Audio-visual and text-based feedback in writing competency: experimental study.

Abstract

A Foreign language knowledge, combined with formal schooling and other cognitive skills, could promote economic development in the current world. Writing skills in the acquisition of English as a foreign language (EFL) is valuable, and it needs tools for enhancing students, such as providing feedback. This quasi-experimental study explored the effectiveness of audio-visual feedback plus written feedback (AVF + WF) on undergraduate students to encourage students’ revision and improvement of their writing pieces versus only receiving written feedback in the EFL online classroom. The study uses the estimator Difference in Difference (DiD) comparing a treated and control group in two different periods a pre-and post-test under the application of 6 treatment sessions, plus a student’s perception survey at the end of the treatment. These empirical results suggest relevant information using multimodal feedback. The treated group showed higher improvement rates in the content of a paragraph between drafts, first and last, than students in the control group. Results also denoted that getting a combination of audio-visual and written feedback had a statistically effect on categories of mechanics (p = .000) and the use of transition words (p = .003). While preceding studies on audio or video feedback have only used student insights of the feedback, this research has helped contribute empirical data through quasi-experimental measuring effectiveness of feedback in online learning environments.