the content of the writing, writing style, and organization of
ideas in writing.
Eksi (2012) researched about the effectiveness of peer review and teacher
feedback in process writing. In order to clearly see the students’ improvement in their
writing skills, the 46 participants, who were the upper intermediate English major
students, were divided into two groups (group one got feedback from the teacher and
group two got feedback from a peer). The results show in group one, the instructor
corrected almost three fourths of students’ deep level revisions, while their peers only
made one third of deep level revisions. Students in group two were also able to correct on
their peers’ deep level revision although not as many as their instructor did. It was
different with deep level revision, surface level revisions precisely corrected by their
peers more than their instructor. This study argued the earlier studies which doubted the
students’ ability to go beyond surface level revisions.
Study from Ashwell (2000) brought the issue about feedback on the writing
features specifically provided by the teachers. The study was conducted to the 50 non-
native students in a Japanese university. The results were concluded from the treatments
which were given in the students’ first, second, and third draft and the questionnaires.
The treatments started with feedback on content and then on form. The students’ answers
to the questionnaires show that their concerns were more to the feedback of form than
feedback on content.
Another study is from Simpson (2006) about EFL students’ attitude changed
towards feedback on writing. This study is an ethnographic-type study in which the
24
teacher asked the students about questions related to their writing and their attitude
towards their experience during the writing lesson. The results report that the students
had different attitude towards feedback on grammar and content, organization, and
communicating ideas. According to Simpson (2006) “although not everyone grew to
accept the kind of praiseworthy grading recommended by Dragga (1985, 1988), most did
learn to accept content feedback as an important part of learning how to write in a foreign
language” (p. 110). This attitude change is specifically for the students whose English
position is as a foreign language because the participants’ native language in this study is
Spanish.
A similar study which took EFL students as the participants is from Diab (2005).
This study investigated the students’ preferences towards error correction and teacher
feedback. The second research question in this study addressed the issue about the
writing features which the students need in order to improve their writing. The results
show that although feedback on grammar had the highest percentages compared to any
other types of writing features both in the first and second draft, but when they were
reading the correction, most of the students paid more attention to the writing style and
ideas/content. Both in the first and last draft, feedback on spelling took place after
grammar. Then writing style and organization of paper had a different position in first
and last draft while feedback on the ideas expressed in the paper and punctuation placed
as the two least important feedbacks they need from their teachers.
However, while the study in twenties mostly found that the students perceived
surface level errors (especially on grammar) as the most important feedback it should be
about; number of studies in the nineties showed the balance findings about surface level
25
errors. These studies reported that feedback on the surface level errors should be
abandoned (Truscott, 1996) and have no influence to the students’ writing (Kepner, 1991;
Sheppard, 1992).
Table 1
Studies in the Nineties about Feedback on the Surface Level Errors
Findings Research Studies from

Leki (1991)
Feedback on the surface level Enginarlar (1993)
errors is beneficial Saito (1994)
Ferris (1995)
Kepner (1991)
Feedback on the surface level Sheppard (1992)
errors is not beneficial Truscott (1996)
Truscott (1999)
Direct and Indirect Feedback
According to Bitchener (2005), “direct or explicit feedback occurs when the
teacher identifies an error and provides the correct form, while indirect feedback refers to
situations when the teacher indicates that an error has been made but does not provide a
correction, thereby leaving the student to diagnose and correct it” (p. 193). In indirect
feedback, the correction of the correct linguistic form or structure is given above, beside
or at least close to the words which are corrected by crossing out the words or phrases
without giving the correction directly (Bitchener, Young, & Cameron, 2005; Ferris &
Roberts, 2001). Unlike indirect feedback, when the incorrect words or phrases are
crossed out, then the correct words or phrases are written on the top of it, beside it, or
near the words or phrases corrected, then it is called direct feedback (Ellis, 2009).
Since indirect feedback requires the feedback recipient to think and analyze what
the correct words, phrases or structures are to correct it, indirect feedback might not be
26
preferable for students with a lower English proficiency level (Ferris, 2002). With other
words, direct feedback is preferred for a lower English proficiency level while indirect
feedback is promoted for students with a higher English proficiency level in which they
are able to analyze the feedback and provide the correct words, phrases or structures.
According to Ellis, Sheen, Murakami and Takashima (2008), “the effectiveness of
direct and indirect CF is likely to depend on the current state of the learner’s grammatical
knowledge. From a practical standpoint, however, it is unlikely that teachers will be
sufficiently familiar with individual learners’ interlanguages to be able to make
principled decisions regarding whether to correct directly or indirectly” (p. 355). Whether
students prefer to have direct or indirect feedback to their writing, Diab (2005) stated that
students preferred to have direct feedback only in their final draft. They prefer to have
their writing corrected directly which will make the revision process easier since they
have to submit the paper on time. They also agreed that indirect feedback will promote
their learning process but it should be given in their first and second draft, not in the final
draft when they need to submit their work on time.
More specific study about direct and indirect feedback is addressed by Crandler
(2003). In Chandler (2003), there are two studies described. Overall the results from
Crandler’s two studies (2003) who clearly described that the participants were
undergraduate students from East Asia, thought that correction (direct feedback) and
underline and describe (indirect feedback) are the two kinds of feedback which worked
best to improve their writing quality. In the first study, since the experimental group only
got the feedback by underlining the errors and then describing them (indirect feedback),
the students felt like this kind of errors correction helped them a lot. The second study
27
offers correction (direct feedback) and underline and describe (indirect feedback) at the
same time. The results show that students perceived both correction and underline and
describe as the effective feedback to help them improve their writing by correcting their
errors. Although some students preferred correction (direct feedback) more than
underline and describe (indirect feedback) because it is the fastest way to correct their
errors, but comparing it to underline and describe, students felt like they were learning
more through indirect feedback because it made them think about what the correct
words/forms are. They feel like involving more in the learning process than just receiving
the correct words/forms written by their teacher.
Kim (2009) has the same result with Chandler (2003) that students benefit from
direct and indirect feedback. However, results from Chandler (2003) do not specifically
connect them with the students’ English proficiency levels. According to Kim (2009)
“For the beginner-level learners, direct correction with detailed meta-linguistic
explanation turned out to be more effective than coded feedback. Given that learners with
a low proficiency have limited linguistic knowledge of the target language (Swain &
Lapkin, 2000), they would benefit more from direct correction with detailed explanation
about the error when making judgments about what is right or wrong and why. By
contrast, the intermediate-level learners profited more by indirect-coded feedback” (p.
218). Regarding students’ proficiency levels, direct feedback is effective for the students
with lower proficiency levels while indirect feedback is more effective for higher L2
proficiency.
Different from Chandler (2003) and Kim (2009), Hashemnezhad, and
Mohammadnejad (2012) found that direct feedback has the most effective benefits to the
28
higher proficiency students too. The corrections in this study are for the use of simple
tense, relative pronouns, and prepositions while in Kim’s study (2009) the corrections are
for the grammar errors/mistakes. Chandler (2003) corrected not only grammatical errors
but also lexical errors in the two studies.
Oral and Written Feedback
Oral and written feedback are the two options both for feedback from peers and
from teachers. Written feedback works with an individual paper, in which the teacher
should read paper by paper when giving feedback. If 15 minutes is spent on one paper for
feedback and grading, then if it was in large class which consists of fifty students, the
total time the teacher needs to finish it all is 750 minutes (6.5 hours) per assignment. Just
imagine if the teacher taught more than one class and had more than one assignment to be
corrected and given feedback. That is why many teachers perceived that correcting the
students’ writing errors/mistakes by meeting them face to face/conferences (Zamel, 1985)
will lessen the teacher’s correction time and written work (Ferris & Hedgcock, 1998).
Not only do the teachers who benefit from oral feedback, but it is also beneficial
for the students because oral feedback on one-on-one writing conferences enable the
students to get more detailed explanation towards the mistakes in their writing by asking
for clarification from the teacher (Grabe & Caplan, 1996). However, the benefits of oral
feedback/one-on-one writing conferences will not automatically be achieved by all the
students. The students’ active participation such as asking and commenting will
determine the success of oral feedback (Goldstein & Conrad, 1990). The students should
not act passively by receiving all the teacher’s corrections and comments, but they have
29
to actively involve themselves when their teacher addresses their writing errors/mistakes
(Patthey-Chavez & Ferris, 1997).
Grami (2005) found that the participants in this study, who were all male, in the
department of English language in a Saudi university perceived and expected their
teacher to give them feedback in written form. This is a qualitative study in which the
data were collected through the participants’ answers to the questions in the
questionnaire. Similar to this finding, a study from Mahfoodh (2011) reported that the
students in EFL Arab context akin to written feedback from their teacher. The
participants in this study valued written feedback when it was given only by their teacher
because they perceived that teacher is the one who has the writing skill and the authority
in responding to the students’ writing.
Taylor and Nolen (2008) (cited in Telceker & Akcan (2010)) discussed the effect
of oral and written teacher written feedback to the students’ writing. According to them
“feedback refers to the teacher’s verbal or non-verbal response or actions whereby s/he
provides information to his/her students regarding their ideas or actions” (p. 45). Telceker
and Akcan (2010) found that each oral and written feedback from the teacher has
different benefits for the students’ writing improvement. For teacher feedback in written
form, it enables the students to get the corrections of the errors in their writing by having
their teacher code their mistakes. In order to enable the students to deeply understand
what the teacher means with his/her correction, the teacher can write any additional
comments and explanations. Oral teacher feedback can raise students’ attentions to their
writing because they will prepare themselves before the oral feedback given by their
teacher in order to make the process of correcting and commenting easier. I note that in
30
doing oral feedback with the lower proficiency students, it is suggested that the teacher
uses the L1 language in order to avoid unclear feedback.
Berg and Pilot (2005) did research on both written and oral feedback provided by
students/peers. This study found the different aspects between oral and written feedback
from peers. The results show that comments about their friends’ writing style takes place
in oral feedback, while written feedback discusses more on the grammatical aspects. Oral
feedback is non-product-oriented while written feedback from peers is product-oriented.
According to Berg and Pilot “written feedback was concentrated mainly on evaluative
comments, whereas in the oral feedback students provided arguments and suggestions for
text revision” (p. 145-146). Students’ communicative competence plays an important role
when they deal with oral feedback while in written feedback, they have to concentrate
more on their writing components’ knowledge such as grammar.
Feedback on the First and Final Draft
Feedback on the first and the final draft is the time when the feedback is better
given to the students. When it is given in the first draft, it enables students to produce
better writing because they have another chance to be corrected in the second draft before
handing in the writing to the teacher. On the other hand, if the teacher only provides
feedback on their final draft, it will also be helpful for them since it is provided before the
submission.
Most students preferred to have indirect feedback in their first draft where the
teacher showed where the errors were and then gave the clues on them. For the final
draft, they tend to choose direct feedback in which the teacher shows where the errors are
and gives the correct words, phrases, or structures (Diab, 2005). This way is helpful
31
because when it is in the first draft, they still have more time to think and analyze the
error correction, while in the final draft, in which the time is usually so close with the
submission, students tend to be nervous and lose their confidence in correcting and
analyzing the errors.
The students also expected to get feedback from different sources in their first and
final draft (feedback from teacher or peer). To quote the interview in M. Yang et al
(2006) study, which indicates who should give the feedback first?
He: if the teacher gives feedback first, the peer would feel the pressure and say
nothing for fear of saying something wrong because we all trust the teacher
more. But if the peer gives feedback first, he would be much freer to express
his opinions. Teacher feedback that comes later could evaluate both the essay
and the peer’s comments, which, I think, is of great help (p. 194).
The students feel their freedom in expressing their ideas towards their friend’s writing
more when the feedback is provided in the first draft. However, they perceived that there
will be nothing to comment or correct when the feedback from their teacher comes before
their feedback.
The Importance of Feedback to the EFL Students’ Writing
For some subjects involving calculation such as mathematics and science,
feedback is not as needed as in writing in order to promote students’ learning because
they are learning by practicing. However, for some other subjects about improving the
skills like English, especially writing, feedback is indispensable for making an
improvement. Through feedback, learners will be able to know what their mistakes are
and what areas in their writing need improvement. People usually write something which
32
makes sense to them, but not all of what they want to say is understandable to other
people, especially when we try to translate what we have in our first language to the
second or other languages. In this case, some kinds of misunderstanding or
misinterpretation will be formed.
Having other people to give any comments or correct the mistakes will be very
helpful because sometimes there seems to be no mistakes in our writing until other people
see it; M. Yang, et al (2006) correctly stated that “two heads are better than one.”
Feedback can be used for students to promote their writing. It is true that after receiving
the feedback, writer or learner is going to be able to realize the weaknesses of the writing,
organize the ideas, restructure the sentences, and most importantly the feedback will last
forever since it will come up with the memory and more understanding. Winne and
Butler (1994) stated in their research conclusion that “feedback is information with which
a learner can confirm, add to, overwrite, tune, or restructure information in memory,
whether that information is domain knowledge, meta-cognitive knowledge, beliefs about
self and tasks, or cognitive, tactics and strategies” (p. 5740).
What is the Effective Feedback?
Feedback can be given by teacher, peer, book, parents, and even experience, but
the feedback which tackles the main problem is better than untargeted feedback. The term
of effective feedback is used to find out about the learners’ needs for their work. To
answer the question of what effective feedback is, the feedback giver has to know the
three basic questions promoted by Hattie and Timperly (2007), they are: “Where am I
going? (What are the goals?), How am I going? (What progress is being made toward the
goal?), and Where to next? (What activities need to be undertaken to make better
33
progress?). The three questions addressing the effective feedback are summarized below
from Hattie and Timperly (2007) in their research titled “The Power of Feedback” (p.
86).
Question 1: Where am I going?(What are the goals?)
This question is to address the purpose of what the feedback is used for. By
knowing the purpose of the feedback, it will enable the giver to know what, when, and
how feedback should be given. For example, the feedback is needed for the final draft of
writing which means that teacher will give the detailed feedback about what to do to the
draft before submitting it. This is different from the first draft in which the feedback is
not as detailed as in the final draft because there will be another chance for the students to
correct it and rethink about it. Setting the goal is crucial to manage the result. Locke &
Latham (1990) clearly stated that as to what type or level of performance is to be attained
so that they can direct and evaluate their actions and efforts accordingly. Feedback allows
them to set reasonable goals and to track their performance in relation to their goals so
that adjustments in effort, direction, and even strategy can be made as needed (p. 23).
Question 2: How am I going? (What progress is being made toward the goal?)
This question refers to the feedback receiver who needs to know how he or she
will benefit from the feedback. Specifically, the coordination among the feedback
provider (teacher, peer, etc) and the feedback receiver should be clear from the start so
that it will enable both parties to create, receive, and process the feedback. For example,
when it is about the teacher’s grammar surface correction which uses correction codes
(such as ‘V’ for error in verb tense or verb form, ‘S’ for spelling error, ‘Art’ for article or
34
other determiner missing or unnecessary or incorrectly used), the students should be
familiar with those correction codes first before they process the feedback.
Question3: Where to next? (What activities need to be undertaken to make better

