FEEDBACK ON WRITTEN WORK

Feedback on written work

The way teachers give feedback to written work depends on the type of writing task the students have undertaken. When it is about workbook exercises based on controlled testing activities, teachers should mark their efforts right or wrong, writing down the correct answer for them to reflect upon.
However, when the students have undertaken a more creative or communicative writing, teachers should manifest interest in the content of the students’ work. Teachers’ marking in the latter kind of task can help learners to improve those areas identified by the teachers without giving the correct way. Learners are the ones who should do this work but students would be interested in having some indicators to know where to start.
Learners usually want clear, unambiguous feedback on the language they have used; they want to know if they are right or wrong so that they can learn from their mistakes.
Principles of responding to students’ writing
• When students hand in their pieces of writing do not hurry to take a pen and correct it; read the paper before you write anything to get a general idea about the form, content and organization of ideas.
• Take into consideration that each piece of writing has good and bad points and do not omit to inform the students about their good points.
• If you use any marking symbols, make sure your students are familiar with them and give them the chance to use them, too.
• Read the paper in full before commenting anything on it in order to see the way it is organized
• It is advisable not to correct all the errors in a paper but rather recurring grammatical structures. You can choose several areas that need to be improved
• If the paper has many mistakes focus only on those that interfere with meaning
• Feedback should be mostly positive; in general students do not know what they do well otherwise they can become demotivated.
• Students could lose interest in your feedback if your response takes long.
• Asking questions in the body of the piece of writing gives the writer the feeling of being in a dialogue with the reader.
• Your comments should be direct and explicit in order to make it clear for the students what is required.
• It is advisable to avoid unfamiliar terms such as “this essay lacks coherence” when commenting on a piece of writing.Your comments should consist of complete sentences not cryptic messages such as “linkers?”, “title?” Be specific and concrete in order not confuse and discourage them.
• Your tone should be respectful despite fatigue or other problems you may have.
• Your writing has to be legible to avoid confusion from the part of the students; otherwise they will not make any effort to try to decipher it.
• It is advisable to write a final comment not to criticize but to express your expectations and give advice on how students should prepare more effective pieces of writing.
Bibliography
Tribble, Christopher, Writing, Oxford University Press, 1996;