This study investigates the effectiveness of context-specific teaching materials delivered through an adapted process genre model of writing, in enhancing academic writing proficiency of tertiary level English foreign language (EFL) students. The study was conducted at a College of Technology in Oman and was motivated by the low EFL writing level of tertiary students at the college. The study employed a quasi-experimental design in which two main groups (experimental and control) were included. The experimental group received EFL writing instruction for one semester via the especially developed teaching materials, while the control group received EFL writing instruction via the prescribed textbook. The findings indicated statistically significant differences between the experimental and control groups in the Mid-Semester examination (MSE) and the Level-Exit examination (LEE). A qualitative analysis of the experimental group’s writing suggests that this group significantly outperformed the control group in writing fluency and accuracy. Therefore, based on the findings of the current study, it can be concluded that context-specific materials delivered through the proposed process genre model of writing are effective in enhancing tertiary level students’ academic writing proficiency in an EFL context. Specifically, the writing intervention had a positive effect on students’ ability to compose a variety of genres in an examination setting, which is an important finding, given that the process-genre approach to writing is normally not associated with writing in an examination setting. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (Linguistics)

Writing, an important academic skill for university students to acquire, becomes more important in a distance education institution where assessment is primarily on written work. Successful teaching and learning practices for Open Distance Learning (ODL) incorporate multiple forms of interaction when using technology within a constructivist approach. The study seeks to understand students’ perceptions of wikis within a process writing approach, and the suitability of Web 2.0 technology for tasks designed to teach academic writing. A participatory action research design was selected as it merges social action and research to solve educational problems while increasing human understanding of the phenomena. The findings show that students may be open to using wikis within their actual learning environment. Of significance was the issue of the early integration and engagement of students into online learning communities. The challenges experienced in the study can be addressed adapting Chickering and Ehrmann’s (1996) principles to frame the development of online learning. / Teaching Practice Unit / M.A. (TESOL)

Linguistics and Modern Languages / M.A. (Linguistics)

Thesis (MPhil)--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The application designed is an attempt to solve the problems that students face in writing well balanced academic essays. These are essays that are correct in structure and form, coherent and cohesive, well referenced, and not plagiarised. These concerns are addressed in five basic units. These are "Where to Start", "The Basic Structure", "Paragraphing", "Referencing" and "Exercises". The exercises serve as a summary of all the units. This application derived out of the needs of the students of the University of Botswana. The content was a result of a needs analysis done through observation and interviews. The evaluation of the application was done by the students themselves and fellow students at Stellenbosch University. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Hierdie voorlegging is 'n soeke na 'n oplossing vir die probleme wat studente ondervind om 'n goed-gebalanseerde akademiese essay (werkstuk, proefskrif, tesis) te skryf. Hierdie is essays wat in struktuur en vorm korrek is, duidelik en relevant is, korrekte verwysings het en nie nageskryf (plagiaat) is nie. Die probleme is in vyf afdelings bespreek; nl. "Waar om te Begin", "Die Basiese Struktuur", "Paragrawe", "Verwysings" en "Oefeninge". Die oefeninge dien as opsomming vir al die eenhede. Hierdie voorlegging het ontstaan uit ’n behoefte van die studente by die Universiteit Botswana. Die inhoud was die resultaat van 'n behoefte-analise wat deur observasie en onderhoude gedoen is. Die evaluasie is deur die betrokke studente en studente aan die Universiteit Stellenbosch gedoen.

