Effects Of Integrating Peer Feedback Into Automated Writing Evaluation System On The Writing Of Non-English Majors

Writing is one of the most important tools for students’ communication and evaluation oftheir language proficiency. It plays a more and more important role in foreign languagelearning. However, it is also the most difficult among the four basic skills of language. Withthe expansion of colleges and universities enrollment, there are more students in a class thanbefore, obviously, it is difficult for teachers to assess students’ writing. The effects of writinginstruction are far from satisfactory. In order to solve the problem, many universities bringAutomated Writing Evaluation System (AWES) into use. With its timeliness and efficiency, ithas been widely accepted by teachers and students. But previous studies show it can’tcompletely take the place of teachers. It is necessary for researchers to explore an effectiveand scientific way to combine artificial evaluation and intelligence evaluation together.As one of the most important factors influencing SLA, feedback becomes an importantresearch topic. There have been many studies about feedback both in China and abroad.However, few empirical studies are found to explore the influence of combining artificialfeedback and intelligence feedback on college English writing. Based on Output Hypothesisand Cooperative Learning Theory, the writer conducts an empirical experiment in two non-English major classes in Shandong Agricultural University. By integrating peer feedback intoAWES, the writer tries to find out which feedback is more useful for students’ writing, andattempts to propose a more effective way of feedback for college English writing. It aims atanswering the following four questions:1) Is there any improvement in students’ writing proficiency after receiving different kindsof feedbacks? If yes, in what ways?2) Is there any difference in students’ writing proficiency after receiving AWES feedbackand AWES plus peer feedback? If yes, in what ways?3) What’s students’ attitude towards different feedbacks?4) What’s the influence of the experiment on students and their writing process?This study is mainly quantitative in nature, and complemented by qualitative data. Thewriter selected180sophomores of two non-English majors from Shandong AgriculturalUniversity, with90students in each class, one was from College of Horticulture Science andEngineering, the other from College of Forestry. The two classes were divided into twogroups randomly, with students from College of Horticulture Science and Engineering ascontrolled group (CG) receiving sixteen weeks’ writing training, during which studentsreceived feedback from AWES; the other one was experimental group (EG) receivingfeedback from both peer and AWES. The AWES used in the study is called Pigai.net, which can provide holistic score and analytic report on some writing sub-items. With SPSS17.0, thewriter got the analytic results for these quantitative data, which can answer the first tworesearch questions. After the experiment, the author gives out a questionnaire to allparticipants and select10students randomly from the two group to conduct an interview,which provides qualitative data to answer students’ attitude to different feedbacks and theinfluence on students and their writing process.After sixteen weeks’ experiment, the writer has the following findings:1) AWES feedback and AWES plus peer feedback are helpful for students’ writing. Afterthe experiment, students’ writing proficiency in the two classes is improved.2) There is difference in students’ holistic score and some sub-items after receiving AWESfeedback and AWES plus peer feedback; students in EG and CG have the greatest differencein the number of words for coherence, followed by sentence complexity, average word lengthand number of high-frequency words. Students in EG outperformed students in CG in mostsub-items except in number of high-frequency words.3) Students hold different attitude towards AWES feedback and AWES plus peerfeedback. More students prefer AWES plus peer feedback.4) There are two changes brought by the experiment, one is the role of teachers andstudents, the other is students’ learning process.Finally, the writer proposes some suggestions for future college English writing teaching,including adopting Process Writing Approach, introducing multiple-drafts into writingteaching, encouraging students to get involved in peers’ writing evaluation after systematicpeer feedback training and using AWES effectively to promote English writing teaching.