progress?).
This last question is about the last stage of providing feedback when the teacher
has to give additional comments and reminder to the students for a future better
understanding about their weaknesses in their writing.
Students, who are the doer of learning process, have to realize that the success
will not be gained without their intention and effort. They have to know that their main
job is not only learning what the teacher present to them in the classroom, but they also
have to manage their own attention to what the teaching and learning duty. It will enable
the learning process when they know about what to do and not to do. In this case, the
function of self—regulation will be able to construct their understanding about the
feedback message given (Ivanic et all, 2000). As Pintrich and Zusho (2002) define that
“self-regulated learning is an active constructive process whereby learners set goals for
their learning and monitor, regulate, and control their cognition, motivation, and
behavior, guided and constrained by their goals and the contextual features of the
environment” (p. 64).
It is not an easy task for students to be able to monitor, regulate, and control their
cognition, motivation, and behavior. The teacher has to introduce, support, and
familiarize self-regulation for the students. When the students have been familiar self-
regulation practice in their daily activity, the teacher can start to think about what kind of
feedback is effective for his or her class. As an illustration, Nichole and Dick (2006)
formulated seven criteria of good feedback derived from the model of good feedback
35
practice which was published earlier by Buttler and Winne (1995) that good feedback
practice:
1. helps clarify what good performance is (goals, criteria, expected standards);
2. facilitates the development of self-assessment (reflection) in learning;
3. delivers high quality information to students about their learning;
4. encourages teacher and peer dialogue around learning;
5. encourages positive motivational beliefs and self-esteem;
6. provides opportunities to close the gap between current and desired performance;
7. provides information to teachers that can be used to help shape teaching (Nichole &
Dick, 2006, p. 205).
Defining Large Class
Most of the studies about feedback are done in the small classes. The reason is
because small class benefits both students and teacher in the teaching and learning
process (Blatchford et al.’s, 2003). However, although many studies investigate that large
classes have less benefit than small classes, does not mean that large classes should be
abandoned. As long as large classes exist, further study about them should have been
conducted especially in relation to the feedback. No exact definition about small and
large class has been used worldwide because of the different perception about number of
students in a class. A large number of students based on one country’s standard can be
the smaller number in another country. As Shamim et al. (2007) note, “a large class in a
western context might be considered small for both teachers and learners in most
teaching-learning contexts in Africa” (p. 12) or even super small in the Ivory Coast
(Bamba, 2012).
36
In inner circle countries, such as United Kingdom, Australia, United States of
America, and Canada, where English is the primary language of the country, a class with
more than 30 students is called super large class which needs not only a teacher but also
assistance of the teacher to manage the class properly (Blatchford et al., 2002; 2003;
2007;Pedder, 2006). Specifically, the large class in the USA is between 22 to 30 students
based on the Tennessee project or STAR project (Student-Teacher Achievement Ratio, a
four- year study authorized by the Tennessee legislature) and the 1996 California Class
Size Reduction (CSR) initiative (Stasz & Stecher, 2000), Norway and the Netherlands are
relatively smaller with 24 to 25 students only (Ozerk, 2001; Folmer- Annevelink et al,
2009; Konstantopoulos, 2008).
A great comparison between inner circle countries and developing countries is
that a large class in inner circle countries is the small class in the developing countries.
The reason is because a class is considered as a large class when the numbers start from
30 students and more. Uganda, Haiti, and other developing countries have 71 and 100+
students in their large class (O’sullivan, 2006; Renaud, Tannenbaum & Stantial, 2007;
Shamim et al., 2007).
How many students there are in one class is not the only parameter in defining
large class. The other thing is the teachers’ judgment about the class size (Coleman,
1989c). When a teacher who used to teach a class with 30 students is asked to teach a
class with 40 students, he or she will assume that his or her class now is a large class.
Otherwise, a teacher who handles 40 students for the first time thinks that it is a small
class since he or she used to handle 60 students (Todd, 2006).
37
Besides this, the subject to be taught will also define the teachers’ feeling toward
the class size. Having a hundred students in a class when the transfer of factual
knowledge happens (such as science, mathematics) is not considered to be a large class
because the teacher is still able to cover all students (Obanya et all.,nd). Additionally, the
interaction between student – teacher and teacher – student does not happen in the full
time of one class session since teacher will mostly give a lecture while the students pay
attention. The interaction is needed when the question arises and the problem solving can
be done among the teacher and students in a whole class.
However, the teaching of English, in which the interaction between teacher –
student, student – teacher, and student – student should be balanced, students talking time
(STT) must be more than teacher talking time (TTT) (Gower et al., 1995; Scrivener,1994;
Lewis, 1993). That is why the teacher is going to consider that his or her class is a large
class when teacher talking time is higher than students talking time (e.g. Coleman, 1989b,
1989c; Kumar,1992).A high teacher talking time is the proof of the imbalance power
between teacher and students in a large class (Phillips, 1997; Watson, 1996).
Studies about Feedback in Large Class
Teacher plays a very important role as well as handles the hardest work when
managing the large class. He or she has to make sure that the knowledge is transferred
evenly to all of the students in that class no matter how many students there are.
Lecturing is not a problem as long as the students pay attention to what is going on in that
class. The worst thing which will happen in a large class is when front-row students are
the ones who pay attention, while the rest do not due to the class noise and teacher’s
voice. As Nunan & Lamb (1996) stated that “a teacher is unable to deal well with “the
38
two-zone problem”- those students who sit in the front of the class may have the
academic advantage of teacher-student interaction while those in the back cannot see or
hear instructional activities clearly, and tend to be demotivated” (p. 147-148). Moreover,
the vicious cycle of the “Matthew Effects” where the poor get poorer and the rich get
richer (Stanovich, 1986, cited in Lin, 2009) will happen in a large class because students
with a lower confidence will not ask questions and will keep silent in the class.
Dealing with writing, teacher has to be really careful about responding and
assessing. In a small class with 20 students, if the teacher spends 20 minutes to read,
mark the mistakes, respond, and give some suggestions, he or she needs 400 minutes (6
hours and 77 minutes) for each assignment continuously to work on that without
interruption. Obviously, when the teacher has more than one class per week, it is
impossible for him or her to manage all in a week. Considering the situation, feedback in
a large class should be carefully decided not only based on the time management for the
teacher, but also based on the students’ needs in order to make the feedback more
effective.
Since large class is only used in the developing countries where the research does
not mostly take place, there is only a limited number of studies explored about feedback
practice in large class. Research from Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006) and Lin (2009) are
the two studies about feedback in large class. Both studies put feedback from teachers as
the most important feedback in improving their writing. The results of those studies
showed that the participants promoted teacher feedback but also valued peer feedback
due to the advantages of the two.
39
Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006), who did the research in a Chinese EFL writing
class, used two different classes: one has peer feedback (n=38) and the other one has
teacher feedback (n=40). The data are from students’ writing and the questionnaire. The
results bring four important conclusions;
1. Feedback plays an important role in Chinese EFL students’ revision in writing (Both
teacher’s feedback and peer feedback).
2. The impact of teacher and peer feedback is different. Teacher feedback seems
incorporate compare with the peer feedback in which students can have negotiation
during the process, but surprisingly, there are many meaning changes when peer
feedback is done.
3. Chinese students value teacher feedback more highly than peer feedback.
4. Although peer feedback has less impact than teacher feedback, but it leads to the
students’ writing improvement (p. 193).
The comments in the questionnaire data stated students’ perception towards peer
and teacher feedback. The participants said “two heads are better than one. My peers are
closer to me in age and experience. We have more in common when we exchange ideas. I
can have more time communicating with my partner. You can always learn something
from your classmates. On teacher feedback they said teacher feedback is more accurate.
Teacher feedback is more to the point. Teacher feedback is more trustworthy.” (p. 193).
A case study from Lin (2009) yielded the same result with Miao, Badger, and
Zhen (2006) which support peer feedback to be applied in a large class, but value teacher
feedback more. This study explored how large multi level EFL writing class experiences
and interacts with self, peer, and teacher feedback. Twenty four students (21 females and
40
three males) were divided into three groups based on the result of their writing during the
past three semesters: seven students as a higher level English proficiency, nine
intermediate, and eight students as lower level of English proficiency. The results showed
that each type of the three feedback has its own strength and weaknesses. To choose
among the three types of feedback, 15 students put teacher feedback as their most
preference with some reasons, such as teacher is the one who is professional, trust
worthy, capable of correction, has more knowledge than peers.
This study added new result that no matter their English proficiency level (low,
intermediate, and high), teacher feedback is still their first choice comparing with peer
feedback and self-feedback. These studies from Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006) and Lin
(2009) show that although students feel more comfortable with peer feedback because it
enables them to negotiate their ideas, they still view teacher feedback as the feedback
which is the most important feedback source (Ferris & Hedgcock, 2005; Miao et al.,
2006; Tsui & Ng, 2000).
The two studies found about feedback in large classes only yield the result that
feedback from teacher and peer are valued for large classes, without specifically describe
about what kind of feedback the students expected to get from their teacher and peer to
their writing. That is why, firstly, the current study is designed to explore the students’
preferences about feedback they are expecting to get from their lecturer or peer.
Secondly, it is designed in order to know about the students’ preferences toward the
sources of feedback.
The quantitative questionnaire of this study is designed to answer the following
research questions:
41
class?
2. What features of their writing do university students believe are the most important to
be responded to?
Conclusion
Not many studies about feedback have done in large classes because large classes
are no longer used in inner circle country or the countries where the majority research has
been done. Most developing countries still use large class. Since this study conducted in
Indonesia, where large classes are still used, I focused on feedback practice in the large
class. This chapter starts with the definition of feedback, then discuss all about feedback
starting from the sources of feedback, kinds of feedback practices, and the importance of
feedback in writing class. Knowing all about that, the discussion about large class in
which a class which consists of 50 to 90 students is the description of large class which
fits to the context of this study. Finally, two studies about feedback in large class were
discussed in which the clear gap was illustrated and ended in research questions. The next
chapter discusses the methodology of this study.
42
CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
This chapter discusses the methodology that was used in this study. The first part
of this chapter discusses the research design applied in the study, and after that the
description of participants is provided. The next section explains about data collection
method and reasons for choosing the method. Then, detail data collection procedures are
described. Finally, data analysis process is explained to complete the description of the
research methodology for this study.
Research Design
The objective of the study is to describe the student preferences for feedback on
writing in large classes. It means that this study attempts to describe what kind of
feedback practices is useful for improving the students’ writing quality. Based on the
objective of this study, large numbers of participants’ opinions are needed in order to
generalize the finding. That is why the appropriate research design for this study is
quantitative research design because in quantitative research, the larger number of
participants the more reliable the finding will be (Creswell, 2003). In quantitative
research, the data also will be presented in numerical data which will simplify the
process.
Sampling Method
The sampling method of this study was purposeful sampling (Meriam, 1998;
Patton, 2002). Based on Patton (2002), the objective of purposeful sampling is to “select
rich information strategically and purposefully” (p. 234). This study used purposive
sampling method because all the participants fitted the four criteria;
43
1. The participants are studying in large classes;
2. The participants have had Writing 1 in which they studied about the basic component
of writing such as what simple sentences are. In addition, in this writing course, the
writing lecturers provide the students with lecturer feedback and started to introduce
peer feedback in their second semester.
3. The participants have had Writing 2 in which they studied about compound and
complex sentences. The lecturers who teach this Writing 2 course start to balance the
portion of lecturer feedback (70%) and peer feedback (30%). This Writing 2 is given
in the third semester.
4. The participants have had Writing 3 in the fourth semester in which they started to
make one to two pages writing report. Peer feedback is used more frequently than in
the Writing 2.
5. The participants are in the fifth semester and studying writing 4 in which the lecturers
start to provide the students with feedback from them and feedback from their peers
in the same portion; 50% lecturer feedback and 50% peer feedback.
The study was conducted in English Study Program in a private university in
Indonesia where writing is presented in four semesters. The participants in this study
were undergraduate students of English Study Program in the Faculty of Teacher
Training and Education. From 600 students of the total population, there were 150
students of undergraduate English study program in the Faculty of Teacher Training and
Education who fitted the criteria. Their age is ranging from 20 until 25. There is no
restriction on the sex of the subjects. Both men and women participated in this study.
44
The Data Collection Method
As the method of data collection, this study used questionnaire (Appendix A). The
aim of using this questionnaire is to collect the data which can be used to quantify the
kinds of feedback which is preferred by the participants for their writing in large classes.
In addition, Bulmer (2004) cited in Bird (2009) stated “the questionnaire is a well
established tool within social science research for acquiring information on participant
social characteristics, present and past behavior, standards of behavior or attitudes and
their beliefs and reasons for action with respect to the topic under investigation” (p.
1307). By using the questionnaire, the students’ past experience and their present practice
in receiving feedback can be recalled in completing this study.
The questionnaire consists of 26 closed-ended questions. This study used closed-
ended questions due to the following reasons; firstly, it is easier to make an analysis,
statistical count, and comparison among the sample; secondly, it is quicker to be coded
and analyzed than open-ended questions (Cohen, Manion, & Morrison, 2011). The
questions were divided into two categories: feedback from lecturer and peer. Each
lecturer and peer has 13 questions of the kinds of feedback (Written, Oral, Grammar,
Spelling, Punctuation, Vocabulary Choice, Style, Organization, Direct, Indirect,
Feedback in the first draft, Feedback in the second draft) which the students prefer to get
from their peer and teacher.
The questionnaire used a rating scale model (Likert Scale). The reason why this
study used rating scale (Likert scale) is because of the degree of sensitivity and
differentiation of response whilst still generating numbers (Cohen, Manion & Morison,
2011, p. 386). The participants were asked to express their opinion about a series of
45
statements based on a limited range of possible answers. They were asked to express their
opinion to a series of statements by answering the questionnaire using the Likert Scale
(Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful). The questionnaire which had
been completed was sent to me via postage mail.
Data Collection Procedures
Since the participants of this study were the students in one of the private
universities in Indonesia, the data collection procedure was started by asking the
university’s approval for me to take the data there. At first, I, who am one of the
assistants of a professor in that university, had a correspondence with one of my
colleagues there about my research. After being well acquainted with my research, the
university gave me a letter of approval to do the research there.
The next step was recruiting the participants. Since I was not able to collect the
data by myself due to a long distance, I contacted one of my colleagues to help me
collecting the data. After the Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved this study, I
informed my colleague to start the process of recruiting the participants. The 150 students
of the fifth semester of undergraduate study were gathered in one room to get some
explanations about what this research is about and the advantages of the research for the
participants as the students who experience studying writing in large classes.
At the same time, their voluntary status, confidentiality, and my identity in the
cover letter (Appendix B) were explained. The 150 students who agreed to participate in
this study were asked to complete the informed consent form (Appendix C) and sign it.
They were welcomed to ask questions about the study and the confidentiality. Five
46
minutes were given to the participants to complete the informed consent form and sign it
and twenty minutes were given to answer the questionnaires.
Pilot Testing
A draft version of the questionnaire was pilot tested twice. Firstly, it was given to
the 20 MA TESOL students. They commented on the instruction, structures, and the
order of the questions in the questionnaire. The participants’ comments focused on the
instruction, structures, and the order of the questions in the questionnaire. Based on the
feedback, the number of questions, which were 30 at first, reduced to 26 because there
were four questions which repeated and overlapped. Furthermore, the example on how to
answer the questionnaire was added in the instruction’s part.
Since there were only a few of MA TESOL students who answered the
questionnaire, secondly, 20 students from a different private university in Indonesia who
shared similar background with the target participants for this study were asked to
complete the questionnaire. The second pilot test showed that all the 20 participants
understood what all the questions were about. They interpreted the questions in the same
way because all the response choices were appropriate. The problem which was found in
the first pilot test about the unclear instruction did not result in any confusion in the
second pilot test. They all correctly followed the instruction. No comments were found
about the instruction or the questions. Fifteen from twenty participants in this second
pilot test clearly stated their additional comments in the comment’s lines, while the other
five just wrote “No comment” in those lines.
47
Data Analysis
The data were analyzed by using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences
(SPSS) (Version 20 software). In order to make the data transferring easier to the SPSS,
the participants’ responses to the questionnaires were arranged into the Excel table. Since
the answers to the research questions not only based on the whole numbers of
participants, but also based on their gender and English proficiency level (TOEFL scores
with four ranges: 1) 200 to 300; 2) 301 to 400; 3) 401 to 500; and 4) 500 and above), so
my thesis advisor asked me to arrange the data based on the dependent and independent
variables in the Excel table.
The dependent variable is rating (Likert scale: (Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 –
5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful)). There are three independent variables in this study. They are:
1. Participants (150 participants)
2. Gender (Male and Female)
3. English proficiency level (TOEFL scores ranges)
To get the answers to the research questions and to determine whether there is / no any
significant differences among the variables, two-way and three-way ANOVA (analysis of
variance) were used. According to Pallant (2001) “Two-way ANOVA allows us to look
at the individual and joint effect of two independent variables on one dependent variable”
(p. 201).
To answer the first and second questions, descriptive data from means and
standard deviations scores were compared while to see the significant differences, the
inferential statistic data were used. The significant values of question numbers (Types of
feedback), participants, gender (male-female), and English proficiency level (TOEFL
48
score ranges) were analyzed to see the main effects and interactional effects between the
dependent and independent variables.
Summary
This chapter outlines the methodological rationale and procedures of quantitative
research approach as the research design. I explored, through the questionnaire with 150
participants, their opinions about the feedback on writing in large class. The
questionnaire consisted of 26 closed-ended questions. The participants expressed their
opinion by rating the feedback with the Likert scale (Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5
– 6 – 7 Very Helpful).
Data collection procedures started with the letter of approval from the university
where I took the data and recruited participants. Then, right after I got my IRB approved,
the questionnaires were distributed to the 150 participants. In analyzing the data, SPSS
was used. In order to clearly address the research questions, two-way and three-way
ANOVA were interpreted by using descriptive and inferential statistics data. In chapter
four, I describe the results of the study.
49
CHAPTER FOUR
RESULTS
This chapter presents the findings of the statistical analysis of the data collected
from the questionnaire. All the data were analyzed to find the answer to the two research
questions. The following are the questions that are presented in this chapter:
1. What do university students perceive as effective feedback in a large EFL
writing class?
2. What features of their writing do university students believe are the most
important to be responded to?
Description of the Program
The data were collected in one of the private universities in Indonesia, from
Faculty of Teacher Training and Education in English Study Program of undergraduate
students, who were in semester five. There is no TOEFL in the entrance test which causes
the students to be placed in a classroom not based on their English proficiency level but
based on their registration time. This makes one classroom consist of multiple English
proficiency levels which is defined by the students’ TOEFL scores (the scores ranging
from 200 to 300, 301 to 400, 401 to 500, and 500 and above).
Students are obliged to take TOEFL prediction for three times during four
academic years: in the first week of the first semester, at the end of semester four, and
before BA thesis defense. The purpose is to know about the students’ English proficiency
during the four academic years, whether their scores increase or decrease. Students are
required to reach a TOEFL prediction score of at least 500 as the main requirement for
having their thesis defense.
50
Unlike an English classroom in the United States or classroom in any other inner
circle countries, which only consists of 15 to 20 students, the class in Indonesia consists
of 50 to 90 students which are considered as large class. There is no restriction in
teaching and learning processes; all are presented in the large class. Writing is taught in
four courses beginning with Writing 1 which is taught in semester two, Writing 2 in
semester three, Writing 3 in semester four, and Writing 4 in semester five. They are also
given in the large class.
Participant Demographics
As shown in Table 2, a majority of the 150 participants who answered the survey
questionnaire were female (81.33%) and male (18%), while only (0.64%) of the rest did
not fill the gender option.
Table 2
Gender of Participants
Gender Frequency Percent %

