CORRECTIVE FEEDBACK IN ENGLISH

AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE: A
LITERATURE REVIEW

Student: Eider Moyano Chantar

Degree: Bachelor’s in English Studies
Academic Year: 2019–2020
Tutor: Bryan John Leferman
Department: English and German Philology and
Translation and Interpretation

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Abstract

Over the last few decades, corrective feedback has been a major area of interest within
the language acquisition field. In particular, its role has been subject of controversy due
to its questionable effectiveness. To date, several studies have focused on second
language contexts, but less has been done in foreign language contexts. Thus, this paper
focuses on the latter by reviewing the literature on corrective feedback in English as a
Foreign Language contexts. The review covers the process of corrective feedback in the
classroom setting, including decisions regarding the errors to target and the feedback
provider(s). Moreover, it contains both oral and written corrective feedback types and
the preferences teachers and students have of them. Finally, this paper addresses the
importance of student uptake and its consequent impact on students. In addition to
providing a general overview, this paper suggests that both oral and written corrective
feedback have a positive impact on students, more specifically, on two aspects of the
classroom setting: speaking skills and writing accuracy. Lastly, further research lines
and pedagogical implications are proposed.

Keywords: corrective feedback, English as a foreign language, literature review,

classroom setting

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Table of Contents

Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 2

1. Introduction ............................................................................................................... 4

2. Error Analysis: What Errors to Target ...................................................................... 5

3. Corrective Feedback Providers in the Classroom Setting ......................................... 7

4. Types of Corrective Feedback ................................................................................... 8

4.1. Oral Corrective Feedback .................................................................................. 8

4.1.1. OCF Strategies ............................................................................................ 8

4.1.2. Timing ....................................................................................................... 11

4.2. Written Corrective Feedback ........................................................................... 12

4.2.1. WCF Strategies ......................................................................................... 12

4.2.2. Timing ....................................................................................................... 18

5. Corrective Feedback Preferences ............................................................................ 18

5.1. Teachers’ Preferences ...................................................................................... 18

5.1.1. Teachers’ Preferences of OCF .................................................................. 18

5.1.2. Teachers’ Preferences of WCF ................................................................. 19

5.2. Students’ Preferences ....................................................................................... 20

5.2.1. Students’ Preferences of OCF................................................................... 20

5.2.2. Students’ Preferences of WCF .................................................................. 21

6. Students’ Response to Feedback: Uptake................................................................ 22

6.1. OCF Uptake ..................................................................................................... 23

6.2. WCF Uptake..................................................................................................... 25

7. Impact of CF on Students ........................................................................................ 26

7.1. Impact of OCF on Speaking Skills................................................................... 26

7.2. Impact of WCF on Writing Accuracy .............................................................. 28

8. Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 30

References ....................................................................................................................... 31

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1. Introduction

Central to the entire discipline of foreign language acquisition, the study of

corrective feedback (CF) has received considerable critical attention in recent decades.
This term refers to “teacher and peer responses to learners’ erroneous second language
(L2) production” (Li, 2014, p. 196). More specifically, Ellis (2009, pp. 3-4) stated that:

Corrective feedback constitutes one type of negative feedback. It takes the form of
a response to a learner utterance containing a linguistic error. The response is an
other-initiated repair and can consist of (1) an indication that an error has been
committed, (2) provision of the correct target language form, (3) metalinguistic
information about the nature of the error, or any combination of these.

This teaching strategy is considered necessary in supporting and consolidating

foreign language learning as it matches the learner’s utterance with its corresponding
version in the target language and draws her attention to structures that still have not
been mastered (Tesnim, 2019). Therefore, the growing interest in CF resides mainly in
its theoretical and pedagogical significance, which consolidate foreign language
learning.

Even though corrective feedback is a term that has been widely used in recent years,
the diverse definitions are similar in that they include teachers’ and learners’
participation and a classroom as a setting where CF takes place. Even so, the role and
importance of CF are amid growing debate as perspectives vary.

The use of corrective feedback or its absence in the language classroom is in the
midst of this controversy. According to Mendez and Cruz (2012), some of the problems
seem to be (a) the inconsistency, ambiguity, and ineffectiveness of teachers’ correction,
(b) random and unsystematic feedback on errors by teachers, (c) acceptance of errors for
fear of interrupting communication, and (d) a wide range of learner error types
addressed as corrective feedback.

Corrective feedback has been discussed mainly in second language acquisition

contexts. Nevertheless, fewer studies focus on foreign language settings. For this
reason, the current literature review aims at shedding further light on this issue by
presenting the choices the teacher needs to make when providing the student with CF in

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English as a Foreign Language (EFL) contexts as well as the impact these may have on
students.

The overall structure of this literature review has eight main sections, including this
introduction. Section 2 looks at error analysis, and more specifically, the errors that
should be targeted within corrective feedback. Section 3 presents the different feedback
providers, both in oral and in written CF. Section 4 presents the various oral and written
CF types available. Section 5 contains the CF preferences of teachers and students.
Sections 6 and 7 address the importance of students’ responses to corrective feedback
and the consequent impact it can have on them. Finally, the conclusion provides a
summary and a final interpretation of the topic.

2. Error Analysis: What Errors to Target

Errors have always been seen as something avoidable and so the question of what
errors to target seems a highly important aspect of foreign language learning. In an
attempt to answer it, Corder (1967) suggests that a distinction should be made between
errors and mistakes and he states that teachers should correct errors but not mistakes.
Corder explains that errors occur due to a lack of knowledge, thus, they are systematic.
On the other hand, mistakes are of no significance to the process of language learning as
they occur when a learner fails to perform to her competence (i.e. they are non-
systematic). However, he qualifies that “the problem of determining what is a learner’s
mistake and what a learner’s error is one of some difficulty and involves a much more
sophisticated study” (p.167).

