How to use peer feedback effectively to improve writing skill for 10th graders at Thieu Hoa high school

THANH HOA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
THIEU HOA HIGH SCHOOL
EXPERIENCE INITIATIVE
HOW TO USE “PEER FEEDBACK” EFFECTIVELY TO IMPROVE WRITING SKILL FOR 10TH GRADERS AT THIEU HOA HIGH SCHOOL
The author: Trinh Thi Loan
Job position: Teacher
Subject: English
THANH HOÁ – 2019
 I. INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale for the study
Writing is wildly viewed as a process and it requires contributions of time from teachers and students in order for it to achieve satisfactory results. These days, there have been a lot of techniques recommended to boost students’ writing competence. From my teaching experience, I am convinced that giving writing feedback is of great importance because feedback is considered an indispensable component of instructing and learning process, the implementation of effective feedback, therefore, plays a key role in improving students’ writing skill.
Unfortunately, in reality, assessing or grading writing papers and providing students with feedback in overcrowded classrooms has become a real challenge for teachers in my rural teaching context. In some classrooms, for example, the student to teacher ratio is 100-150 students per teacher. Teaching in such overpopulated classrooms limits the feedback the teachers can provide to students so opportunities to receive it are often scarce in classrooms. This is certainly the case in large language learning classes at my school. 
Another factor posing a challenge for promoting students’ writing development of is that teachers have limited time to grade students’ papers. This often means students receive feedback long after completing a written task, making it hard for them to work on their weaknesses and improve on their strengths before completing subsequent writing assignments. Receiving feedback late definitely does not help students learn better. 
This practical situation raises a big question is that “how can teachers provide their students with credible and timely feedback?” Peer feedback may represent one way of responding to this question. I have applied this kind of feedback in my writing classes for long enough to assure its great significance in motivating students’ participation, cultivating their critical thinking and developing their ability of self-regulated learning. Students become information-and-assistance providers for they have sufficient time, energy and resource. It is especially applicable to large-size English classes in school.
The above reasons have inspired me to conduct my initiative with the title “How to use peer feedback effectively to improve writing skill for 10th graders at Thieu Hoa high school” with the hope of sharing my experience about using peer feedback in teaching writing skill.
2. Objectives of research 
2.1. For the students
- Provide learners with an overview of how to perform peer feedback in writing exercises.
- Help students to enable to find the mistakes in the writing papers and correct them quickly and effectively.
2.2. For the teachers
- Find out the most effective methods to improve students’ writing skill in general and the method of applying peer feedback in detail.
- Know how to stimulate students to improve their writing skills.
3. Research methodology 
I write this topic based on:
- The method of studying theory.
- The method of investigating.
- Applying the topic to real teaching English at Thieu Hoa high school. 
- Comparison, collation and summary of the result, effect of the topic.
4. Scope of research
The scope of this study is limited to “peer feedback” carried out in writing lessons in English 10 at high school. It explores the strengths and limitation of peer feedback in teaching and learning writing skill, the real situation of giving written corrective peer feedback at my school and how to make use of peer feedback to improve writing skill for 10th graders.
II. PROBLEM SOLVING
1. Theoretical background and practical background 
1. 1. Theoretical background
Writing, unlike speaking, is not an ability we acquire naturally, even in our first language - it has to be taught. Writing is a system for interpersonal communication using various styles of language (Jalaludin, 2011). It plays a fundamental role in our personal and professional lives. In academia, writing has become central as a measure for academic success. 
Giving feedback in writing is an activity after students have written a complete draft of a paper, but while there is still time for substantial revision or it can be carried out in the post-writing. 
Peer feedback means feedback from your fellow students. If you are working on the same assignment as another student, peer feedback can mean exchanging drafts and comments on each others' drafts. Providing peer feedback can better students’ own writing skill. By giving feedback to friends, students often begin to think more flexibly about their own writings. This experience will promote the student’s ability to take the grader’s perspective when they feedback their own work before submitting it for a grade. Furthermore, peer feedback gives students responsibility for critiquing writing (and thinking), rather than putting all the responsibility on teachers. The hope is that they will internalize this process and carry it on independently, to the benefit of their future work. 
