新课标下高中英语写作作业教师反馈调查研究

CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Research
In recent years, with the reform and implementation of the New EnglishCurriculum Standards, and in the new circumstance of the reform of college entranceexaminations, new theories of English teaching have been gradually attached moreimportance. Attention has been given not only to classroom English teaching,including teaching principles, teaching strategies and teaching methods, but also tothe extension of classroom teaching content, such as English assignment. Englishwriting is considered as one of the four basic skills of language learning, and theoutput of English learning. It is regarded as an inseparable means of expression andcommunication and plays an indispensable role in English teaching in senior highschool.However, a large number of senior high school students believe that writingassignment is a really difficult task for them. Some of them are not interested inEnglish writing, so they are reluctant to complete the writing assignment. Some ofthem are used to be concerned too much about vocabulary and grammatical structuresso that the article is far from satisfactory. What’s more, after finishing writing, fewstudents will go over their compositions again where there may be lots of mistakes.Therefore how to improve students’ writing skills is a significant study for recentsenior high school teachers.With the development of second language acquisition (SLA) and communicativeapproach, process writing approach is gradually established, in which the feedback isa central issue of the research. As one of the effective ways to enhance EFL learners’writing skill, writing feedback can help students recognize their insufficiencies andcorrect the mistakes. It is also a vital process and an effective means for Englishteachers in writing teaching.
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1.2 Purpose and Significance of the Research
Feedback is an important and necessary part in English writing assignments.Students’ insufficient writing capacities need to be improved. Teacher feedback justgives an opportunity to students to revise their compositions. Through praising the shining points of their compositions, teachers not only offer information and guidanceto them, but also evoke their interest and motivation in writing. Furthermore, theirfeedback can direct and point out the errors and defects in the writing assignments, forthe students to revise them again, even reconstruct the content. It is exactly constantfeedback and repeated revision that gradually improve students’ writing skill. Insenior high school, teacher feedback can directly impact the effect of teachers’ writingteaching and learners’ writing ability.Therefore, based on the New English Curriculum Standards, sociocultural theoryand process approach, the purpose of this research is to investigate the teacherfeedback on senior high school English writing assignment, which is beneficial topractical teaching and eases the burden of correcting assignments. This thesis willinvestigate the present situation of teacher feedback on English writing assignment insenior high school. It includes teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards feedback, andthe way in which teachers used to give feedback to writing assignments and so on.Besides, it attempts to figure out the effect of teacher feedback, whether it canenhance learners’ writing skill, if so, what kind of feedback it is and how it works.Moreover, the thesis will shed light on teacher feedback which is helpful tounderstand the importance of feedback. And at last, some pedagogical suggestionswill be offered according to the investigation in order to boost English writingteaching in senior high school.
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CHAPTER TWO LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Researches on Feedback
In various subject areas, experts and scholars define feedback diversely. Even inthe field of language learning, feedback has many different definitions. Scholars oftenshed light on different aspects of feedback. In addition, different types of feedbackplay obvious parts in the development of learners’ writing capacity, among whichteacher feedback has a marked impact on students’ writing quality.The term ‘feedback’ stemmed from the theory of engineering systems. It isprimarily used to depict a feature of a system which allows information regarding acertain aspect of the output of a system to be ‘fed back’ to the input so as to affectfuture outputs (William, as cited in Kelly Tee Pei Leng, 2014, p. 390). And in theOxford English Dictionary it is defined as “The return of a fraction of the outputsignal from one stage of a circuit, amplifier, etc., to the input of the same or apreceding stage.” It is usually applied in electronic equipment.
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2.2 English Writing and Teacher Feedback
English Writing, as one of the four basic skills, plays an increasingly importantpart in language teaching, while feedback is a medial stage of writing rather than anend (J. Q. Yang, 1996).Feedback theory was not initially adopted in writing. But its essence andfeatures can be theoretically employed in writing teaching. During teaching, student isthe source of feedback, and teacher is the processor and decision-maker of feedbackinformation. Writing practice with little or no teacher feedback would lead to a limitedprogress in writing. Whether the feedback information is accurate or not, teachers’appropriate performance is of big importance for students. A large number ofresearches (Ashwell, 2000; Bitchener, 2008; Fathman &Whalley, 1990; Ferris&Roberts, 2001) have been done to demonstrate teacher feedback has a significantimpact on subsequent drafts of the same piece of writing.Feedback reveals itself as a crucial aspect in the relationship between teachersand students (Black & William, 1998; Black, Harrison, Lee, Marshall, & William,2002). For students, feedback theory applied in writing can consolidate their rights,correct the errors, and find the reason in order to modulate their way of thinking andmake the way of study better. For teachers, feedback information is a superb means tograsp the teaching results, which contributes to adjusting teaching activities andperfect teaching methods so as to improve teaching quality. The process of teachingand learning is the one of transferring information. It has been found that the amountof knowledge students accept is not equal to that teachers impart. In other words, howmuch knowledge students accept is connected with not only teachers’ input, but alsothe efficiency of students’ acceptance.
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CHAPTER THREE METHODOLOGY.... 18
3.1 Research Purpose ........ 18
3.2 Subjects .... 18
3.3 Instruments and Procedures ........ 19
3.4 Contents of the Questionnaires........ 20
CHAPTER FOUR RESULTS DISCUSSION ...... 22
4.1 Data Analysis of the Questionnaires .... 22
4.1.1 Data Analysis of Questionnaire for Teachers ........ 22
4.1.2 Data Analysis of Questionnaire for Students ........ 30
4.2 Major Findings and Reflection........ 37
4.2.1 Feedback Pattern .... 37
4.2.2 Feedback Content and its Focus........ 38
4.2.3 Response to Teacher Feedback ...... 38
CHAPTER FIVE CONCLUSION.... 40
5.1 Pedagogical Implications and Suggestions ...... 40
5.2 A Case of Effective Feedback...... 49
5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for the Further Research........ 50

