Brief Outline "Gifted Students Reaction Towards Teachers' Feedback"

To begin, the title is GIFTED STUDENTS REACTION TOWARDS TEACHERS’ FEEDBACK ON ESL WRITING. This is a replication of a study done by Prof Icy Lee entitled Error Correction in the L2 Writing Classroom: What Do Students Think? I think it worth to mention that this study is not the sole study done by Lee on the topic. She has done numerous studies on the topic even when she was in Canada. Many of her respondents are Chinese speaker, even those studies done in Canada. So that is the starting point for my research – my respondents are Malaysians, mainly Malay speakers (I cannot assured it now that it is 100% Malay since MRSM do have non-Bumi).

Speaking of gifted students, I got the idea when I thought of what is available for me for the study. Surely enough, as I am teaching at an SBP, my students are readily accessible for me. I kept asking myself over and again, “what would make these kids different of those Lee’s population?”. As if there was a light shining so brightly above me, I found the answer – these kids are gifted.

Now, I am sure many of you think that SBP students are not all gifted. I thought the same too. Well, I still am. Because this is a scientific-adhered research, a definition is a must. Therefore I googled the term and came to a definition in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (taken from the US National Association for Gifted Children) which says:

                “Students, children, or youth who give evidence of high achievement capability in areas such as intellectual, creative, artistic, or leadership capacity, or in specific academic fields, and who need services and activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop those capabilities.”

Hence, from this definition, students of SBP and MRSM are deemed gifted, at least when we consider the fact that these children are selected based on their UPSR or PMR.

I remember when I was in MRSM not so long ago. OK, it has been over ten years now (I was in MRSM Tun Ghaffar Baba, Jasin in 2000 – 2001). The Principal, Mr Mohd Hussin Ibrahim (we called him MHI, like that morning talk show at TV3), would give speech about giftedness like in every assembly. Of course I didn’t understand it back then because I had a miserable life there (it was not easy to live in hostel crowded with smart students). All right…this paragraph serves no purpose for the study. End.

Among other things that are related to gifted students is the fact that they are highly perfectionist. So there is a gap there – how would these perfectionist utilise the feedback given by the teacher? Logically, they would make the best out of it. They would make sure they don’t do the same mistake again in the next task. So that is the hypotheses.

I remember when I was in MRSM, I actually went to see the teacher asking for that 1 more mark. The argument was simple – mine is just as good as my friend’s, why I get less mark? The argument was obviously fruitless. The teacher ignored me. If she actually discuss with me what is wrong with my essay, I think I would take it more positively. That is actually part of my readings (which I cannot remember which) in which the study looks into the effectiveness of post-essay feedback conference. Now being a teacher myself, I would not do the same to my students. I am always available for the students to discuss about their essay. But surely I have that one rule – if that 1 extra mark doesn’t change the grade, don’t bother to see me.

For the purpose of this study, the same survey questionnaire used in the original study will be used. I added a question to the questionnaire as I was curious myself of what do they students do when they get their essays back. The same question will be asked again during the focused-group interview. The reason why there is no open-ended question in the survey is that I have decided to do the interview. Well, even in Lee’s original study, no open-ended question is put in the questionnaire. The data collection will be done in two ways – survey and interview. Surely enough, the data collected from the interview will be used to support the data collected through the survey. The questionnaire has been translated into Malay and verified by my colleague who happens to be Guru Cemerlang Bahasa Melayu. I have done a pilot study to check the clarity of the questions and no problem was found.

Prior to this, I have actually administered the survey to two schools (as I mentioned in the previous entry). I wanted to get done and over with the thesis so I did it without consulting my supervisor. Well, obviously there are lotsa issues raised by her. And that was the trigger point of me to think harder and deeper into the study. Luckily for me now, even though I alter the study slightly, I can still use the responds given by the students.

I have to say that this master degree takes a lot more than what I expected. Time, energy, money, worries and headache and I have come to the point where I suffered migraine and insomnia. I wonder if I don’t do this, would my life becomes better. But one thing for sure, I’d be bored to dead as I don’t have much to do then J