Moreover, apart from distinguishing errors from mistakes, Yoshida (2008) further
classifies errors into four categories:

1. Morphosyntactic errors occur when learners incorrectly use items such as word
order, tense, conjugation, and participles.
2. Phonological errors indicate mispronunciation of words.
3. Lexical errors involve the inappropriate use of vocabulary or a code-switch to their
first language due to a lack of lexical knowledge.
4. Semantic and pragmatic errors occur when the teacher does not understand the
learner’s utterance, even if there are no grammatical, lexical or phonological errors.

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 Burt (as cited in Tesnim, 2019) suggests distinguishing global errors from local
errors. She claims that teachers should privilege providing CF on global errors over
local errors as the former affect the overall sentence organization (e.g. wrong word
order, missing or wrongly placed sentence connectors and syntactic
overgeneralizations) whereas the latter affect single elements in the sentence (e.g. errors
in morphology or grammatical functions). Therefore, global errors cause
communication problems and should be corrected, but not local errors, in which the
teacher’s correction may only disrupt the course of communication.

Finally, Ferris (as cited in Bitchener et al., 2005) introduces the distinction between
treatable and untreatable errors. According to her, treatable errors are those which occur
in a rule-governed way (e.g. verb tense and form, subject-verb agreement, article usage,
plural and possessive noun endings, and sentence fragments). Learners can consult
grammar books or sets of rules to correct these errors. Ferris states that untreatable
errors (e.g. word choice errors and unidiomatic sentence structure) are idiosyncratic and
so cannot be found in books. Instead, learners need to resort to their acquired
knowledge of the language to resolve the error.

As we observe, diverse distinctions and classifications exist regarding the types of

errors to correct. Nevertheless, neither in theory nor in practice is there agreement
regarding the decision of what errors to correct. When dealing with errors, the CF
provider needs to carefully identify and target the error types she finds appropriate to
correct.

As noted by Ellis (2009), the implementation of these proposals in practice is not a

straightforward affair, as these distinctions are not as clear-cut as would be expected at a
glance. Moreover, he comments that the gravity of an error is to a great extent a
personal matter given that there is no accepted theory of grammatical complexity that
could help instructors decide whether a rule is simple or not. Thus, the decision of what
errors to target seems to be a complex task that the instructor needs to complete before
giving feedback.

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3. Corrective Feedback Providers in the Classroom Setting

The choice of corrector seems to be another controversial issue regarding CF.

Mendez and Cruz (2012) specify three different correction providers taking into account
the participants in the corrective feedback interaction: self-correction, peer correction,
and teacher correction.

Self-correction occurs when the learner becomes aware of the error that she has
committed and provides the correct form to repair it. This type of correction is face-
saving and enables the learner to participate actively in the corrective event (Mendez &
Cruz, 2012). Nowadays, self-correction plays an important role as it fosters autonomous
learning. Nevertheless, Ellis (2009) recognizes several problems. He states that students
typically prefer the teacher to correct them. Moreover, he declares that learners can only
correct themselves when they possess the necessary linguistic knowledge. In Corder’s
(1967) terms, they will be able to correct their mistakes—not their errors. This means
that an additional correction, typically teacher correction, will be needed for learners to
identify forms that are not yet part of their interlanguage (Ellis, 2009).

Peer correction indicates that one learner corrects another. In peer correction both
learners are involved in a face-to-face interaction, which enables them to cooperate in
language learning and become less teacher-dependent (Mendez & Cruz, 2012).
Moreover, this correction does not make errors public, protecting the learner’s self-
esteem and increasing her self-confidence. As noted by Mendez and Cruz (2012), peer
correction is considered to be useful for teachers as it allows them to obtain information
about learners’ current abilities. According to Ganji (2009), this method can be
informative because it comes from an equal who shares the same experience.

The third option is teacher correction. This occurs when the feedback provider is the
teacher, who has the knowledge and ability to identify and solve the problems that may
arise. Furthermore, the teacher has the tools to make the learner understand the error.
Nevertheless, Walz (as cited in Ganji, 2009) noted that if learners are given the correct
answers, a long-term memory pattern may not be established. Even so, this method is
used normally in the classroom setting and the next section turns to it.

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4. Types of Corrective Feedback

Broadly speaking, the strategies employed in CF are divided into two main groups
based on the form: oral corrective feedback and written CF. As advanced in the
previous section, since the feedback provider tends to be the teacher this section
presents the teacher CF strategies.

4.1. Oral Corrective Feedback

Oral corrective feedback (OCF) is a type of CF that occurs when the teacher makes
corrections to repair ill forms of linguistic units used in speaking (Mufidah, 2018).

4.1.1. OCF Strategies

OCF comprises recasts, repetitions, clarification requests, explicit corrections,

metalinguistic explanations, elicitations, and paralinguistic signals. These strategies are
classified into (a) implicit vs. explicit and (b) input-providing vs. output-prompting.
These distinctions are provided in the following table (Ellis, 2009):

Table 1

A Taxonomy of CF Strategies

Implicit Explicit

Input-providing Recasts Explicit correction

Output-prompting Repetition Metalinguistic explanation

Clarification requests Elicitation

Paralinguistic signals

The classification into implicit and explicit CF strategies is the most commonly used
division. “With explicit, there is an overt linguistic signal in the correction; with implicit
the correction is prompted or elicited without an overt linguistic signal” (Mendez &
Cruz, 2012, p. 66). Regarding the division into input-providing and output-prompting,
Li (2014) states that the former provides the correct form without encouraging a

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response from the learner whereas the latter withholds the correct form and is more
likely to be followed by learner uptake.

