Applying peer feedback in letter writing challenges and suggestions for improvement

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES
*******************

NGUYỄN HÀ NGỌC ÁNH

APPLYING PEER FEEDBACK IN LETTER WRITING: CHALLENGES AND
SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

(Áp dụng hình thức nhận xét bạn học trong luyện tập kỹ năng viết thư:
Những khó khăn và giải pháp đề xuất)

Field: English Teaching Methodology (applied program)
Code: 8140231.01

HANOI - 2018


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES
*******************

NGUYỄN HÀ NGỌC ÁNH

APPLYING PEER FEEDBACK IN LETTER WRITING: CHALLENGES AND
SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

(Áp dụng hình thức nhận xét bạn học trong luyện tập kỹ năng viết thư:
Những khó khăn và giải pháp đề xuất)

Field: English Teaching Methodology (applied program)
Code: 8140231.01
Supervisor: Dr. Pham Lan Anh

HANOI, 2018


DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY
I am aware of and understand the University's policy on plagiarism and I declare
that this thesis is my own work in the fulfillment of the requirement for the Degree of
Master at Faculty of Postgraduate Studies, University of Languages and International
Studies, Vietnam National University, except for quotations, and citations which have
been acknowledged.

NGUYỄN HÀ NGỌC ÁNH

i


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This thesis would not be carried out and possible without the massive support
and on-time encouragements of my professors, colleagues, students, and my family.
First of all, I would be grateful to my supervisor – Dr. Pham Lan Anh who is a
dedicated and inspired professor for making my study possible.
I would like to deeply thank Dr. Huynh Anh Tuan, support staffs and librarians
at the Faculty of Postgraduate Studies who are kind and helpful.
I wish to express my sincere gratitude to my colleagues who helped me to find
the necessary materials and gave me constructive comments.
I would like to show my appreciation for our students involved in my study for

their enthusiasm and patience.
Finally, from bottom of my heart, I thank my parents, my beloved sister and my
friends for their love and encouragements.

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LIST OF FIGURES/ TABLES
Figure 1: Students’ perceptions on peer feedback in general
Table 1: Students’ perceptions on the benefits of peer feedback
Table 2: Students’ perceptions on the disadvantages of peer written feedback
Table 3: Difficulties that students encounter when they do peer written feedback
Table 4: Students’ follow – up activities after receiving peer feedback
Table 5: Students’ expectations of using peer feedback in the future
Table 6: Students’ opinions about solutions to overcome difficulties in giving peer
feedback

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ABSTRACT
Although writing is an important component of language, it is not easy for
learners to achieve the high level of writing and review other's work. Therefore, a
number of studies were done for peer feedback in writing. Nonetheless, this thesis is
concerned with student's difficulties in giving peer feedback in writing letters of
application because it is regarded as the initial step to show their talent and experience
as well as to leave the first impression on recruiters. This thesis was conducted in an
English center in Hanoi with 50 pre-intermediate university students. The data of the
research were collected by means of questionnaires, and interviews. The results
revealed the attitude of students toward peer feedback as well as some difficulties they

had when they gave peer feedback in letter writing. Some solutions to the problem
were also suggested in the study with the hope that students could overcome those
problems.
Keywords: peer feedback; letter writing; letter of application.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY ......................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............................................................................................. ii
LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................iii
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... iv
PART 1: INTRODUCTION.......................................................................................... 1
1. The rationale ................................................................................................................ 1
2. Research objectives and aims....................................................................................... 2
3. Research questions ....................................................................................................... 3
4. The scope of the study.................................................................................................. 3
5. The significance of the study ....................................................................................... 3
6. Methodology ................................................................................................................ 4
7. Organization of the thesis............................................................................................. 4
PART 2: DEVELOPMENT .......................................................................................... 5
CHAPTER 1: The Literature Review .......................................................................... 5
I. Theoretical framework............................................................................................... 5
1.Teaching writing skills ................................................................................................ 5
2. Teaching letter writing skills and letter of application ............................................... 7
3. Feedback and feedback in writing ............................................................................... 7
4. Peer feedback in writing ........................................................................................... 10
4.1. The importance of peer feedback in writing ...................................................... 10
4.2.Types of feedback in writing ............................................................................... 10