Male 27 18%
Female 122 81.33%
No gender specified 1 0.67%
51
Figure 3. Pie chart of gender of the participants
The English proficiency levels of the participants was determined by their TOEFL
prediction scores ranging from 200-300, 301-400, 401-500, and 500 and above. More
than half (52.67%) of the participants’ TOEFL prediction scores ranges from 301 to 400.
More than one third (38%) of the participants’ TOEFL prediction scores ranges from 401
to 500. There were nine participants (6%) who did not fill out the information about the
TOEFL score ranges. The lowest TOEFL prediction scores which ranging from 200 to
300 were possessed by only three participants (2%) while only two participants (1.33%)
who hold the highest TOEFL prediction scores of 500 and above.
Table 3
English Proficiency Level of Participants
Range of English Proficiency Level Frequency Percent %

No score range specified 9 6%
200-300 3 2%
301-400 79 52.67%
401-500 57 38%
500+ 2 1.33%
52
Figure 4. Pie chart of English proficiency level
Data Interpretation
In order to clearly address the aforementioned two research questions, the
researcher used the descriptive statistics in which the mean and standard deviation scores
were analyzed to see the rating of each type of feedback. First, each research question
was answered based on participants (lecturers and peers), gender (male/female), and
English proficiency level (TOEFL scores ranging from 200-300, 301-400, 401-500, and
500 and above).
To answer the first research question, I began with showing the students’
preferences in the source of feedback which was claimed to be more effective in the large
EFL writing class. It was concluded to be more effective by comparing the total means of
both types of feedback from lecturers and peers. After that, she interpreted the highest
mean scores of feedback practices from lecturers and peers as the students’ perceptions
about the effective feedback practices in the large EFL writing class. The feedback
53
practices were divided into three categories: 1) Oral and written feedback, 2) Direct and
indirect feedback, and 3) Feedback on the first and final draft.
Four higher writing features’ mean scores from lecturers and peers answered the
second research question. Like research question one, research question two was also
answered based on participants, gender, and English proficiency level. Finally, I
substantiated the relationship or connection among the data through the inferential
statistics; two way ANOVA participants (Lecturer and peers), three way ANOVA of
gender (males/females), and three way ANOVA of English proficiency level (TOEFL
scores ranging from 200-300, 301-400, 401-500, and 500 and above).
Research Question 1
What do university students perceive as effective feedback in a large EFL writing class?
Perceptions about effective feedback practices based on participants. Based
on the participants (Table 4), the students preferred to get feedback from their lecturers
(Total Mean=6.20 on the 1 to 7 Likert scale, Standard Deviation= 1.31) more than from
their peers (Total Mean=5.84 on the 1 to 7 Likert scale, Standard Deviation= 1.45).
Table 4
Feedback Sources
Total
No Feedback Sources
M SD
1 Lecturers 6.20 1.31
2 Peers 5.84 1.45
However, although the total mean scores of feedback from the lecturers is higher than
feedback from peer, it does not mean that the students wanted to get feedback only from
the lecturers. The students perceived that indirect feedback 1, in which they needed their
54
mistakes or errors just to be shown without any other comments, was effective if it was
given by their peers but not by their lecturers (Figure 5).
Figure 5. Bar chart of kinds of feedback practices based on participants
Oral and written feedback. As can be seen in Table 5, although the difference
mean scores between oral and written feedback were not too large, the students somewhat
perceived that written feedback (M=6.54 on the 1 to 7 Likert scale, SD=1.13) was more
effective given by their lecturers than oral feedback (M=6.11, SD=1.41). However, most
of the 150 students in this study perceived that oral feedback (M=5.95, SD=1.37) is more
effective compared to written feedback (M=5.73, SD=1.45) from their peers.
55
Table 5
Written and Oral Feedback based on Participants
Feedback Lecturers Feedback Peers

No No
Type M SD Type M SD
1 Written 6.54 1.13 1 Oral 5.95 1.37
2 Oral 6.11 1.41 2 Written 5.73 1.45
Direct and indirect feedback. The students in this study had the same perceptions
on direct and indirect feedback (Table 6). They agreed that the effective feedback
practice in a large EFL writing class given by both lecturers and peers was direct
feedback. They believed that indirect feedback in which their lecturers or peers showed
where the mistakes were and gave clues on how to correct them was the least effective
form of feedback.
Table 6
Direct and Indirect Feedback based on Participants

No No
Type M SD Type M SD
1 Direct 6.45 1.25 1 Direct 6.05 1.43
2 Indirect 2 6.27 1.26 2 Indirect 2 5.83 1.49
Feedback on the first and final draft. The students had the same perceptions
regarding feedback on the first or final draft (Table 7). They perceived that feedback
which was given by lecturers in the final draft (M=5.85, SD=1.46) was more effective
than in the first draft (M=5.70, SD=1.46). In the final draft too, the students thought that
the feedback would be effective when their peers corrected their writing (M=5.56,
SD=1.63).
56
Table 7
Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Participants
Lecturers Peers
No Feedback on No Feedback on
M SD M SD
1 the Final Draft 5.85 1.46 1 the Final Draft 5.56 1.63
2 st
the 1 Draft 5.70 1.51 2 st
the 1 Draft 5.37 1.57
Overall, the students perceived that:
1. From their lecturers, the effective feedback practices should be in the written form in
which the lecturers write their comments or corrections by showing where the mistakes
are and writing the correct words or structures next to them in the final draft.
2. From their peers, the effective feedback practices are speaking to them and showing
where the mistakes are and what the correct words or structures are in the final draft.
The significant result of ANOVA based on participants (lecturers & peers)-
question (Table 8) shows that there was a significant different rating not only among the
questions (types of feedback) but also between the participantss (lecturers and peers) (p
value < 0.01). In regard to the interaction effect between the question number and
participants, the p value also shows that there was no significant effect of question
number (Types of feedback) and rating for feedback from lecturers and from peers
(Participants) (p value < 0.01).
Coefficient p value < 0.01 was used instead of p value < 0.05 because the result of
Levene’s test significant value was less than .05 which mean the stringent significant
level (0.01) is recommended for evaluating the result of this two way ANOVA (Pallant,
2001). It can be seen in Table 9.
57
Table 8
Two Way ANOVA Participants-Question
Dependent variable: RATING

Type III Sum Mean
Source df F Sig
of Squares Square
Corrected Model 468.218a 25 18.729 10.207 .000
Intercept 141343.017 1 141343.017 77031 .000
Question_Number 302.034 12 25.169 13.717 .000
Participants 125.615 1 125.615 68.46 .000
Question_Number*
Participants 40.779 12 3.398 1.825 .035
Error 7102.84 3871 1.835
Total 148909 3897
Corrected Total 7571.058 3896
Table 9
Levene’s Test of Equality of Error Variances
Dependent variable: RATING

F df1 df2 Sig.
7.378 25 3871 .000
Perceptions about the effective feedback practices based on gender. Based on
the gender (Table 10), although the difference mean scores between lecturers and peers is
only 0.22, the higher mean from lecturers (M=5.97) shows that male students preferred to
get feedback from their lecturers. It also occurs in the mean scores from feedback sources
which were chosen by female students. They chose feedback from their lecturers
(M=6.25, SD=1.26) more than from their peer (M=5.86, SD=1.48).
58
Table 10
Feedback Sources based on Gender
Male Female
No Feedback Sources Total
M SD M SD
1 Lecturers 5.97 1.50 6.25 1.26
2 Peers 5.75 1.35 5.86 1.48
Oral and written feedback. Based on their gender, as can be seen in Table 11,
both male and female students agreed that written feedback from their lecturers was more
effective than oral feedback. They expected their lecturers to write the corrections and
comments about the mistakes in their writing.
Table 11
Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender
Feedback from Lecturers

Feedback
No Male Female
Type
M SD M SD
1 Written 6.41 1.37 6.57 1.08
2 Oral 6.04 1.48 6.14 1.39
Different from the feedback which was given by their lecturers, both male and
female students chose oral feedback from their peers (Table 12). Female students thought
that feedback from their peers was effective in oral (M=5.88, SD=1.46) not in written
form (M=5.75, SD=1.50). Male students also agreed that their peers had to speak to them
when correcting their writing (M=6.30, SD=0.87).
59
Table 12
Written and Oral Feedback from Peers based on Gender
Feedback from Peers

Feedback
No Male Female
Type
M SD M SD
1 Oral 6.30 0.87 5.88 1.46
2 Written 5.59 1.28 5.75 1.50
Direct and indirect feedback. In Table 13 and 14, most of the 27 males and 122
females perceived that it was more effective when their lecturers gave the feedback by
showing them where the mistakes were and writing the correct words or structures
(Direct feedback). Female students not only perceived direct feedback as the effective
feedback from their lecturers (M=6.48, SD=1.31), but also from their peers (M=6.06,
SD=1.47). However, male students perceived them differently. Although the different
mean scores among indirect feedback 2 and direct feedback was only 0.04 (Table 12b),
male students perceived indirect feedback (M=6.00, SD= 0.92) as more effective from
their peers while direct feedback from their lecturers.
Table 13
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender

Male Female
No Feedback Type No Feedback Type
M SD M SD
1 Direct 6.30 0.99 1 Direct 6.48 1.31
60
Table 14
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on Gender
Feedback from Peers

Male Female
M SD M SD
1 Indirect 2 6.00 0.92 1 Direct 6.06 1.47
2 Direct 5.96 1.22 2 Indirect 2 5.80 1.60
Feedback on the first and final draft. As can be seen in Table 15, male and
female students decided that feedback on the final draft was the effective feedback
practice for their writing which was done in a large EFL writing class. Whether from
their lecturers or from their peers, they all chose feedback on the final draft as more
effective than feedback on the first draft.
Table 15
Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Gender
Feedback from Lecturers Feedback from Peer

No Feedback on Male Female Male Female
M SD M SD M SD M SD
1 the Final Draft 5.67 1.73 5.89 1.41 5.67 1.47 5.52 1.67
2 st
the 1 Draft 5.41 1.74 5.75 1.46 5.30 1.75 5.38 1.53
It can be concluded that both male and female students perceived written
feedback as the effective feedback practice if it was given by their lecturers. They also
both agreed that from their peers, oral feedback was the effective feedback practice in a
large EFL writing class. They all agreed that feedback on the final draft would be helpful
for their writing whether it was given by lecturers or peers. The different perception
61
towards the effective feedback practice occurred in their choice of direct and indirect
feedback.
When the feedback was given by their lecturers, both male and female students
agreed that direct feedback was effective. However, their perceptions were different on
feedback from peers. Male students believed when their peers showed them where the
mistakes were and gave the clues on how to correct them (Indirect feedback 2) as more
effective than directly writing the correct words or structures (Direct feedback). On the
other hand, female students thought that feedback from their peers would be good when
they directly wrote the correct words or structures upon the mistakes (Direct feedback).
The significant result of three way ANOVA of gender (male/female)-Participants
(lecturers/peers)-Question (types of feedback) (Table 15) shows that there is no
significant interaction among the rating of question number, participants, and gender
(p=1.000, p value>.05), although there is a significantly different rating between gender
(p value=.000, p<.05).
Table 16
Three Way ANOVA Gender-Participants-Question
Type III Sum Mean
Source df F Sig
of Squares Square
Intercept 8577.546 1 8577.546 4665.720 .000
Question_Number 15.555 12 1.296 .705 .748
Participants .925 1 .925 .503 .478
Gender 31.026 2 15.513 8.438 .000
Question_Number*Participants 4.190 12 .349 .190 .999
Question_Number*Gender 30.722 24 1.280 .696 .860
Participants*Gender 6.528 2 3.264 1.775 .170
Question_Number*
Participants*Gender 13.640 24 .568 .309 1.000
Error 7020.920 3819 1.838
Total 148909 3897
62
Perceptions about the effective feedback practices based on English
proficiency level. Based on the English proficiency level, the students from four different
TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 500 and above preferred to get feedback from their
lecturers more than from their peers (see Table 17). There is a light different mean score
between feedback from lecturers and peers of the students with the TOEFL score ranging
from 500 and above. The different is more than 1.00.
Table 17
Feedback Sources based on English Proficiency Level
TOEFL Score Ranges

500 and
200-300 301-400 401-500
above
No Feedback Sources Total
M SD M SD M SD M SD
1 Lecturers 6.92 2.32 6.25 1.22 6.18 1.36 6.19 1.02
2 Peers 6.74 0.59 5.91 1.44 5.81 1.40 5.00 1.50
Oral and written feedback. As shown in Table 18, the students from four
different English proficiency level overall perceived that written feedback as the effective
feedback from their lecturers. Interestingly, only the students with TOEFL scores ranging
from 200 to 300 had a different in the mean and standard deviation scores for oral
(M=5.00, SD=3.46) and written (M=7.00, SD=0.00) feedback. The other thing was from
the students with TOEFL score ranging from 500 and above, the two students valued
feedback in oral (M=6.50, SD=0.71) and in written form (M=6.50, SD=0.71), the same
way when the feedback came from their lecturers. The students with TOEFL scores
ranging from 200 to 300 seemed to strongly believe that written feedback from their
lecturers was more effective than oral feedback. However, the students with the mean
63
scores ranging from 500 and above perceived both written (M=6.50, SD=0.71) and oral
feedback (M=6.50, SD=0.71) from the lecturers as the effective feedback.
Table 18
Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency Level

TOEFL Score Ranges
200-300 301-400 401-500 500 +
No Feedback Type
M SD M SD M SD M SD
1 Written 7.00 0.00 6.47 1.26 6.63 0.99 6.50 0.71
2 Oral 5.00 3.46 6.32 1.04 6.05 1.60 6.50 0.71
It was also found the same that all the students with different TOEFL scores
perceived oral feedback as the effective feedback from their peers not written feedback
(Table 19). Similar to the result of feedback from lecturers, students with TOEFL scores
ranging on 200 to 300 chose the Likert scale with the highest rating 7 for their choices of
the effective feedback.
Table 19
Written and Oral Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level
Feedback from Peers

TOEFL Score Ranges
200-300 301-400 401-500 500 +
No Feedback Type
M SD M SD M SD M SD
1 Oral 7.00 0.00 5.94 1.44 6.02 1.23 6.50 0.71
2 Written 6.67 0.58 5.57 1.65 5.93 1.18 5.00 1.41
Direct and indirect feedback. Table 20 and 21 show that almost all the students
preferred their lecturers to show them where the mistakes in their writing were and have
their lecturer correct them by writing the correct words or structures (Direct feedback).
They were the students with the TOEFL score ranging from 200-300 (M=7.00,
64
SD=0.00), 401-500 (M=6.63, SD=0.84), and 500+ (M=7.00, SD=0.00). Different from
the students with those TOEFL score ranges, students with TOEFL score ranging from
301 to 400 believed that indirect feedback 2 (M=6.28, SD=1.35), in which the lecturers
just showed the mistakes and wrote the clues, as the effective feedback from their
lecturers.
The rating shows that direct feedback is in the first rating, indirect feedback 2 as
the second, and indirect feedback 1 as the last one for the students with the TOEFL
scores ranging from 200-300, 401-500, and 500+. Conversely, the students with TOEFL
scores ranging from 300 to 400 rated them differently. They chose indirect feedback 2 as
the first, direct feedback in the second rating, and indirect feedback 1 as the last. It was
found the same on indirect feedback 1. They all perceived that when their lecturers as
well as their peers only showed where the mistakes were without correcting them
(Indirect feedback 1) as the less effective feedback.
Table 20
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency Level

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
1 Direct 7.00 0.00 1 Indirect 2 6.28 1.35
2 Indirect 2 6.00 1.00 2 Direct 6.27 1.47
65
Table 21
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency Level

401-500 500 +
M SD M SD
1 Direct 6.63 0.84 1 Direct 7.00 0.00
An interesting finding is on the feedback in the first or second draft from peers
(Table 22 and 23). It is interesting because students with the highest and the lowest
TOEFL scores only wanted their peers to show where the mistakes were. The students in
TOEFL scores 200-300 and 500and above perceived that indirect feedback 1 as the most
effective feedback from their peers. Students with TOEFL scores 200-300 and 500 and
above also had the same way in rating the three kinds of feedback practices. They
preferred indirect feedback 1 as the first choice, indirect feedback 2 as the second, and
direct feedback as the last. On the other hand, direct feedback was perceived as the
effective feedback from peers by the students with TOEFL scores 301 to 500.
Table 22
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level
Feedback from Peers

