Using Screencast Video Feedback in the 21st Century EFL Writing Class

Abstract

Giving feedback has always been the backbone of the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) writing class. Written corrective feedback focuses on responding to students’ written work by extensively correcting their errors or offering constructive suggestions for improvements. The process of digitalization of education offered an alternative to teachers’ written feedback and opened up new opportunities to give video feedback to students. The latter has the potential of improving feedback provision through video capture tools, such as screencasts. The purpose of the research project was to investigate the effectiveness of using screencast video feedback on EFL writing and explore students’ perceptions of receiving video feedback for their written assignments. The mixed-method research was carried out with a group of 40 English language students in their academic writing class at a private university in Georgia. To investigate students’ perceptions, an online questionnaire was applied that focused on the benefits perceived by the students and technical issues faced during the process of video feedback. The qualitative data was obtained from semi-structured interviews in which the participants talked about the impact of the technology and their overall experience of using it. The findings of the study revealed that video feedback appeared to have been very interactive and supportive in the learning-to-write in a foreign language process. The participants also regarded video feedback as supportive, engaging, multimodal and easily comprehensible.