An exploratory study of feedback practices for written and oral tasks in an online English course

1. An exploratory study of feedback
practices for written and oral tasks
in an online English course
Laia Canals and Jackie Robbins

2. 0. Outline
1. Objectives and context
2. Methodology
3. Findings
4. Conclusions

3. 1. Objectives and context
● Objectives:
● to unveil the factors that determine successful teaching practices which
contribute to student engagement with the subject and have an impact
on students’ progress in CALL settings
● to assess the impact of an ongoing teacher development programme
● Context:
● 43 fully online B2 EFL classrooms
● TBLT with oral and written tasks

4. 2. Methodology
● Successful feedback practices: the ones that foster student engagement
with the subject (Garrison & Cleveland-Innes 2005) and reflective teaching
and feedback practices on the part of the teacher (Sockalingam, 2016)
● Data: feedback practices take place in two asynchronous communication
spaces in the VLE which facilitate written and oral communication
interactions between teachers and learners and amongst peers themselves:
discussion forums and oral discussion spaces

5. 2. Methodology
● Data collection: we collect and analyze responses to a
survey/questionnaire to identify variables that can account for successful
classroom feedback practices
● Instruments: teachers questionnaire and VLE statistical data: number of
posts and the spaces used to post whole-class feedback messages
● Data treatment: data was coded and descriptive and inferential statistical
analyses run. The study combines quantitative and qualitative data analysis
methods.

6. 2. Methodology
● Dependent variable: The construct classroom type (successful vs. average) is determined
by a higher than average completion rate.
● Independent variables:
● Classroom size
● Teacher’s experience level
● Teacher’s and learners’ posts in the written communication space
● Teacher’s posts in the written communication space
● Teacher’s and learners’ posts in the oral communication space
● Teacher’s posts in the oral communication space
● Descriptive and frequency statistical analyses were applied to determine the means and
standard deviation; ANOVAs to compare the two types of classrooms and determine significant
variable differences.

7. 3. Findings
● Successful vs. average classrooms
18 successful; 25 average
In successful classrooms:
● Similar classrooms sizes and experience level, but no novice teachers
● 13 out of 18 instructors in successful classrooms are seasoned teachers
● Higher number of both students and teachers posts in the written
communication space (953 and 73.5) (than average classrooms: 777 and 71.2)
● Higher number of overall posts to the oral communication space (448)
compared with the average classroom (352).
● The average classroom, however, showed a higher number of teachers’ posts to
the oral communication space.

8. 3. Findings
Figure 1. Differences between successful (S) and average (A) classrooms
N Mean Std. Deviation
Classroom size
A 25 45.52 7.693
S 18 46.89 5.645
Experience
A 25 1.32 852
S 18 1.72 461
Number of posts in the written communication space
A 25 777.12 200.888
S 18 953.94 214.471
Number of teachers posts in the written communication space
A 25 71.28 42.307
S 18 73.56 42.291
Number of posts in the oral communication space
A 25 352.28 74.96
S 18 448.33 70.36
Number of teachers’ posts in the oral communication space
A 25 8.76 3.244
S 18 7.83 2.64

9. 3. Findings
Figure 2. One-way ANOVA between classroom type and number of posts in the written and oral
communication spaces and teachers’ experience
Sum of
Squares
df
Mean
Square
F Sig.
Number of posts in written
communication space
Between Groups 327211.578 1 327211.578 7.664 0.008
Within Groups 1750507.584 41 42695.307
Number of posts in oral
communication space
Between Groups 96553.704 1 96553.704 18.075 0.001
Within Groups 219013.04 41 5341.781
Experience
Between Groups 1.693 1 1.693 3.298 0.077
Within Groups 21.051 41 513
Only two of the variables showed significant differences between the two types of
classrooms behaviors.
The overall number of messages in the written communication space and the overall
number of comments in the oral communication space showed a main effect F (1, 41) =
7,664, p. = .008 and F (1, 41) = 18,075, p. = .001 on classroom success.

10. Teachers’ beliefs and comments about feedback practices
● Teachers appreciate reflective activities; helpful to engage learners more and improving the
learning process (Sockalingam, 2016)
● Teachers in successful classrooms changed: provided more meaningful group feedback for
learners by creating specific space or using the same space consistently to give feedback,
providing shorter and focused feedback
● Teachers in average classrooms: recognize they should give more feedback and adjust the
tone of messages to foster learners’ engagement with the learning process; concerned about
time constraints
● Comparison successful & average classrooms from last semester and current semester:
improvement in terms of student completion rates; teacher development activity has raised
teachers’ awareness of the impact of their feedback practices on students
3. Findings

11. ● Successful teachers foster
learners’ engagement in group
interaction communicative
activities resulting in higher
completion rates (Robbins,
Malicka, Canals & Appel, 2015)
● Teachers learn to be more
successful; need for continuous
teacher development to raise
teachers’ awareness of the
effects of their feedback
practices
● The questionnaires did not
prove to be suitable for tapping
into teachers’ beliefs and
behaviors regarding group
feedback practices; instruments
need to be refined
● Wider study into different
whole-class feedback practices
to determine which foster
student and teacher
engagement, key determiners
of group cohesion & online
course success (Garrison &
Cleveland-Innes, 2005).
4. Conclusions
Afrodisias Agora, picture by Laia Canals

12. Garrison, R. & Cleveland-Innes, M. (2005). Facilitating Cognitive Presence in Online Learning: Interaction Is
Not Enough. The American Journal of Distance Education, 19(3), 133-148.
Robbins, J., Malicka, A., Canals, E. and Appel, C. (2015). The role of student and teacher activity on
retention in an online higher education EFL course. In Sorensen, E. K., Szucs, A., & Khalid, M. S.(Eds.)
(2015). Proceedings of the 1th D4 Learning international Conference Innovations in Digital Learning for
Inclusion (D4Learning, 2015).
Sockalingam, N. (2016). Engaged teaching to enhance teaching and learning. Asian Journal of the
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 6(2), 122-128.
References

13. UOC.universitat
@UOCuniversitat
UOCuniversitat
Thank you for listening!
ecanalsf@uoc.edu
jrobbins@uoc.edu
@laia.canals
bit.ly/CanalsRobbins