1. 2. Practical background
Most of the teachers at my school consider peer feedback as an ineffective technique for improving students' writing and prefer teacher feedback to peer feedback. They believe that teachers are only ones who have high knowledge to provide feedback to students' writing and peer feedback is time-consuming. Until now hardly have English teachers at high school in my province used peer feedback in teaching writing skill and students are generally not used to giving or receiving peer feedback during a writing lesson. I met with a lot of disapproval when I told my colleagues about my intention of applying peer feedback in a writing lesson. They suppose there is not enough time for peer feedback. They have been following these procedures when teaching writing lessons.
A traditional writing lesson plan at my high school includes:
I . Warm-up. (5 minutes): Games or checking the old lesson.
II. Pre – writing. (12 minutes)
Prewriting is the preparation the teacher and students do before students begin to draft the paper. In this stage, vocabulary is taught and structure or format is prsented. Usually, some tasks designed in the textbook are carried out. 
III. While – writing. (13minutes)
Students begin to put the paper in paragraph form. They may write their papers individually, in pairs or in groups. Teachers observe and help.
IV. Post – Writing.( 10 minutes )
Teacher gives feedback. The more time the teacher has, the more papers he / she gives feedback to.
V. Homework. (5 minutes)
Here are the results after students in class in 10th form (10B) when they were required to write a paragraph (100 words) about their daily activities when the teacher follows the traditional writing lesson plans. This test was done at the beginning of the school year.
Class
Number of students
8.0 – 10.0
6.5 - 7.0
5.0 – 6.0
<5.0
10 B
 40
5 ( 12,5 % ) 
5 ( 12,5 % ) 
 10 ( 25% )
 20 (50 %)
I have observed a lot of such writing lessons and I wondered how I can get students more involved and active, how I can make writing lessons more learner- centred, and how to shift the focus of activity from the teacher to the learners because teaching activities, after all, should focus on learners, considering learners as the center of teaching and cognition process.
2. Applying peer feedback in writing lessons at Thieu Hoa high school.
2.1.Difficulty
Many students were too shy to pronounce a judgment on their peers’ writing. They might not desire to hurt a partner’s feelings or simply their inexperience with providing constructive criticism on a peer’s work. Besides, some students might not know how to comment on one another’s writing constructively because over the years they have not received helpful feedback from teachers grading their papers. In addition, many students are likely to assume that it is only the teacher’s feedback that “counts.” Even when they take seriously feedback provided by their peers, students often do not know how to incorporate that feedback when they revise their papers. To respond to the challenges described above, I read a lot of books, articles on the internet and come up with some strategies that I find useful in my application of peer feedback.
2.2. Key Strategies
 	Firstly, I identified and taught the skills required for peer feedback. I listed the skills that students should learn and put into practice when participating in peer feedback such as writing skills (writing clear, specific comments and questions), and collaboration skills (phrasing critiques in a descriptive, constructive way). 
 Secondly, I developed checklists and guidelines for students to use when they evaluate their peers’ written work in terms of some certain aspects of language such as grammar, syntax, vocabulary and learning strategy and bore in my mind that peer feedback becomes questionable if students are asked to allocate grades to their peers. Therefore, grades should be the teacher’s responsibility because peers do not like being accountable for misjudging their peers.
 Thirdly, I taught peer feedback as a vital part of the writing process. I reminded students that the process of producing academic and professional writing generally involves three steps: drafting, revising, and editing. Peer feedback is often most helpful to student writers when it is utilized between the drafting and revision stages, or after each student has produced a complete draft, but while there is still time to make substantial changes. A writer might learn from peer-feedbackers. The purpose of peer feedback as a prelude to revision is to help the writer determine which parts of the paper are effective, and which are unclear, incomplete, or unconvincing. 
