This dissertation studies the impact of using the Scaffolded Literacy Strategies as developed by Dr. David Rose, in a South African Special Needs school. The central aim of the study was to establish the efficacy of this approach and whether it would have any effect on the levels of literacy and comprehension of the learners at the / Thesis (M. Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

This study reports information received from basic writing instructors at colleges in the Christian College Coalition, a group of 77 Christian, liberal arts colleges in the U. S. and Canada. Respondents completed a questionnaire and submitted sample syllabi and writing assignments. The study compares data from the respondents to current theories of basic writing instruction, most notably those of Andrea Lunsford and Mike Rose. It also compares the results to a similar study of all colleges by Joe Trimmer.The study found that the Christian College Coalition population was similar to the national population with regard to placement methods, textbook choice, and course goals. However, the study showed that a significant portion of basic writing courses are taught by tenure track English department faculty members. This finding represents a strength of this population as the national study showed that almost no basic writing courses were taught by tenure track faculty. In addition, the atmosphere of the small, Christian liberal arts colleges encourages low teacher/student ratios and more contact between faculty members and students in writing classes. These are areas of strength the Coalition schools should develop further.This study also reports and analyzes actual writing assignments and syllabi, some of the course materials Stephen North calls "lore." The examination of these materials shows more clearly than survey responses the types of writing students are actually doing in basic writing classes. / Department of English

In the theoretical and epistemological frameworks of Vygotsky’s cognitive theory and French intellectuals’ written legacy (Cixous, Deleuze, Derrida, Foucault, Kristeva, and Lyotard), the research explores philosophical, psychological, and educational migrations of a second language (L2) learner among cultures and languages in her comprehension and further nativization of an L2 through her comprehension and nativization of the culture of the language. The role of Canadian culture in Canada’s second/additional language education (SLE) is the research focus. In this research, the concept of Canadian culture is interpreted narrowly as literature, music, arts, and history of its people, and broadly as creations of its people. The dissertation consists of 3 parts: Pre-Theory, Theory, and Post-Theory. The Pre-Theory part is built according to the conventional thesis design: introduction, theoretical framework, literature review, research question, methodology, credibility, and significance. Narrative inquiry (Connelly & Clandinin, 2006) as the initial methodology of the research unfolds in innovative ways as literary-philosophical essays in the Theory part, and later as a music-poetry work in the Post-Theory part. The Theory part is a conceptual philosophy-arts piece of writing that develops based on the principle “writing as a method of knowing”. The Post-Theory part is the researcher’s music-poetry work “I-Migrations: Psychedelic Story” that is a practical epitome of her research theory. Based on her own way of learning English, first, as a foreign language (FL) in Russia, and then as an L2 in Canada, the researcher theoretically substantiates her postulate of the underestimated role of Canadian culture, in terms of literature, music, arts, and history in Canada’s SLE and proposes to make Canadian culture an integral part of Canada’s SLE curricula. This research fulfils the gaps in the literature on an older L2 learner’s experience across a lifetime and the inclusion of arts and culture alongside of language learning in SLE. Keywords: second language, second language culture, writing, second language writing, second language education

The study, using a within-group design with eighteen adult high-beginner Chinese L2 learners, investigated the effects of peer review and co-writing on writing in Chinese-as-a-foreign language. Three writing conditions (peer review, co-writing, and individual writing) and three narrative writing topics were counterbalanced for the collection of data, including forty-five writing products, seventy-two questionnaires, videorecorded screen activities and interactions. The research has three main aims: (a) to investigate the effects of peer review and co-writing on writing with respect to fluency, complexity, and accuracy, (b) to explore the nature of verbal interactions during peer review and co-writing, and (c) to investigate students’ perceptions of the three writing activities. With regard to writing performance, the research found no statistically significant differences in measures of fluency and complexity. However, peer review and co-writing resulted in significantly more accurate writing than individual writing, but no difference was observed in the two collaborative writing activities. The analysis of verbal interactions indicated that (1) there were significantly more on-task episodes in peer review than in co-writing; (2) there were significantly more language-related episodes (LREs) and content-related episodes in peer review than in co-writing, while there were significantly more idea-related episodes and text-assessing episodes in co-writing than in peer review; (3) students paid significantly more attention to LRE-lexis and LRE-grammar in peer review than in co-writing, and the differences were mainly observed in discussions on word meanings, verb forms, word usage, and sentence/phrase meanings; and (4) there were also significantly more spelling episodes in peer review than in co-writing. Concerning students’ perceptions, although students tended to prefer co-writing to peer review and peer review to individual writing, they held competing attitudes toward the three activities and believed each of the three had their own strengths, which could not be replaced by the advantages of the other. The findings suggest that peer review, co-writing, and individual writing play different roles in Chinese L2 learners’ development of writing skills, as measured by a range of linguistic indices and as revealed by students’ evaluations. Thus, they are all important because they direct learners to different aspects of their language development. / Graduate

