Weekly Reflection (W12) by Myong Hee
On Tuesday (L2 writing & Error correction)
Covered Hyland (1998), Hyland (2003), Hyland & Hyland (2006)
Use of feedback
Individual difference in the amount of feedback used and preferences
• Maho – Received more overall feedback but fewer usable ones
Did not incorporate teacher’s feedback much (22%)
Preferred feedback on her ideas (less priority for grammatical accuracy)
• Samorn – Used teacher’s feedback more (82%)
More concerned about grammar & interested in improving this aspect
However, lost her confidence in grammatical competence at the end of course
Dealing with plagiarism
• When citing in writing, students may have different assumptions and practices due to their cultural backgrounds
• Teachers may react differently due to individual and cultural differences.
• When providing feedback regarding plagiarism, which is better: direct vs. mitigated
• A teacher should have been more direct, explicit in dealing with Maho’s unacceptable behavior since she may not be aware of its consequences (Kevin)
Issue of mitigation
• When to be ‘mitigated’ and when to be ‘direct’?
• Teachers need to clarify confusion about feedback (Yukiko)
• Teachers’ indirect feedback seems confusing & not effective based on her own experience as a L2 writer (Yun Deok)
• Sangki – degree of mitigation may be varied depending on types of errors
Lourdes’comments: Terms ‘treatable’ & ‘nontreatable’ by Ferris (1999) are not grounded.
Issue of revision
As a teacher
• For providing good feedback, teachers may take time; the may have better ideas once they knows about their students. Likewise, training may help for effective peer feedback
• When providing feedback, it involves 2 things: (a) how do I do it (b) knowing what student’s intent was
As a student
• Form-focused feedback may not bring in global level revision (Luciana)
• Revision is high level skills: it may involves beyond feedback & not directly related to feedback
• A good writer takes feedback as prompts to generate better ideas to revise the whole text
Lourdes’ comments: We may need future studies on students’ revisions skills or training to revise
Questions to think about
1. Observations in which you recognize yourself as a writing teacher
2. Observations in which you recognize yourself as a writer