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4.2.1. Verbal feedback ......................................................................................... 10
4.2.2. Written feedback.......................................................................................... 11
5. Potential difficulties in giving peer written feedback ............................................... 12
II. Review of previous studies ..................................................................................... 13
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY .............................................................................. 15
1. Research setting ................................................................................................. 15
2. Participants ......................................................................................................... 15
3. Data collection instrument ................................................................................ 16
3.1. Questionnaire ............................................................................................... 16
3.2. Interview ....................................................................................................... 16
4. Data collection procedure .................................................................................... 17
5. Data analysis procedure ....................................................................................... 18
CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ........................................................ 20
1. Findings .............................................................................................................. 20
1.1. Results from questionnaire............................................................................ 20
1.1.1. Students’ perceptions on peer feedback .................................................. 20
1.1.1.1.Students’ perceptions on feedback in general ................................... 20
1.1.1.2. Students’ perceptions on the benefits of peer feedback ................... 21
1.1.1.3. Students’ perceptions on the disadvantages of peer feedback .......... 22
1.1.2. Students’ difficulties that they encountered when giving peer written
feedback .......................................................................................................................... 23
1.1.3 Students’ follow – up activities after receiving peer feedback ................ 27
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1.1.4. Students’ expectations of using peer feedback in the future .................. 28
1.1.5. Students’ opinions about solutions to overcome difficulties in giving peer

feedback ......................................................................................................................... 28
1.2. Results from interview ................................................................................ 30
2. Discussion ......................................................................................................... 34
2.1. The reasons for these difficulties of giving peer feedback in writing were
recognized ...................................................................................................................... 37
2.2. Recommendations for improving peer feedback as well as writing skills .. 39
PART 3: CONCLUSION .......................................................................................... 42
1. Recapitulations of main findings ...................................................................... 42
2. The implication for teaching ............................................................................. 43
3. Limitations of the study .................................................................................... 43
4. Suggestions for further studies .......................................................................... 44
REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. 45
APPENDICES ............................................................................................................... I
APPENDIX I: SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE ............................................................ I
APPENDIX II: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR STUDENTS .............................. V
APPENDIX III: THE RESULT OF INTERVIEW ................................................. VI
APPENDIX IV: SAMPLE OF STUDENT’S INTERVIEW ................................ VIII

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PART 1: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
English seems to have been adopted as the language of globalization these days
as the language of global culture and the international economy (Graddol, D. 1997).
Therefore, fluency in the four English macro skills seems to be one of the important
factors in order to meet those requirements and to master the language. More
specifically, two productive skills (speaking and writing) will be the main factors to
decide the ability to use language and writing skills are regarded as the most difficult
ones. Numan (1989) argues that writing is an extremely difficult cognitive activity

which requires the learner to have control over various factors. Moreover, the writing is
viewed in terms of isolated units such as orthography, sentence structure, and discourse
level structure (Matsuda, 2006). It comprises numerous skills and all types of
knowledge from critical thinking, comprehension, problem – solving, reflection to
revision. In other words, writing is a way to help people express their own thought,
define themselves and the world, and clarify their ideas and knowledge as well as
reinforce their grammar structure and vocabulary.
Although strong writing skills may enhance students' chances for success
(Alexander, 2008), the majority of Vietnamese students lack proficiency in language to
become successful upon graduation. Despite the fact that they spend years studying
English, from primary to tertiary level, they are not capable of being fluent in English.
As a consequence, fresh graduate students cannot create good impressions for
recruiters because of their English proficiency. More specifically, they may fail from
the profile selection round and a letter of application is always considered the first.
It can be said that letter writing skills play an essential role in contributing to
students' initial success in the society of modernization and industrialization. However,
writing a letter does not seem an easy task for most students. A lack of letter writing
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skills is caused by various factors. Several researchers inform that the absence of
feedback is also a reason for the problems of poor writing skills.
There are several kinds of feedback such as teacher's feedback, peer feedback
which seem to be effective tools for students to improve their skills. Most teachers use
teacher feedback as the single mode in their class because it saves time. Nonetheless,
Liu et al., 2001 shows that peer interaction is crucial to the improvement of students'
learning because it allows students to construct knowledge through social sharing and
interaction. Most students may feel confused and have difficulties in giving feedback to
others because letter writing is practical which requires the use of authentic language.
Because of the importance of letter writing in students’ future career and the enormous

