چكيده
This study explored the effect of feedback provision through Ginger software vs. conventional teacher feedback on Iranian EFL learners' writing performance and retention in Goldis, a private language institute in Tabriz, Iran. To this end, among 300 intermediate learners, 47 male and female learners were selected after taking Oxford Placement Test in order to ensure the homogeneity of the students. The participants were randomly divided into experimental and control groups. In the research, a pretest as a writing proficiency test at the beginning, 8 writing tasks during the course, a post-test of writing after the treatment, and a delayed post-test two weeks after post-test were conducted to measure and compare the improvement in writing performance of the two groups. IELTS Writing 2: Band Descriptor was used as a criterion for evaluating the writings’ task achievement. The EG received feedback from the Ginger software for their writing and the CG from the teacher. A two-way repeated measures ANOVA was used to compare the two groups' performance over time. Ginger Software feedback improved writing in this research as post-test results were better for the EG. The immediate post-test performance was better than the delayed test. The results also showed that feedback types and time interact to affect writing performance. Both groups had similar pre-test scores but the EG outperformed the CG in the post-test and delayed post-test. Since Ginger software gave better feedback than traditional methods, the implications of research may have positive effects such as teachers’ reliance on introducing software programs and encouraging students to use applications like Ginger to improve their writing performance.
