In this section, I examine the limitations of this study firstly considering the general limitations and then considering specific limitations.
7.3.1. General Limitations of the Study
Researchers should be honest in reporting all the issues of their researches including any limitations (Cohen et al, 2007:116). Similar to numerous others, this study is not one hundred percent perfect, and it has got some limitations which will be demonstrated hereunder. One obvious possible shortcoming was the researcher’s own prior positive attitude to f2f feedback. Although every effort was made to appear impartial during the interviews, the fact that the interview was about a (for the students) ‘new’ method of feedback must have suggested to them that their interviewer held this
positive attitude. It is therefore likely that their responses converged towards this presumed attitude. Nevertheless, in view of the inevitability of this kind of co-construction of meaning in any kind of interaction, this ‘bias’ can be seen as an advantage, and even itself an additional indication of the benefits of feedback given face-to-face.
Even though the teachers and students who participated in this study volunteered to do that; there were some deficiencies. For example, the students participants were females and no male students participate in the interview which could be a shortcoming because these students may have different views and attitudes towards face-to-face feedback that are different from the female. In addition to these limits on generalisability, there are practical limitations in conducting this kind of research. For illustration, the interview was really time consuming and tiring because I had to wait some times for a long time to meet the students. Also, the interview was cancelled many times because students had either exams or forgot about it and sometimes they had an extra lecture which made students fail to meet me on the specified date. The interview was done with participants from the treatment group only whereas there were none from the control group that was interviewed which is another limitation for the study, therefore we do not really know how the control group felt about written feedback, and they might have had some interesting opinion about both face-to-face and written feedback.
In addition, the researcher lent a hand to the teacher who was observed with corrections, and monitoring of exams and regarding the observation as mentioned earlier, it was only done for the group who got the face-to-face feedback (treatment group); therefore my presence might have inadvertently affected the attitude and behaviour of the teacher. In addition, the study depended more on the treatment group as the main tool to collect information from the participants while it would be much better to interview and observe the control group to ensure better understanding of this group views.
The study’s main interest was to find out the effectiveness of face-to-face feedback compared with written feedback, therefore further studies are recommended to investigate the effect of other kinds of feedback in Libyan students writing. In addition, another limitation is that, it was applied for only a short period of time and as such, time constraint was one of the issues affecting the study. It might be valuable to conduct a longitudinal study, which is a study that involves repeated observations of the same variables over long periods of time.
A different kind of limitation now has to be considered. This matter concerns how the quality of writing was assessed. As Li (1996) argues on the basis of cross- cultural study of teachers’ reaction to students writing, the criteria for ‘’ good writing’’ are a cross cultural variable , therefore the teachers’ criteria ‘’are shaped, transformed, and determined to a large extent by the historical, cultural forces that are beyond an individual’s control’. The result of the pre and posttests are derived from the marks awarded by Libyan teachers. Although, efforts were made to avoid subjectivity (see
marking guide in appendix 8) it is probably inevitable that some degree of culture specific orientation was applied. The results obtained in this study, therefore, while reliable for the Libyan context, may not necessarily be so elsewhere in the world. (An additional limitation on the wider applicability of the findings here concerns face-to-face feedback itself, which is considered in 7.4.1 below; what is at issue here is simply the reliability of the quantitative findings.)
This cross-cultural variability, however, is not the same thing as variation in quality. Canagarajah (2002a) argues that students’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds should not be viewed as making them more or less capable than others of critical thought or analysis, or of preventing them from becoming successful writers in English. He point out elsewhere (Canagarajah 2002b, p.101) that “everyone has agency to rise above their culture and social conditions to attain critical insights into their human condition”.
7.3.2. Limitation in Libyan Universities
This study is derived from Libyan participants. The results, therefore, can be generalized to all Libyan students but may not be generalizable to other ESL students in other countries.
In addition, there are various shortcomings in Libyan universities that have an effect on both of teaching and learning writing. Examples of these issues are; time, administration and the number of students in each class.
7.3.2.1. Time
Time is one of the biggest issues that both teachers and learners face; this is because students cannot get what they need in writing with the time given, in order to improve their writing skills.
Teachers do not have an adequate amount of time to provide face to face feedback for students individually. As the lesson is either short or the number of students make it impractical to provide face to face feedback for each student.
Tutors are not able to meet their students even after lectures to discuss their work, provide them with extra help or give face to face feedback, as the universities lack of facilities such as offices for teachers to see the students and to give them extra time.
7.3.2.2. Class
There is a big number of students in each class, which makes it unsuitable for learning especially now that the students are learning another language, which requires a lot of effort and attention from both the student and the lecturer. This large number has a negative effect on their motivation whilst learning. In other words, lack of motivation among most of students is obvious based on the work level. Also, the classes contain students with mixed abilities and different levels which is another issue because it is a dilemma that affects both students and their teachers. This effects students as
the weak students feel shy to participate or ask questions and it affects the stronger students as they will feel like they are being pulled behind by the weaker students. As for the teachers it is an issue because they work with different levels and it can be difficult to meet their needs in teaching writing skills, also due to the large number it is very difficult to give direct (face to face) feedback to the students.
7.3.2.3. Administration
English departments in Libyan universities are required to have a firm plan towards improving their students’ knowledge. Teachers should work together to smooth the progress of learning for their students. In other words, teachers have to discuss what they teach to be more aware of what their students need and how to evaluate them.
To illustrate this; as mentioned in this study students’ lack of vocabulary, and sentence structure problems are some of the many problems that students face in their writing. If teachers of writing discuss with the teachers of reading and teachers of grammar what they cover in their class, teachers of writing can help their students in an easier way. For example, when the students learn about X topic, it is supposed that they get some vocabulary about the topic; so when the writing teacher asks them to write a topic where the students can use X information it would be easier for the teacher to evaluate students and to provide sufficient feedback.
Therefore, the mentioned areas need to be addressed by following:
1- In service training is required as a professional development activity to develop their skills.
2- Learning and teaching ESL especially at university needs to be enriched with providing more time to students in order to make teachers aware of the students’ issues and meet their needs, as a result, they could help them improve through different activities and techniques rather than through using lectures only.
3- Examinations need to be done before enrolling the university in order to place students in the right level as group and therefore, working with different levels can be easier for the both teachers and learners.
4- Department of English curriculum and organisation have to be re-thought completely in order to overcome the problems that students face