Written comments that guide revision

Written comments can help students revise a text when they indicate what to revise and how to proceed. The number of marks alone does not predict learning. Available research includes university students, school students, and people writing in a second language. It therefore offers useful criteria, though not a single rule for every writing classroom.

Comments that relate to the text

In Responding to Student Writing, Nancy Sommers examined teachers’ comments on student texts at universities in the United States. The ERIC record summarises one finding: many comments were not specific to the text. A note such as “develop this idea” may point to a difficulty, but it leaves open which part should be developed and what change the reader expects.

The observation remains relevant to school writing. A comment is more useful when it can be located in a passage and turned into an action. “In this paragraph, add a reason that connects your example to the main idea” gives a location and a task. The student still has to decide what reason to write. That decision is part of revision.

Sommers studied American higher education and written response practices. Her work does not demonstrate a causal effect among Chilean school students. It provides a precise description of a frequent problem: the distance between a general comment and a possible revision.

Instructions for the next version

The study published in Frontiers in Education analysed 3,204 essays from high school and university students who received comments in Turnitin Feedback Studio and then submitted a final version. The authors classified the comments. Comments that indicated a next action, called “where to next”, were associated with greater improvement from the first to the final submission.

The research is observational. Differences between comments were not randomly assigned, so the association does not by itself establish that one comment type causes better outcomes. It also found a relationship between the number of comments and improvement. The study does not support a fixed formula that always limits feedback to one observation.

Its practical contribution is more specific. A comment can include an instruction that a student can use in the next version. This requires that the task have a clear purpose and that there be time to revise. Without another version, a comment may remain only an evaluation of work that has already ended.

Error correction and an instructional focus

Comprehensive correction of surface errors, such as spelling, punctuation, or agreement, can be appropriate for some tasks. A focused response selects one aspect to teach at a stage in the writing process. These are different decisions. The first gives information about many errors; the second concentrates revision on a bounded goal.

The synthesis by Kang and Han brought together 21 studies on written corrective feedback and accuracy in second-language writing. The article addresses a different question from feedback on first-language school writing. Its results do not establish a definitive answer for Chilean students writing in Spanish. They do show that the mode of correction, students’ level of language proficiency, and the learning context matter when interpreting effects.

A recent study by Meyer, Jansen, and Fleckenstein examines nonengagement and unsuccessful engagement with feedback in lower secondary education. The study title identifies an important point for any feedback strategy: delivering comments does not ensure that a student reads, understands, or uses them. The response needs to leave a possible task for the person receiving the text.

A classroom example

In a first draft of an argumentative text, the purpose of revision may be to connect each reason to the thesis. The teacher can read the whole piece to understand the text and select two paragraphs where that connection is missing. When returning it, the teacher can mark those paragraphs and write: “After each example, add a sentence explaining how it supports your position.” The next class includes time to rewrite those sentences.

This example leaves other aspects for another occasion. It does not assume that spelling, structure, or evidence lack importance. It simply organises revision around a task that can be completed and checked. If the activity is intended to assess spelling conventions, the focus and type of comment would need to change.

Limits of the evidence

The four studies come from different contexts. Sommers investigated teachers’ responses at American universities. Hattie and colleagues analysed high school and university essays in a digital platform. Kang and Han synthesised studies of second-language writing. Meyer and colleagues studied engagement with feedback in lower secondary education. None directly establishes the effect of a commenting strategy on school writing in Chile.

The evidence supports a limited conclusion: students need understandable comments and an opportunity to use them. The choice between correcting many aspects and concentrating on one depends on the purpose of the task, the stage of writing, and what the class needs to learn. Recording the changes students make in a second version can help teachers decide whether their way of giving feedback is useful.