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
1 Indirect 1 7.00 0.00 1 Direct 6.16 1.39
3 Direct 6.33 1.15 3 Indirect 1 5.86 1.52
66
Table 23
Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on English Proficiency Level
Feedback from Peers

401-500 500 +
M SD M SD
1 Direct 5.96 1.43 1 Indirect 1 6.00 1.41
3 Indirect 1 5.63 1.52 3 Direct 5.00 2.83
Feedback on the first and final draft. As seen in table 24 and 25, the students
with TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 300 were the only ones who perceived feedback
on the first draft as the effective feedback when it was given by their lecturers (M=4.67,
SD=4.04). The other three TOEFL score ranges believed that feedback on the final draft
was the effective one from their lecturers.
Table 24
Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores Ranging from 200 to 400

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
1 the 1st draft 4.67 4.04 1 the final draft 5.85 1.54
st
2 the final draft 4.67 4.04 2 the 1 draft 5.75 1.53
Table 25
and above

401-500 500 +
M SD M SD
1 the final draft 5.86 1.25 1 the final draft 6.50 0.71
st st
2 the 1 draft 5.74 1.25 2 the 1 draft 6.00 1.41
67
Students with TOEFL scores from 200 to 300 perceived feedback from peers in
the same preferences with feedback from lecturers (see Table 26 and 27). They chose the
first draft as the effective draft to be corrected both by lecturers and peers. Not only did
students with TOEFL scores 200-300 perceive feedback on the first draft as the effective
feedback practice from their peers, but also students with TOEFL scores 500 and above
perceived the same way. They perceived feedback on the final draft as not as effective as
on the first draft when it was given by their peers. The other students with the TOEFL
score ranging from 301 to 500 had a different perception; they agreed that the final draft
was the effective draft when their peers had to correct their mistakes.
Table 26
Feedback from Peers

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
1 the final draft 7.00 0.00 1 the final draft 5.58 1.69
nd st
2 the 2 draft 7.00 0.00 2 the 1 draft 5.46 1.49
Table 27
and above
Feedback from Peers

401-500 500 +
M SD M SD
1 the final draft 5.51 1.62 1 the 1st draft 4.00 1.41
st
2 the 1 draft 5.35 1.51 2 the final draft 4.00 1.41
On the whole feedback practices, it was found the same that all students from four
TOEFL score ranges put written feedback as more effective from their lecturers. Oral
feedback was assumed as the effective feedback practice when it was given by their
68
peers. However, there were different perceptions on direct and indirect feedback both
from lecturers and peers. Students with TOEFL scores 200-300, 401-500, and 500 and
above perceived that direct feedback was the most effective feedback given by their
lecturers. Only students with TOEFL score 301-400 believed that indirect feedback 2 as
the most effective feedback practice given by their lecturers.
An interesting finding was on the feedback practices trend from students with the
highest and lowest TOEFL scores. They both agreed that when their peers just showed
them where the mistakes were as the most effective way to correct their writing. On the
other hand, students with TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to 500 still perceived that
direct feedback was the most effective feedback both from their lecturers and peers.
Students with the lowest TOEFL scores preferred to get the feedback from their
lecturers and peers in their first draft. The highest TOEFL scoring students also preferred
to get Feedback on the first draft but only when it was from their peers. From their
lecturers, students with TOEFL scores ranging from 500 and above were the same with
students with the TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to 500; they perceived feedback on the
final draft as more effective given by their lecturers. Only students with the TOEFL
scores ranging from 301 to 500 consistently chose feedback on the final draft both from
their lecturers and peers.
The significant result of three way ANOVA of Gender (male/female)-Participants
(lecturers/peers)-Question (type of feedback) (Table 28) shows that there is a significant
difference in ratings among the English proficiency level (p value=.000, p value<.05)
which means that there is significantly different perceptions among the students with the
TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 500 and above. There is also a significant interaction
69
between participants and English proficiency level (p value=.000, p value<.05).
However, there is no significant interaction between question number (Types of
feedback) and English proficiency level (p value=.989, p value>.05). There is also no
significant interaction among question number (Types of feedback), participants, and
English proficiency level (p value=.954, p value>.05).
Table 28
Three Way ANOVA English Proficiency Level-Participants-Question
Type III Sum Mean

Source df F Sig
of Squares Square
Intercept 23494.730 1 23494.730 12829.628 .000
Question_Number 72.684 12 6.057 3.308 .000
Participants 18.502 1 18.502 10.103 .001
ESL_Level 53.355 4 13.339 7.284 .000
Question_Number*
Participants 25.725 12 2.146 1.172 .297
Question_Number*
ESL_Level 52.072 48 1.085 .592 .989
Participants*
ESL_Level 38.977 4 9.744 5.321 .000
Question_Number*
Participants*
ESL_Level 59.981 48 1.250 .682 .954
Error 6898.458 1.8381.831
Total 148909.000 3897
It was mentioned before that the there are four ranges of TOEFL scores which
mean that the English proficiency level are different. In order to know which English
proficiency levels (TOEFL score ranges) had a significant difference in mean scores, post
hoc test was conducted (Table 29). Post-hoc comparisons using the LSD test indicated
that the mean scores for the students with TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 300 was
significantly different from the students with TOEFL scores ranging from 400 to 500 and
70
the students with TOEFL scores ranging from 500 and above. The students with TOEFL
scores ranging from 300 to 400 (M=6.08, SD=1.34) did not differ significantly from
either of the groups.
Table 29
Multiple Comparisons (Post-hoc Test)
LSD
(I) English (J) English 95%...
Mean Std.
proficiency proficiency Sig Lower Upper
Diff(I-J) Error
level level Bound Bound
.00 200-300 -.6624* .17693 .000 -1.0093 -.3155
301-400 -.4080* .09337 .000 -.5911 -.2250
401-500 -.3270* .09519 .001 -.5137 -.1404
500+ -.0748 .20747 .719 -.3320 .4815
200-300 .00 .6624* .17693 .000 .3155 1.0093
301-400 2543 .15611 .103 -.0517 .5604
401-500 .3354* .15721 .033 .0271 .6436
500+ .7372* .24227 .002 .2622 1.2122
301-400 .00 .4080* .09337 .000 .2250 .5911
200-300 -.2543 .15611 .103 -.5604 .0517
401-500 .0810 .04614 .079 -.0094 .1715
500+ .4828* .19003 .011 .1103 .8554
401-500 .00 .3270* .09519 .001 .1404 .5137
200-300 -.3354* .15721 .033 -.6436 -.0271
301-400 -.0810 .04614 .079 -.1715 .0094
500+ .4018 .19093 .035 .0275 .7762
500+ .00 -.0748 .20747 .719 -.4815 .3320
200-300 -.7372* .24227 .002 -1.2122 -.2622
301-400 -.4828* .19003 .011 -.8554 -.1103
401-500 -.4018* .19093 .035 -.7762 -.0275
Research Question 2
What features of their writing do university students believe are the most important to be
responded to?
The most important writing features based on participants. As seen in Table
30, the students had different perceptions about the two most important and the two least
71
important writing features to be responded by their lecturers and peers. They first thought
that their lecturers had to correct their grammar mistakes (M= 6.67, SD=0.99) and then
the spelling mistakes (M=6.59, SD=0.99) in their writing. However, they needed their
peers to correct their spelling (M=6.24, SD=1.22) first, not their grammar mistakes
(M=6.22, SD=1.27).
After grammar and spelling, they believed that vocabulary choice and punctuation
were the important writing features from both their lecturers and from their peers. They
perceived that the organization of ideas and their writing style were the two writing
features which were considered to be the least important ones to be responded to by their
lecturers and peers. Writing style (M=5.89, SD=1.35) had the lowest mean score from all
writing features the students wanted their lecturer to respond to. Different from what they
expected to be the last writing features for their lecturers to respond to, they needed an
organization of ideas (M=5.60, SD=1.47) to be the last writing features for their peers to
respond to.
Table 30
Feedback on the Writing Features

No No
Type M SD Type M SD
1 Grammar 6.67 0.99 1 Spelling 6.24 1.22
2 Spelling 6.59 1.00 2 Grammar 6.22 1.27
Vocabulary Vocabulary
3 6.43 1.18 3 6.17 1.17
choice choice
4 Punctuation 6.38 0.97 4 Punctuation 5.81 1.48
Organization 6.09 1.21 Writing
5 5 5.69 1.44
of ideas Style
Writing Organization
6 5.89 1.35 6 5.60 1.47
Style of ideas
72
The most important writing features based on gender. As seen in Table 31,
although the mean scores of the writing features the students wanted their lecturer to
respond to were different from male and female, the rating showed that they had the same
perception on what writing features were considered to be the most important and least
important to be responded to by their lecturers. They perceived that they needed their
lecturers to respond to the mistakes of their grammar, spelling, vocabulary choice, and
punctuation. However, they thought that they wanted their writing style to be the last
writing feature for their lecturers to respond to.
Table 31
Feedback on Writing Features from Lecturers

Male Female
M SD M SD
1 Grammar 6.44 1.41 1 Grammar 6.71 0.88
2 Spelling 6.22 1.42 2 Spelling 6.66 0.89
3 Vocabulary Choice 6.22 1.42 3 Vocabulary Choice 6.48 1.13
5 Organization of Ideas 5.70 1.63 5 Organization of Ideas 6.17 1.10
6 Writing Style 5.37 1.92 6 Writing Style 6.00 1.17
Meanwhile, both male and female students had different perception on what
writing features they expected to be responded to by their peers (Table 32). Male students
wanted their vocabulary choice (M=5.93, SD=0.92) to be the first writing features to be
responded to by their peers, while female students expected the response would be on
their spelling (M=6.33, SD=1.14) mistakes. Male students put spelling (M=5.81,
SD=1.49) in the second place, grammar (M=5.47, SD=1.43) in the third place,
73
organization of ideas (M=5.71, SD=1.27) as the fourth, and punctuation (M=5.56,
SD=1.50) as the last one. Female students rated grammar (M=6.32, SD=1.21) as the
second writing features they wanted their peers to respond to and vocabulary choice
(M=6.22, SD=1.22) as the third one.
Punctuation and organization of ideas were the two writing features which were
assumed interchangeably based on female and male students. As mentioned before, male
students expected their friend/peer to correct their punctuation errors in the last time, but
female students wanted their friend/peer to concern on their organization of ideas
(M=5.57, SD=4.52) as the last writing feature to be responded to.
Table 32
Feedback on Writing Features from Peers
Feedback from Peers

Male Female
M SD M SD
1 Vocabulary Choice 5.93 0.92 1 Spelling 6.33 1.14

3 Grammar 5.74 1.43 3 Vocabulary Choice 6.22 1.22
4 Organization of Ideas 5.71 1.27 4 Punctuation 5.85 1.48
5 Writing Style 5.67 1.39 5 Writing Style 5.69 1.46
6 Punctuation 5.56 1.50 6 Organization of ideas 5.57 1.52
The most important writing features based on English proficiency level. As
can be seen in Table 33 and 34, the four different TOEFL scores students agreed about
the first writing features that they needed their lecturers to respond to. They believed that
it was grammar. Only the students with TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 500 had the
same opinion that they needed their lecturers to correct their spelling mistakes after the
grammar mistakes. However, correction on spelling (M=5.50, SD=2.11) was the last
74
writing feature students with the highest TOEFL scores wanted their lecturers to respond
to. Vocabulary choice and punctuation were the other two writing features that the
students with TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 500 wanted their lecturers to respond
to.
It was found the same those students with the TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to
500 perceived writing styles as the last writing features to be responded by their lecturers.
Different with them, the students with lowest TOEFL scores perceived organization of
ideas as the last one to be corrected. Finally, the highest TOEFL scores students thought
that organization of ideas not as one of the last writing features to be responded but as the
third one.
Table 33
Feedback on Writing Features from Lecturers (TOEFL Score 200 to 400)

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
1 Grammar 7.00 0.00 1 Grammar 6.78 0.59
2 Spelling 7.00 0.00 2 Spelling 6.70 0.67
3 Vocabulary Choice 7.00 0.00 3 Punctuation 6.47 0.78
4 Punctuation 7.00 0.00 4 Vocabulary Choice 6.42 1.09
5 Writing Style 4.67 4.04 5 Organization of Ideas 6.22 0.84
6 Organization of Ideas 4.67 4.04 6 Writing Style 5.97 1.07
75
Table 34
Feedback on Writing Features from Lecturers (TOEFL Score 401 to 500 and above)

401-500 500+
M SD M SD
1 Grammar 6.54 1.38 1 Grammar 7.00 0.00
2 Spelling 6.51 1.34 2 Vocabulary Choice 6.50 0.71
3 Vocabulary Choice 6.46 1.35 3 Organization of Ideas 6.50 0.71
5 Organization of Ideas 6.04 1.38 5 Writing Style 6.00 0.00
6 Writing Style 5.93 1.52 6 Spelling 5.50 2.12
From their peers (Table 35 and 36), students with TOEFL scores ranging from
301 to 500 had the same perception on the most important writing features they wanted
their peers to respond to. They chose grammar, spelling, punctuation, and vocabulary
choice. They also had the same choice on the last writing features they believed their
peers had to respond to, it was their organization of ideas.
Students with the lowest and highest TOEFL scores ranges thought that their
mistakes on grammar, spelling, and punctuation were the three most important writing
features to be responded to by their peers. However, they did not include correction on
vocabulary choice mistakes as the top four writing features to be responded to by their
peers. The lowest TOEFL scores students needed their organization of ideas to be
responded to more rather than their vocabulary choice mistakes while the highest TOEFL
scores students wanted their writing styles as the fourth writing styles to be responded to.
Organization of ideas was agreed by the students with TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to
500 and above to be the least important writing feature they wanted their peers to correct
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while writing style was as the least important one perceived by the lowest TOEFL scores
students.
Table 35
Feedback on Writing Features from Peers (TOEFL Score 200 to 400)
Feedback from Peers

200-300 301-400
M SD M SD
3 Punctuation 6.67 0.58 3 Vocabulary Choice 6.25 1.13
4 Organization of Ideas 6.67 0.58 4 Punctuation 5.86 1.46
5 Vocabulary Choice 6.33 1.15 5 Writing Style 5.78 1.32
6 Writing Style 6.33 1.15 6 Organization of Ideas 5.65 1.33
Table 36
Feedback on Writing Features from Peers (TOEFL Score 401 to 500 and above)
Feedback from Peers

