Formative computer-based feedback in the university classroom: Specific concept maps scaffold students' writing

Formative feedback can be regarded as a crucial scaffold for students' writing cohesive texts. However, especially in large lectures students rarely receive feedback on their writing product. Thus, computer based feedback could be an alternative to provide formative feedback to students. However, it is less clear, how computer-based feedback should be designed to help students writing cohesive texts. For that purpose, we implemented three different computer-based feedback methods within an authentic large lecture class. We investigated effects of the format (outline versus concept map) and the specificity (specific versus general) of the feedback on students' perceived difficulty and the generation of cohesive texts. We found that specific concept map feedback was perceived as less difficult as compared to the general feedback or the specific outline feedback. Additionally, students who received specific feedback wrote explanatory texts that were more cohesive as compared to students with the general feedback. However, the format of the feedback (concept map versus outline) did not account for improvements of cohesion. Evidently, specific concept map feedback can be regarded as an efficient scaffold to provide cohesive explanations. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.