4.1.1.1. Recasts

As noted by Sheen (2011), a recast is a reformulation of the students’ erroneous

utterance that aims at correcting all or part of it and that is enclosed in the continuing
discourse. This strategy can be realized in various ways (Ellis, 2009). First of all, recasts
may or may not include prosodic emphasis on the problematic form. Moreover, they
may be performed with rising intonation (i.e. as a confirmation check) or with falling
intonation (i.e. as a statement). They can also be partial or complete, the former
meaning that they reformulate only the erroneous segment in the learner’s utterance and
the latter referring to reformulating all of it. Finally, they may involve correcting just
one or more than one feature. Mendez and Cruz (2012) add that recasts can be didactic
or conversational. A didactic recast is a partial or whole reformulation that draws the
learner’s attention to the error made and whose purpose is merely pedagogical, whereas
the conversation recast occurs in a communication breakdown where the corrector
reformulates to verify that the information is comprehended.

Therefore, depending on the form of realization, recasts can be implicit, as in the

case of full recasts performed in isolation, as a confirmation check, and without any
prosodic emphasis; or they can be more explicit, as in the case of partial recasts
performed in conjunction with another strategy, such as repetition, and as a statement
with prosodic emphasis (Ellis, 2009). The following dialogues from Mendez and Cruz
(2012, p. 65) illustrate this strategy:

Student: I have 20 years old

T: I am
(Partial didactic recast)

Student: I can lend your pen?

Teacher: What?
Student: Can I lend your pen?
Teacher: You mean, Can I borrow your pen?
(Conversation recast)

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4.1.1.2. Explicit Correction

In explicit correction, the feedback provider makes the learner aware of the error,
identifies it, and provides the appropriate correction (Ellis, 2009). Sheen (2011) notes
that this treatment is usually accompanied by phrases such as “It’s not X but Y”, “We
say X not Y” and “You should say X”. Mendez and Cruz (2012, p. 65) provide the
following example:

Student: She go to school every day.

Teacher: It’s not “she go”, but “she goes”

4.1.1.3. Repetition

According to Mendez and Cruz (2012), in this strategy the wrong utterance is
partially or entirely repeated to elicit the correct form. They note repetition generally
includes some intonation change to emphasize the error. For instance (Mendez & Cruz,
2012, p. 66):

Student: I eated a sandwich

Teacher: I EATED a sandwich?

4.1.1.4. Clarification Request

According to Mufidah (2018), it occurs when the learner’s utterance contains an

error and a clarification is requested. He states that a phrase such as “Pardon” or “I
don’t understand” following the student utterance indirectly signals a misunderstanding
or an ill-formation. Thus, the teacher indicates some kind of error to the speaker and
that a repetition or reformulation is needed (Mufidah, 2018). Mendez and Cruz (2012, p.
66) provide an example:

Student: How many years do you have?

Teacher: Sorry?

4.1.1.5. Metalinguistic Explanation

As noted by Mufidah (2018), in this strategy a metalinguistic comment on the form is

provided by the teacher. It also consists of a brief metalinguistic explanation in the form

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of a comment, a question, or information that aims at eliciting a self-correction from the
student. For instance (Mufidah, 2018, p. 220):

Student: She like reading a book.

Teacher: Third-person singular. Remember? Add ‘s’…
Student: She likes reading book.

4.1.1.6. Elicitation

It occurs when the instructor repeats the expression or some parts of it but not the
incorrect part, where she uses rising intonation to signal it (Lubis et al., 2017). Yoshida
(2008) states that this strategy can consist of (a) the teacher pausing strategically in the
middle of an utterance to elicit the learner’s completion, (b) the teacher using a partial
repetition of the learner’s erroneous utterance or (c) the teacher eliciting the learner’s
reformulation by asking questions. An example from Mendez and Cruz (2012, p. 66)
illustrating this:

Student: When did you went to the market?

Teacher: When did you…?

4.1.1.7. Paralinguistic Signal

The corrector indicates to the learner that she has made an error by means of gestures
or facial expressions (Ellis, 2009). Yao (as cited in Mendez & Cruz, 2012) notes that
these may include a frown, a head-shaking, or a finger signaling “no”. For instance
(Mendez & Cruz, 2012, p. 66):

Student: She doesn’t can swim

Teacher: Mmm. (Teacher shakes her head = no)

4.1.2. Timing

Regarding the timing of OCF, teachers face the dilemma of deciding whether
feedback should be provided immediately after the error or later on. According to Li
(2014) the former is called online CF whereas the latter represents offline CF, and both
can focus either on a particular linguistic target or on a variety of linguistic features. As
noted by Mendez and Cruz (2012), the main distinction that teachers implement tends to

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be the one between fluency and accuracy. That is, the activity implies negotiation of
meaning or it involves negotiation of form. Thus, teachers who practice a focus on
meaning instruction and encourage fluency prefer delaying corrective feedback (i.e.
offline CF) whereas instructors who follow a focus on form and want to encourage
accuracy opt for both immediate (i.e. online CF) and delayed CF (Mendez & Cruz,
2012).

Long (as cited in Li, 2014) notes that online corrective feedback provide learners
with opportunities for a brief timeout from the ongoing interaction. He states that it
serves as an ideal form-focusing device in task-based language learning as it implies an
immediate juxtaposition between wrong and correct forms. Besides, Li (2014) asserts
that offline CF enables the instructor to annotate the main errors and then go through
them with the class. More specifically, Willis and Willis (as cited in Li, 2014) have a
preference for delayed CF since learners will not be predisposed to focus on a particular
linguistic structure as form-focused instruction is contextualized. They add that “when
linguistic forms are addressed in a pre-task phase, learners’ consequent obsession with
form can undermine the primary focus on meaning” (p. 197).

Besides, it seems essential to consider the frequency of OCF in the classroom. As

Mendez and Cruz (2012) state, an excess of correction can lead to a negative effect on
the learner’s attitude and performance, while a lack of feedback can be perceived by
students as a hindrance to efficient and effective language learning. Therefore, finding
the right balance is far from being a simple task.