401-500 500 +
M SD M SD
1 Vocabulary Choice 6.14 1.11 1 Grammar 5.50 2.12
3 Spelling 6.04 1.39 3 Punctuation 5.00 1.41
4 Punctuation 5.82 4.47 4 Writing Style 5.00 1.41
5 Writing Style 5.65 1.48 5 Vocabulary Choice 4.50 2.12
6 Organization of Ideas 5.65 1.45 6 Organization of Ideas 4.00 1.41
Conclusion
This study aims at investigating the students’ perceptions towards the effective
feedback practices to their writing both from their lecturers and peers. This study
specifically addresses the students’ preferences on the source of feedback, feedback
types, and what writing features to respond to. The quantitative research through
questionnaires was conducted in this study.
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In order to clearly address the students’ perceptions about what effective source of
feedback, feedback types, and writing features they wanted their lecturers and peers to
provide them with, the data were analyzed based on participants, gender, and English
proficiency level (TOEFL score ranges). Mean and standard deviation scores were
compared to answer both questions (descriptive). The scores from the p value, in which p
value < .05 was used as the standard, was analyzed to see whether there is a significant
difference between the independent variables or not and whether there is a significant
interaction between and among the independent variables when multiple independent
variables were analyzed together.
The results show that the students had the same perceptions about whom the
feedback is better given by. They agreed that feedback from their lecturers is more
effective for their writing than feedback from peers. However, since this study was done
with the purpose to find the effective feedback practices in a large class, the students
preferred to get the feedback from their lecturers and what kind of feedback they
expected to get from their peers was also investigated. The reason is because of the time
limitations and the lecturers’ capability in correcting and giving the feedback in a class
with more than 50 students. Therefore, peer feedback can be used as the alternative
feedback in the large EFL writing class.
There were different perceptions found about direct and indirect feedback.
Different perceptions were also found about in which draft the students needed their
writing to be corrected by their lecturers and peers. Oral and written feedback was
different in terms of whom the feedback came from. Although it was analyzed based on
participants, gender, and English proficiency level (TOEFL score ranges), the results
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showed that the students agreed to get oral feedback from their friend/peer while
feedback in written form from their lecturers.
Meanwhile, most of the students perceived that the most important writing
features they needed their lecturers and peers to respond to are grammar, spelling,
punctuation, and vocabulary choice. They needed their surface level errors to be
corrected more than their writing style and their organization of ideas. The students’
writing style and organization of ideas were placed as the two least important writing
features to be responded to by their peers and lecturers.
In chapter five, I discuss the major themes that emerge across the descriptive and
inferential results with the literature findings. In what follows, I introduce the large
themes that will be explicated in chapter five: 1. Students’ perceptions towards the
effective source of feedback; 2. Students’ perceptions towards oral and written feedback;
3. Students’ perceptions towards direct and indirect feedback; 4. Students’ perceptions
towards the first and final draft of their writing to be responded to; and 5. Students’
perceptions towards the most important writing features of their writing to be responded
to. Finally, in chapter five, I discuss the implications of the findings for teaching and
teacher education, the limitation of the study, and the direction for future research. I
concluded with some final comments at the end of chapter five.
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CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
This final chapter aims at presenting a summary of the study, a discussion of the
major findings, implication of the study, recommendation for future study, and
limitations. The first part of the chapter presents the summary of the research findings.
The research findings are presented into two parts based on the two research questions.
The summary is presented based on the way the data were analyzed (based on
participants, gender, and English proficiency level) under each part. The relationship of
the current study to prior related studies in Chapter 2 is explicated to show whether the
findings in the current study are similar or different to the earlier studies. The conclusion
of the findings is presented at the end of the summary section. Based on the research
findings, the implications of this research are discussed. Then, recommendation and
suggestions for further study is offered. To end the chapter, limitations of the study is
described before the final comments about the research.
Summary and Discussion of the Research Findings
Two main research findings are based on the research questions that this research
attempted to answer:
class?
2. What features of their writing do university students believe are the most important to
be responded to?
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The following is a summary of the research results which is organized into two parts
according to the two research questions of this study. As mentioned earlier, the findings
are structured based on the way the data were analyzed (based on participants, gender,
and English proficiency level). The major findings will be connected to the related
studies as mentioned in Chapter 2 if available. If the related research studies are
unavailable, explanations will be given to the findings.
Students’ Perceptions about the Effective Feedback in the Large EFL Writing Class
Participants. Based on the participants, the students perceived that feedback from
lecturers is more effective than feedback from their peers. This finding is in line with the
study about feedback in large classes from Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006). The results
from them, who investigated two Chinese EFL writing classes (one class has peer
feedback (n=38) and the other one has teacher feedback (n=40)), showed that students
valued teacher feedback more than peer feedback. This finding is similar to the finding of
this study. The participants’ comments in Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006) implied that
students preferred the feedback from teachers because it was trustworthy, accurate, and to
the point.
Studies from Cresswell (2000) and Tsui and Ng (2000) are also in agreement with
the current study. The participants in their study perceived that getting feedback from a
teacher is more important than from their peer. I assume that the reason why my
participants chose teacher feedback over peer feedback maybe similar to the reasons
found in Cresswell (2000) and Tsui and Ng (2000). Cresswell (2000) reported that the
students believed that writing ability is owned by teachers. Based on Tsui and Ng (2000),
it is because the students never doubt their teachers’ comments. I assume that another
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possible reason is because the students believed that their teachers’ feedback towards
their writing will result in them getting a good writing grade (Muncie, 2000). My other
presumption on the students’ decision to choose feedback from lecturers rather than peers
is because they are not familiar with peer feedback.
Although the total mean for feedback from lecturers and from peers showed that
feedback from lecturers has a higher total mean than feedback from a peer (Table 4),
interestingly there is one mean score of feedback from lecturers lower than feedback
from peers. Indirect feedback 1 (Figure 5), in which the corrections/comments were given
by showing where they were without giving any clues or writing the corrections, was
perceived as the only feedback type which is more effective given by their peers. I guess
they did not need their peers to provide them with the correction directly because with
their peers, they could do the correction together by asking and clarifying their ideas
which they could not do with their lecturers due to the time limitation (Miao, Badger, &
Zhen, 2006). This finding means that indirect feedback 1 is better given by their peers
than their lecturers.
Grami (2005) and Mahfoodh (2011) reported that the students in their study
preferred to get feedback in written form from their teacher. Grami (2000) specifically
found that the students in a Saudi university expected their teacher to give them feedback
in written form not oral. Mahfoodh (2005) who did a research to the EFL Arab context
found that the students only valued written feedback when it was from their teacher.
These two studies’ results are in agreement with one of the current study’s findings. The
participants in the current study also agreed that feedback in written form was more
effective when it was provided by their lecturers. However, this finding is different from
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the findings of Grabe and Caplan (1996). They found that oral feedback as the beneficial
feedback from their teacher because it creates an opportunity for the students to get more
explanation about the feedback they get from their teacher. Based on the study from
Grabe and Caplan (1996), oral feedback enables the students to ask for the follow up
explanation regarding their mistakes/errors which cannot be done when the teacher gives
the feedback in written form.
The current study also finds that the students expected their peers to give them a
different type of feedback from what they expected from their lecturers. They perceived
that feedback from their peers would be effective in oral not in written form. Berg and
Pilot (2005) place themselves in a neutral position about oral and written feedback
provided by peer. They found that peer feedback in written form focused on grammar
while oral feedback focused on their peer’s writing style. The finding of Berg and Pilot
(2005) is not supported by this current study because in this study, the students did not
perceive oral feedback from peers focused on grammar, but they believed they needed
their peers’ oral feedback to be focused firstly on their spelling not grammar (Table 5 and
22). This finding is drawn by connecting the answer of research question one and two
based on participants.
To point out whether the students in this study agreed to have direct or indirect
feedback in the first or final draft of their writing from their lecturers or peers,
interestingly, there were no different perceptions found about it. The students in this
study perceived that direct feedback which was given in the final draft as the most
effective feedback practice both from their lecturers and peers (Table 6 and 7). This
finding is somewhat different from the finding in Diab’s (2005) study. Diab (2005) finds
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that the students paired direct feedback with final draft and indirect feedback with the
first draft. Based on Diab (2005), having their teacher direct feedback in the final draft
will secure their writing from late submission. Indirect feedback in the first draft is
considered to be okay because they are not rushing to meet the submission deadline.
Crandler (2003), whose data came from experimental and control group, reports that
although the students’ learning process occur in indirect feedback, most of the students
preferred direct feedback for the easier and faster correction.
Gender. The inferential statistic data shows that there is no significant effect of
question number (types of feedback) and rating for male and female students. This result
means that the gender (whether it is male or female) did not influence their rating to the
different kinds of feedback. This finding is not in line with the finding of Alhaisony’s
(2004) study who found that gender has a strong effect on the findings (cited in Grami,
2004, p. 54). It is worth noting that there is an imbalance in gender distribution in the
current study. There were only 27 male and 122 female students in this study which
means that when comparing the data from male and female, the results cannot be
generalized. On the other hand, the discussion about female students in this current study
is more trusted since there were 122 male students participated in this study.
Since I only found one study about feedback with only male participants, so this
part of the finding discussion will discuss the finding about the students’ perception
towards the effective feedback practice based on male and female students’ perceptions
separately. The study from Grami (2004), who conducted the study for MA thesis, found
that male students valued feedback from their teacher (Miao, Badger, & Zhen, 2006;
Cresswell, 2000; Tsui & Ng, 2000) because they thought that there were many benefits
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they got from their teacher’s correction. This study was conducted in an Arab country
with the 36 male university-level students who were asked to respond to the
questionnaire. Besides this, this study from Grami (2004) also found that the students
perceived that direct feedback which was given by their teacher could help them know
their mistakes or errors in their writing. The students believed that direct feedback
benefited them more than indirect feedback although the interview with two ESL teachers
in the same university showed that the teachers promoted indirect feedback more than
direct feedback because it involved their students’ learning process in correcting their
writing.
This study from Grami (2004) is in line with the findings of the current research
study in which male students perceived that getting the written feedback from their
lecturers would help them improve their writing skills (Mahfoodh, 2011). The male
students in the current study also preferred their lecturers to write their corrections or
comments into their papers by showing where the mistakes are and writing the correct
words or structures next to them (direct feedback). Moreover, male students preferred
their lecturers to write the comments or corrections in the final draft not in the first draft.
Based on the present study, male students thought that feedback from their peers
would be effective when their peers corrects their mistakes by speaking to them to show
where the mistakes are and tell them the clues about how to correct them (indirect
feedback) in the final draft. The only difference between what male students wanted from
their lecturers and peers is that they preferred their lecturers to provide them with direct
feedback while it was enough to get the indirect feedback from their peers. Regarding the
male students’ perception that indirect feedback was more effective than direct feedback
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when it was provided by their peers is supported by the finding from Kramarae and
Treichler (1990) that male students would rather discuss their ideas, argue the opinion,
and ponder the different perceptions than take notes or read.
In addition to what I mentioned before that I could not find another study which
discussed about feedback based on gender except the study from Grami (2004).
Therefore, this study could not be used as the reference when discussing the findings
about female students’ perceptions towards the effective feedback practices because the
participants of this study were all male students.
Regarding female students in this study, they perceived similarly that the
feedback would be effective if both their lecturers and peers could show them where the
mistakes or errors were and write the correct words or structures next to mistakes or
errors (direct feedback) in their final draft. The only difference is that they perceived
differently about from whom oral and written feedback should be provided. They
believed that their lecturers should write the corrections or comments into their paper
while they wanted their peers to speak to them about the mistakes or errors in their
writing. A study from Tamada (as cited in Schwarte & Meier, 1998) highlighted that
female students’ learning characteristics is to write as many notes as possible and make
summary of what they have learned. This study is in line with the finding of the current
study in which female students preferred to get direct feedback because as found in
Tamada’s study that female students are not good in discussing, that is why they
preferred to choose direct feedback in which the answers were there without asking or
discussing with peers or lecturers.
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English proficiency level. Based on the students’ English proficiency level,
which is determined by the TOEFL scores, the students perceived that feedback from
lecturers is the source of feedback which is more effective than feedback from their peers
(Miao, Badger, & Zhen, 2006; Cresswell, 2000; Tsui & Ng, 2000). This perception was
perceived similarly by the students in all four TOEFL scores ranges. This finding is in
agreement with one of the findings in Lin (2009) who investigated three types of
feedback (self directed feedback, peer feedback, and teacher feedback) in a large class.
Lin (2009) reported that the participants, who were divided into three English proficiency
levels; low achievers, intermediate achievers, and high achievers, believed that teacher
feedback is the most important feedback compared to self and peer feedback.
It is worth noting that the students with the highest TOEFL scores in the current
study showed their different perception towards feedback from their peers and lecturers.
They believed and valued the corrections only from their lecturers not from their peers
while the other students seemed to be more negotiable with the feedback from their
lecturers and peers. The higher mean score of the feedback from lecturers than from peers
proved it. It is supported by the inferential statistic data with the level of significance of
the interaction between English proficiency level and participants are less than .05 which
means that there was a significant difference interaction between the English proficiency
level and participants.
This finding is also in line with the other finding from Lin (2009) who found the
specific reason why the students with the higher TOEFL scores differ in feedback from
their teacher and peer. According to Lin (2009) “as for the strategies students adopt to
deal with the unclearness of teacher comments, high achievers are more likely to go
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straight to the teacher than intermediate and low achiever, who will discuss with peers
before consulting the teacher” (p. 276). It can be inferred that the higher achiever students
tend to interact with their teacher most of the time although it is only for clarifying the
teacher’s comments, while the lower and intermediate achiever students tend to
formulate the corrections to their writing with their friends first before asking their
teacher’s explanation.
This finding is very helpful for the classes with multiple English proficiency
levels. By knowing the different preferences between higher and lower achiever students,
the teachers can manage the time when doing follow up feedback. Instead of calling the
students randomly, the teachers can call the higher achiever students first when doing
face to face feedback conferences and let the lower achiever students discuss with their
peer while waiting for their turn to be called. This strategy will save the time and make
the feedback more efficient because the lower achiever students are ready with what they
want to ask to their teachers.
Regarding oral and written feedback, students from the different TOEFL score
ranges showed that they agreed that feedback from their lecturer was effective in written
form (Grammi, 2005; Mahfoodh, 2011). There are two interesting findings from the
students with the lowest and highest TOEFL scores ranges. First, besides preferring the
feedback in the written form from their lecturers, it seemed that the lowest TOEFL score
students had a difficulty in understanding oral feedback from their lecturers. I assumed it
is because of their lack of speaking ability and it is hard for them to understand their
lecturers’ explanation. Another reason is that because they would have more time to
think, look up the dictionary for the difficult words their lecturers used, and ask their
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friends about their lecturers’ feedback when it was in written form. However, the students
with the highest TOEFL scores perceived that they were okay when their lecturers gave
them feedback both in oral and in written form. These two findings implied that the level
of English proficiency determine the students’ preferences towards the feedback types
they needed and expected.
The students in the four TOEFL score ranges perceived that it is more effective
when their peers gave them feedback by speaking to them than writing it into their
papers. The students with higher TOEFL scores thought that oral feedback from their
peers was far better than written feedback. I take for granted that it is because the
students with the highest TOEFL score ranges believed that it was better for the students
with the lower TOEFL score ranges to speak to them when correcting their mistakes or
errors because it enabled them to ask for the reasons of their corrections. I assume that
the basic reason for this is because of the highest TOEFL score students were in doubt of
their peer’s ability in correcting their writing (Lin, 2009; Tsui & Ng, 2000; Cresswell,
2000).
Regarding direct and indirect feedback, only the students with the TOEFL score
ranging from 301 to 400 perceived that having the lecturers show where the errors or
mistakes were and then provide some clues on how to correct them is the most effective
feedback from their lecturers. The other students perceived that it was more effective
when their lecturers showed where the errors or mistakes were and provided them with
the correct words or structures next to the correction rather than just giving some clues. It
was found that the students whose TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 300 (the lowest
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TOEFL scores) and from 500 and above (the highest TOEFL scores) both rated direct
feedback with the highest rating.
The finding of this current study has both a similarity and difference with the
findings from Kim (2009). It is found similar with the study from Kim (2009) that the
students with the lower English proficiency level profited more from the direct feedback
than indirect feedback. However, the finding in this current study is different from one of
the findings from Kim (2009) because the current study found that the higher English
proficiency students preferred direct feedback to indirect feedback, whereas Kim (2009)
found indirect feedback is more effective for the higher English proficiency students. The
finding from this current study is in agreement with Hashemnezhad and Mohammadnejad
(2012) that direct feedback has the most dramatic effect even on the higher English
proficiency level students.
The students with the lowest and highest TOEFL scores (500 and above) also
perceived similarly that they needed their peer to just show them where the errors or
mistakes were without showing how to correct them or providing some clues on the
corrections. For the students with the highest TOEFL scores, I assume that the reason is
because they did not want their peer, whose writing skills were lower than theirs, to
correct their writing (Lin, 2009). I also assume that the students with the lowest TOEFL
scores wanted their peer to just show where the errors or mistakes were because they
wanted to find the correct words or structures by themselves which will improve the
speed of their learning process.
Concerning the draft of the writing which the feedback should be in, the students
with the TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to 500 consistently perceived that both
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feedback from their lecturers and peers was more effective when it was given in the final
draft. However, the students with the lowest TOEFL scores perceived that feedback from
lecturers and peers was effective when both were given in the first draft. My presumption
is that they would like to find the missing corrections from their peers in the feedback
from their lecturers. It would make them have fewer concerns towards their writing’s
mistakes/errors in their second draft.
In addition, the students with the highest TOEFL scores thought that the feedback
from their lecturers would be effective when it was given in the first draft, while their
peers should give the feedback in their final draft, which differed from the perceptions of
the students from other scores. This finding is overall against the findings of Miao,
Badger, and Zhen (2006) who found that the students in their study believed that their
teacher should give the feedback in their final draft because it enables their friends to
make more corrections and to give freedom to their peer to correct their mistakes or
errors without being worried of repeating what their teacher has corrected before.
Students’ Perceptions about the Most Important Writing Features to be Responded
to by
Participants. As defined by Eksi (2012) surface level errors are a kind of
feedback which focuses on form while deep surface errors focus on the content and
organization of the writing. The students in the current study thought that both their
lecturer and peer have to respond to their surface level errors first and then deep surface
level errors. This result is in line with the study from Ashwell (2000) who found that the
students believed that they put feedback focuses on form as the first need and feedback
on content as the second. This finding is also in agreement with the findings from Diab
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(2005). The study which investigated about the students’ preferences towards surface
level errors and deep surface errors showed that the students preferred to get feedback on
the surface level errors (grammar) than on the organization of ideas and writing features.
The finding about feedback on form in the current study is also similar with the
findings from some studies in the nineties such as Enginarlar, 1993; Ferris, 1995; Leki,
1991; Radecki and Swales, 1988, Saito, 1994; Schulz, 1996. However, as stated in the
previous studies which investigated feedback on form and content, these studies in the
nineties, a study from Diab (2005) and the current study are against the controversial
study from Truscott (1996) whose respective review of the literatures proved that
teachers may not give grammar corrections to their students’ writing because it has no
element to improve their writing skills. In addition, the earlier study from Huntley (1992)
is in line with Truscott (1996) who believed that feedback on grammar contributes
nothing to the improvement of the students’ writing skills, while feedback on content and
organization is the feedback that the teacher has to provide their students with in their
writing corrections.
Gender. As mentioned earlier when discussing the answer of research question
one, I could only find a study about feedback with the gender issue. That is why in
formulating this discussion, I used the data as the main point and assumptions to clarify
the interpretation. To start with, female and male students perceived similarly that the
most important writing features for their lecturers to respond to were on the form not on
the content of their writing. Comparing the responses of female and male students to the
rating scale in the questionnaire, the mean scores of female students had no more than .10
to .18 distances between ratings of the feedback on writing features from lecturers (Table
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23a). It means that the female students perceived that they did need their lecturers to
respond to their writing both to the surface level errors and deep surface errors.
Although the current study had a small sample of male students, it is worth noting
that the far different mean scores between surface level errors and deep level errors from
male students indicates that the male students were concerned more with the feedback on
form and not too worried about the feedback on content when the feedback was provided
by their lecturers. On the other hand, when the feedback came from their peers, female
students seemed focused on surface level errors of their writing to be corrected and not
too worried about the content.
Regarding the male students’ perception towards the writing features they needed
their peers to respond to, interestingly, male students wanted their peers to check their
vocabulary choice first, then spelling, and finally grammar. This finding is interesting
because feedback on grammar, which mostly placed in the first and second rank when
gender is not considered, was placed as the third rank by male students. Some other
points of interest are the deep-level errors. Male students did not perceive that feedback
on content was the least important feedback, but it was punctuation that they thought
their peers did not need to respond to in their writing.
English proficiency level. Lin (2009) explored how large multi-level EFL
writing class experiences and interacts with self, peer, and teacher feedback. Twenty four
students (twenty one females and three males) were divided into three groups based on
the result of their writing during the past three semesters: seven students as a higher level
English proficiency, nine intermediate, and eight students as lower level of English
proficiency. This study showed that the students with the higher English proficiency level
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perceived that they needed their teacher to focus on the deep level errors when correcting
their writing. They believed that their teacher had to pay more attention to the content of
their writing because they thought that they did not need feedback on grammar anymore
because they realized that their grammar ability is good and they seldom made grammar
mistakes. This study is in line with Miao, Badger, and Zhen (2006) who also did their
study in a large class.
One of the findings from Lin (2009) is against one of the findings in the current
study. The reason is because the current study shows that the students with the TOEFL
scores ranging from 400 to 500 and above believed that the most important writing
feature they need their lecturers to respond to was grammar. I assumed that they had this
perception because although they were sure about their ability in using the correct
grammar, they still kept their belief that the lecturers was the one who has knowledge in
writing.
Most of the findings from Lin (2009) are not very different from the current study
because one of the current study’s results showed that the students with lower English
proficiency level believed that grammar was the most important writing feature that they
needed their lecturers to respond to. This finding is similar to Lin (2009) whose findings
showed that the lower achiever students perceived that they needed feedback on grammar
because they realized that they had a lack of grammar skills.
The students in the three TOEFL score ranges (200 to 300, 301 to 400, and 401 to
500) in the current study believed that deep level errors were the least important feedback
they needed from their lecturers. I assumed that they consider it the least important
because the elements in the surface level errors; grammar, spelling, vocabulary choice,
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and punctuation were the errors which can be predicted easily by their readers while deep
level errors cannot be predicted as easy as surface level errors. In addition, they may
assume that their expectation is only to produce a meaningful writing not writing with
equal quality to native speakers because English is only as a foreign language for them.
The remarkable finding in this study is that the students with the highest TOEFL
scores believed that deep level errors were as important as surface level errors they
needed to have corrected by their lecturers. It is proven by the same total mean scores for
deep level errors (Organization of Ideas=6.50+Writing Style=6.00 = 6.25(Total mean
scores)) and surface level errors (grammar=7.00+Vocabulary
Choice=6.50+Punctuation=6.00+Spelling=5.50 = 6.25 (Total mean scores)). I assume
that it is because based on their English proficiency levels which are high, they
understand about the importance of deep level errors for their writing.
Regarding feedback from a peer, the results of this study showed that students
perceived surface level errors were more important than deep level errors. The
intermediate and advance students believed that organization of ideas was the least
important writing feature they need their peers to respond to. However, the students with
the lowest TOEFL scores perceived writing styles were the least important writing
features to be responded to. The students with the highest TOEFL score ranges rated
feedback from lecturers higher than feedback from a peer. This finding is similar to Lin
(2009) who found that the higher achiever students viewed peer feedback not as valuable
as teacher feedback.
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Conclusion of the Findings
Although feedback will not result in the students’ writing perfection (Bitchener,
2008; Ferris, 2008), feedback is able to raise the students’ awareness of making mistakes
when writing (Barnawi, 2010). In order to reach the goal of raising the students’
awareness of making mistakes during writing, it is better for the teacher to know what
specific areas of writing the students need to improve, what kind of feedback works
better to them, and what kind of feedback they expect to get both from their lecturers and
peers.
Referring to what the scholars and researchers argued in Reyes (1992) on the term
of “one size fits all,” the teachers cannot make a generalization that one kind of feedback
will work to all of the students. As the teaching method which needs to be adapted to the
students’ situation, background and level of education, the teachers also need to consider
factors such as educational background, English proficiency level, gender, and culture
when providing feedback to their students’ writing. That is why this study investigates
the students’ perceptions about the most effective feedback in a large EFL writing class
based on participants, gender, and English proficiency level.
Since not many studies specifically discussed students’ perceptions or preferences
toward feedback based on gender and English proficiency level, this study could not use
many references to support or to argue the findings. Moreover, the current study tried to
find out the students’ perceptions toward the types of feedback they expect from their
lecturers and peers. Although the results showed from analyzing the data based on
participants, gender, and English proficiency level showed that the students preferred to
get feedback from their lecturers rather than their peers (Table 37), it does not mean that
96
the results will only focus on feedback from lecturers. That is why this study explored
both feedback types from the lecturers and peers. The reason is because both feedback
from lecturers and peers work interchangeably in the large writing class (Lin, 2009).
Table 37
Summary Table of the Students’ Preferences about the Source of Feedback based on the
Independent Variables
English proficiency level (TOEFL

