Feedback plays an important role in acquiring a highly complex skill such as writing. Currently, feedback aiming to improve the writing process is scarce. In practice, teachers usually give feedback on the writing product. However, given that it is the writing process that generates the product, feedback on the writing process is valuable and should be taken into account as well.
We conducted an intervention study to explore the effects of two types of process-oriented feedback. A total of 67 Dutch students (grade 10) were randomly assigned to one of the feedback conditions. Each student wrote three synthesis texts (texts in which information from different sources is integrated) at three measurement occasions and received individual feedback at measurement occasion 2 and 3, prior to writing a new text. Participants received a customised process report generated with keystroke logging tool Inputlog, providing them with numerical and visual information on several aspects of their personal writing process. The process report was embedded into a feedback flow in which students were encouraged to reflect on their writing. In the position-setting feedback condition, students compared their writing process to that of students with a similar text quality score. The students in the feed-forward feedback condition, compared their writing process to better scoring students. These exemplary writing processes were selected from a national baseline study with more than 700 Dutch students. In our presentation we will focus on the development and implementation of the different feedback types. Moreover, we will present results on the effectiveness of the feedback: in the feed-forward condition the intervention was effective. When comparing the students’ progress to a national baseline study (serving as control group), we can conclude that in one week they made a progress comparable to one year of regular schooling.