There is growing interest in the role of written corrective feedback (CF).
Although many studies have investigated the effect of written CF on the
development of L2 accuracy, there is still little classroom-based research. Most of
studies investigated the effectiveness of focused written CF in laboratory settings,
limiting the application of the findings to real classrooms. Thus, the present study
investigated whether or not unfocused written CF was useful with respect to L2
accuracy development in four composition classes in a university. More
specifically, the study examined written CF practiced in intact classrooms. It
focused on the relationships between the effects of CF and types of errors (i.e.,
verb, noun, article, lexicon, and sentence) and types of error correction (i.e., direct
vs. indirect CF). The data were collected from forty university learners enrolled in
four composition classes taught by two native English speaking teachers. The
research found that learner errors decreased in the use of verb, article, and
sentence; but not in noun and lexicon. The reduction, however, was only observed
in the classroom where direct CF was provided. In this paper, the findings are
discussed with respect to the complexity of grammar rules and the degree of
explicitness of instruction. The results of the research added another piece of
evidence to the claim that all grammar rules are not learned in the same way;
thus, learner errors need to be treated differently according to the nature of the
targeted rules. Feedback providers need to carefully consider the relationship
among the complexity of the rules, the explicitness of feedback, and given
instruction time.