Thesis (MPhil (Modern Foreign Languages))--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / This research is based on a study which was made in order to investigate why the students who study Education at the Eastern Cape Technikon fail to acquire competence in essay writing, in spite of going through the Computer program that is being used by the Department of Communication. The name of this program is the Writing Process Workshop, and will be referred to as the WPW throughout the study. This program has been in use at the Technikon as a form of supplementary program for those students who were perceived to have shortfalls1 in their essay writing communication skills. This perception came about from the Department of Communication which decided that those students who scored less than 40% overall in (in language, not in content) their assignments, class works, and tests should go through the program and work independently, in the hope that their performance will improve. The study spans over two years, with the first year being the period where the researcher collected data in the form of written errors that the students made in their essays. The second year of the research is the period when the main research took place. During the second year of the research, the researcher observed the students as they went through the WPW for three months. Upon completing the program, the students were asked to respond to a questionnaire. In addition to the questionnaire, the researcher examined the student errors that occurred in the students’ essays throughout 2003 (while they were on the program, together with the ones from last year (2003). The reason for this was to determine if the errors that were present in 2002 are still present even after the students had gone through the WPW. The researcher then found that there was still considerable occurrence of the same errors in the students’ essays, a fact which led the researcher to deduce that very little improvement in the writing skills of the students has occurred between 2002 and 2003. To explain the above point further, the research findings indicated that the essay-writing competence of the subjects did not improve in spite of the WPW intervention.The researcher then went on to evaluate the program, using a set of guidelines2, and found it consistent with the requirements of the evaluation; and therefore ruled it out as the cause of the failure of students to improve their competence in writing. Based on the findings of the study, the researcher found that the students do not put conscious effort to apply what they have learnt in the program, and that some have not even completed the required tasks from the program. She also found that there is lack of integration of the software into the curriculum. Specific recommendations in Chapter 9 are given on how to facilitate this integration and to motivate the students to apply what they have learnt from the WPW to the mainstream essay writing exercises.

Feminist scholars have in many instances led the way in challenging the tendency of academics to make transcendent claims from a disembodied and unmarked position, often in the name of objectivity. One means of reinstating the writer in the act of writing and thus circumventing discourse that, in effect, erases the writer as well as the complexities of the subject is to teach from the perspective of situated knowledges: that is, from the understanding that knowledge is mediated by one's cultural, ideological, and historical position. Moreover, the concept of situated knowledges challenges the positivist assumptions that place the writer outside of the cultural and situational context of the research subject. Situated knowledge thus holds out some intriguing possibilities for the future shape of the teaching of academic discourse. Foremost among those experimenting with the practice of positioning oneself in academic discourse are those scholars working in the cross-disciplinary field of Women's Studies. This dissertation analyzes the rhetorical strategies that three feminist scholars working at the University of Arizona employ in situating themselves in their professional writing. Each scholar occupies a different position along the continuum that represents the efforts to locate oneself. The most conservative strategy common to conventional ideological positioning is one in which the writer avoids any reference to personal location while situating herself within a community of scholars by means of reference and citation. Further along the continuum, the writer may invoke a form of strategic essentialism, critiquing those semiotic systems that enforce various forms of oppression while defining the social context to the advantage of the oppressed group. At the furthest extreme, the researcher acts as participant observer, placing herself in the research situation using a self-reflexive research methodology. In closing, I survey the potential that feminist research methodologies hold for writing pedagogy, especially in assisting our students in locating themselves in their own scholarly pursuits.

