Impact of Teachers’ Feedback in Improving Students’ Writing Skills: A Study of Tertiary Level Students in Dhaka

This study sought to investigate the impact of teachers’ feedback in improving students' writing skills. Feedback is perhaps the most widely used method for responding to students’ writing. While various studies have investigated the effectiveness of providing error correction, there has been relatively little research in Bangladesh incorporating the impact of teachers' feedback in improving students’ writing skills. Supporting Vygotsky's concept of ‘Zone of Proximal Development’ a mixed method approach was used to collect data. The data was analyzed in both numerical and descriptive manner. 90 undergraduate students were chosen for this research using convenience sampling. The major findings indicate that students find multiple benefits of feedback and have positive attitude towards receiving feedback but the feedback they receive is not clear, specific, well explained and immediate. This study finds that a teacher-student conferencing is the feedback that students prefer the most. Finally, some suggestions are given to improve feedback quality for enhancing writing skills of tertiary level students in Bangladesh. This study will help teachers have better understanding in giving feedback to improve the writing skills of EFL students. It will also facilitate educational administrators and policymakers.

providing effective strategies to develop writing skills through feedback. In Bangladesh feedback is not given much importance. Students struggle to develop their writing skills as they seldom receive feedback in classrooms. The impact of feedback is a necessity for the students to develop their writing skills (Cada, 2021).
There are many studies which were conducted on how error corrections are provided, the type of feed-back and teachers'-students' beliefs about feedback practices, but a very few studies cover the effectiveness of teachers' feedback in improving students' EFL writing skills in Bangladesh. Karim & Ivy, (2011) mention teachers in Bangladesh do not provide feedback frequently in classrooms, for that reason students do not understand the problems in their writing. This study focuses on tertiary level students' struggle in Bangladesh to identify their writing difficulties as they rarely receive enough feedback that are needed to develop their writing skills. Consequently, they are less motivated and feel nervous about their writing skills. It is assumed from these facts that it is necessary to have specific feedback in improving students' written skills which will help them gain optimum proficiency in their written compositions. This study therefore began with the following objectives: 1) To understand students' perceptions of teachers' feedback in improving their writing skills. 2) To ascertain the frequency of feedback received by the students. 3) To determine the impact of teachers' feedback in improving students' writing skills. It is mostly cited as "The distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem-solving and the level of potential development as determined through problemsolving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers" (Fithriani, 2019). Lightbown and Spada, (1999) examined that feedback provides "an indication that the use of their target language is incorrect'' (172). Truscott, (1996) speculates that students who learn English as a second language have negative attitudes towards error correction. However, Semke, (1984) mentions that most students prefer to receive feedback and consider it very beneficial to inspire them and it decreases their grammatical errors and boosts their quality of writing rather than being harmful or offensive. Radecki

Literature Review
which looked into the effect of different kind of error corrections in students' writing. His results discovered that the group which received corrective feedback showed substantial improvement in the accuracy and the fluency in their writings, whereas the control group which did not receive any feedback consequently did not improve the accuracy. Wu, (2003) finds teachers' feedback is useful and acceptable to students. His study shows that nearly 60% students expressed that they would correct mistakes and read teacher's comments when their journals were returned. Similar findings also confirm students are prone to accept teachers' feed-back because it helps to revise errors in their writing skills. Feedback facilitates students' error corrections and increases their writing fluency. Feedback also makes them feel anxious while writing journals (Cohen & Cavalcanti, 1990

