From frustration to fascination: Discourse analysis as writing feedback for multilingual learners

Abstract

Language difference is often framed through a deficit lens, especially for multilingual student writers. Compounding this issue, teacher candidates (TCs) rarely receive sustained guidance on how to give effective writing feedback. As a result, many TCs perceive the primary purpose of writing feedback to be surface-level error correction. To address this challenge, our study explored how TCs (n = 42) across two universities engaged with a writing feedback approach grounded in discourse analysis principles. We examined participants’ feedback on writing authored by adolescent multilingual learners before and after exploring discourse analysis as a feedback method. Findings suggested a shift from a corrective to an observational focus, linguistic curiosity rather than evaluation, and ascribing intentionality to students’ language choices. These findings demonstrate the potential of discourse analysis as a tool in writing feedback to frame language difference as an asset, toward disrupting deficit-oriented views of linguistic diversity in multilingual writing and classrooms.