The present study aimed to establish a test development and validation framework of reading-into-writing tests to improve the accountability of using the integrated task type to assess test takers' ability in Academic English. This study applied Weir's (2005) socio-cognitive framework to collect three components of test validity: context validity, cognitive validity and criterion-related validity of two common types of reading-into-writing test tasks (essay task with multiple verbal inputs and essay task with multiple verbal and non-verbal inputs). Through literature review and a series of pilot, a set of contextual and cognitive parameters that are useful to explicitly describe the features of the target academic writing tasks and the cognitive processes required to complete these tasks successfully was defined at the pilot phase of this study. A mixed-method approach was used in the main study to establish the context, cognitive and criterion-related validity of the reading-into-writing test tasks. First of all, for context validity, expert judgement and automated textual analysis were applied to examine the degree of correspondence of the contextual features (overall task setting and input text features) of the reading-into-writing test tasks to those of the target academic writing tasks. For cognitive validity, a cognitive process questionnaire was developed to assist participants to report the processes they employed on the two reading-into-writing test tasks and two real-life academic tasks. A total of 443 questionnaires from 219 participants were collected. The analysis of the cognitive validity included three stands: 1) the cognitive processes involved in real-life academic writing, 2) the extent to which these processes are elicited by the reading-into-writing test tasks, and 3) the underlying structure of the processes elicited by the reading-into-writing test tasks. A range of descriptive, inferential and factor analyses were performed on the questionnaire data. The participants' scores on these real-life academic and reading-into-writing test tasks were collected for correlational analyses to investigate the criterion-related validity of the test tasks. The findings of the study support the context, cognitive and criterion-related validity of the integrated reading-into-writing task type. In terms of context validity, the two reading-into-writing tasks largely resembled the overall task setting, the input text features and the linguistic complexity of the input texts of the real-life tasks in a number of important ways. Regarding cognitive validity, the results revealed 11 cognitive processes involved in 5 phases of real-life academic writing as well as the extent to which these processes were elicited by the test tasks. Both reading-into-writing test tasks were able to elicit from high-achieving and low-achieving participants most of these cognitive processes to a similar extent as the participants employed the processes on the real-life tasks. The medium-achieving participants tended to employ these processes more on the real-life tasks than on the test tasks. The results of explanatory factor analysis showed that both test tasks were largely able to elicit from the participants the same underlying cognitive processes as the real-life tasks did. Lastly, for criterion-related validity, the correlations between the two reading-into-writing test scores and academic performance reported in this study are apparently better than most previously reported figures in the literature. To the best of the researcher's knowledge, this study is the first study to validate two types of reading-into-writing test tasks in terms of three validity components. The results of the study proved with empirical evidence that reading-into-writing tests can successfully operationalise the appropriate contextual features of academic writing tasks and the cognitive processes required in real-life academic writing under test conditions, and the reading-into-writing test scores demonstrated a promising correlation to the target academic performance. The results have important implications for university admissions officers and other stakeholders; in particular they demonstrate that the integrated reading-into-writing task type is a valid option when considering language teaching and testing for academic purposes. The study also puts forward a test framework with explicit contextual and cognitive parameters for language teachers, test developers and future researchers who intend to develop valid reading-into-writing test tasks for assessing academic writing ability and to conduct validity studies in such integrated task type.

Good academic literacy skills are vital for success in the 21st century for students in higher education and for professional people in the workforce to be able to process and convey information and knowledge. The purpose of the current study was to gain insights into the construct of academic literacy skills and to identify indicators affecting the development of the academic literacy skills of first year students in higher education. To this end, a case study was done on a cohort of 20 first year male Emirati students attending an academic literacy skills course in an engineering higher education institute in the Arabian Gulf region. The study was guided by three research questions concerning the development of academic literacy skills which were defined as writing strategies, library research strategies and general study skills (Bury, Sheese & Katz, 2013). Data gathered comprised surveys, grade comparisons, written assignments, semi-structured interviews, classroom observations recorded using a video camera and instructor observations. The framework of Academic Literacies developed by Lea and Street (1998, 2000, 2006) was used for analysis with a focus on the supplementing constructs of study skills and academic socialization. To extract more detailed knowledge and further insights about the students’ academic literacy skills, a comparison was also made between the developmental indicators regarding successful and non-successful students’ written work and their approaches to completing assignments. The indicators revealed included the students’ lack of library research strategies, digital literacy skills and sense of ownership. Theoretical and practical implications for developing students’ academic literacy skills are provided in conclusion.

