The effects of written corrective feedback on Turkish efl learners' use of state verbs: An experimental study

The errors made by EFL learners are natural parts of EFL contexts since it is a demanding and difficult process. There is both a continueing debate on the effectiveness of corrective feedback on EFL learners? performance and an agreement on the need of further research on this issue. Inspired from this debate and agreement, this study investigates the effectiveness of two different types of written corrective feedback ? namely direct and indirect feedback ? on Turkish EFL learners? short and long term performance.For this purpose, a 29-day period pretest-posttest-delayed posttest study was designed and 71 Intermediate level students at 11th grade at an Anatolian High School were randomly assigned to two experimental and a control group. State verbs in English were chosen as the target form due to their different use in English and Turkish.Before the corrective feedback sessions, a pretest on some state verbs in English was developed and conducted to the three subject groups. Then, all of the subjects were given the same Error Recognition and Controlled Production Tasks on state verbs. After subjects completed these tasks, one of the experimental groups was given written direct corrective feedback and the other experimental group received written indirect corrective feedback. The control group subjects did not receive any written corrective feedback on their errors. Subsequently, all the subjects attended both an immediate posttest and a delayed posttest on the target form.The data collected from the tests were analyzed through two-way and one-way ANOVAs to see whether the written corrective feedback is effective or not. Additionally, LSD and Dunnett t-tests were used in order to se which type of written corrective feedback is more effective than the other in short and long term.The statistical analysis of the data revealed that the experimental groups who received written corrective feedback significantly outperformed the control group who did not receive any written corrective feedback in both short and long term. The study also showed that the written direct corrective feedback group significantly outperformed written indirect corrective feedback group in both short and long term. As a result, the results of the current study suggested that Turkish EFL teachers should not neglect correcting their learners? structural errors in EFL contexts and should use written direct corrective feedback in their classrooms in order that the EFL learners can have better performance in both short and long term.Key words: corrective feedback, state verbs, direct feedback, indirect feedback