4.2. Written Corrective Feedback

Written corrective feedback (WCF) is a type of CF that corresponds to how the

reader indicates to the language student that some usage in the writing does not conform
to the norms of the target language (Mufidah, 2018).

4.2.1. WCF Strategies

WCF comprises direct CF, indirect, metalinguistic CF, unfocused CF, focused,
electronic feedback, and reformulations. According to Ellis (2008), indirect CF can
consist of (a) indicating and locating the error or (b) indicating only. Similarly,

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metalinguistic feedback may imply (a) the use of error code or (b) brief grammatical
descriptions. The classification adapted from Ellis (2008) is presented in Table 2:

Table 2

Types of Teacher WCF

1. Direct CF

2. Indirect CF a. Indicating + locating the error

b. Indicating only

3. Metalinguistic CF a. Use of error code

b. Brief grammatical descriptions

4. The focus of the feedback a. Focused CF

b. Unfocused CF

5. Electronic feedback

6. Reformulation

4.2.1.1. Direct CF

Here the instructor provides the learner with the correct form (Ellis, 2008). Ferris (as
cited in Ellis, 2008) notes that this correction can consist of crossing out an unnecessary
word, phrase, or morpheme; inserting a missing word or morpheme; or writing the
correct form above or near the erroneous form. The following example from Ellis
(2008, p. 99) illustrates this strategy:

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 One of the major advantages of this strategy is that it provides learners with explicit
guidance about how to correct their errors. This seems convenient provided that learners
do not know what the correct form is and therefore, are not capable of self-correcting
the error (Ellis, 2008). Accordingly, Ferris and Roberts (as cited in Farjadnasab &
Khodashenas, 2017) suggest that this strategy is more effective than indirect CF with
students of low levels of writing proficiency. Conversely, Ellis (2008) notes that even
though it might help learners to produce the correct form when they revise their writing,
it may not contribute to long-term learning as it requires minimal processing on the part
of the learner.

4.2.1.2. Indirect CF

According to Ellis, (2008) indirect CF consists of indicating to learners that they

have made an error without correcting it. He states that depending on whether the
intention is to show the precise location of the error or not, the forms can vary: teachers
can underline the error or use cursors to show omissions in the student’s text,
corresponding to option 2.a in Table 2; or teachers can place a cross in the margin next
to the line containing the error, corresponding to option 2.b. The following example
from Ellis illustrates it (2008, p. 100):

Regarding this strategy, Ellis (2008) notes that indirect feedback (i.e. where the exact
location of the error is not shown) might be more effective than direct feedback (i.e.
where the location of the error is shown) since learners would have to engage in deeper
processing.

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4.2.1.3. Metalinguistic CF

Metalinguistic CF implies providing the learner with some sort of explicit comment
about the source of the error she has made (Ellis, 2008). As Ellis explains, this comment
can take two forms. The first one (option 3.a in Table 2) is the most common and
involves the use of error codes, which consist of abbreviated labels that are placed in the
text itself or the margin for the diverse sorts of errors. According to Ellis, if in the text,
the learner needs to deduce the correction needed from the clue provided, whereas if in
the margin, the learner needs to first locate the error and then deduce the correction.
Respective examples are provided below (Ellis, 2008, p. 101):

The second form of metalinguistic CF (option 3.b in Table 2) implies providing the
learners with brief grammatical descriptions of their errors. The example below taken
from Ellis (2008, p. 102) illustrates this form. Here, the teacher numbers the various
errors in the text and then writes a grammatical description for each numbered error at
the bottom of the text (Ellis, 2008). According to Ellis (2008), this form is less common
since “it calls for the teacher to possess sufficient metalinguistic knowledge to be able
to write clear and accurate explanations for a variety of errors” (p. 101).

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4.2.1.4. Focused CF

Depending on the focus, the feedback might be focused, which occurs when the
focus of the feedback is on specific error types (Ellis, 2008). As previously mentioned,
this focus can be applied to all the strategies. As noted by Ellis et al. (2008), focused CF
is more intensive as it draws learners’ attention to specific errors while other errors are
ignored.

The effectiveness of this strategy is among its advantages. Ellis (2008) notes that this
strategy may prove particularly effective as it enables the student to examine numerous
corrections of a single error, and thus, obtain the rich evidence needed to both
understand the nature of the error and to acquire the correct form. He claims that given
that learning depends on attention to form, it is assumed that “the more intensive the
attention, the more likely the correction is to lead to learning” (p. 102).

4.2.1.5. Unfocused CF

CF can also be unfocused, meaning that the teacher corrects all of the student’s errors
(Ellis, 2008). This can be applied to all the rest of the strategies. According to Ellis et al.
(2008), unfocused CF is considered to be extensive, as it treats multiple errors.

This strategy addresses a variety of errors, so it may prove superior in the long run
despite not being as effective as focused CF in assisting learners to acquire specific
features (Ellis, 2008). Regarding the disadvantages of this strategy, Ellis (2008)

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comments that in unfocused CF it will be more difficult for the learner to process
corrections as she is required to attend to a wide variety of errors. Thence, the learner is
unlikely to be able to meditate much on each error committed.

4.2.1.6. Electronic Feedback

Electronic feedback occurs when the instructor indicates to the learner the error
committed and provides her with a hyperlink to the file where examples of correct
usage are given (Ellis, 2008). As Ellis (2008) states, instructors can provide learners
with assistance in their writing through extensive corpora of written English, which
might be either carefully constructed or available via search engines such as Google.

This strategy eliminates the need for the teacher to determine what constitutes a
correct form. According to Ellis (2008), a usage-based approach seems to be more
reliable given that teachers’ intuitions regarding grammatical correctness are not always
reliable. Moreover, he claims that this strategy encourages student independence as it
enables the learner to locate the corrections that are most suitable for their textual
intentions.

