Writing teachers usually give metalinguistic written corrective feedback (WCF) to instruct students on their grammar errors in writing. However, little is known about the effect of exploiting students’ linguistic repertoire via pedagogical translanguaging in metalinguistic WCF on their accurate use of grammar structures in writing. This study explored the respective and relative effects of using two versus three languages via pedagogical translanguaging in metalinguistic WCF on students’ accurate use of the Spanish preterite and imperfect tenses. Two groups of Taiwanese students participated in this study. The trilingual-pedagogical-translanguaging group received Spanish/Mandarin/English metalinguistic WCF, while the bilingualpedagogical-translanguaging group received Spanish/Mandarin metalinguistic WCF. Results show that both groups improved their accuracy rate of using the two grammar structures over time, with the trilingual group outperforming the bilingual group. These findings suggest that accessing learners’ full linguistic repertoires in metalinguistic WCF is a viable strategy to increase students’ correct use of the two tenses.
