A Case Study Of High School Students’ Feedback Uptake In Online Teacher-student Writing Conference

Teacher’s feedback plays an essential role in improving students’ writing capacity.Most research on writing feedback centers on written feedback at home and abroad,while its effect is unsatisfactory due to its vagueness and generality.Teacher-student writing conference(TSWC)then is explored for being clear and explanatory.With the popularity of online learning,various online platforms provide opportunities for applying online writing instruction.Hence,online TSWC may be a promising alternative feedback mode,especially for Chinese high school students who did not receive effective writing feedback in online learning.However,research in this field is scarce and mostly based on tertiary education abroad,whose results may not be generalizable among Chinese high school students.To address this issue,this study investigated the application of online TSWC among Chinese high school students by exploring their feedback uptake,which is an essential criterion of feedback effect,to provide some feasible suggestions for enhancing the effect of writing feedback to Chinese high school students.To achieve the purpose,three research questions are proposed.First,what is high school students’ overall uptake in online TSWC?Second,what is high school students’ feedback uptake in online TSWC in terms of orientation,domain,action,and stimulus? Third,what factors may influence high school students’ feedback uptake in online TSWC? To answer these questions,four students in a science class from a key high school in central China were selected as the subjects of this case study.Data were collected from semi-structured interviews,retrospective interviews,and students’ original and revised drafts.Inductive thematic analysis and textual analysis were adopted for data analysis.It was found that generally participants showed a high rate of feedback uptake,and increased their awareness of the meaning-level aspects and of using online resources to improve their writing.Specifically,participants’ feedback uptake varied in the four dimensions.Overall,they tended to take up surface-level feedback and to use substitution for small-scale revisions.Most of the students’ revisions originated directly from the teacher’s feedback,which in turn encouraged students’ self-reflection.Factors influencing students’ feedback uptake were threefold: students’ comprehension,learning style,and motivation;the teacher’s identity and feedback style;and the atmosphere of online TSWC and the learning environment.Based on the results,the following suggestions are made to alleviate students’ feedback uptake in the online TSWC.First,teachers should personalize the online TSWC based on learners’ characteristics.It is also advisable to explore the potential of the online platform to improve students’ participation.Most importantly,teachers can try to integrate online TSWC with writing courses as a reinforcement and supplement to improve students’ feedback uptake.