4.2.1.7. Reformulation

The last strategy to be explained is reformulation. “This consists of a native

speaker’s reworking of the students’ entire text to make the language seem as native-
like as possible while keeping the content of the original intact” (Ellis, 2008, p. 98).
This strategy, according to Ellis (2008), provides learners with a resource to correct
their errors and enables them to have the responsibility to decide whether and how to
correct.

The idea of using reformulation as a technique of providing feedback grows out of

the procedure of reconstruction, where the teacher needs to construct a native-like
version of the part of the text containing the error. Ellis (2008) continues explaining
how then the writer revises and decides which of the reconstructions to accept, thus
involving direct correction and revision and enabling the learner to identify the specific
alterations that have been made. An example of this strategy from Ellis (2008, p. 104) is
provided below:

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4.2.2. Timing

With regard to the timing of WCF, it seems relevant to mention that correction is
always delayed so as to allow teachers to collect students’ written works and respond to
them (Ellis, 2009).

5. Corrective Feedback Preferences

The previous section has explored the different options when providing oral and
written CF in the classroom setting. Among all the strategies covered, teachers and
students have some preferences. Thus, the following sections deal with them.

5.1. Teachers’ Preferences

As mentioned above, teachers have some preferences concerning CF strategies and

their timing that may vary depending on whether the feedback to be provided is oral or
written.

5.1.1. Teachers’ Preferences of OCF

Regarding OCF preferences, Mendez and Cruz (2012) conducted a descriptive study
at a Mexican university that offered EFL courses. For this study, five language
instructors, aged 25 to 60, were interviewed and a questionnaire was distributed among
15 teachers, both methods intending to obtain data about teachers’ preferences and
attitudes toward OCF. They found that clarification request was the strategy most used
by teachers. More specifically, 86.6% of the teachers used it always and most
frequently, even though the remaining part (13.4%) reported using it periodically.
Moreover, paralinguistic signals and recasts were preferred by 80% of the teachers, with
the remaining 20% using it occasionally. Finally, 67.7% of teachers opted for using
repetitions always and frequently as an OCF strategy, whereas 20% rarely used it.

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Considering timing, more than half of the instructors (60%) preferred to provide the
whole class with feedback at the end of the class whereas the rest (40%) agreed that CF
should be provided immediately after the learners’ error.

In the same line, Yousefi (2016) conducted a study to investigate the frequency of
OCF types. The participants were teachers from the Buali-Sina University in Iran.
While students delivered an oral presentation the teacher was supposed to provide the
students with OCF. The results showed that, from about 25 feedbacks provided in half
an hour, 8 (32%) were clarification requests, 7 (28%) corresponded to metalinguistic
feedback, 6 (24%) were recasts, 2 (8%) elicitations and, finally, 2 (8%) were repetitions.

Lubis et al. (2017) also used open- and close-ended questionnaires and interviews in
their study in order to recognize teachers’ perceptions and attitudes towards CF. Data
was gathered from the answers of 19 teachers who were teaching at schools from
different levels. The results revealed that out of 19, 10 teachers gave feedback in the
middle of the oral task whereas 9 instructors preferred providing it at the end of the
performance. Considering the group of teachers that favored online CF, 3 instructors
preferred clarification requests, 4 leaned towards explicit corrections, 2 made use of
elicitations, and 1 preferred paralinguistic signals. On the other hand, out of 9 teachers
who opted for offline CF, 4 waited until the end of the performance with notes, 3 waited
but without notes, 1 chose to wait without taking notes but giving a reward at the end,
and 1 collected the students’ errors and provided feedback when the lesson was
finished.

Thus, these studies suggest that the strategy most preferred by teachers to provide
OCF is using clarification requests. Moreover, a great number of instructors opt for
recasts as a method to correct. Other strategies such as elicitation, paralinguistic signals
or repetition are also common. Regarding timing, there is no agreement among
instructors. While some of them lean towards online CF in order to make the learner
notice the error, others favor offline CF so that the student is not interrupted.

5.1.2. Teachers’ Preferences of WCF

While several studies focus on teachers’ preferences in relation to OCF, fewer

analyze their tendency in relation to WCF. Among these latter is Lubis et al. (2017),
who explored instructors’ perceptions and attitudes by means of questionnaires and

19
interviews. The participants were 19 teachers from a state university in Indonesia. The
results showed that out of 19 instructors, 8 opted for providing direct CF and 8 preferred
indirect CF. Moreover, 2 leaned towards focused CF and verbal explanation (i.e.
providing general feedback in class on common errors) and 1 preferred indirect CF and
verbal explanation (i.e. putting a sign on the incorrect parts and providing oral feedback
as well).

Similarly, Black and Nanni (2016) conducted a study in a Thai EFL context where
they employed questionnaires so as to understand teachers’ preferences regarding WCF
strategies. The participants were 21 native English teachers. The results demonstrated
that instructors favored indirect CF with metalinguistic comments (average value of
4.22 out of 5). This option was followed by indirect CF (3.47 average value) and direct
CF with metalinguistic comment (3.42 average value). Teachers did not opt so much for
direct CF, which received an average value of 2.68 out of 5.

Accordingly, the WCF strategies preferred by teachers are direct and indirect
feedback. Between these, teachers favor indirect CF, especially with metalinguistic
comments. Other strategies such as metalinguistic CF are also mentioned, generally in
combination with other methods.

5.2. Students’ Preferences

As already stated, students have as well preferences concerning the type and the
timing of CF, and these may not necessarily correspond to those of their instructors.

5.2.1. Students’ Preferences of OCF

In order to analyze students’ preferences regarding OCF, Alamri and Fawzi (2016)
conducted a study at Yanbu University College in Saudi Arabia. The participants were
84 female students of EFL aged around 22. They were randomly selected so as to have
students from diverse levels. A questionnaire was used to gather data. The results
indicated that students favored recasts (77%) and explicit correction (70%) as OCF
methods. Moreover, they also opted for repetition and clarification requests (65% and
63%, respectively). Other strategies such as metalinguistic explanation (61%) and
elicitation (58%) proved not to be so desirable. Regarding timing, there seems to be no
agreement as some students preferred online CF whereas others opted for offline CF.