Esta dissertação teve por objetivo estudar o desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem ligadas à escrita acadêmica em francês dos alunos da graduação em Letras (habilitação em língua francesa) ao longo de um semestre, por meio da análise de suas produções textuais. Para tal, tivemos como objetivos específicos a produção do modelo didático (SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004) do gênero textual artigo científico em francês da área de estudos literários e, a partir dele, a elaboração de uma sequência didática (SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004) visando a ensinar as características do gênero textual em questão para os alunos inscritos na disciplina de graduação Monografia. Com vistas a entender de que forma a atuação do professor, no momento da aplicação da sequência didática (SD), contribui para o desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem dos alunos, as aulas da SD foram filmadas e transcritas. Além disso, analisamos a influência dos comentários realizados pela professora-pesquisadora às primeiras versões dos artigos no desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem dos alunos. Para desenvolver nossa pesquisa, adotamos o quadro teórico-metodológico do interacionismo sociodiscursivo (ISD) (BRONCKART, 1999/2012, SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004 e MACHADO, 2009), que tem suas bases nos estudos de Vigotski (1998; 1997; 2010; 2011; 2013) sobre o desenvolvimento humano. Servimo-nos dos conceitos de instrumento e zona de desenvolvimento proximal (VIGOTSKI, 1997; 2010; 2011; 2013) para entender o desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem dos alunos; de modelo didático (DI PIETRO et al., 2004) e sequência didática (DOLZ; NOVERRAZ; SCHNEUWLY, 2004) para realizar a didatização do gênero textual; de gestos didáticos (SCHNEUWLY, 2009) para compreender como se deu a atuação da professora na aplicação da sequência didática. Apoiamo-nos, igualmente, em alguns estudos ligados à escrita acadêmica e às dificuldades de escrita encontradas pelos universitários e pós-graduandos. Para tanto, usamos a noção proposta por Bazerman (2009; 2013) de que os gêneros textuais funcionam como frames para o desenvolvimento de tipos de pensamentos ligados às disciplinas; e, com base nas categorias de análise do ISD e nas pesquisas realizadas por Matencio (2003) e Pollet (2004) sobre as dificuldades de produção textual encontradas em textos de universitários e pós-graduandos quanto à inserção de vozes de outros autores, elaboramos as categorias de retextualização para realizar as análises dos textos produzidos pelos alunos. As produções dos alunos foram analisadas, primeiramente, de acordo com o modelo da arquitetura textual (BRONCKART, 1999/2012; 2006) para verificar se houve desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem e se ele poderia ser atribuído à sequência didática, à atuação da professora e/ou ao comentário da professora-pesquisadora. Em nossas análises, pudemos constatar que houve desenvolvimento das capacidades de linguagem dos alunos ao longo do semestre, especialmente, das capacidades de ação e discursivas, sendo grande parte desse desenvolvimento ligado às atividades dos módulos da sequência didática, aos gestos didáticos regulação local e institucionalização usados pela professora ao aplicar a sequência didática e ao comentário da professora-pesquisadora. / This dissertations goal was to study the development of language capacities of Language Studies undergraduate students related to academic writing in French throughout a semester by analyzing their written works. To this end, our specific objective was to create a didactic model (SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004) of the textual genre academic paper in French at the department of literature studies in order to elaborate a didactic sequence (SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004) aiming at teaching the characteristics of that textual genre to the students enrolled in the course Monografia. Aiming at understanding how the teachers performance contributes to the development of the students language capacities when applying the didactic sequence (DS), the classes were recorded and transcribed. Furthermore, we analyzed the influence of the remarks given by the researcher-teacher to the first versions of the papers in the development of the students language capacities. In order to develop our research, we adopted the socio-discursive interactionism (SDI) theoretical and methodological framework (BRONCKART, 1999/2012, SCHNEUWLY; DOLZ, 2004 e MACHADO, 2009), which is rooted in Vigotskis (1998; 1997; 2010; 2011; 2013) studies on human development. We employed the concepts of instrument and zone of proximal development (VIGOTSKI, 1997; 2010; 2011; 2013) to understand the development of the students language capacities; of didactic model (DI PIETRO et al., 2004) and didactic sequence (DOLZ; NOVERRAZ; SCHNEUWLY, 2004) to accomplish the didactization of the textual genre; and of fundamental teaching gestures (SCHNEUWLY, 2009) to comprehend how the teachers performance in the application of the didactic sequence took place. We also rely on studies related to academic writing and writing difficulties experienced by undergraduate and graduate students. To do so, we used the idea proposed by Bazerman (2009; 2013) that the textual genres work as frames to develop the kinds of thoughts related to the courses; and based on the SDI analyses categories and on the research accomplished by Matencio (2003) e Pollet (2004) about the difficulties of writing experienced by undergraduate and graduate students regarding the insertion of other authors voices, we elaborated categories of retextualization to accomplish the analysis of the students texts. The students texts were first analyzed according to the textual architecture model (BRONCKART, 1999/2012; 2006) in order to verify if there was development of the language capacities and if it could be attributed to the didactic sequence, to the teachers performance and/or to the remarks given by the researcher-teacher. In our analysis we could observe the development of the students language capacities throughout the semester, specially of the action and discursive capacities, a great part of which connected to the didactic sequence activities, to the fundamental teaching gestures of local regulation and institutionalization used by the teacher when applying the didactic sequence and to the researcher-teacher remarks.