benefits of peer feedback for improving writing skills, I decided to carry out the study
entitled "Applying peer feedback in letter writing: challenges and suggestions for
improvement".
2. Aim and objectives
Aim:
The aim of this research is to figure out the difficulties or challenges that
students often have when they do peer written feedback in letter writing in order to find
possible solutions for the identified problems.
Objectives:
This aim of the research is reflected through the following objectives. Firstly, it
explores the attitude and perception of students toward peer written feedback.
Secondly, it identifies the difficulties they encounter when they do peer written
feedback in letter writing. After analysis, some reasons causing poor writing might be
discovered; then several potential solutions have been proposed to help them improve
their writing letter skills.

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3. Research questions
1. What are the perceptions of students on peer feedback?
2. What are the difficulties students often encounter when they give peer written
feedback?
3. What are possible solutions to help students overcome these problems?
4. The scope of the study
Due to the time constraint, the length of the thesis and the researcher's
knowledge, this study only focuses on students' difficulties in letter writing. However,
to meet the demand for student's future job, this study focuses much on formal letter
writing, especially letter of application. In addition, it is necessary for students to do
peer written feedback in writing lessons in class so that the teacher can effectively take

control and students can make progress in writing skills and become more critical
writers. To improve students' writing skills, a number of activities and strategies can be
proposed, however, the study mainly focuses on the challenges that students face with
when they do peer written feedback in order to provide some suggestions for
improvement.
5. Significance of the study
The study provides a deeper and critical understanding of students' difficulties
when they do peer written feedback. Although the study was carried out in an English
center in Hanoi, it is believed to be helpful for university students in Hanoi in general.
The results of the study will motivate other researchers to investigate other aspects
related to writing skills. Furthermore, the researcher hopes that students will have more
interests and motivation in letter writing to acquire proficiency in this skill.

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6. Methodology
The study adopts a qualitative approach for data collection and data analysis. In
order to obtain adequate information for the study, the survey questionnaire and
interviews were applied. The questionnaire was designed to deliver to 50 university
students learning at an English center in Hanoi. And then, 15 students randomly
selected were interviewed. The purpose of the two methods is to explore the
perceptions of students toward peer feedback and identify the difficulties the students
encounter when they do peer written feedback in letter writing as well as their solutions
to overcome these problems.
7. Organization of the thesis
The thesis is divided into three main parts: Introduction, Development, and
Conclusion.
The first part is Introduction. It gives an overview of the study, specifying
reasons for choosing the topic, the aim, objectives, and research questions as well as

the methods of the study. It also provides the significance and scope of the study.
The second part is – Development. It consists of three chapters.
Chapter 1 is Literature review and theoretical framework.
Chapter 2 is Methodology. It describes in detail the research methodology which
comprises the information of the participants, instrumentation, data collection and data
analysis procedure.
Chapter 3 is Results and Discussion. This chapter shows the analysis and discussion of
the findings.
The last part is the Conclusion. It summaries the main findings of the study. At
the same time, it indicates implications for teaching, the limitations and suggestions for
further studies.

