Recasting Or Underlining?

The current study aims to investigate the efficacy on accuracy improvement of two different types of feedback forms in Chinese EFL writing classroom. Recasting and underlining, which are frequently used by second or foreign language teachers in the classrooms, are not considered novel in the realm. Nevertheless, few researchers ever tried to incorporate these two into peer response activities, not to mention comparing the differences of them in peer revision. Furthermore, under the circumstance of communication-oriented teaching strategy, linguistic accuracy and grammar—the very basis of language acquisition are often ignored. Therefore, the study dedicated to seek balance between the two by applying peer response as form and linguistic accuracy as target of evaluation.47 intermediate-proficiency-level-students divided into three groups took part in the empirical study, namely the recasting group, the underlining group as well as the no feedback group (the control group). Before the experiment was conducted, a mini-lesson given by the teacher on the five main error types were explained to them so that all of them could point out the category each error belonging to at ease. The research lasted for ten weeks, consisting one grammar knowledge test, five argumentative essays and a questionnaire completion, with the first two of the writing tasks written in two drafts while the last three, applied as delayed-posttest, were one draft only. Ten weeks of experiment makes the research a longitudinal one and therefore yields the long-term results. The research design mentioned above on one hand evaluated the efficacy of peer response activities on accuracy; on the other hand, probed into the relationship between error types and feedback forms.By using descriptive statistics and paired samples t tests, it can be known that peer response activities led to positive effects on accuracy improvement in students'writing tasks both in the short run and in the long run. Also among the discovery list was the differences between two experimental groups, which was concluded based on descriptive statistics and independent samples t tests. To be more specific, recasting was proved to be superior in short-term accuracy improvement to the underlining group, while the result was reversed as far as long-term effects were concerned. At the same time, statistics also helped to demonstrate leaners'beliefs on peer revision as well as the degree of acceptance towards two different forms of feedback. Last but not least one way ANOVA was adopted to find that there were no significant differences between any of the five error types and the feedback forms. Therefore, feedback forms outweighed error types of accuracy-based peer response practice.Furthermore, the questionnaire responses helped to explore learner beliefs in writing tasks and peer revision, confirmed the statistics that there were no differences in incorporation rates of feedback forms, and suggested the role the teacher should play in the process of the activity.All in all, the results of the experiments accord with the hypotheses proposed before, with some fully confirmed and others partially supported, which sheds light on teaching activities and future research.