An Action Research Of The Effects Of Peer Feedback Modes On High School Students' English Writing Competence

Since the late 1990 s,peer feedback in writing has gained increasing attention.Whereas benefits of peer feedback on improving students' writing competence,fostering reader's awareness and enhancing cooperation and interaction among students have been widely acknowledged,little is known about the effects of peer feedback modes on students' writing competence.It is of great importance to choose appropriate feedback modes in order to successfully employ peer feedback,for example,to choose peer oral and\or written feedback.Therefore,it is important to explore the peer feedback modes.The research tried to conduct a three-month action research to apply peer oral and\or written feedback in writing class of senior high school students.The research attempted to answer the following research questions:1.Can peer feedback modes improve high school students' writing competence?2.What are the students' attitudes towards peer feedback modes?52 students,including 30 boys and 22 girls with an average age of 16 from one class of Grade 1,a senior high school in Heyuan,Guangdong took part in the research.Based on the action research model of “plan-action-observation-reflection”,the research had three round actions.Peer oral feedback was employed in the first round of peer feedback activity.Peer oral feedback doesn't provide notes for students to review.With the problems met in the first round,peer written feedback was employed in second round.Peer written feedback doesn't provide an opportunity for students to discuss what they they feel uncertain.And then with the problems in the second round,the combination of peer written feedback and oral feedback was employed in the third round.The scores of the compositions in pre-test and post-test were used to answer the first question.Questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were employed for answering the second question.The results indicated that:1)From the analysis of results in writing scores between the pre-test and post-test,peer feedback modes can help students improve writing competence.After third rounds of different peer feedback modes in English writing class,students' English performance has improved significantly.2)The majority of the students held positive attitudes towards peer feedback modes.After three months of action research,most students are satisfied with peer feedback modes.3)After third round of peer feedback activities,some merits and constraints of peer oral feedback and written feedback were found.Peer written feedback and peer oral feedback are mutually complementary.Peer written feedback provides notes for students when they revise their second draft,while peer oral feedback provides students with an opportunity to discuss what they feel uncertain.Based on the action research,peer feedback modes are recommended to be flexibly used in writing teaching.Besides,specialized peer training is essential to guarantee the reliability and accuracy of peer feedback.Furthermore,teachers are suggested to play the role of an organizer,guider,consultant,supervisor and also a partner in the cooperative peer feedback activities.What's more,timely encouragement and positive assessment is indispensable to cultivate students' confidence.