METHOLODOGY:
This is a mixed method descriptive research study. "Descriptive research includes surveys and fact-finding inquiries of different kinds'' (Creswell, 2002). The mixed method study collects and analyzes both quantitative and qualitative data. The respondents of this study are selected using convenience sampling technique. "Convenience sampling is a nonprobability or nonrandom sampling where members of the target population meet certain practical criteria, such as easy accessibility, geographical proximity, availability at a given time, or the willingness to participate are included for the purpose of the study'' (Dornyei, 2007 andEtikan et al., 2016). Since this research has been conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, convenience sampling method was implemented to maintain physical distancing to stop corona virus from spreading.90 undergraduate level students were selected as respondents among who 58 were female and rest of the 32 respondents were male. All of them are the students of English language and their age range between 19 and 25.
Respondents are students of four private universities (Notre Dame University Bangladesh, East-West University, North-south University, BRAC University) and two public universities (Jahangirnagar University and Jagannath University). To accomplish the objectives of the research a semi-structured questionnaire was prepared using Google form. Questionnaires consisted of 20 questions.
Both close and open-ended questions were designed. The questionnaire was first given to a faculty member of Notre Dame University Bangladesh for validation. After the approval, the questionnaires were sent for pilot testing. The students who had similar characteristics as the respondents took part in the pilot test. Minor corrections were integrated after the pilot study. Questionnaires were then distributed among the respondents to understand the actual scenario of feedback in Bangladesh. The online survey link was shared across different online platforms (Facebook, WhatsApp, Gmail, and Messen-ger).
The survey link was also posted on Facebook walls and Facebook friends who were studying in English department were requested to fill in the survey questionnaires. 90 respondents participated in this study.
Respondents were asked to give their opinions where necessary. While analyzing the qualitative data collected from the open-ended questions, eight respondents was called over telephones to clarify their opinions. Phone calls were recorded and transcribed to be analyzed which have been included in the analysis and interpretation section. Data were analyzed in numerical and descriptive manner. The numerical data has been analyzed in a quantitative manner using Microsoft Excel and they are presented in pie chart, graph, and table to give a clear idea of the responses to the questions. Qualitative data have been described to understand the opinions of the students.

Limitations of the study
The COVID-19 pandemic situation made it difficult to meet the respondents face to face. It was very challenging for the researchers to convince the respondents to take part in the study. Some questions remained unclear as the respondents did not care to clarify because of the physical distance. There were some difficulties while interpreting qualitative data as some respondents did not answer properly or completely which could have affected the validity of the research. However, the researchers tried to make the responses clear through phone calls. The responses could be different if the study was carried out another time. In the future this study can be carried for better validity, reliability and more comprehensive explanation of the situation.

Data Analysis and Interpretation
The following data explain students' perception of teachers' feedback in improving their writing skills which was no. 1 objective of this study. a) It is inevitable for upgrading writing skills. b) It is beneficial because problems are shared directly and feedback is received immediately. Also, questions can be asked for more clarification at the same time. c) Sometimes feedback may either be too concise or less detailed if written or delivered orally especially during online classes. In that case, a personal meeting is comparatively preferable to the students. d) A personal meeting helps understand the weaknesses and also assists with possible solutions immediately.