Source of Gender
No. Participants Scores)
Feedback
Male Female 200-300 301-400 401-500 500+
1. Lecturers √ √ √ √ √ √ √
2. Peers
In addition, the other motives on why I kept investigating the students’
perceptions towards the most effective feedback from peers are first, peer feedback
proved to be a better alternative to replace lecturer feedback (Gielen, Tops, Dochy,
Onghena, & Smeets, 2010; Eksi, 2012). Second, peer feedback can decrease the
lecturers’ workload (Ferris & Hedgcock, 2005). Third, peer feedback promotes critical
thinking, communication skills, and competition skills (Forman & Cazden, 1986; Ferris
& Hedgcock, 2005). Fourth, the element of competition to write better among
friends/peers motivates the students to be aware of their mistakes or errors. Finally, the
feedback from peer seems to be easier to be understood because their ability/knowledge
is about the same (Topping, 2003).
In general, the students wanted their lecturers to write their comments or
corrections by showing where the surface level errors were and writing the correct words
or structures next to the errors or mistakes in the final draft. From their peers, they needed
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their peers to speak to them about the surface level errors in their writing and tell them
the correction in the final draft (Table 38).
Table 38
Summary Table of Feedback Based on Participants
Feedback Types
Source
NO. of Surface Deep
Feedback Oral Written Direct Indirect 1st Final level level
draft draft errors errors
1 Lecturers √ √ √ √
2 Peers √ √ √ √
Based on the gender of the students (see Table 39), male students perceived that
the feedback from their lecturers would be effective when their lecturers write their
corrections or comments into their papers by marking the surface level errors and writing
the correction of the errors next to them in the final draft. They believed feedback from
their peer would be effective when their peer correct their surface level errors by
speaking to them to show where the mistakes are and tell them the clues about how to
correct them in the final draft.
Female students perceived that the feedback from their lecturers would be
effective when their lecturers wrote their corrections or comments into their papers by
showing where the surface level errors are and writing the correction of the errors next to
them in the final draft. Feedback from their peer would be effective when their peers
correct their errors by speaking to them to show where the surface level errors are and tell
them the correction of the errors in the second draft.
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Table 39
Summary Table of Feedback Based on Gender
Feedback Types
Source
Gender Surface Deep
NO. of
Type
Feedback Oral Written Direct Indirect 1st Final level level
draft draft errors errors
1 Male Lecturers √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
2 Female Lecturers √ √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
The students with TOEFL scores ranging from 200 to 300 perceived that feedback
from their lecturers would be effective when their lecturers correct their surface level
errors by writing them (Table 40). Their lecturers had to show them where the surface
level errors are and give them clues on how to correct them in written form in the first
draft of their writing. In addition, feedback from their peers would be effective when their
peers only show them where the surface level errors are in the first draft of their writing
by speaking to them.
The students with TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to 400 perceived feedback
from their lecturers would be effective when their lecturers correct their mistakes by
showing them where the surface level errors are and giving them clues on how to correct
them in written form. They expect the feedback to be given in the final draft of their
writing. Feedback from their peers would be effective when their peers speak to them
about the surface level errors in their writing and tell them the correct words or structures
in the final draft of their writing.
The students with TOEFL scores ranging from 401 to 500 perceived feedback
from their lecturers as effective when their lecturers correct their surface level errors by
99
showing them where the surface level errors are and giving them clues on how to correct
them in written form. They expect the feedback is given in the final draft of their writing.
Feedback from their peers would be effective when their peers speak to them about their
surface level errors in their writing and tell them the correct words or structures in the
final draft of their writing.
The students with TOEFL scores ranging from 500 and above perceived feedback
from their lecturers as effective when their lecturers correct their surface level errors by
showing them where the mistakes are and giving them clues on how to correct them in
written form. They expect the feedback is given in the second draft of their writing.
Feedback from their peers is considered to be effective when their peers only show them
where the mistakes are in the first draft of their writing by speaking to them.
Table 40
Summary Table of Feedback Based on English Proficiency Level
Feedback Types
NO. TOEFL Source Surface Deep

Score of Oral Written Direct Indirect 1st Final level level
Ranges Feedback draft draft errors errors
1 200-300 Lecturers √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
2 301-400 Lecturers √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
3 401-500 Lecturers √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
4 500+ Lecturers √ √ √ √ √
Peers √ √ √ √
100
Implications of the Study
The findings of this study imply that it is possible for the lecturers/teachers to
alternate feedback from them with peer feedback by specifically asking their students to
respond to their peers’ works based on their preferences found in this study. For example
the lecturers/teachers may ask their students to respond to their peers’ writing by
speaking to them to show where the mistakes are and tell them the clues about how to
correct them in the final draft (The finding in the current study is based on the
participants).
If the students are not too familiar with the peer feedback, lecturers/teachers
should provide students with training on how to do peer feedback. In order to help the
students address what their peer needs to get from their comments/corrections, lecturers
should provide students with rubrics about writing areas in order to carefully correct and
comment on their friends’ writing. Lecturers/teachers have to address oral and written
feedback correctly in which the students expect to get the feedback from
lecturers/teachers in written form and orally from peers (Finding of the current study
based on participants, gender, and English proficiency levels).
Since the results showed that the students perceived the surface level errors as
more important than deep level errors, the lecturers/teachers have to introduce and
explain the importance of deep level errors to the. The reason is because deep level errors
are important to increase their writing quality as well as surface level errors.
The current study will be useful if one or two of the following situations describes
the classroom context:
 The students study in a large class
101
 There is a gender restriction in the classroom
 The classroom is formed based on the English proficiency level (different English
proficiency levels)
The current study will be useful to be applied in the Arab context since there is a
separation of male and female students at schools there (as the study from Grammi
(2004)). In addition, although there is no gender restriction in Indonesian higher
education, gender restriction occurs in the specific junior and senior high schools in
Indonesia, which are called “Pesantren.” This study can be taken as one of the references
in determining the effective feedback practice for those kinds of boarding schools.
Recommendations
Based on the findings of this study, the following are recommendations for minister
of education in Indonesia, curriculum designers, classroom practitioner, and researchers.
Minister of Education in Indonesia
As the decision maker and curriculum regulator, the minister of education in
Indonesia should add a new rule about the formulation of classroom. For the English
study program in the institution and university of higher education, the students should be
grouped based on their English proficiency level. This is in order to make the objectives
of teaching and learning process more precise.
Curriculum Designers
Writing course curricula should consider the connection among the courses in the
case that writing is taught in a series of courses: Writing 1, Writing 2, Writing 3, and
Writing 4. The objectives of those writing courses should be mapped out from very basic
skills to the highest ones and clearly shown the connection between what has been taught
102
in past with what will happen in the future. In facilitating the lecturers/teachers towards
the kinds of feedback works in a large class, a workshop, seminar, and training should be
done.
Classroom Practitioner
The classroom practitioner, in this case, the lecturers, should try to find a way to
make the students like their writing lesson. It can be done by varying the teaching
strategy and using interesting topics. In order to improve the students’ writing skills, it is
better for the lecturer to think about which feedback works better for a certain condition.
As in Indonesia, there are many schools with gender restrictions and different English
proficiency levels. In providing the students with feedback, it is better to differentiate the
kinds of feedback based on their English proficiency level because what the students with
a higher English proficiency level expect is different from students with a lower English
proficiency level (see appendix F, p. 99-100).
In referring to the students’ preferences and perceptions towards feedback to
their writing based on this study’s result (see appendix F), lecturers should be open
minded to reconsider the possibility that the students’ preferences/perceptions toward the
effective feedback will not always be able to improve the students’ writing skills. The
reason is because the result of this study only based on the questionnaires without any
experiment to prove whether the results of this study really able to improve the students’
writing quality or not. Finally, since the majority of students tend to focus more on the
surface level errors, lecturers have to be able to explain to the students that deep level
errors are as important as surface level errors.
103
Future Researchers
Since not many studies found discussing feedback practice for ESL/EFL in the
large writing class, it is recommended for the future researchers to focus on the issue of a
large class. The reason is because although most of the teaching and learning processes
are conducted in small classes, many schools/universities use large classes especially in
the developing countries. In addition, not many studies about feedback in writing classes
connect their studies with gender and students’ proficiency levels, so the future study is
expected to bring those issues about gender and proficiency levels.
Since this is a quantitative study in which I got the data only from the students’
responses to the closed-ended questions, it makes me not able to find the reasons why the
participants of her study perceived their answers that way. That is why it is recommended
for the future study to use a mixed method or at least combine the closed-ended and
open-ended questions in order to get clearer pictures of the students’ reasons to choose
certain kinds of feedback.
Moreover, the future studies will get better results if the research can use more
diverse participants. It is also worth noting that in order to get better results, it is
important for the future studies to pay attention to the equality of the participants’
numbers, such as male and female, higher, intermediate, and lower proficiency students.
In view of the fact that the participants of the current study have the same cultural
background, there is no cultural effect that can be drawn for this conclusion, so the future
studies which require the diversity of culture will be very useful studies, especially for
the classes which consist of many international students with the different cultural
104
backgrounds. Finally, any future studies with the same topic will also be useful in order
to find the similarities or differences in findings with the current study.
Limitations of the Study
There are several limitations found in this study. To begin with, although this
study has found about the students perceptions towards the effective feedback practices in
a large EFL class based on participants, gender, and English proficiency level, it does not
mean applying the result of this study will increase the students writing skills. Detail
further research such as observation to the real class condition to which these feedback
perceptions used should be done in order to see the progress. Another thing is since this is
a quantitative study; the results/findings were drawn from the questionnaire data which
limit the findings based on the descriptive and inferential statistics data. Therefore there
was not any interaction with the participants in order to know the reason behind their
perceptions.
The next limitation is the independent variables used in this study. Although the
results addressed the students’ perceptions towards the effective feedback practices in the
large EFL writing class based on gender and English proficiency level, the results of this
research cannot be generalized. The reason is because of the unequal number of male and
female students (27 male and 122 female) and the unequal number of students who were
in each English proficiency level (three students in the TOEFL scores ranging from 200
to 300; 79 students with the TOEFL scores ranging from 301 to 400; 57 students in the
range of 401 to 500; and only two students whose TOEFL scores were around 500 and
above). Finally, the results could have shed more light for the purpose of investigating the
105
effective feedback practices for EFL writing in large classes if this research had used a
mixed method in which the quantitative data was enriched by the qualitative data.
Final Comments
Doing this research about the students’ perceptions towards the effective feedback
practices based on participants, gender, and English proficiency level in a large EFL class
benefit me so much. The findings in this study will be a useful reference specifically for
me in responding to my students’ writing and their BA thesis when I return to Indonesia.
In general purpose, this study will benefit my colleagues and teachers in providing the
feedback to their students. The finding about oral and written feedback will open up a
new space for the lecturers and teachers who are confused on when to use them.
106
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Appendix A (IRB Forms)
Supplemental Material for IRB Submission: Rini Susanti
Project Title: Students Preferences for Feedback on Writing in Large Classes.
A. A. PURPOSE, RESEARCH VARIABLES, AND POPULATION
Purpose: This study aims at fulfilling two major goals: 1) Firstly, the study aims at
exploring the student preferences for feedback on writing in large classes; 2) The
second aim is to find what kind of feedback the student expects to get from their
lecturers and peers. In other words, the study aims at exploring the student
perspective about feedback which they will get from lecturers and peers into their
writing which is done in large class in order to improve their writing ability and
enable lecturers to specify the kinds of feedback to be used when teaching writing.
Background: The change of Indonesian education rules about national education

