A Study On Students' Perceptions And Experiences Of Computerized Feedback By IWrite

Breakthroughs in educational technology have made the individualized instruction and immediate feedback features of automated writing evaluation(AWE) increasingly attractive to language teachers. AWE systems are used to evaluate and provide feedback automatically for students in English writing. Convenient, quick and detailed traits will be a general direction of researching college students' English writing feedback in the future.Therefore, it is indispensable to do some research into this issue. However, many previous studies on AWE have concentrated more on the reliability and validity of this kind of system, while others have dealt with the effects on the scores of students' English writing ability. As a result, studies on whether the system can promote students' English writing and self-improvement and help teachers to provide timely feedback and guidance by using information technology in teaching a big class are very rare. Based on the predecessors' research, this paper explores the effects of the automatic writing. evaluation system on the students' writing accuracy, the attitudes of the students while using the evaluation system, and how the students use the platform. Taking non-English majors from the university in Wuhan as the research objects, the research methods includes questionnaires. The research questions are:(1) What are iwrite's functions and features on the aspect of providing feedback? (2) In which aspects did the iWrite system improve students' ablilities? (3) How do students use the features and functions of the platform to carry out autonomous exercises? (4) Can iWrite systems release teachers loads in teaching a big class?The results show that, the "iWrite" system can immediately evaluate students'compositions from four dimensions (language, content, organization, and mechanics) and highlight their errors and error types. It is iWrite system's timeliness and efficiency that students can modify and improve their writing efficiency in a short time. In addition, the system also gives students the opportunity to submit many times so as to meet the requirements based on this system. At the same time, by and large, the students are satisfied with the evaluation system. After using the iWrite System to submit their English compositions, the detailed types of errors (language, content, organization and mechanics), the evaluation and the number of annotations help students improve the quality of their essays. However, most of the students think that the automatic evaluation system were not specific or informative enough to guide them how to revise their writings. What's more, the system is also rich in composition exercises with diverse topics to help students select one they are interested in to put it into real and autonomous practice. Students'level of English writing ability is improved significantly. In addition,the iWrite system helps teachers solve the difficult problem in providing the personalized feedback and guidance in the teaching of writing in large classes. What's more, iWrite system also help teachers to provide timely feedback and guidance by using information technology in teaching a big class.In short, the feedback can help English learners improve writing accuracy. However,most of the students think that the automatic evaluation system were not specific or informative enough to guide them how to revise their writings. They are more willing to get both automated feedback and teacher feedback to improve they English writing abilities.