Made available in DSpace on 2017-07-21T14:53:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Cristiane Nunes Borges.pdf: 1087562 bytes, checksum: a5ce1d9f629b0c6e94a430be85751ead (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-02-28 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This paper aims to discuss the academic writing through the social practices of the university. It starts with the hypothesis that there is a constructive process of writing closely related to the process of (re)construction of identities (BAUMAN, 2005; HALL,2006) of academics during graduation, because they become part of the university practices and intervene in that environment using the language as a subsidy. The methodology of this paperwork, qualitative basis, consists in the monitoring of two graduates of the Bachelor's Degree in Modern Language from the State University of Ponta Grossa to check and analyze some of these influences which are coming from the university environment and reflect in the production of academic writing (BALOCCO,2001, WILSON 2009). To organize the corpus of this research, interviews were conducted, analysis of texts produced by academic participants during graduation were made, and a discussion group. Thus, this research discusses, from the data, the reflections of this process in order to notice the linguistic actions reverberated in the writing of the participants, considering the individual and institutional interests, which rule some norms of the academic writing. The theoretical studies are related to Linguistic Pragmatics (RAJAGOPALAN, 2010; MEY, 2001a, 2010) in order to reflect on the uses of language in a perspective in which it is seen as performative (AUSTIN,1962; OTTONE, 1998) and in the critical study of language and discourse (FAIRCLOUGH, 2001a, 2001b). It is considered that the doing in linguistic uses involves interests and choices, which are eminently political (RAJAGOPALAN, 1998,2003, 2008a) and should also be approached from a critical view in pragmatics in order to realize the games of power in social environments as a fundamental aspect in political writing (CORREA, 2010; 2011), in the acting and the intervening in the subject. Thus,the results indicate that it is possible to see some Language politics acting in the academic writing amid social practices in the university environment exerting thus influence on identity construction and on the production process of academic writing. / Este trabalho tem por objetivo discutir a escrita acadêmica em meio às práticas sociais da universidade. Parte-se da hipótese de que há um processo de construção da escrita intimamente relacionado ao processo de (re)construção de identidades (BAUMAN, 2005; HALL, 2006) de acadêmicos durante a graduação, pois esses passam a fazer parte das práticas universitárias e a intervir nesse meio usando a linguagem como subsídio. A metodologia deste trabalho, de base qualitativa, consiste no acompanhamento de duas graduandas do curso de Licenciatura em Letras da Universidade Estadual de Ponta Grossa para verificar e analisar algumas dessas influências as quais são advindas do ambiente universitário e refletem nas produções da escrita acadêmica (BALOCCO, 2001; WILSON, 2009). Para organizar o corpus da pesquisa foram realizadas entrevistas, análise de textos de caráter acadêmico produzidos pelas participantes durante a graduação e um grupo de discussão. Assim, esta pesquisa procura discutir, a partir dos dados, as reflexões sobre esse processo de modo a perceber as ações linguísticas repercutidas na escrita das participantes, considerando os interesses individuais e institucionais que regem algumas normas da escrita acadêmica. Os estudos teóricos estão relacionados à pragmática linguística (RAJAGOPALAN, 2010; MEY, 2001a, 2010) visando a refletir sobre os usos da linguagem em uma perspectiva na qual ela é vista como performativa (AUSTIN, 1962; OTTONI, 1998) e ao estudo crítico da linguagem e do discurso (FAIRCLOUGH, 2001a, 2001b). Considera-se que o fazer nos usos linguísticos envolve interesses e escolhas, os quais são iminentemente políticos (RAJAGOPALAN, 1998, 2003, 2008a) e devem ser também abordados sob um olhar crítico na pragmática com intuito de perceber os jogos de força nos ambientes sociais como um aspecto fundamental nas políticas de escrita (CORREA, 2010; 2011), no agir e intervir dos sujeitos. Dessa forma, os resultados apontam que é possível perceber algumas políticas de linguagem agindo nos usos linguísticos da escrita acadêmica em meio às práticas sociais no ambiente universitário exercendo, assim, influência na construção identitária e no processo de produção da escrita acadêmica. Palavras-chave: Práticas sociais, identidades, pragmática, escrita acadêmica.