CHAPTER FOUR RESULTS DISCUSSION

4.1 Data Analysis of the Questionnaires
Data analysis was constructed in the following three stages. At first, every copyof the questionnaire was examined to ensure the veracity of the data. In the secondphase, the data was sorted in the light of different dimensions and presented throughtables or figures. What follows is a description of the data analysis found in thisinvestigation, which are directly concerned with teacher feedback on writingassignment in senior high school.Through collecting and analyzing data by Word and Excel, the followinganalysis of teacher questionnaire will be presented from four component parts,teachers’ general information, teachers’ attitudes to students’ writing assignment andfeedback, teachers’ feedback pattern, and teachers’ feedback content and timeliness.1) Teachers’ general informationTeachers’ specialty literacy and teaching experience, such as the grade to teach,the number of students and years spent in teaching, which all impact their writingteaching ability and feedback patterns. Besides, their behaviors and attitudes towriting feedback differ from each other as well. As the table presented below (Table4.1), most of the teachers investigated in this study are seasoned. So they have a greatdeal of knowledge and experience of writing teaching and feedback.

CONCLUSION

Writing is an extreme complicated long-term process. The improvement ofstudents’ English writing ability can not be achieved at one stroke. There are manycomplex influencing factors, among which feedback is indispensable. Feedback is notsimply a conclusive summing-up. Instead, it is a way by evaluation to facilitatestudents’ development, encourage students to find appropriate study method andstrategy, evoke their desire to rewriting. Its importance depends on studentsdiscovering their merits and demerits, and promoting learners’ writing skill. It is anintermediate link of the whole writing teaching or a new start to the next writing.As Zhang Xuemei and Dai Weidong (2001) considers, feedback consists of twodiscernable parts, evaluation and correction. The New English Curriculum Standardsemphasizes that evaluation should reflect the educational idea of people-oriented,highlight students’ dominate position in teaching, and help students to play theirpositive role in the process of feedback. Evaluation should be connected with thedevelopment process of students’ comprehensive language application ability,together with the development and change of learners’ affect, values and learningstrategies.From the investigation, senior high school English teachers lack the awareness offeedback, the understanding of feedback strategy, the attention to feedback effect. Inreality, teacher feedback on writing assignment are short of systematicity andprinciple. There are lots of improvement and perfection made on writing feedback. Inthe meantime, there are some limitations and deficiencies in this research. And somesuggestions for further study will also be proposed.
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References (omitted)