system number 2 (1989) to rule number 20 (2003) brought a new paradigm from a
traditional one to the modern one in which higher education is ruled based on
autonomy, accountability, and quality assurance (Daulay, 2005). Since then, rules
and policies among higher education have been different from one to another. Some
universities, especially public universities, will limit the number of students in one
class between 20 to 30 students. However, some others have the minimum number of
50 students and maximum 90 students which is categorized as large class (Kumar,
1992). These large classes are applied to all subjects including English writing. Since
the position of English in Indonesia is as a Foreign Language, students do need
comments, corrections, questions, and suggestions are the form of feedback which is
needed in to support students’ writing development and build their confidence in
their writing (Hyland, 2003). However, there are only a limited number of studies
which discuss about feedback in large classes. The two studies found are from Lin
(2009) and Miao et al (2006) which yielded the same result to support peer feedback
because it benefits the students with the communicative skill/interaction, but value
teacher feedback more because feedback from teacher is trustworthy for the ability in
writing to be applied in large classes. While the study in small classes found that
students expect to get different kinds of feedback from their teacher and peer. For
example, they need written feedback to their error (Rahimi, 2009; Ferris, 1999, 2003,
2004; Lee, 1997, 2004; Hedgcok & Lefkowitz, 1994; Diab, 2004). The written error
in the form of verbs, words choice, sentence structure, article, and noun endings
(Satio, 1994; Ferris, 1995; Ferris & Roberts, 2001). The two studies found about
feedback in large classes only yield the result that feedback from teacher and peer are
valued for large classes, without specifically describe about what kind of feedback
the students expected to get from their teacher and peer to their writing. That is why,
the current study is designed to explore the student preferences about feedback they
are expecting to get from their lecturers or peers. The quantitative questionnaire of
this study is designed to answer the following research questions:
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3. What do university students perceive as effective feedback in a large EFL
writing class?
4. What features of their writing do university students believe are the most
important to be responded to?
References
Daulay, N, K. (2005). Otonomi pendidikan tinggi (Tinjauan terhadap aspek material
dan aspek substansial). Laporan Penelitian.
Diab, R. (2005). EFL university students’ preferences for error correction. Journal of
Second Language Writing, 44, 53-55.
Ferris, D. (1995). Can advanced ESL students be taught to correct their errors?
CATESTOL Journal, 8, 41-62.
Ferris, D. (1999). The case for grammar correction in L2 writing classes: A response
to Truscott (1996). Journal of Second Language Writing, 8, 1-10.
Ferris, D. and Roberts, B. (2001). Error feedback in L2 writing classes: How explicit
does it need to be? Journal of Second Language Writing, 10, 161-184.
Ferris, D. (2003). Response to student writing: Implications for second language
students. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Ferris, D. (2004). The grammar correction debate in L2 writing: Where are we, and
where do we go from here? And what do we do in the meantime …? Journal
of Second Language Writing, 13, 49- 62.
Hedgcock, J. and Lefkowitz, N. (1994). Feedback on feedback: Assessing learner
receptivity in second language writing. Journal of Second Language Writing,
3, 141-163.
Hyland, K. (2003). Second Language Writing. New York: NY, Cambridge
University Press.
Kumar, K. (1992). Does class size really make a difference? Exploring classroom
interaction in large and small classes. RELC Journal, 23 (1), 29-47.
Lee, I. (1997). ESL learners' performance in error correction in writing: Some
implications for college- level teaching. System, 25, 465- 477.
Lee, I. (2004). Error correction in L2 secondary writing classroom. Journal of
Second Language Writing, 13, 285-312.
Lin, Hsien-Chuan, "A Case Study of How a Large Multilevel EFL Writing Class
Experiences and Perceives Multiple InteractionActivities" (2009).
Dissertations. Paper 79.
Miao, Y., Badger, R., & Zhen, Y. (2009). A comparative study of peer and teacher
feedback
in a Chinese EFL writing class. Journal of Second Language Writing, 15, 179–200.
Saito, H. (1994). Teachers’ practices and students’ preferences for feedback. TESL
Canada Journal, 11, 46-70.
Subject Population: The proposed participants in this study are undergraduate

students of English study program in the Faculty of Teacher Training and Education
in one of the private universities in Indonesia. As this is a quantitative survey, the
aim is to get as many numbers of undergraduate students who fulfill the inclusion
criteria.
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a. Age: All the participants in this study will be undergraduate students ranging in
age from 20 till 25.
b. Sex: Both men and women undergraduate students will participate. There is no
restriction on the sex of the subjects.
c. Number: For the quantitative survey 150 students in the fifth semester will
participate.
d. Inclusion Criteria: Since this study analyzes the student preferences for feedback
on writing in large classes, the inclusion criteria are: 1) The participant is studying in
large classes; 2) The participant has had writing I in their second semester, writing II
in the third semester, and writing III in the fourth semester; 3) The participant is in
the fifth semester who is studying writing IV; 4) The participant has been
experiencing all kinds of feedback to their writing; and 5) The participant is willing
to participate in this research after having an explanation of the advantages of this
study for their future study.
e. Exclusion Criteria: There are no exclusion criteria. As long as the participant
meets the inclusion criteria they will be included in the study.
f. Vulnerable Subjects: There are no vulnerable participants in this study.
B. METHODS AND PROCEDURES
Method of Subject Selection: Since I am one of the assistant lecturers in the

institution where the data is going to be taken from and the institution supports my
research, one of my senior colleagues (Dr. Indawan Syahri) will meet students and
collect data for me. I will be training my colleague on issues of data collection and
the ethical considerations of voluntary participation and confidentiality. I will provide
a protocol to my colleague describing my research and the aims of my study. He is
going to describe about my research and the advantages of it to all of the participants
who is studying writing in large classes. A power point of my study and the content
of informed consent form will be sent to him in order to illustrate my study. In the
same time, the participants will be asked to complete the consent form before the
survey will be conducted. Only those students who agree to sign the consent form
will be part of my research.
Study Site: This study will be conducted in the University of Muhammadiyah

Palembang in the city of Palembang, Sumatera Selatan, Indonesia. Letter of approval
from the research site is attached.
Methods and Procedures: This study will use quantitative methods-a rating scale
questionnaire. The questionnaire consists of 30 closed-ended questions. The
questions are divided into two categories; feedback from lecturers and peers. Each
lecturer and peer feedback has 15 questions which are about the 15 kinds of feedback
(Written, Oral, Grammar, Spelling, Punctuation, Vocabulary Choice, Content, Style,
Organization, Direct, Indirect, Major, Minor, Feedback in the first draft, Feedback in
the second draft) the students prefer to get from their peer and teacher. The
participants will be asked to express their opinion by answering the questionnaire
using the likert scale (Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful). A
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full version of this survey is attached to this document. The questionnaire will be
completed by the participants by themselves. The questionnaire which has been
completed will be sent to the me via postage mail.
C. RISKS/BENEFITS
Potential Risks: There are no potential risks attached to this research project.
Protection against Risks: There are no risks attached to this study.
Potential Benefits: Participants will not receive any monetary benefit from this study.
However, there are indirect benefits for them as the students who are studying writing
in large classes. Since the aim of this study is to find out the student preferences for
feedback on writing in large classes, specifically about what kind of feedback they
expect to get from their lecturers and their peers, firstly, it will benefit the participants
as the feedback grantor and recipient to their feedback practice for their future writing
such as paper and BA thesis. Secondly, as the demand of the president of the
university where the data will be taken from, the copy of this research is asked which
is going to be the guidance for the lecturers who teaches writing I, II, III, and IV in
applying and giving the feedback in their large writing classes. Finally, this study will
contribute the research about feedback in large classes which is limited only in a few
studies.
Compensation for Participation: Participants will not receive any monetary

compensation.
Alternatives to Participation: Participation is voluntary and not connected to any

academic or institutional requirement. Accordingly, if someone does not want to
participate then they will not participate and will not receive any alternative work.
Information Withheld: No information is withheld from the participants.
Debriefing: This study is conducted as a requirement for my MA Thesis. At the end

of the research project, a copy of the thesis containing information concerning the
findings of the study and the educational recommendations will be available in IUP
library. In addition, when I complete my thesis and return to the University of
Muhammadiyah Palembang, I will do a lecture for the students and faculty presenting
the finding of this research which can be applied to the teaching and learning writing
process.
D. Confidentiality
The method of collecting the data will be in anonymous questionnaire. The 150
participants are going to be divided into three groups of 50 participants. They are
going to do it together in one classroom with distances among chairs. They will not
write their names and there will be no way of identifying individual students. They
will only be asked to define their gender, semester, and their TOEFL score range. The
TOEFL score range is needed in order to make the data easier to be grouped because
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the participants consist of multiple higher proficiency level. The survey questionnaire
data will be retained for three years in a secure setting.
E. COPY OF CONSENT FORM

A copy of the consent form is attached in this document.
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Appendix B (Informed Consent Form)
INFORMED CONSENT FORM
You are invited to participate in this research study. The following information is
provided in order to help you to make an informed decision whether or not to participate.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask. You are eligible to participate
because you are an undergraduate student who is studying writing IV and has had writing
I, II, and III which is conducted in large classes.
The purpose of this study is to find out the student preferences for feedback on writing in
large classes, specifically about what kind of feedback they expect to get from their
lecturers and their peers. Participation in this study will require a thirty minutes of your
time. You will be asked to complete a questionnaire which consists of 30 closed-ended
questions. You will be asked to express their opinion by answering the questionnaire
using the likert scale (Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful).In order
to maintain the confidentiality of your participation, you will not write your name in the
questionnaire. Should you choose to participate; no monetary compensation will be
offered.
Your participation in this study is voluntary. You are free to decide not to participate in
this study or to withdraw at any time without adversely affecting our relationship. If you
choose to participate, you may withdraw from the study at any time; just let me know by
contacting me through E-mail, phone, or mail. You have all my contact information in
the E-mail I sent to you earlier. Upon your request to withdraw, all information pertaining
to you will be destroyed.
If you are willing to participate in this study, please sign the statement below.
Thank you,
Rini Susanti, Dr. David I. Hanauer
Student, Professor
MA Tesol, English Department
Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana University of
Pennsylvania
Indiana, PA 15705, U.S.A. Indiana, PA 15705, U.S.A.
Phone: 585-351-8857 Phone: 724-357-2274
Email: r.susanti@iup.edu, Email: hanuer@iup.edu
This study has the oversight of the IRB of Indiana University of Pennsylvania (Phone:
724/357-7730)
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INFORMED CONSENT FORM (CONTINUED)
VOLUNTARY CONSENT FORM:
I have read and understand the information on the form and I consent to volunteer to be a
subject in this study. I understand that my responses are completely confidential and that
I have the right to withdraw at any time. I have received an unsigned copy of this
Informed Consent Form to keep in my possession.
Name (PLEASE PRINT) :
Signature :
Date :
I certify that I have explained to the above individual the name and purpose, the potential
benefits, and possible risks associated with participating in this research study, have
answered any questions that have been raised, and have witnessed the above signature.
Date Investigator’s
Signature
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Appendix C (Questionnaire)
QUESTIONNAIRE
Thank you for agreeing to participate in this study. I am very interested in your responses to this
questionnaire which looks at students preferences about what kind of feedback which is helpful to
improve their writing when it is done in the class with 50 to 90 students (large classes). You are asked to
participate since you are one of the students in large classes. Hopefully this questionnaire which is used
as the data collection method for the study titled “Students Preferences about Feedback on Writing in
Large Classes” will be helpful both for the researcher and the students as you who experience studying
writing in large classes to improve your writing skill by using the effective feedback practice.
PERSONAL DATA
(Please provide your personal data by ticking the relevant box)
Gender : Male Female

Semester : 3 5 7
TOEFL Score : in the range of 200-300
in the range of 301-400
in the range of 401-500, and
above 500
Directions: Below are some general preferences students have about feedback to writing.
Read each statement and then on the scale rate how helpful this type of feedback would be for you:
Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful
Please circle the number that best describes the degree of your agreement with each statement.
In the questions below you will be asked to rate the degree of helpfulness of the different types of feedback
presented to you. A rating of 1 means that this type of feedback did not help you at all. A rating of 7 means
that the feedback was very helpful. In answering each question think to what degree was the feedback you
received helpful and circle a number from 1 to 7. For example if a form of feedback was a bit helpful but
really all that much, you should probable circle a 5. If feedback was just a little bit helpful perhaps you
should circle a 2. The rating scale from 1 to 7 allows you to measure the degree to which a type of feedback
was helpful.
example:
 After reading your writing, your lecturer gives you comments.
This is: Not Helpful at All 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 Very Helpful
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Note: There is no right or wrong answers. We are simply interested in your opinions.
I. Feedback from Lecturer
1. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your errors by writing it in your paper
2. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your error by speaking to you
3. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your grammar.
example: She go to school every day.

goes
4. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your spelling.
example: Swiming is one of my favorite hobbies.

Swimming
5. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your vocabulary choice.
example: The aim of this study is to look at the growth dynamics and to find out the microbial
examine determine
populations living in the C140 prototype hydraulic system.
6. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your punctuation.
example: The University offers many majors in business. Such as advertising and economics.
business, such
7. After reading your writing, your lecturer comments on your writing style.
 Whether your writing style is Indonesian-English
 Whether your writing style is English-English
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8. After reading your writing, your lecturer comments on the way you organize the ideas among
the sentences and paragraphs in your writing.

9. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your writing by only showing where the error
is.
example: All faculty members vote for the Dean’s election yesterday.
10. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your writing by crossing out what is incorrect
and writing the correct word or structure.
voted
11. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects your writing by showing where the error is
and giving a clue about how to correct it.
Change to past participle verb
12. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects the error in your first writing draft.
13. After reading your writing, your lecturer corrects the error in your final writing draft.
II. Feedback from Peer / Friend
1. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your errors by
writing it in your paper.
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2. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your error by
speaking to you.
3. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your grammar.
Example: . She go to school every day.

Goes
4. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your spelling.
Example: Swiming is one of my favorite hobbies.