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PART 2: DEVELOPMENT
This part is the core of the study which is divided into 3 chapters: Literature
Review, Methodology, and Findings.
Chapter 1: Literature review
This chapter is to provide a theoretical framework for the study as well as to
review the related previous studies concerning writing in general and letter writing in
particular.
I. Theoretical framework
1. Teaching writing skills
Writing skills play an essential role in modern life because of their purposes of
communication and business. Walsh (2010) demonstrates that the importance of
writing cannot be denied due to its extensive use in higher education and the
workplace. Furthermore, writing is the best supportive tool to assist people to develop
their ability using language and academic skills as well as communication skills. It
requires writers to gain enough knowledge of writing (topic and skills) and other skills

(analyzing, synthesizing and evaluating) so as to achieve the goals. Indeed, writing
encourages students to engage with the text to deepen their understanding of the
content and link them to prior learning experiences. Therefore, according to Tribble
(1996) & Brown (2001)," Written products are often the result of thinking". As a result,
they developed theories of two main approaches to teaching witting – process and
product approach. However, they vary in the sense of principles and techniques on the
one hand, and they demonstrate merits and drawbacks on the other.

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Product approach
Product approach is considered a traditional approach in which students imitate
a model text and are expected to follow the guided steps to construct a new piece of
writing. The aim of this approach is aiding students to become aware of grammar,
meaningful punctuality, use layout correctly and develop a range of vocabulary. As
Pincas (1982) claims, "writing is primarily about linguistic knowledge, looking at the
appropriate use of vocabulary, syntax and cohesive devices". Picas also shows four
stages of product approach before students produce the end-product for evaluation,
namely Familiarization (students have to study the model text and highlight features of
genre), Controlled writing (students are allowed to do controlled exercises to revise
grammatical features and related vocabulary), Guided writing and Free writing
(Students choose from the choice of comparable writing tasks and apply what they
have been taught to produce the product). Although learners can improve their
accuracy of language through this approach, it is obvious that creativity is decreased
because the model texts inspire students to use the same structure in different settings
and apply the same format.
Process approach
The Process approach mainly focuses on students' ideas for writing rather than
their product (Tompkins, 1990). Furthermore, the strength of this process is developing

students' ability to generate and present their own ideas to their target audiences. It can
be a way for teachers to discover the student's new ideas, languages and expressions as
Zamal (1982) claims that the act of writing is mainly "a process of discovery". In spite
of its strength, there still have been some limitations. Hyland (2003) points out three
weaknesses of process approach from a social perspective. Firstly, this approach
focuses on personal thinking which is regarded as a decontextualized skill but less pays
attention to grammar and the final product. Secondly, students may find it hard to give
feedback if they are not familiar with revision. Thirdly, it could be time – consuming
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because students are not provided structures of the target text types and have to rewrite
several times based on teacher's comments. As a consequence, teachers need to spend
time grading students' writing.
2. Teaching letter writing skills and letter of application
A letter serves several purposes for both personal and professional
communication. The right letter can make all the differences from getting the right job
to closing the sale, from obtaining a scholarship to offering thanks gracefully. All in
all, it is a means of communication among people, therefore, it has its own principles in
addition to the general writing principles: the arrangement of the address; the date and
its position; the greetings; the body of the letter and its purpose; the closing paragraph
and the writers' expectation from the addressee; the complimentary phrase and the
signature. Therefore, Fawcett (2005) presents 7 strategies for better writing. Firstly,
keep it short and to the point. Secondly, make it clear, concise, and logical. Thirdly,
focus on the recipient’s needs. Fourthly, use simple and appropriate language. Fifthly,
use short sentences and paragraphs. Sixthly, review and revise it. Lastly, double check
grammar and spelling.
These rules above are general ones for all forms of letters; however, the letter of
the application shows its own features. A letter of application is comprised of two
parts: a Resume (sometimes called a vita, data sheet, or personal record) and a covering

letter. The covering letter is to interest the reader in the total application. The resume is
to present work-related information that an employer wants to know. No matter what
students write, it is necessary for them to keep those things in minds to make an
impressive letter of application because it will be the first impression for recruiters to
decide on their qualification.