Preference of different types of feedback from teachers
A respondent explains why he prefers a teacher-student meeting: "Sometimes I may not understand the feedback properly but still, I don't ask the teacher because I feel shy and uncomfortable in front of so many students. So that's why I think personal meeting is more constructive as it helps to create a strong communication between the teacher & the student.'' Another respondent expresses her opinion why she prefers a personal meeting. She states the following: "I prefer a personal meeting because sometimes I received feedback but it was not clear to me, I needed to know my flaws but after thinking that people will laugh at me, if I asked some silly questions then I restrained myself to ask questions in the classroom, so it would be better if I talked personally with my teacher.'' Whereas, 32.2% report that "oral comments" are beneficial. Respondents describe why they prefer oral comments. The comments are as follow: a) An oral comment is beneficial as the teacher may not write detailed feedback but s/he can orally explain in detail where students can easily find their mistakes in the writing compositions. b) The oral comment is better than the written comment. It's more specific and more effective for students.
Another respondent expresses why she prefers oral comments. Her comments are as following: ''As the written comments are usually found in exam script and when I return the script the written comments go with the scripts, it is hard for me to remember all those comments, therefore, it has less impact on me and if the comments are oral then it hits my mind and that's why my opinion is for oral comment.'' Another respondent gives his opinion about why he prefers oral comments: "Oral comments are beneficial because we can record them and can hear whenever we feel the necessity of it. While personal meetings with teachers also create a big impact on students but often we don't get enough time as teachers are busy because of their busy schedule so I feel Oral comments are better.'' 30.0% of respondents prefer "written comments" and explain that written comments are beneficial for them; they stated their views regarding their preference for "written comments". The opinions are as follows: a) Written comments are helpful because when we see our errors in our scripts that remain in our mind for a long time. b) It is usually short and specific which always helps students get the message from the teachers without miscommunication. c) Written comments are beneficial since they specifically indicate the mistakes we make in our papers; thus, it is also easier for the students to understand their errors and resolve them.
From Fig 1, it is understood that among all other feedbacks the majority prefer a teacher-student personal meeting and combination of both oral and written comments, because they find the scope to share their problems and can easily receive effective guideline. Moreover, majority of the respondents do not like to receive grades only without any kind of feedback. 6% state that they look at marks more carefully than comments. Fig 5 therefore explains that respondents prefer comments more than grades which reveal the necessity of receiving feedback in the classroom. The data in Fig 6 indicate that 90% of respondents express that they think teachers' feedback is important in improving their writing skills. However, only 10% explain that they think teachers' feedback is not important for them to write better. However, majority of the respondents realize that there is a need for feedback to improve their writing skills.

Students' attitude towards feedback
The data to open-ended questions explain in details the reasons for students' belief that feedback is important for them. Comments are given below: a) Feedback is important because it includes corrections, advices, inspirations, and more importantly gives guidelines to acquire better writing skills. b) It is indispensable because we come to know about the good and bad sides of our writing skills. c) It also creates better communication between teachers and students. d) Feedback is important because it provides information on our writing progress which is difficult to learn only through grades.
One of the respondents expresses her viewpoint regarding why feedback is important: ''For me, feedback is like the other side of the coin that we cannot see easily, but specific feedback rectifies our mistakes also enables us to create better work for the future.'' The following data demonstrate the frequency of feedback received by the students which is objective no. 2 of this study. From Table 1, it is understood that 60.7% of teachers give writing tasks weekly, 25.8% give tasks monthly while 9% give writing tasks once a term. Table 1 reveals that weekly written task is more frequent than daily, monthly, and once a term.  Table 2 shows that 50% of respondents receive feedback 'weekly', 34.4% receive feedback on a 'monthly' basis, 7.8% of respondents receive feedback on their written assignments 'daily'; whereas 7.8% express that they never receive any feedback for their written works in classroom. Table 2 therefore shows that weekly feedback is more frequent than daily, monthly, and never.  ) "sometimes'' ask for feedback, 29 respondents (32.6%) state they ''often'' ask for feedback, 24 respondents (25.8%) "always'' ask for feedback to correct errors while a few (7.9%) describe that they "never'' ask for feedback in classroom. Students ask for feedback to understand their concepts more clearly that is why the most of the respondents prefer to ask questions to correct errors in classroom.   According to Fig 10, 95.4% believe that teachers' feedback helps them correct their errors, whereas a few 5.6% express that they feel feedback does not help much. From Fig 10, it is understood that the majority of the respondents feel that feedback helps them in developing writing skills. The responses to the openended questions regarding students' beliefs "how feedback helps them develop their writing skills'' are given below: a) Feedback increases confidence, self-knowledge, and learning excitement. b) Both positive and negative feedback helps us in developing our writing skills. If it's negative then we come to know about our incompetence and if we receive positive feedback then it will inspire us to enhance our writing skills. c) Feedback helps to fix our shortcomings, shapes our ideas, and improves writing styles to organize our written works more explicitly. d) Feedback helps to improve students' writing ability, after receiving feedback students can easily identify their grammatical mistakes which help to improve that particular area and also enriches their vocabulary knowledge.

