ESP and EAP
Mohammad - Zohrabi; Nava Nourdad; Israa Abbas Alsaadi
Abstract
Written corrective feedback comprises an error treatment intervention that aims to apprise language learners of the existence of errors in their written work, enables them to self-correct their written output, prompts them to use complex grammatical structures, and empowers them to cast aside their writing ...
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Written corrective feedback comprises an error treatment intervention that aims to apprise language learners of the existence of errors in their written work, enables them to self-correct their written output, prompts them to use complex grammatical structures, and empowers them to cast aside their writing task inhibitions. The present study used a mixed-methods design to examine the utility of written corrective feedback in foreign language context of Iraq. To this end, in the quantitative phase, the researchers selected 104 nursing students in four English for general purposes classes of a public university in Iraq as the participants. Furthermore, they assigned the learners to three experimental groups including direct, indirect, and metalinguistic groups and a control group. The researchers provided the experimental groups with their pertinent corrective feedback during 14 treatment sessions. Nonetheless, they used the traditional product-oriented writing instruction method in the control group. In addition, in the qualitative phase, the researchers randomly selected 10 students in each of the experimental groups and probed their perspectives on their relevant treatment using a researcher-developed semi-structured interview protocol. Based on the results, all of the examined WCF strategies ameliorated nursing students’ writing performance. However, direct and metalinguistic WCF strategies were more efficacious than the indirect strategy. Moreover, the qualitative findings indicated that the participants had a preference for direct and metalinguistic WCF strategies. The results can have practical implications regarding the use of written corrective feedback strategies in Iraqi context.Keywords: Direct, Indirect, and Metalinguistic Feedback Strategies