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3. Feedback and feedback in writing
Feedback is regarded as a formative assessment for students to know their
position in learning. Teachers, as well as learners, will have recognition of students'
strengths and weaknesses in learning and guidelines for improvement. It can be said
that good feedback can support students have better achievement in their learning and
establish specific learning objectives in the future. In brief, a good and appropriate
feedback can act as both an assessment for learning as well as an assessment of
learning (Lee, 2007). According to Ur (1996), and Littlewood (1981) feedback is
defined as a means of information exchange to their performance. Teachers and other
learners who concern others’ success in learning will pass their comments about
progress and show their errors for the purpose of guiding them to areas for betterment.
The role of feedback in writing cannot be denied, so it is considered central to
the development of writing skills. The objective of corrective feedback is to help the
learners identify problems with their products and they can use the correct form after
feedback. It should have an impact on students' attitude toward writing and their
motivation for learning in the future (Grabe & Kaplan, 1996).
Because of the significance of feedback in student’s writing, there are three
major areas of feedback which are synthesized after a review of literature.
Teacher’s feedback
Many teachers see their FB as an effective way of helping their students to excel
in their learning. Indeed, thanks to those feedbacks, students have more support during

the critical period of application of their recently acquired knowledge. Meysam's report
from analysis of other researchers revealed that the effect of teacher – editing is
stronger in the reduction of errors in the students' revised draft. When providing
feedback, different teachers may have different purposes when examining a student's
work. At this point, teachers should use feedback to try to reduce the gap between the

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student's understanding and actual performance and raise their expectations of theirs
(Carvalho, Santos, Conboy &Martins, 2014).
Self – assessment
Self – assessment is defined as “the involvement of learners in making
judgments about their achievements and the outcome of their learning” (Boud and
Falchikov, 1989 as cited in Wride, 2017). It is no doubt that self – assessment focuses
on student’s learning autonomy or the student’s monitoring of their learning processes.
Indeed, it enhances learners' confidence to accept the errors and boost them to invest
effort into seeking and dealing with feedback information. It can be said that self –
assessment brings a number of benefits for learners when they apply it to develop
learning. It promotes better thoughtfulness and an understanding of the content on the
task given. As a consequence, it can enhance lifelong learning for personal or
intellectual development or social competencies. Despite those benefits, it has several
limitations that students need to be aware of. It can be an obstacle for students who
lack the necessary skills and confidence to assess themselves. Furthermore, it can be
time-consuming if students are not self – conscious enough and do not accomplish it
seriously.
Peer feedback
The renovation of the education system in modern society leads to the shift of
the teacher-centered model from learner-centered in language teaching; hence the
practice of peer feedback has become considerably more frequent in language

classrooms. Peer feedback is also referred to peer review, peer correction or peer
editing which is defined as a process by which students assess the quality of and
comment on other students’ work and provide feedback (Berget al., 2006 as cited in
Alnasser, 2013). Therefore peer feedback allows learners to construct knowledge and
make progress effectively and efficiently. They can identify their strengths and
weaknesses and know how to improve themselves. Rollinson (2005) states that
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students prefer peer feedback to teacher’s feedback due to experiencing less anxiety
when they get corrected by own friends. The classroom atmosphere gets friendlier and
more supportive because students are free to exchange correction with each other
without using professional and formal language. Cole & Chan (1994) supports that
feedback may not only show the learner's effort and performance but also increase
encouragement and create an active classroom atmosphere.
4. Peer feedback in writing
4.1 The importance of peer feedback in writing
It is obvious that using peer feedback offers several advantages for learners as
well as teachers. Firstly, it enhances students learning autonomy, cooperation,
interaction, and critical thinking. Paulus (1999) as cited in Min (2006) indicates that
peer editing in writing can do more than teacher's feedback because it can generate
more comments on the content, organization, and vocabulary meanwhile teacher have
enough time to give comments on grammatical features. Secondly, the practice of peer
review seems to be a useful instrument for learners to perceive their errors and develop
different language skills. In other words, students are more careful with the details of a
piece of writing of either their own work or others. In addition, they will learn how to
formulate and respond to feedback so as to strengthen their writing.
4.2. Types of peer feedback in writing
Applying peer feedback in writing has become a dominant technique in recent
years, especially when the communicative language teaching approach and learnercentered model are taken priority, and peer review plays a more important role in

learning strategies. Therefore, scholars developed different types of peer feedback. In
this research, I mentioned two common types that I recognized that they are suitable

