Formative Peer Feedback during the Pre-writing Stage

Abstract

This study was carried out in a public high school in Guayaquil city in Ecuador. The participants were eight grade students whose ages ranged from 11 to 13 years old. Students’ mother tongue is Spanish. They were at the pre-A1 English level based on the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR). This study aimed at improving writing drafts using formative peer feedback facilitated by google docs. The present action research was conducted for six weeks (24 hours classes) and quantitative methods were used to data collection. The quantitative instruments were a checklist, a pre- and post-test, a rubric, and a survey. At the end of the innovation, there was an improvement in the mean in the post-test compared to the pre-test. This innovation accordingly with the results had a positive impact on students’ first pre-writing stage. Participants were aware of the importance of formative peer feedback in a collaborative environment. This study is addressed to people who wants to improve the writing skill in their classes specially EFL teachers.