What is the best way to give students feedback on their writing?

Research on feedback is clear: process feedback beats person feedback. Comments aimed at what the student did and what to do next drive real revision; "great job!" or "you're a natural writer" produces minimal learning.

1. Point to the exact place and the exact move. Not "needs more detail" but "paragraph 2 states your claim but doesn't support it — add one piece of evidence and a sentence explaining how it backs up your claim." A student reading that knows exactly what to revise.
2. Comment on the process, not the person. Avoid trait language ("you're a strong writer" or "this needs work"). Name the observable behavior: "You underline the main idea of each paragraph; keep doing that. Then identify the sentence that doesn't support the main idea and cut it." Feedback on work, not on the student, is what transfers to the next piece.
3. Make every comment require an action. Feedback without a next move is wasted. The best comments direct a specific revision: add, cut, reorder, explain, clarify. A student who reads "proofread for comma splices" and then re-reads the whole draft inefficiently learns nothing. "Check sentences 3 and 5 for comma splices — put a period or semicolon between the independent clauses" creates action.

Prioritize — don't mark everything. Choose the one or two highest-leverage moves per piece (usually organization and evidence before grammar). Overwhelming feedback demoralizes; focused revision builds a transferable skill.

Writing process-focused, actionable feedback for 25 essays is the bottleneck. A feedback drafter can generate strong first-round comments anchored to the actual text so you spend your time on judgment, not typing.