Writing Instruction and Policies for Written Corrective Feedback in the Basic Language Sequence

This study presents results of a May 2009 online survey that asked foreign language program directors at U.S. universities about corrective feedback options their teachers use in response to student writing in beginning and intermediate courses. Survey categories included: 1) general information, 2) general written corrective feedback (WCF) policies, 3) specific WCF types applied at different instruction levels, and 4) open-ended commentaries. Results indicate a number of common tendencies: 1) teachers in most programs provide WCF on multiple drafts of student writing; 2) the number of programs with uniform writing policies has been recently increasing; and 3) written feedback on holistic aspects in addition to surface-level error correction is expanding. The study concludes with suggestions for further research and pedagogical applications.