High School English Language Learners' Perception of Teachers' Verbal Feedback: Grade 11 in Focus
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Date
1999-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The main purpose of this study was to investigate the kind of feeling high school
English language learners have on their teachers' verbal feedback, their perception of
the extent of information on the correctness or incorrectness of their responses
contained in teachers' verbal feedback, their perception of the extent of explanation
given in teachers' verbal feedback on the correctness or incorrectness of responses,
and their perception of the kind of direction given in teachers' verbal feedback for
better or improved responses or output.
To achieve the objectives, four grade eleven English language lessons of four sections
at the Higher 12 Comprehensive Secondary School here in Addis Ababa were
recorded and extracts of classroom exchanges or discourses were transcribed to be
used as basis for the study. The feedback types found in the lessons were
categorized and ana lysed in terms of frequencies and percentages. Accordingly, the
twenty types of feedback employed in the recorded lessons were used to develop a
questionnaire so that the learners of the four sections from which the lessons were
recorded could give their perception on these types of teachers' verbal feedback used
in the four lessons and presented in the questionnaire. One hundred and sixty eight
learners from the four sections filled in the questionnaire while twenty others from
these sections were interviewed. Then, the results were analysed both quantitatively
and qualitatively.
Some of the results showed that most of the respondents have positive feeling about
all the feedback types employed in the four lessons except in the case of the provision
(
Some of the results showed that most of the respondents have positive feeling about
all the feedback types employed in the four lessons except in the case of the provision
of "Interrupt" and "Simple Reproof Denial" which are found to provoke the feeling of
learners negatively. The learners have positive feeling when they are praised by their
teachers for their adequate or correct responses, and contrary to this, most of the
learners have negative feeling when their teachers comment on their wrong or
inadequate performance.
All the respondents positively or favourably perceive the extent of information on
correctness and/or incorrectness of responses contained in all the teachers' verbal
feedback and have similar perception on the extent of explanation contained in all the
teacher's verbal feedback except in the case of the provision of "Interrupt" where the
majority of the respondents have negative or unfavourable perception as regards the
extent of explanation contained. Except in the case of the provision of 'Interrupt' and
'Simple Reproof Denial, most learners positively perceive the kind of direction given in
the teachers' verbal feedback, and, in general, the respondents' understanding of their
teachers' verbal feedback is favourable or positive.
On the basis of these findings, conclusions were drawn and possible
recommendations put forward to hopefully help improve the English language
teaching/learning process.
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Keywords
Perception of Teachers