20
 Following this line, Ananda et al. (2017) investigated students’ preferences by means
of interviews and a questionnaire. 76 EFL students from the Lambung Mangkurat
University in Indonesia participated in the study. Based on the percentages, the results
revealed that learners preferred repetition (65%) over other strategies. Elicitation and
clarification requests were likewise chosen (56% and 52%, respectively) by slightly
more than a half of the students. Not so popular were explicit correction (46%) and
metalinguistic feedback (43%), chosen by less than half of the learners. When
considering time, results showed that students preferred receiving OCF in class or
immediately after their error instead of receiving it after the class.

Similarly, Rashti and Tous (2016) conducted a study in Iran for the same purpose.
100 Iranian EFL learners from the University of Guilan participated in it, 50 elementary
and 50 upper intermediate learners. The research method chosen was a questionnaire.
Results demonstrated that for the elementary participants, the types of OCF preferred
were elicitation (4.06 out of 5) and explicit feedback (4.08). In contrast, they expressed
their lowest rating for recasts (2.88 out of 5). In addition, upper intermediate level
students leaned towards repetition (4.10 average value) and elicitation (4.02). They did
not opt so much for recasts (2.98 out of 5). Concerning frequency, both elementary
(3.64 average value) and intermediate learners (3.92) preferred offline CF.

Hence, there is no agreement regarding the type of feedback preferred by learners.

Nevertheless, the types of OCF more popular among them seem to be recasts,
repetition, elicitation and explicit feedback. Moreover, there is likewise a lack of
agreement in regards to the frequency of OCF. While some learners prefer online CF
others opt for offline CF.

5.2.2. Students’ Preferences of WCF

As in the case of teachers’ preferences, few studies select students’ preferences of

WCF as their object of study. Still, Black and Nanni (2016) conducted a study in
Thailand for this purpose. The participants were 262 intermediate Thai students aged
between 17 and 20 from Mahidol University. The instrument used for this study was a
questionnaire. The results suggested that learners favored direct CF with metalinguistic
comment (4.43 out of 5) over other strategies. They also opted for direct CF (3.87
average value) and indirect CF with metalinguistic comment (3.22 average value).

21
Indirect feedback with study suggestion and indirect CF were not popular among Thai
learners (2.55 and 2.41, respectively).

So as to investigate students’ priorities regarding WCF, Aridah et al. (2017)

conducted a study with 54 EFL students, with ages ranging between 18 and 22 years,
from the Mulawarman University in Indonesia. The instrument used to collect data was
a questionnaire. The results denoted that between direct and indirect CF students opted
for direct feedback (33.17 and 20.59 out of 40, respectively). In addition, regarding the
focus of the feedback, learners preferred unfocused feedback (27.76) over focused CF
(18.48) (Aridah et al., 2017).

Therefore, these results suggest that students favor direct feedback and direct CF
with metalinguistic comment over indirect CF. This would indicate that students prefer
to have their errors corrected instead of thinking about the source of the error.
Moreover, concerning the focus, they opt for unfocused feedback, where all the errors
are corrected.

All these results imply that teachers’ preferences do not correspond to those of
students. While the OCF strategy preferred by teachers seems to be using clarification
requests, students opt for other methods such as recasts, repetition or elicitation. When
considering timing, there is no agreement between teachers and students. In addition,
teachers’ and students’ views differ as well regarding WCF, as instructors favor indirect
CF whereas learners lean towards direct CF. Accordingly, it appears relevant for
teachers to be acquainted with their students’ preferences before selecting the type of
oral and written CF they will provide learners with.

6. Students’ Response to Feedback: Uptake

The effectiveness of the diverse types of CF explained is determined by students’

response; that is, by whether there is an uptake and if so, by whether it results in repair
or not. Uptake is defined by Lyster and Ranta (1997) as “a student’s utterance that
immediately follows the teacher’s feedback and that constitutes a reaction in some way
to the teacher’s intention to draw attention to some aspect of the student’s initial
utterance” (p. 49). The sequence begins with the student’s erroneous utterance and this
may be followed by teacher’s CF or not (Lyster & Ranta, 1997). If not, there is topic

22
continuation. If CF is provided this can be followed by uptake or not. If there is uptake,
it will be oral or written depending on the type of feedback provided by the teacher. The
following sections will analyze students’ uptake in the oral and written dimensions as
part of the CF process.

6.1. OCF Uptake

According to Lyster and Ranta’s (1997) model, student OCF uptake can be either (a)
uptake resulting in repair of the error on which the teacher’s feedback focused, or (b)
uptake resulting in an utterance that still needs repair. This sequence is illustrated in
Figure 1 (Lyster & Ranta, 1997):

Figure 1

Error Treatment Sequence

23
 When considering uptake resulting in repair, Lyster and Ranta (1997) propose four
types:

1. Repetition: the student’s repetition of the correct form provided by the teacher.
2. Incorporation: the student’s repetition of the correct form provided by the teacher,
which is then incorporated into the student’s longer utterance.
3. Self-repair: the self-correction produced by the student in response to the teacher’s
CF not including the correct form.
4. Peer-repair: the correction provided by another student in response to the teacher’s
CF not including the correct form.

As reflected in Figure 1, learner uptake can lead to topic continuation or

reinforcement. On the one hand, topic continuation can be initiated by either the same
or another student, or by the teacher. In the first case, the teacher’s intention is ignored
whereas in the second one, the teacher does not provide opportunity for uptake. On the
other hand, reinforcement refers to the moment in which teachers reinforce the correct
form before proceeding to topic continuation by making short statements of approval or
by repeating the student’s corrected utterance (Lyster & Ranta, 1997).