Teachers give extra time for error correction after the class hours
One respondent gives his opinion on 'How feedback helps them develop their writing skills''. His opinion is as follows: ''For me, teachers' words influence me like medicine; they have positive effect on me as their little appreciation of my writing ability inspires me a lot. Also, as a student, we can't be good at all skills. Feedback also helps me correct my structural errors, and boost my writing ability.'' Another respondent explains his point of view in expressing how feedback helps him develop his writing skills: "Feedback helps me enrich my knowledge. Before receiving feedback, I was only concerned about grammatical errors. Now, I became aware of how to organize ideas, learnt to write thesis statements, and brainstorm before writing essays which allows me to write accurately and express my views on the topic that I am writing."

Fig 11:
Feedback enables students' overcome writing challenges.

Fig 11
reveals that 80 respondents out of 90 (88.9%) explain feedback enables them to overcome writing challenges in their academic life, whereas only a few (11.1%) disagree with this argument and claim that they think feedback does not help overcome the challenges. Fig 11 therefore shows that majority of students realize that feedback enables them to over-come writing challenges. In the open-ended question respondents share their opinion regarding "how feedback enables overcome writing challenges." They explain that they face several challenges during the preliminary stage of the writing process, for example, 'shortage of vocabulary', 'inconsistency in writing styles', 'structural errors', 'grammatical errors or punctuation problem', 'problems in composing thesis statements', 'problems in paraphrasing'. Respondents believe all of these challenges create barriers for a writer.  According to Fig 13, 50% of respondents claim that feedback ''always'' have positive impact on their academic results; on the other hand, 48.9% reveal that teachers' feedback "sometimes'' assists them to amend their flaws and achieve a good score, whereas only a few (1.1%) respond negatively. Fig 13 therefore indicates that a significant number of respondents believe feedback has positive impact on their academic results.

Feedback enables revision of composition
The level of competence after receiving feedback Fig 14: The level of competence after receiving feedback.
According to Fig 14, after receiving feedback in classroom, 43.3% of respondents "sometimes" understand their flaws, 27.8% of respondents describe that they "often'' understand the feedback and 26.7% state that they "always'' understand the feedback. However, only (2.2%) explain that they cannot understand their flaws even after receiving feedback from teachers. From Fig 14, it is understood that a majority of the respondents "sometimes" realizes what their problems are in writing while going through teacher's feedback.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION:
The purpose of this study was to investigate the students' perceptions about teachers' feedback on their writing skills in EFL classroom, the frequency of feedback on students' written assignments, and the impact of teachers' feedback on students' written skills. It is evident from the findings that there is an enormous need for feedback in writing classes as 71.1% feel that the teachers' feedback has positive impact on their academic life. However, this view is contradicted in some prior studies as they state feedback from the teacher is ineffective and students don't even care about them (Ferris, 1997;Zamel, 1985). 65.6% of students express that they read teachers' comments carefully which also indicates that they really value receiving feedback in classroom. This result has similarity to Chiang's, (2004) study which reveals 13.3% of students "often'' read teacher's feedback regarding their composition and 10% of students generally read it after their teachers give them their written works back (Kahraman & Yalvac, 2015). Nevertheless, this result doesn't fit Radecki & Swales's, (1988) research as they find students take grades in their written assignments more seriously than teachers' remarks. The findings of this study also explain that feedback from teachers is central to developing writing skills. Feedback from teachers is beneficial to students because it makes students understand in which area they need to work for improvement (Chaudron, 1984;Ferris, 1997;Zacharias, 2007). This result contradicts Zamel's, (1985) as it says, students consider teacher's feedback as ambiguous, and often misleads them in the wrong direction. Secondly, this study explored that receiving feedback weekly is more frequent than daily and monthly. The learners become more inspired when feedback is given immediately as immediate feedback has positive impact on their academic life. It would be more beneficial if students are given tasks more frequently which will provide more scopes for feedback in classroom. Providing frequent feedback encourages students' to be actively involved in writing process and develop their writing skills. This study sheds light on an interesting fact that students often find the given feedback unclear, less specific, and less detailed. Students explain their opinions such as "not clearly explained" as teachers do not explain clearly the particular aspect they need to deal with. This is in agreement with Sommers, (1982), who argues that feedback from teachers is not always comprehensive and also comments on a particular piece of writing are not precise. It is teachers' responsibility to understand students' demands and give some time to explain in detail what their problems are so that they have clear concepts of their problems. Vygotsky's 'scaffolding' advocates 'assisted performance' which is when someone with more knowledge than learners help to progress in learning. The 'scaffolding' continues until the learners reach their successfully (Harmer, 2007). This is also supported by Ziv, (1982) who agrees that students prefer to receive clear feedback from the instructors, and they need to get further advice or suggestions to fix the mistakes. The findings revealed that students prefer student-teacher conferencing most.
Lastly, correcting errors helps students modify their written works which influences their academic results. Students appreciate teachers' supervision that provides constructive and effective criticism on their written work. Feedback helps students overcome their writing challenges, which encourage them to develop a positive attitude towards feedback. This result contradicts with the fact that students have negative attitude towards teachers' feedback as found in Semke's, (1984) study which argues students may feel discouraged and disappointed when they receive too much feedback marked with a red-colored pen. Truscott, (1996) also believe that teachers' feedback is not helpful for the students to increase their writing ability as he claims learning is better when students enjoy it; whereas feedback causes opposite feelings to them. However, this study reveals students consider that feedback enables them to reread their compositions. A good number of researchers claim that students revise their papers after receiving feedback resulting in the improvement of their writing accuracy (Chandler, 2000;Ferris, 1997;Lalande, 1982).

