Comparing Impact of Metalinguistic Corrective Feedback and Directive Feedback on Paragraph Writing Among EFL Students

In this study effect of corrective feedback on learning skills especially writing has been investigated. According to the studies corrective feedback has two general types consisting of direct feedback and indirect feedback. The present study was designed to investigate the effectiveness of two types of mentioned, in improving paragraph writing of Iranian advanced EFL learners. In so doing,۴۵ male learners who were studying at Guyesh institute in Qom, in the ۱۶-۲۱ age range, were selected among ۹۰ participants based on their performance on OPT. Participants were randomly assigned to two experimental groups and one control group consisting of ۱۵ participants. A pre-test was administered to the three groups. Then, both experimental groups received ۱۰-session treatments that were the use of metalinguistic in the experimental group (A) and the use of direct feedback in the experimental group (B). A post-test was then administered to all the three groups. A statistically significant difference was found between three groups.The results also revealed that the experimental group (B) that utilized direct feedback achieved significantly higher proficiency in paragraph writing than the other two groups. Additionally, the experimental group (A) that received metalinguistic outperformed the control group. Based on the findings of this study, language teachers can utilize both kinds of feedbacks investigated in this study to make better their students’ paragraph writing ability.

Keywords:

corrective feedback , indirect feedback , direct feedback , metalinguistic