10


for most of the classroom teachings as Keh (1990) and Mangeldorf (1992) indicated in
their studies.
4.2.1. Verbal feedback
Verbal feedback can also be beneficial and it could be one of the quickest and
easiest forms of feedback. All wonders can be cleared up or clarified by asking and
answering. It means that a number of direct elicitations are exploded by asking students
to formulate the utterance and pausing to allow students to complete other’s utterance.
It can be direct to the students who are targeted such as individuals or groups and also
indirect to learners who will listen and reflect on what has been said (Sultana, 2015).
As a result, verbal comments assist students to find out what they have already known,
identified gaps in knowledge and their learning goals. In spite of these advantages, the
oral comments give some certain drawbacks. Firstly, it is time – consuming because it
takes a long period of time for students and their peer(s) to exchange with each other.
Secondly, they may misunderstand their friend's ideas when they listen or do not catch
up with their speech to take note; as a consequence, they are not able to revise their
writing correctly.
4.2.2. Written feedback
Written feedback, even in its simplest form could be beneficial to all students,
including the English Language Learners in the classroom. A written form is a record
of students' strengths and weaknesses and several suggestions for their improvement.
Generally, in most situations, students lack ideas for writing down in their peer's
writing, they often leave a brief compliment like “good, very good, perfect or bad”. It
seems to discourage students because they do not know what needs to be developed or
improved. Alternatively, a productive comment should point out their advantages and

disadvantages in their writing. At this point, Shepherd (2005) and Black et al. (2004)
indicate that students achieve their learning goals better when commenting focuses on
11


the specifics of the learning tasks and the student’s learning issues. According to the
study by Cheah & Tee (2016) and Danielle MacDonald of the Learning & Teaching
Office’s Professional Development in Teaching Program, an effective written feedback
consists of these following criteria. Firstly, written feedback should be specific and
clear. Secondly, this feedback should be descriptive and explains clearly what aspects
could be improved and provides specific suggestions for these areas to be strengthened.
Last but not least, positive feedback is preferred in several aspects.
Written feedback also includes a checklist which made it easier for students who
are both writers and editors to revise their writing and understand what needed to be
corrected. Compared with written feedback, the checklist is much simpler because it is
a list of all the things to be checked. However, a fixed checklist should not be applied
for all types of writing; it is necessary to grasp attention on the critical features of the
particular task; hence teachers can design a variety of checklist to meet specific needs.
Summary:
Two types of peer feedback have their own advantages and disadvantages when
they are adopted. However, realizing several limitations of applying oral comments in
my classes, I prefer written peer feedback because of class size, time constraint, and
easy control.
5. Potential difficulties in giving peer written feedback in letter writing
Effective writing requires a number of things: a high degree of organization in
the development of ideas and information; a high degree of accuracy so that there is no
ambiguity of meaning; the use of complex grammatical devices for focus and
emphasis; and a careful choice of vocabulary, grammatical patterns, and sentence
structures" (Hedge 1988). According to grading criteria of British Council for General
IELTS Writing Task 1 (Letter writing), there are 4 main criteria: Task achievement;

Cohesion and coherence; Lexical resource; and Grammar range & Accuracy.
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Task achievement
Students need to cover all the requirements of the task and present a clear
purpose. Moreover, they need to present, highlight and illustrate key features/ bullet
points clearly and appropriately. (It refers to form and content).
Cohesion and coherence
Students logically organize information and ideas. They use a range of linking
devices effectively. (It refers to organization and conjunction).
Lexical resource
Students are able to use a wide/sufficient range of vocabulary flexibly to convey
precise meanings. Furthermore, their collocation and word choice are accuracy. They
produce rare errors in spelling and/or word formation.
Grammar range and Accuracy
Students apply a wide range of structures with flexibility and accuracy. They
have good control of grammar and punctuation with the majority of error – free
sentences.
II. Review of previous studies
This part is the review of some typical researches which has some common
ideas about peer feedback. It consists of both foreign and Vietnamese studies. After
these reviews, it is hoped that new and different subject of peer feedback will be
discovered to carry out a new research or project.
A study by Lin & Chen (2009) investigated the Effectiveness of Peer Feedback
at the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature, a National University in
Taiwan, Republic of China. The study was carried out within 8 weeks of writing
training and peer feedback activities with 7 volunteers. After 8 weeks of training and
analyzing survey questions, two researchers concluded that most language learners had
a positive attitude toward the pedagogy of peer feedback. They also agreed that social