Swimming
5. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your vocabulary
choice.
Example: The aim of this study is to look at the growth dynamics and to find out the microbial
examine determine
populations living in the C140 prototype hydraulic system.
6. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your
punctuation.
Example: The University offers many majors in business. Such as advertising and economics.
business, such
131
7. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to comment on your
writing style.
 Whether your writing style is Indonesian-English

 Whether your writing style is English-English
8. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to comment on the way you
organize the ideas among the sentences and paragraphs in your writing.
9. Your writing could be read by your friends and they could help you to correct your writing by
only showing where the error is.
crossing out what is incorrect and writing the correct word or structure.
voted

showing where the error is and giving a clue about how to correct it.
Change to past participle verb
12. Your writing could be read by your friend and they could help you to correct the error in your
first writing draft.
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13. Your writing could be read by your friend and they could help you to correct the error in your
final writing draft.
In the space below please write any comments you have on the value of different types of feedback
(If any):
Thank you
133
Appendix D (Research Topic Approval)
134
Appendix E (Institutional Review Board (IRB) Approval)
135
Appendix F (Direct Recommendation of the Students’ Perceptions towards Kinds of
Feedback for Writing in a Large Class)
Students’ Perception towards Feedback to Their Writing
This handout provides recommendation for lecturers, who teach academic writing in a class with
more than 50 students, to provide the students with feedback to their writing based on the students’
perception. The following recommendations were formed based on the results of study conducted in 2013
about the Students’ Perceptions towards the Effective Feedback Practices in the Large EFL Writing Class
based on Participants, Gender, and English proficiency level.
Feedback Gender ESL Level (TOEFL Score)

No. Source of Feedback Responder
Types Male Female 200-300 301-400 401-500 500+
1 Lecturer Written √ √ √ √ √ √ √
Oral
Peer Written
Oral √ √ √ √ √ √ √
2 Lecturer Direct √ √ √ √ √ √
Indirect √ √
Peer Direct √ √ √ √
Indirect √ √ √
3 Lecturer 1st Draft √
Final Draft √ √ √ √ √ √
Peer 1st Draft √ √
Final Draft √ √ √ √ √
4 Lecturer Surface level errors √ √ √ √ √ √ √
Deep level errors √
Peer Surface level errors √ √ √ √ √ √ √
Deep level errors
Note:
1. Oral Feedback is kind of feedback in which you/the student’s peer has to give the correction by
speaking to the writers.
2. Written feedback is a kind of feedback in which you/the student’s peer has to give the corrections by
writing them into the writers’ paper.
3. Direct feedback is when you/ the student’s peer show where the errors of their writing are and then
provide the writers with the correction next to the errors.
4. Indirect feedback is when you/ the student’s peer only shows the writers the errors/mistakes in their
writing, then you/their peer only gives them some clues on how to correct them.
136
Appendix G (Table of Data Sheet)
QUESTIONNAIRE ANSWERS' OUTLINE
Toefl
No Gender Feedback from Lecturer Feedback from Peer/Friend
Score
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13
1 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7
2 M 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
3 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 1 1 7 7 7 2 3 3 7 7 7 7 7
4 F > 500 7 6 7 7 6 5 6 7 4 7 7 7 6 6 6 7 7 6 6 6 5 7 7 7 5 5
5 F 401-500 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 5 7 6 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 6 6 6
6 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7
7 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 6 6 7 6 7
8 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 6 5 5 4 4 5 4 4 4 5 4 5 4 5
9 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 6 6 7 6 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 5 6
10 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 5 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7
11 F 401-500 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 6 6 5 5 7 7 7 6 5 6 5 6 7 5 6
12 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
13 M 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
14 M 401-500 7 1 - - - 4 - 2 1 5 7 5 2 2 7 3 1 5 4 4 7 2 2 7 2 4
15 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
16 F 401-500 7 1 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 6 7
17 F 301-400 7 5 6 7 7 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
18 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
19 - - 7 4 7 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7
20 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 - 1 1 1 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 2 2
21 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 7 7
22 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 7 6 7 6 6 5 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 5
23 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 5 7 7 5 6 7 5 7 7 7 5 5 6 5 6 7 7 6 7
24 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 5 4 5 7 5 7 5 4 5 5 7 5 7 4 4 6 6 6 5 5 4
25 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 - 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 7
26 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 6 7 4 5 6 6 6 6 5 5 4 5 6 3 4
27 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
28 F 401-500 7 3 7 7 7 7 4 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 3 7 7 7 7 4 4 7 7 7 7 7
29 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
30 F 301-400 7 4 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
31 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 5 5 7 5 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 5 5 7 5 7 5 7
32 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 - 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
137
33 M 200-300 7 7 7 7 7 7 - - 4 7 6 - - 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
34 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 5 5 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 6 7 7 7 5 6
35 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 7 6 7 6 7
36 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 7 6 7 5 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 5 6 6 7 - 5 6
37 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 5 7 7 6 7 7 6 5 7 6 4 7
38 M 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 5 5 4 6 7 6 6 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 6
39 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 5 5 6 5 4 4 4 3 3 2 2 2
40 M 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 3 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 2 2 6 1 7 5 6 7 5 1 1
41 F 401-500 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 6 6 6
42 F 401-500 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 6 6 6 7 7 6 7 7 7 6
43 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 7 7
44 F 401-500 6 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 5 7 6 5 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 7 6 6 6 6 5 5
45 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 6
46 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 4 7 7 6 4 7 6
47 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 7 - 4 7 5 6 6 7 6 6 7 6 6 6 6 7 6
48 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 - 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 6 4 6
49 M 200--300 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 6 5 6 5 6 7 5 7 7 7
50 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7
51 F - 7 6 7 6 5 6 5 5 4 7 5 6 5 5 4 7 6 5 5 4 5 5 6 4 1 6
52 F 401-500 7 6 6 6 7 6 6 6 3 7 7 7 4 4 5 6 6 5 6 5 6 6 6 5 6 5
53 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 4 4 5 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 4 4 4 7 4 5 5
54 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 6 6 7 7 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 6 6
55 M 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 7
56 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 - - 7 5 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 6 5 5 5
57 F 301-400 7 6 7 6 5 5 6 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6
58 F 301-400 7 5 6 7 7 6 5 6 5 7 6 6 5 6 6 6 6 6 5 6 5 6 6 5 6 6
59 F 301-400 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 6 6
60 F - 6 7 7 7 7 4 3 6 6 7 6 5 5 6 7 7 5 7 6 6 7 5 5 3 6 5
61 F 401-500 7 - - - - - - - 5 3 5 3 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 5 5 5 5 7 5 7
62 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 8 4 7 4 6 4 4 4 7 6 7 5 4 4 4 7 4 4 2
63 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
64 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
65 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 7 6 6 6 5 6 4 6 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6
66 F 301-400 4 4 7 7 5 6 4 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 5 6 6 5 5 5 5 7 6 7 6 5
67 F 301-400 7 4 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 5 7 7 6 5 6 7 7 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
68 F 301-400 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 5 5 6 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 6 6
69 M 301-400 6 4 7 6 5 6 4 6 4 7 6 7 4 6 7 5 7 6 7 7 5 6 5 5 6 7
70 F 401-500 7 5 7 7 7 5 5 6 3 7 5 3 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 5 6 7 5 3 6
138
71 F 301-400 5 7 7 7 - 5 7 6 7 2 7 7 7 5 6 7 7 6 7 5 5 6 4 7 5 4
72 F 301-400 5 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 3 7 7 7 5 5 7 7 7 7 7 6 - 7 5 5 5
73 M 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 5 7 6 5 4 3 4 5 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 6 7 6 6
74 - - 7 3 4 7 7 6 5 3 7 7 7 4 7 7 3 7 7 7 3 5 2 5 7 2 3 5
75 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
76 F 301-400 6 7 7 7 6 7 6 5 7 7 7 6 7 4 5 6 7 6 7 6 5 7 7 7 6 7
77 F 301-400 7 6 7 5 6 7 6 6 7 6 5 6 7 4 5 6 7 6 5 6 5 6 6 7 5 6
78 F - 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
79 F 401-500 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 4 6 7 3 3 3 7 6 6 7 7 7 6 4 7 7 7 3 3
80 F 301-400 7 7 4 6 5 6 4 4 1 2 7 3 4 1 1 2 2 2 2 1 1 2 2 2 2 1
81 M - 7 3 7 7 5 5 6 7 7 7 7 1 7 5 5 7 7 7 3 2 2 1 7 7 1 7
82 F 301-400 - 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 5 6 5 6 7 5 7 5 6 6 7 7 7 6 6
83 F 301-400 7 5 5 3 6 4 3 6 5 4 4 7 4 3 3 6 5 3 3 6 3 6 5 7 4 2
84 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
85 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
86 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
87 F 301-400 6 6 5 6 5 6 7 6 6 5 - 6 7 6 7 6 7 6 5 7 7 7 6 6 6 7
88 F 301-400 7 2 7 7 7 7 4 7 1 7 7 2 3 7 7 7 7 7 4 5 5 7 7 7 3 1
89 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 7 4 4 4 3 7 4 4 5 5 3 4 5 5 5 5 6 4 6 5 6 4
90 M 301-400 6 5 6 6 7 6 5 5 6 5 5 4 6 5 7 5 6 7 7 5 6 4 7 5 5 5
91 F 301-400 7 5 7 6 4 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 4 5 6 7 7 6 7 5 5 4 7 7 4 3
92 M 301-400 7 7 6 7 6 6 7 6 6 4 4 6 6 5 7 5 6 5 5 6 6 6 7 6 5 5
93 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
94 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
95 F 401-500 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
96 M 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7
97 F 301-400 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
98 F 301-400 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
99 F 401-500 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 6 6 6 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 6 6
100 F 200-300 7 1 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 7 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
101 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 4 2 7 1 1 1 7 7 5 7 1 3 3 7 1 1 6 7
102 M 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 7 7 5 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 7 7 6 7
103 F 401-500 6 6 5 6 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 6 5 5 6 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 5 5
104 F 401-500 6 6 5 6 6 6 6 6 5 6 6 6 6 5 5 6 5 5 5 6 5 5 5 5 5 5
105 M 401-500 6 6 6 5 6 7 6 6 6 6 6 7 6 5 5 5 5 5 4 6 6 6 5 6 6 7
106 M 401-500 6 6 5 6 7 6 6 6 6 7 6 7 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 6 6 6 5 6 6 5
107 M 401-500 - 5 5 6 7 6 4 4 1 4 4 5 6 5 5 4 4 4 3 2 2 3 4 4 3 4
108 M 401-500 6 6 7 6 6 6 6 7 6 6 6 7 5 5 6 6 5 4 5 6 6 6 5 5 6 5
139
109 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 6 5 6 6 6 6 6 7
110 M 301-400 7 5 7 6 6 6 5 5 6 7 7 6 6 7 6 6 6 6 6 5 5 6 6 6 5 6
111 F 401-500 7 4 7 6 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 5 5 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 4 7 5 6 6
112 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
113 F 301-400 6 6 7 6 5 6 6 5 5 6 6 6 6 5 5 6 5 5 5 4 6 6 6 6 5 6
114 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 7 7 7 5 7 7 6 6 6 6 5 6 5 7 6 6 7
115 F 301-400 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 5 7 7 6 6 6 7 7 6 7 6 7
116 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 5 7 5 5 5 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 5 5 5
117 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 6 5 5 6 7 7 7 7 5 5 6 5 7 6 5 5
118 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 3 7 6 5 6 6 5 7 7 6 6 6 5 5 6 6 5 4
119 F 301-400 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 5 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 5 6 6 6 6 5 5
120 F 401-500 7 6 7 7 6 6 6 4 7 7 6 6 5 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 6 5 7
121 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 6
122 F 401-500 6 7 7 7 5 5 4 5 6 7 5 4 5 4 6 6 5 5 6 6 5 6 6 4 5 6
123 F 401-500 7 4 7 7 7 7 6 5 3 7 4 3 3 5 5 7 7 7 7 6 5 3 6 5 3 3
124 M 401-500 7 7 7 7 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 7
125 F 401-500 7 5 7 7 7 7 5 5 4 7 7 3 3 7 5 7 7 7 7 3 4 3 7 4 5 3
126 F 401-500 6 7 7 6 6 7 6 7 6 7 7 5 5 6 7 6 5 6 6 5 5 6 5 6 5 5
127 F 401-500 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 6 7 4 2 3 4 3 2 2 1 2 2 3 5 1
128 F 301-400 7 4 7 7 7 7 5 5 7 7 7 5 6 4 4 7 7 7 6 6 4 6 6 6 5 5
129 F 401-500 7 7 7 7 7 7 5 5 7 7 5 5 5 3 1 1 2 2 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1
130 M 401-500 6 7 7 7 7 6 5 5 6 7 6 6 7 7 7 5 6 6 6 5 6 6 7 6 6 7
131 M 401-500 6 7 7 6 6 5 6 7 5 5 5 5 5 7 7 6 5 6 6 5 6 6 6 6 5 5
132 M 401-500 6 6 7 7 7 5 6 5 3 7 7 5 5 5 6 7 6 7 5 5 5 3 7 5 5 5
133 F 301-400 5 6 5 6 7 5 5 6 6 7 6 7 5 5 6 5 6 7 6 5 6 5 7 6 6 4
134 F 401-500 7 5 7 6 6 7 7 7 4 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 6 7 7 7 6 7 7 5 7
135 M 301-400 6 7 6 7 5 6 7 5 4 5 6 4 6 4 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 6 6 5 4 4
136 F 401-500 7 5 7 7 6 6 6 6 4 6 7 4 5 4 6 5 5 5 6 5 5 5 5 4 4 4
137 M - 7 5 7 7 6 6 5 6 6 7 7 6 7 6 6 7 6 6 7 5 6 7 5 5 5 4
138 F 301-400 7 7 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 6 6 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7
139 F 301-400 7 6 6 7 5 7 6 7 7 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7
140 F 7 6 5 6 7 7 6 5 4 7 6 5 6 6 6 6 7 6 7 7 7 7 5 6 6 5
141 F 301-400 6 7 5 5 4 6 6 5 5 6 6 4 4 3 3 2 2 4 3 2 1 1 3 3 2 2
142 F 4 3 6 5 4 5 4 4 3 2 5 6 4 3 2 3 4 2 2 1 1 2 2 3 1 3
143 F 301-400 6 7 7 6 6 6 6 5 7 7 6 7 6 4 5 4 3 3 3 4 3 4 4 3 4 4
144 F 301-400 7 5 7 6 7 7 7 6 5 7 7 7 7 4 6 4 4 3 3 4 4 4 3 3 3 3
145 F 301-400 5 5 7 6 5 6 4 5 2 3 4 3 3 2 2 3 5 4 4 6 5 2 1 3 2 2
146 F - 7 6 7 7 7 7 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 6 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 6 5 5
140
147 F - 6 5 6 5 5 6 5 6 6 7 7 7 6 5 5 6 6 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 6
148 F >500 6 7 7 4 7 7 6 6 4 7 6 5 7 4 7 4 4 3 4 4 3 4 3 4 3 3
149 M - 7 6 7 5 6 5 4 6 4 6 7 5 7 5 4 3 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5
150 F 401-500 6 6 7 7 6 5 5 5 4 7 6 4 4 6 5 6 6 5 4 2 2 1 2 2 3 3
MEAN 6.4 6.1 6.8 6.7 6.6 6.4 6 6.2 5.7 6.5 6.4 5.8 5.9 5.7 5.9 6.2 6.2 6.2 5.8 5.7 5.6 5.8 6 5.9 5.4 5.6
Standard
Deviation 0.6 1.3 0.6 0.6 0.8 0.8 1.1 1 1.5 1.1 0.9 1.4 1.3 1.5 1.4 1.3 1.2 1.2 1.5 1.4 1.5 1.5 1.4 1.4 1.6 1.6
141
Appendix H (SPSS-Two Way ANOVA-Participants)
142
143
144
145
146
Appendix I (SPSS-Three Way ANOVA-Gender)
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
Appendix J (SPSS-Three Way ANOVA- English Proficiency Level)
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169

Students Perceptions Towards The Effective Feedback Practices in PDF

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Indiana University of Pennsylvania

Knowledge Repository @ IUP

Students' Perceptions Towards the Effective

Follow this and additional works at: http://knowledge.library.iup.edu/etd

PRACTICES IN THE LARGE EFL WRITING CLASS BASED ON PARTICIPANTS,

GENDER, AND ENGLISH PROFICIENCY LEVEL

Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies and Research

in Partial Fulfillment of the

Requirements for the Degree

Indiana University of Pennsylvania

All Rights Reserved

We hereby approve the thesis of

Candidate for the degree of Master of Arts

April 10, 2013_____________ Signature on file_______________________

April 10, 2013_____________ Signature on file_______________________

April 10, 2013_____________ Signature on file_______________________

Signature on file_______________________ _____________________

Author: Rini Susanti

Thesis Chair: David I. Hanauer, Ph.D.

Thesis Committee Members: Sharon Deckert, Ph.D,

Gloria Park, Ph.D.

Motivated by my own experience in teaching and learning academic writing in a

effective feedback practices in a large EFL writing class of undergraduates in Indonesia.

English proficiency level (the students’ TOEFL scores).

correction on the surface level errors is the most important to get.

I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to my other committee members

academic journey in Indiana University of Pennsylvania. I wish to thank to Dr. Smith

would not exist without my participants’ willingness to participate in my study; I would

“break” to focus on my thesis. I LOVE YOU. Thanks to my children (Ghibran, Ghina,

is your success; my husband and children.

I am greatly indebted to my sister (Tina), my brother (Alm. Didi), my parents in

encouragement. For all my colleagues in Muhammadiyah University of Palembang,

life happy and proud.

The Use of Feedback in Indonesian Education………………..………………1

Two LITERATURE REVIEW ……………………………………………………15

Defining Feedback …………………………………………………………...15

Description of the Program …………………………………………………..50

Five CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION…………………………….. 80

Summary of the Research Findings…………………………………………. 80

Appendix A - IRB Forms …………………………… ………………….………. 121

2 Gender of Participants ………………………………………………………….. 51

3 English Proficiency Level of Participants………………………………………. 52

4 Feedback Sources ………………………………………………………………..54

5 Written and Oral Feedback based on Participants………………………………. 56

6 Direct and Indirect Feedback based on Participants ……………………...……...56

7 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Participants……………..……...57

8 Two Way ANOVA Participants-Question…………………………………….. 58

9 Levene’s Test of Equality of Error Variances…………………………………... 58

10 Feedback Sources based on Gender……………………………………………... 59

11 Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender……………………59

12 Written and Oral Feedback from Peers based on Gender……..………………… 60

13 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on Gender……………..….. 60

14 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Peers based on Gender…………….……...... 61

15 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on Gender……………………...…. 61

16 Three Way ANOVA Gender-Participants-Question……………………………..62

17 Feedback Sources based on English Proficiency level………………………..….63

18 Written and Oral Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency

20 Direct and Indirect Feedback from Lecturers based on English Proficiency

24 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores

25 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores

26 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores

27 Feedback on the First and Final Draft based on TOEFL Scores

28 Three Way ANOVA English Proficiency Level-Participants-Question …...…. 70

April 10, 2013_ Signature on file___________

April 10, 2013_ Signature on file___________

April 10, 2013_ Signature on file___________

Signature on file___ _