The influence of affective factors on learning has been studied by researchers in a range of disciplines, including within SLA research, where tests measuring anxiety specific to second language writing have been developed (Cheng, 2004). Recent studies on instructor perceptions show increasing numbers of second language learners (SLL) enrolled in mainstream university courses with instructors providing varying types of feedback to these learners. The current study investigates how the writing anxiety of second language learners in a mainstream context may relate to writing performance and how feedback anxiety resulting from one written assignment may be connected to writing performance on a subsequent assignment. Using modified writing anxiety survey instruments, 16 SLLs enrolled in two mainstream university English composition courses (taught by two instructors) completed two surveys, an informal interview, and an online questionnaire about feedback on two writing assignments prepared for their course; feedback and a grade from one assignment and a grade from a second assignment were also collected. Mainstream instructors were found to balance feedback provided to learners between content and organization feedback and grammatical feedback, similar to findings on feedback practices for second language instructors (Evans et al., 2010). Statistical analyses between survey results and grades revealed negative (non-statistically significant) correlations between anxiety scores (from surveys) and grades. Participants expressed 16 different emotions in response to feedback through qualitative data collection methods (open-ended survey questions, interviews, and online questionnaire); hope, acceptance, and anxiety were the three most commonly emotions reported. The number and complexity of emotional responses reported indicate that anxiety is only one of numerous responses to feedback and research on the effects of affective factors on learning may benefit from investigations of other emotions, including pleasant or positive emotions. Two data collection methods converged in reporting that nearly all participants made use of feedback through one or more forms of follow up action. Continued research into the complex emotions inspired by writing feedback may provide a deeper understanding of how SLLs may moderate their own emotional responses and provide instructors insight into additional factors that may affect learners’ writing performance. / Graduate / 0290 / amalec@uvic.ca

No description available.

abstract: This yearlong project examines how multilingual undergraduate writers--including international visa students and U.S. permanent residents or citizens who are non-native English speakers--exercise agency in their first-year composition placement decisions. Agency is defined as the capacity to act or not to act contingent upon various conditions. The goal of the project is to demonstrate how student agency can inform the overall programmatic placement decisions, which can lead to more effective placement practices for multilingual writers. To explore the role of agency in students' placement decisions, I conducted a series of four in-depth interviews with eleven multilingual writers between Fall 2010 and Spring 2011 in the Writing Programs at Arizona State University. To triangulate these placement decisions, I interviewed some of the multilingual student participants' academic advisors and writing teachers as well as writing program administrators. Findings showed that when conditions for agency were appropriate, the multilingual student participants were able to negotiate placement, choose to accept or deny their original placement, self-assess their proficiency level as deciding to choose a writing course, plan on their placement, question about placement, and finally make decisions about a writing course they wanted to take. In the context of this study, conditions for agency include the freedom to choose writing courses and information about placement that is distributed by the following sources: advisors' recommendations, other students' past experience in taking first-year composition, the new student orientation, and other sources that provide placement related information such as an online freshman orientation and a major map. Other findings suggested that the academic advisor participants did not provide the multilingual students with complete placement information; and this affected the way the multilingual students chose which section of first-year composition to enroll in. Meanwhile, there was no formal communication about placement options and placement procedures between the Writing Programs and writing teachers. Building on these findings, I argue for improving conditions for agency by providing placement options, making placement information more readily available, and communicating placement information and options with academic advisors, writing teachers, and multilingual students. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. English 2012

In order to discover to what extent the use of the word processor affects the motivation of high school students when engaged in writing tasks, and to determine the effects of the word processing on the length and quality of their work and editing, two groups, carefully matched in terms of prior computer experience, intelligence and language ability were given eight writing tasks. The test group used word processors while the control group used pen and paper. Their behaviour was closely observed and their writing was subsequently compared. It was found that while the test group were more motivated and spent longer both writing and editing their work, the quality of the work of both groups was similar. The degree of editing was greater for the test group. The conclusion is that there is a place for the use of the word processor in the English classroom, but specific strategies need to be developed to optimise its benefits.