Regarding uptake resulting in an utterance still needing repair, Lyster and Ranta
(1997) present six types:

1. Acknowledgement: normally a “yes” from the student in response to the teacher’s

feedback, implying that the student would like to say that. It may also refer to a
“no” on the part of the student.
2. Same error: the student’s uptake that includes a repetition of her original error.
3. Different error: the student’s uptake that neither corrects the error nor repeats the
original error; instead, she makes a different error.
4. Off target: the student’s uptake that eludes the teacher focus without producing
further errors.
5. Hesitation: hesitation from the student in response to the teacher’s CF.
6. Partial repair: the student’s uptake that includes a correction of only part of the
original error.

This sequence leads to either more CF on the part of the teacher or topic continuation
initiated by the student herself or another student, or by the teacher (Lyster & Ranta,

24
1997). Still, the main idea remains the same: to make the learner notice and
appropriately correct the error.

6.2. WCF Uptake

For WCF to work, learners need to respond to feedback. Therefore, Ellis (2008)
provides various alternatives for achieving this: (a) A revision from the learner is
required, or (b) No revision from the learner is required. In this second option students
may be asked to study corrections or just to give back the corrected text.

Generally, the first option is chosen in order for learners to notice the errors. For this
reason, an approach followed by Ferris (as cited in Ellis, 2008) has been to classify and
describe the types of revisions made by the students:

1. Error corrected: the correction of the error by teacher’s marking

2. Incorrect change: an incorrect change was made
3. No change: an apparent lack of response to the correction
4. Deleted text: the student’s deletion of marked text rather than attempting correction
5. Correct substitution: an invented correction not suggested by the teacher’s marking
6. Incorrect substitution: an incorrect change not suggested by the teacher’s marking
7. Teacher-induced error: an incomplete or misleading teacher marking caused by
student error
8. Averted erroneous teacher marking: the student corrected an error despite an
incomplete or erroneous teacher marking

Therefore, according to Ellis (2009), it is decisive that students revise their corrected
text as this revision can be viewed as part of CF given that students may or may not be
given the opportunity to revise their corrected writing.

In conclusion, for both oral and written CF to be effective, it is essential that the
student responds to the feedback provided and successfully repairs the errors made
following the alternatives provided above. If this sequence is followed, then CF will
have an impact on the student, which constitutes the main objective of CF. The
following section takes this up in detail.

25
7. Impact of CF on Students

As previously stated CF may have an impact as long as the student attends to it and
correctly processes it. Should this be the case, the resulting impact on the learner could
be either positive or negative. For this reason, the efficacy of CF has been subject to a
great deal of controversy both in ESL and EFL. Yet, for matters of space, this section
will focus on the impact of CF on two common aspects of the classroom setting:
language skills and writing accuracy.

7.1. Impact of OCF on Speaking Skills

Speaking skills play a significant role in the oral dimension as they enable learners to
communicate appropriately with their environment. Developing these skills is among
the objectives of foreign language learning. Accordingly, various researchers have
based their studies on the impact of OCF on learners’ speaking skills.

Tesnim (2019) conducted a study in the University of Sfax in Tunisia to discover if

EFL teachers’ OCF positively affected the development of speaking skills. The
participants were 3 Tunisian teachers and 20 first year university EFL students aged 20.
Both teachers and learners were chosen randomly and included males and females with
different levels of high language proficiency. His study had an experimental design that
included a pre-test and a post-test. Oral presentations given by students about the topic
of ‘working as a part-time job while studying’ were used. During the first presentation,
students were provided with immediate explicit OCF. The objective was to determine
the influence of OCF and their linguistic development at the level of grammar,
vocabulary, fluency and pronunciation.

Regarding grammar, students showed generally a poor grammatical competence in

the pre-test, despite being students with a greater grammatical command. Still, most of
the students’ scores increased notably from the pre-test to the post-test. Not so notable
were the results concerning vocabulary. Overall, students’ level of vocabulary was
maintained from pre-test to post-test, with a few exceptions were the level rose.
Similarly, there was little change in the mean number of errors between the two tests,
where the rate of errors of the pre-test slightly surpassed the one of the post-test. A
different picture emerged when taking into account fluency and pronunciation. In both

26
cases, scores remained largely unchanged from pre-test to post-test. Thus, OCF was
helpful to improve students’ grammatical competence but not to improve other oral
aspects such as vocabulary, fluency or pronunciation.

Similarly, Dehgani et al. (2017) conducted a study to investigate whether OCF was
effective in beginner and low intermediate EFL students’ speaking achievement. The
participants were 370 junior high school male students aged from 13 to 16 years old,
separated into beginner and low-intermediate levels. These two groups were further
subdivided into a control group and an experimental group. A standard speaking test
from the students’ English book was used to evaluate students’ speaking skills. The data
collected via this test was recorded as the participants’ pretest score. Then, for six
weeks, teachers provided the experimental group students with oral corrective feedback
while the control group had their usual English classes. After this period, the same
speaking test was used to measure the impact of OCF.

In the results, on the one hand, the score for the control beginner group slightly
decreased from pre-test to post-test, whereas the mean speaking score for the
experimental beginner group increased. On the other hand, the mean speaking score for
the low-intermediate control group remained unchanged, while the score for the low-
intermediate experimental group increased notably from pre-test to post-test. As the
means of control groups decreased or were maintained and the scores of both
experimental groups increased notably, OCF strategies were effective in improving
students’ speaking skills.

Chu (2011) conducted a study for the same purpose. The subjects of this study were
second-year English majors. Three classes were used, a control class and two
experimental classes, the latter receiving output-prompting OCF and input providing
OCF, respectively. The instruments used were a pre-test and a post-test and classroom
observation. A speaking task based on a set of images was used as the pre- and post-
test. In the sixteen-week period, experimental classes experienced diverse OCF
techniques while the control group continued without any feedback.