Lastly, I described peer feedback as an opportunity for students to learn how to write for an authentic audience and defined the role of the peer feedbacker as that of a reader, not an evaluator. Participating in peer feedback can help them learn to shape their written language as a medium of communication with readers. 
2.3 Procedures of conducting peer feedback in the study.
2.3.1. Preparations
2.3.1. 1. Determining how peer feedback would fit into the course.
Before applying feedback to writing lessons, I decided in which writing lessons in the course would include a peer-feedback session. I gave the time that was required to conduct peer-feedback sessions successfully, in Tieng Anh 10, peer feedback would work best in about 10 minutes. Then I decided when peer-feedback sessions would occur. The ideal time for peer feedback is after students have written a complete draft of a paper, but while there is still time for substantial revision. I looked over my course schedule, made time for a “mock” peer-feedback session before I asked students to feedback one another’s writing, so that they could learn to identify and began practicing the skills necessary for peer feedback. 
2.3.1. 2. Designing peer-feedback worksheets for peer-feedback session.
These worksheets (Peer Feedback Worksheet) should include specific tasks that are suitable for students’ levels and feedbackers can complete during the session. I often provide students guiding questions or checklists to use when they evaluate their peers’ written work. Besides, I often demonstrate to students what to focus on and how to communicate about their peers’ written papers.
Here is an example of a set of guiding question I used for peer feedback in the unit 1: writing a narrative
Narrative writing rating scale: Type of Evaluation:
peer (Circle one):
Item
Good, ok or not yet
The story has a well-thought-out setting.
The story has well-thought-out characters.
The story has a conflict.
The story has a solution to the conflict.
The writing contains correct capitalization.
The writing contains correct punctuation.
The writing contains words that are correctly spelled
Comments:-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peer-feedback worksheets should ask the feedbacker to begin by offering a positive comment about the paper. After that point, the peer feedbacker’s role in commenting should be descriptive; each feedbacker should describe his response to the paper. Examples of specific tasks include:
- Indicate which parts of the paper the reader finds most or least effective, and why
- Identify the thesis
- List the major points of support or evidence
- Indicate sentences or paragraphs that seem out of order, incompletely explained, or otherwise in need of revision
2.3.1.3. Creating an assessment system in peer- feedback
 	I have thought carefully about the kind of comments that I would provide students when I feedbacked drafts and graded papers and deciding how I would grade students’ contributions to peer-feedback sessions.
 I assigned a point-value to different aspects of the work required for peer feedback. The following example illustrates a point-system approach to grading student performance in peer feedback:
Brought 2 copies of paper to class: 5 pts
Provided peers with specific, constructive written feedback: 0-5 pts
Participated actively in discussion of each paper: 0-5 pts
Wrote specific response to peers’ feedback: 0-5 pts
Total score for each peer-feedback session: 0-20 pts.
2. 3.2. Before the Peer-Feedback Session
2.3.2.1. Demonstrating a “mock” peer-feedback session.
First, I copied and distributed a brief sample paper submitted by a student in an earlier semester .The chosen paper is typical of students in grade 10. Next, ask students to take 2minutes to read the paper and 5 minutes to write some comments, using a peer-feedback worksheet. If time allows, you can ask students to work in groups of 3-4 to produce written comments; if you do so, give them an additional 4-6 minutes for group discussion.
After students have produced written comments individually or as a group, use a document camera or overhead projector to show some feedbacking comments to the class. When necessary, follow-up with questions that help the students phrase their comments in more specific and constructive ways. For example, if a student comments, “I like the first paragraph,” you might ask, “can you tell the writer what you find effective or appealing about that paragraph? And why?” Your aim should be to help students understand that the point of their comments should be to describe their experience as readers with specific language, not to praise or condemn their peers or to tell the peer how they would write the paper.