In this study an attempt is made to describe and illuminate the current approaches to ESL writing in secondary schools in the Port Elizabeth-Despatch areas where Afrikaans is the first language of the pupils. Teacher and pupil Questionnaires were used as a means of data collection through which the approaches, practices and attitudes to the teaching of ESL writing in the secondary schools in the survey area could be reviewed and assessed. The teacher Questionnaire revealed that most respondents appeared to have a limited awareness or understanding of basic composing processes, especially the role of multiple drafting and teacher intervention in the form of interactive feedback. There is also evidence that there is a limited understanding of how these activities can be effectively implemented in a classroom situation. The pupil Questionnaire was used as a means to extend the understanding of teacher approaches to ESL writing as revealed in the teacher Questionnaire, to enable comparisons to be made and to evaluate the writing approaches currently practised in the ESL classroom. Many of the observations revealed in the teacher Questionnaire were echoed in the analysis of the pupil Questionnaire, especially the limited roles of planning and feedback, treatment of error, attitude to writing and the limited improvement in writing as pupils progress through the secondary school. The analysis also revealed that pupils were reluctant to expose, or share their work with audiences, were pre-occupied with error and viewed the teacher as grade-giver, grammarian and topic-provider. Topic selection was also revealed as a factor which influenced the pupils' negative or indifferent attitudes to writing. Although the process approach was considered a traditional approach to writing by 1986, the analysis and review of the Questionnaire data has revealed that a fair assessment of the state of ESL writing in the survey schools would place the current writing approaches in the traditional product- centred, form-dominated, teacher-centred mould. For this position to change, research pedagogy will need to become part of teacher training and the classroom so that there can be greater teacher awareness and understanding of composing processes and their implementation in the classroom. This is necessary, because research findings have revealed that a genuine orientation to a process approach and the application of composing stategies followed by good writers will result in improved writing progress and pupils having a more positive attitude to writing.

Orientador: Claudia Maria Xatara / Banca: John Robert Schmitz / Banca: Bento Carlos Dias da Silva / Banca: Claudia Zavaglia / Banca: Douglas Altamiro Consolo / Resumo: O objetivo deste trabalho é apresentar parâmetros que possam ser utilizados para orientar melhorias e inovações lexicográficas, a fim de atender as dificuldades dos brasileiros na codificação escrita em línguas estrangeiras. Revisam-se criticamente várias pesquisas, em busca de subsídios que contribuam para diagnosticar as dificuldades de escrever em língua estrangeira, dentre elas os trabalhos produzidos por teóricos da Lexicografia, as pesquisas sobre o uso do dicionário e estudos sobre corpus de aprendizes. Realiza-se, também, uma pesquisa empírica sobre o uso dos dicionários na codificação a fim de complementar, com dados primários, as informações obtidas nas demais fontes. Uma vez conhecidas as necessidades dos usuários de dicionários, analisam-se as obras lexicográficas que expressam o propósito de auxiliar a produção em língua estrangeira. Nessa análise, verifica-se em que medida as necessidades identificadas são atendidas e como são atendidas. Chegase, assim, à conclusão de que algumas das dificuldades solucionáveis por meio da consulta ao dicionário já são satisfatoriamente atendidas pelas obras disponíveis, embora seja oportuno otimizar o acesso dos usuários às informações. Há necessidades, porém, que não são atendidas pelos dicionários ou são atendidas apenas parcialmente. A principal delas é a busca de equivalentes para itens lexicais do português. Há carência de dicionários bilíngües na direção português línguas estrangeiras que possuam, principalmente, a grande maioria dos sentidos e as colocações mais recorrentes de cada item lexical do português, além de ampla exemplificação do uso dos equivalentes em línguas estrangeiras. Para elaborar esses dicionários, o primeiro passo é definir uma nomenclatura que tome por base o léxico ativo do português do Brasil, incluindo lexias simples e complexas, com suas... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: This work aims at presenting useful parameters for lexicographical improvements and innovations that meet encoding difficulties of Brazilian dictionary users. A critical review of lexicographers' works, and researches on second language writing, productive dictionary use, and learner's corpus, contributes to diagnose the problem of foreign language encoding. Also, an empirical research about dictionary use in encoding activities completes with primary data the information obtained from secondary sources. After identifying what dictionary users need, this work presents an analysis of five dictionaries which expressly mention their purpose to help users to write in a foreign language. Such analysis tries to measure to what extent, and how, users' needs are satisfied. The conclusion is that reference works are able to solve some of learners' difficulties, although it is desirable to improve the ways users retrieve information from them. However, there are some needs not met by dictionaries or only partially met. The major of them is the search for equivalents in foreign languages that correspond to Portuguese lexical items. There is a lack of bilingual dictionaries Portuguese-foreign language that present, specially, every meaning and recurrent collocations for Portuguese lexical items, besides examples of equivalents use in foreign language. To compile such dictionaries, the first step is to define a word-list based on Brazilian Portuguese active vocabulary, including simple and complex lexical units with all their respective senses. Then, it is suggested to find equivalents in foreign language with examples that illustrate pedagogically their use. For this work, results from other projects may be reused, such as semantic networks, collocation extraction, Brazilian learners corpus, and parallel corpora of Brazilian Portuguese and foreign languages. / Doutor