Exploring Gifted EFL Students’ Perceptions of Written Corrective Feedback in a Creative Writing Course

This qualitative case study explores gifted English as a foreign language (EFL) students’ perceptions of different types of written corrective feedback (WCF) provided on their creative writing tasks at a Science and Art Center in Türkiye. The participants were four gifted seventh-grade students enrolled in the Special Talent Development Program. Over a ten-week period organised into five two-week cycles, all participants experienced five different types of WCF on their creative writing drafts: direct corrective feedback, indirect coded corrective feedback, metalinguistic corrective feedback, reformulation, and focused indirect corrective feedback. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, weekly student reflective journals, and the researcher’s journal. The data were analysed using a six-phase thematic analysis framework. The findings revealed that students’ perceptions varied systematically according to the explicitness and cognitive demands of each feedback type. A developmental trajectory was observed across the five cycles, characterised by a shift from dependence on explicit teacher correction towards greater learner autonomy, increased metacognitive awareness, and a preference for cognitively engaging feedback. Focused indirect feedback received the most positive evaluations. The study contributes to the WCF literature by examining learner perceptions at the intersection of WCF research, gifted education, and creative writing pedagogy in an EFL context.