Results revealed that learners in experimental classes improved significantly the

accuracy of oral English in their post-test, while the control group did not improve.
Nevertheless, the effects of output prompting and input providing strategies on

27
improving oral accuracy were different as the first experimental class was better than
the second one (Chu, 2011). In other words, OCF proved to be more effective than no
feedback and more specifically, output-prompting strategies (i.e. repetition, clarification
requests, metalinguistic explanations, elicitations and paralinguistic signals) had a
greater effect than input-providing strategies (i.e. recasts and explicit corrections).

In conclusion, OCF seems to have a positive impact on students’ oral skills as the
variations from control to experimental groups are notable. However, not all aspects of
the oral dimension improved by means of feedback. While OCF was helpful to develop
students’ grammatical competence, this was not the case for vocabulary, fluency or
pronunciation. Moreover, there seem to be no differences among levels since lower and
higher levels achieved almost equal notable variations from pre-tests to post-tests.
Finally, it was discovered that output- prompting strategies have a greater impact on
students’ oral accuracy than input-providing strategies.

7.2. Impact of WCF on Writing Accuracy

The most contentious part of CF is the one related to WCF and, more specifically, its
efficacy regarding writing accuracy. At the heart of this polemic lies Truscott (1996),
who claims that “grammar correction has no place in writing courses and should be
abandoned” (p. 328). Nevertheless, Ferris (1999) and other researchers find this
statement overly strong and rash and opt instead for listening to their students’ needs.
As more researchers have based their studies on this topic after the discussion, this
section aims at analyzing research evidence in order to examine the effects of WCF on
writing accuracy.

For instance, Maleki and Eslami (2013) conducted a study so as to investigate

whether WCF was effective to improve EFL learners’ writing accuracy. The
participants were 90 Iranian EFL learners who took part in intermediate courses at Iran-
Australia Language School in Tehran and whose average age was 22. These students
were separated into three groups, two experimental and one control group. Thus,
experimental group A received direct CF in red pen, experimental group B received
indirect CF and control group C received no feedback. The instrument used was a
writing test package that included a pre-test, an immediate post-test and a delayed post-
test.

28
 Results from the immediate post-test showed that both group A and group B
outperformed group C. Regarding the delayed post-test results revealed that group B
performed better than group A and group C. In other words, WCF proved to be more
effective than no feedback and, more specifically, indirect CF proved to be more
effective than direct CF. Therefore, these results go against Truscott’s (1996) claims,
supporting the position that WCF is effective and thus has a positive impact on writing
accuracy.

Similarly, Farjadnasab and Khodashenas (2017) conducted a study to compare the

effectiveness of direct and indirect CF and to investigate whether there was a
differential effect on accuracy when students were required to revise their productions.
The subjects of the study were 79 Iranian low-intermediate EFL students with a mean
age of 21 years old. These students were randomly assigned to four distinct groups.
Group 1 received direct CF, group 2 received indirect CF and students were required to
revise their writings, group 3 received indirect CF as well but students were not required
to revise and finally, group 4 was de control group and accordingly, received no
feedback. The design followed included a pre-test, an immediate post-test and a delayed
post-test.

Results concerning the immediate post-test demonstrate there are no noticeable

differences among the four groups. Conversely, there is an obvious difference between
the control group and the indirect with revision group in the delayed post-test. Thus,
even though the immediate post-test did not present any variation among groups the
delayed post-test showed a notable variation, suggesting that WCF is effective in the
long run and that indirect CF with revision is more effective than the other strategies
employed in the study.

Ellis et al. (2008) analyzed the effects of focused and unfocused WCF on writing
accuracy. The participants of the study were 49 Japanese EFL learners with ages
between 18 and 19 years old. The design included three groups: a group receiving
focused CF, a group receiving unfocused CF and a control group receiving no feedback.
The three groups completed a pre-test, an immediate post-test and a delayed post-test,
where three narratives that involved reading and then rewriting animal stories were
employed.

29
 Results demonstrate that the three groups increased their writing accuracy from pre-
test to immediate post-test, especially unfocused group. Nevertheless, while the focused
group continued to gain accuracy from the immediate post-test to the delayed post-test,
the unfocused group maintained the same level and the control group declined its
accuracy (Ellis et al., 2008). Thus, both experimental groups proved to be more accurate
than the control group in the long term. In addition, even though unfocused CF was
more effective initially, focused CF proved to be more effective in the long run.

Hence, results from the three studies indicate that WCF seems to improve writing
accuracy and thus has a positive impact on students. Regarding strategies, indirect CF,
especially when revision is required, proved to be more effective than direct CF.
Moreover, unfocused CF proved to be more effective initially while focused CF was
more effective in the long run. Accordingly, these results appear to be inconsistent with
Truscott’s (1996) assertions, proving that WCF has a positive impact on writing
accuracy.

8. Conclusion

The main purpose of this paper was to review the CF literature in EFL contexts.
More specifically, this paper has presented the various decisions the feedback provider,
usually the teacher, has to make throughout the process of CF. These include deciding
on the type of errors to target, the feedback provider, and the type of CF to be provided.
Regarding the latter decision, the review has explored the contrasting preferences of
teachers and students. Accordingly, the impact of CF on learners will depend to a great
extent on these decisions. In this respect, this paper has analyzed the effects of written
and oral CF on two aspects of the classroom setting: speaking skills and writing
accuracy.

To conclude, the present paper is an attempt to provide a general overview of the

central issues concerning CF. In addition, it demonstrates that in general, CF is effective
for EFL learners, especially in order to improve learners’ speaking skills and writing
accuracy. Still, further research is needed regarding CF in EFL contexts. Finally, as a
pedagogical implication is suggested that feedback providers should be acquainted with
their students’ preferences of CF strategies as these tend to be different from the ones of
teachers and other feedback providers.

30
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