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS:
"Feedback on students' probably has more effect on achievement than any other single factor" (Black & William, 1998; Harmer, 2007). This study concludes on students' positive attitude towards receiving teachers' feedback in EFL classrooms which asserts that students' value teachers' feedback because it does not only help them enhance their writing skills but also motivates them to write better. Students believe that feedback has multiple benefits as it does not only help error correction but also provides additional information. Students can overcome their writing challenges after receiving feedback from teachers. They consider feedback has more impact in improving their writing skills if it is received early and frequently in classroom and it significantly helps in their academic results. Students also presented their viewpoints about facing difficulties while receiving feedback as it is not always clear and detailed. Some students claim that teachers use difficult vocabularies and phrases which they cannot make sense of; so, they repeat their mistakes even after receiving feedback. It is teachers' responsibility to understand the needs of the students and provide a detailed explanation so that students can understand their problems properly. Students value student-teacher conference meetings more than oral or written feedback as they find it more useful while sharing their problems personally. It is expected that the outcomes of this study may provide EFL writing teachers with pedagogical implications to help enrich EFL students' writing skills. In the future a comparative study may be carried out to understand the effectiveness of oral versus written feedback in enhancing students' writing skills.
The following recommendations are made for enhancing the quality of feedback to improve Bangladeshi tertiary level students' writing skills: 1) Proving feedback at the end of a trimester/semester needs to be avoided as early/continuous feedback have positive impact on students' academic results. 2) Teachers need to encourage students to talk to them more frequently regarding their writing problems so that immediate feedback can be delivered. 3) Feedback needs to be clear, specific and detailed. 4) Teachers may make arrangements for frequent teacher-student conferencing for more personal interaction which may motivate students to discuss their problems without hesitation. 5) Use of rubrics may be more effective for giving feedback.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:
Authors are thankful to Notre Dame University Bangladesh for allowing their students to be the respondents of this study. They are also thankful to all those students who took time to fill in the questionnaires and give their opinions.

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST:
Authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.