Empowering EIL learning with a Web 2.0 resource: An initial finding from the cross campus Storybird feedback study

• Anonymous asynchronous non-reciprocal online feedback was investigated.
• Categories include evaluative, affective and cognitive effect response.
• Focus on content attests to the impact of the content creation feature of Web 2.0.
• The incidence of communicative responses confirms Web 2.0 social rapport function.

Although much has been researched about feedback on traditional paper or wordprocessed compositions, responded to offline, little has yet been done on compositions published and responded to in a web 2.0 environment. This study therefore investigates the anonymous asynchronous non-reciprocal feedback given by 139 peers online to 56 English compositions published on the Storybird website by Taiwanese English major university students of two proficiency levels. Feedback responses were downloaded and submitted to detailed qualitative analysis leading to a taxonomy of feedback types which also provided quantitative findings. Overall the feedback was unlike that often reported in traditional studies of feedback given to non-native speakers by peers or teachers. Instead of a corrective and language oriented focus we found more attention paid to content, with a strong element of genuinely communicative response approximating feedback as conversation, consistent with the social function of Web 2.0. There was also evidence of respondents adjusting their feedback to the proficiency of the writer, not just in giving more language oriented feedback to weaker writers but also in mitigating its impact by greater use of interpersonal cues and communicative responses.