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interaction through writing and peer feedback provided them with more inspiration and
motivation in writing. Additionally, they believed that with the benefits of linguistic
improvements in English writing subject from peer’s cooperative activities of
brainstorming, it should be applied in English class more frequently.
Another research by Kurt and Atay (2007) explored the effect of peer feedback
on writing anxiety. It is used in the Second Language Writing Anxiety Inventory
(SLWAI) and T-test as instruments to analyze data. Results of the study have shown
that the peer feedback group experienced significantly less anxiety than the teacher
feedback group. Similar to the above study, this research also revealed that peer
feedback enhances the participants' attitudes towards writing and has an impact on
increasing motivation through personal responsibility, and interest.
A Vietnamese study by Pham Thi Hong (2016) investigated the practice peer
written feedback in paragraph writing skills among the third-year students. It seems to
be a deep study of this field because the researcher gave full aspects of peer feedback
and issues of student's practice peer written feedback. The questionnaire is always a
popular instrument which is used in research. Besides, she analyzed students' writing to
find out the areas that her students gave feedback to, and their tendency to provide
suggestions and general comments. The results indicated that grammar and vocabulary
were two areas in which students focused much on, and they did not how to give useful
comment to help their peers to improve their writing. In addition, students had troubles
in indicating the mistakes and in providing suggestions. No matter what difficulties are,
the study's findings prove that the peer written feedback can help students improve
their writing skills to some extent.
In conclusion, all the research mentioned above revealed several related fields
about peer feedback in writing. However, there are few studies that explored the
difficulties of students when they give peer feedback. Additionally, paragraph writing
is preferred and taken priority; for that reason, my study created a difference that digs

14


into the difficulties of students when they give peer feedback in writing a letter of
application. Hopefully, this study will be important for learners and their peer to make
progress in letter writing.
Summary:
In this part, previous related studies and the theoretical framework for the study
are presented. They were the basis for the researcher to design the questionnaire and
the interview questions with which the investigation of the students’ difficulties in
applying peer feedback was carried out.

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CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY
In the previous chapter, the literature related to the topic has been reviewed as
a theoretical basis for the study. This chapter provides the general description of how
the study had been conducted. In this chapter, five main categories are addressed
which are research setting, participants, data collection instruments, research
procedure, and data analysis procedure.
1. Research setting
The study was conducted at an English center located in Hanoi. It is specialized
in teaching English communication skills and TOEIC preparation for a certificate.
Students who attend the course vary from elementary, pre-intermediate to intermediate
level. However, students are requested to do a placement test in order to assess the
approximate level of a student's knowledge of English grammar and usage before
starting the course. There are 15 to 25 students in each class. Both TOEIC and English
communication courses centralize on the four language skills (listening, speaking,
reading and writing). Depending on the requirements of each course, teachers have

their own teaching method and techniques. Each class meets three times per week and
each lesson lasts 90 minutes.
2. Participants
The participants selected for the research were 50 students of all three English
communication classes, aged from 18 to 21 with the level of English being preintermediate. Most of them are university or college students and some of them are
high school graduate students. Almost all the respondents paid much attention to
English grammar and reading rather than to writing skill due to the fact that the
entrance exam to university merely requires students’ knowledge of grammar and
reading. As such, in spite of being good at grammar, they could not deliver an
understandable writing product to the readers.
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