Lecturers’ And Students’ Perceptions And Preferences About Esl Corrective Feedback In Namibia: Towards An Intervention Model

ABSTRACT

This study investigated tertiary lecturers’ and students’ perceptions and preferences on the provision of corrective feedback in the English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom at the Namibia University of Science and Technology. The study focused on students’ speaking and writing skills in the English course, Language in Practice.

This study used a triangulation design for data collection and analysis. Numerical data were obtained through closed-response items on questionnaires, while text data were collected through face-to-face interviews and class observation. The data analysis was mainly informed by two theoretical frameworks – Skill acquisition theory and Conversational theory. Skill acquisition theory contributes critically to corrective feedback especially in the context of practice that leads students from conscious thinking to more spontaneous use of ESL. Conversational theorists believe in collaboration and interaction between learners to actively engage in conversations with other speakers of the L2.

The findings of this study reveal that corrective feedback is perceived by both lecturers and students as an essential aspect of developing ESL productive skills. Students preferred more correction than their lecturers provided. Both lecturers and students concurred that providing corrections to English errors, accompanied by comments, is the best practice. Students had high expectations to receive explicit correction with metalinguistic explanations. However, lecturers mostly provided explicit corrective feedback with no metalinguistic explanations. Lecturers identified time constraints as an obstacle preventing them from providing detailed corrective

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feedback with comments. Both lecturers and students indicated that the common practice for corrective feedback on students’ ESL written work is underlining errors. Lecturers concentrate more on form than accuracy when providing corrective feedback in ESL. Students preferred immediate corrective feedback for their spoken errors, while lecturers advocated delayed corrective feedback. Corrective feedback on students’ spoken errors is either provided explicitly or is being ignored. The findings of this study oppose the claims of some scholars who argue that the majority of students are depressed by corrective feedback in L2 learning and use their argument to oppose the ESL corrective feedback practice.

Based on the synergistic findings of this study and other empirical studies on corrective feedback, explicit correction was frequently practised in ESL classes; recasts were well suited to communicative classroom discourse. However, this study maintained the notion that corrective feedback practice cannot solely and rigidly focus on any single standardised corrective feedback strategy due to the multidimensional and cultural nature of language classrooms. Recasts, that correct students explicitly without announcing it, are multifaceted, so they should be applicable across all ESL instructional settings.

The contribution this study makes is a ten-stage Intervention Model that works towards the effectiveness of ESL corrective feedback at tertiary level in Namibia. The major recommendations are that lecturers should carefully scrutinise the specific ESL target language features; practise a variety of suitable corrective feedback techniques; and cater for individual students’ specific needs and preferences