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Corrective Feedback Style

Linda Bond
1. Do you think you may have a preference for using a particular type of corrective
feedback in your teaching?
2. For example, would you consider yourself to be a recaster or a prompter or do
you think you would use a range of different feedback types?
3. What could you do to find out?
Thinking back on my teaching style, I recognize that I have employed many of the Corrective
Feedback Forms. Im definitely not a recaster. I may have used it with my children when they
were learning to speak (I honestly dont recall), but never in the classroom. I think it would be
ineffective because the students may or may not recognize that I was trying to fix an error. They
are usually too busy just trying to keep up with the class to recognize when something is being
recast.t
Metalinguistic feedback is not something I use with students taking the lower levels of ASL. I
think it goes over their heads. I believe upper level students, however, benefit from this form of
corrective feedback.
I know I have used prompting when teaching one-day workshops about English sign systems.
When it comes to the end of the workshop and students are supposed to remember various SEE2
affixes or family group signs, I prompt them to come up with the correct signs. It works.
I do utilize explicit correction, especially in a one on one teaching/review session when students
fully understand that I am there for the express purpose of correcting them. I use clarification
requests (which can include recasting) especially in social situations where a ZPD atmosphere
is acceptable such as our Silent Supper where students come to observe, practice and learn.
I also use elicitation. I prompt students as I elicit completion of sentences. I sometimes ask
what an ASL sign is for an English word, although I almost always use pictures -- not words.
And I do ask students to reformulate their attempts in order to get them to think it through, and
sign it correctly.
Because I am now aware of these techniques, I will be conscious of using a variety of corrective
feedback forms because I will have a diverse group of students with a mixture of learning
styles.
Additionally, I like the idea of the Counterbalance hypothesis. With the Signing Naturally
series, the focus is about meaning, not form. So why not throw in form occasionally which
would get their attention? Feedback to which students pay attention is the best kind of feedback,
so I propose using whatever it takes.
I have based my statements on my memory. I am fairly confident about accuracy because most
of the methods I have described were overt choices. Nevertheless, it would be interesting to
introduce students or former students to these ideas and ask them their perceptions. Their insights

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would potentially shed light not only on what methods I used, but also on the balance among
those methods.