2.3.2.2. Guiding students how to produce and respond to comments in peer feedback 
As your students need to learn and practice the skills involved in providing constructive feedback on their peers’ writing, they will also need to learn how to respond, as writers, to the feedback they receive. Therefore, you might consider including in the “mock” peer-feedback session, described above, an exercise in which you ask your students to put themselves in the position of the writer and come up with a plan for revision based on the comments that they and their classmates have formulated in response to the sample paper. 
Students must learn how to approach a peer-feedback session with an open mind. Often, undergraduate students go into a peer-feedback session thinking that their papers are essentially “done” and need to be edited or changed only slightly. They “hear” only those responses that confirm this view and they end up making very few changes to their papers after the peer-feedback session and before submitting the final draft to the instructor. It is useful to institute a rule that prohibits writers from speaking when peer-feedbackers are offering feedback. 
An exception might be made in a case in which the writer does not understand a feedbacker’s comments and needs to ask for more information. In addition, instructors should require each writer to respond in writing to their peers’ comments
2.3.2.3. Assigning permanent groups of peer-feedback 
Peer feedback should be carried out in groups of three, If so, each student will be feedbacking the papers of two peers during each peer-feedback session, but each group will discuss three papers. It is best to assign students to groups, rather than to have them define the groups themselves. Students often want to form groups with friends, which may actually create difficulties. As you may want to explain to your students, it can be more difficult to provide honest feedback to a writer when that writer is a friend. Moreover, assigning students to the groups will allow the instructor to ensure that the groups are heterogeneous in terms of, for example, student ability, gender, race, and academic major. Such heterogeneity can enhance student learning in groups. When the time is limited, the teacher should ask students to work in pairs.
Maintaining the pairs or groups throughout the semester will help your students build the trust that is necessary for peer feedback to be successful. You should encourage your students to speak with you if they find that their peer-feedback groups are not functioning as well as desired, but you should also make it clear that you are interested in helping them find ways to work together to solve whatever problems have surfaced.
2.3.3. During Peer-Feedback Sessions
2.3.3.1. Structuring each peer-feedback session with clear instructions and time limits.
To start each session, distribute peer-feedback worksheets (see above), explain how students should complete the worksheets, set time limits, and ask each group to designate one person as a time-keeper to make sure that the group stays on schedule. Peer-feedback sessions can be accomplished in 10-15 minutes. If instructors find that more time is preferable, consider asking students to read their peers’ papers before coming to class (This is for giving peer feedback on homework).
The following is a peer-feedback schedule that can work in a 45-minute class. When writing papers in Tieng Anh 10 are around 100- 200 words long, peer-feedbackers should spend about 10-15 minutes reading and feedbacking each paper: 5 minutes reading the paper (tell students to read each paper twice) and 5-10 minutes writing comments. 
 	After all 3 students (or 2 students) have finished commenting on the papers submitted by their peers, the group (the pairs) should then devote 2 minutes to a “discussion” of each paper. During this discussion, the 2 feedbackers should present spoken feedback to the writer. If feedbackers feel uncomfortable with providing spoken feedback, they might start by reading their written comments out loud to the writer. Doing so can produce the added benefit of helping the feedbackers clarify their written comments. As noted above, the writer of the paper should not speak during this discussion, except perhaps to ask a clarifying question.
2.3.3.2. Being a supervisor and a guide
Even with clear instructions, peer-feedback sessions can go awry. Circulate throughout the session to make sure that the groups stay focused. Listen carefully to the spoken feedback, and use questions to help students make their comments as specific and descriptive as possible. For example, if you hear a student saying, “I was confused by the third paragraph,” you might prompt them to say more by asking, “Can you tell the writer where you got lost?” or “What word or phrase confused you? Why?” Students will soon learn to supply such details themselves. Paying attention to how the groups are functioning overall can help you determine whether you need to give additional guidance to the class as a whole. 
2.3.4.