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This research identifies what proficient writers know and do by the end of their freshman year in college and raises the kind of questions that improve the articulation of English instruction.

This thesis, the outcome of nearly three years of preparation, including study, development of procedures, trial and observation, was begun in an attempt to answer the following questions: How may original writing among elementary pupils be motivated successfully? Can positive feelings about self be promoted to a measurable degree as a result of emphasizing individual oral and written expression? Although much thinking and evaluating occurred during the three years, the experimentation and results reported here are limited to the work accomplished and findings obtained during the third year. The twenty-six children involved in this study were third-year elementary pupils, whose ages ranged from seven to nine years. During the experimental period, listening, speaking, thinking, and writing were emphasized in the language arts program. A variety of topics provided subjects for written composition. To test the hypothesis that a measurable increase in self concept or self report ratings could be brought about by experiencing feelings of success and acceptance as a result of self-expression in writing, the Piers-Harris Children's Self Concept Scale was administered to two third grade classes, the experimental group and a control group, at the beginning and at the conclusion of an eight-week experimental period. Average reading scores from the Metropolitan Achievement Test, Form F, were available as an index to the ability of the two groups. During the experimental time, a writing topic was presented to the experimental group daily. Questions were used to promote discussion, elicit ideas, and encourage thinking and interest. When the majority of the group members had participated orally, and appeared to be interested and involved, paper was distributed and writing was begun. The writer could choose the form his writing was to take, and a variety of ideas could be derived from the topic presented. The result might be an account of a personal experience, original imaginative writing, rhymed or unrhymed verse, or a factual report. At the conclusion of the eight-week experimental period, self report scores of the two groups were compared. To demonstrate a significant change in score from the initial to the final report, a difference in individual raw scores of ten or more points was required. The raw scores of four subjects in the experimental group, and two subjects in the control group increased by ten or more points. However. the findings of this study indicated no significant differences to the self concepts of children in the experimental group as compared to the self concepts of children in the control group as a result of the writing treatment.

Poor academic performance and high failure rates in South African tertiary institutions have lead to a need for intervention of some sort. Academic performance is said to be strongly influenced by one’s academic writing ability. Therefore, this study aimed to determine how much influence academic writing ability has on academic performance. It also aimed to establish which measure - the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) or Wechsler Individual Achievement Test II (WIAT-II) - is a more accurate measure of academic writing. Lastly, the research aimed to determine whether any differences between English First Language (EFL) and English Additional Language (EAL) students’ exist. A convenience sample of 125 first-year Psychology students from the University of the Witwatersrand wrote argumentative essays that were analysed quantitatively using the IELTS and WIAT-II scoring system. Correlations and t-tests, as well as regression and reliability analyses were used to investigate the aims and establish the results. From the results it was evident that the IELTS and WIAT-II are both adequate measures of academic writing. However, the results showed that academic writing ability is not a major predictor of and contributor towards academic performance. Significant differences in performance were noted between groups of EFL and EAL students on all measures. The results also showed that failure rates were not as high in this sample as in previous statistics. Further investigation is required in order to determine other factors that contribute to one’s academic performance. Other aspects of academic literacy such as reading and speaking, as well as previous preparedness or intelligence, may need to be considered as determining factors of academic success.

published_or_final_version / abstract / Education / Master / Master of Education

The thesis is a study of the early stages of the writing cycle in an English for Academic Purposes (EAP) class at the University of Singapore. The study focuses on a group brainstorming activity prior to the stage of writing the first draft and on the impact of this activity on the students’ first individual drafts. In addition, the study compares two different modes of discussion: face-to-face and online synchronous chat. The comparison is concerned with the interactional patterns of the discussion in the two modes, and with the transfer of content from the discussion to the first written drafts. The use of group brainstorming at the pre-writing stage is a familiar activity in the writing class but researchers have not yet paid much attention to the way in which the ideas generated in the brainstorming activity are transferred to individual written drafts. It is this gap that this dissertation seeks to fill. A question of particular interest is the extent to which knowledge construction in the composition class is accomplished by the individual or by the group. Data were collected from four classes of first-year undergraduate students of Science taught by the researcher. The control group, with 31 members, carried out their brainstorming activity in face-to-face mode, while the experimental group, with 27 members, carried out their brainstorming using a synchronous chat facility. The primary data were the chat scripts, face-to-face transcripts and first writing drafts. Analysis of the discussion data was carried out using a genre-based content analysis model deriving from speech act theory (Sinclair and Coulthard, 1975), rhetorical structure theory (Mann & Thompson 1986, 1988), and more recent work on collaborative writing by Plowman (1993), think-aloud protocols (Smagorinsky, 1991) and collaborative computer-based communication by Garrison and Anderson (2003), among others. The model is used to count the frequency of different ideas according to their rhetorical characteristics in the two conditions (face-to-face and synchronous chat), and to determine whether the ideas were generated by individuals or through group discussion. The analysis then looks at the extent to which the ideas were subsequently reproduced in individual drafts. The frequency analyses are complemented by detailed qualitative analysis of the discussion transcripts and the essays of four students, two from each discussion mode. The results of the analysis suggest that collaborative brainstorming is productive in helping students with the generation and development of ideas for their writing. The findings also suggest that there is a strong link between ownership and use of ideas initiated in the discussion. This tendency is stronger in the chat group than in the face-to-face group. Analysis of the discussion transcripts suggests that this difference is a result of more ideas being initiated in the chat group. In addition to these group differences, the analysis shows that discussion in both modes is characterised by a tendency to seek consensus, with very little argument and negotiation of content. The implications of these findings for the use of group discussion in the writing class are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship of word processor use by foreign college writers and their attitudes toward writing, writing revision practices, writing quality, attitudes toward the use of computers, and time spent on computers. The results indicate that students' attitudes toward writing and their perceptions of computer usefulness significantly affected their writing quality. Students with more positive attitudes toward writing and the usefulness of computers tended to produce better quality writing. In addition, the findings indicate that students' writing revision practices significantly affected their attitudes toward writing. Students who revised their writing more frequently tended to have better attitudes toward writing than those who did not. In contrast, students' levels of computer anxiety, computer confidence, computer liking and their writing revision practices did not significantly affect the quality of their writing. Furthermore, the amount of time that students spent on computers did not significantly affect their attitudes toward using computers in writing.

This investigation is concerned with the problem of Texas employers' inability to hire adequately trained technical communication personnel because Texas universities and colleges do not offer a bachelor's degree program for that career field. This study contains the results of five separate surveys that investigate the backgrounds and training of present technical communication personnel and the training desired by supervisory personnel. The study also recommends a bachelor's degree program in technical communication with three technological specialties: electronics, mechanical, and chemical/petroleum. Anticipated problems in setting up such a degree program and possible solutions to the problems are discussed in the study. The suggested freshman and sophomore curriculum could be used as a guideline for a junior college associate program.

Although the benefits of group and pair work in the second language (L2) classroom have been extensively studied, most documented research has focused on the use of oral tasks and spoken interaction between learners. Recently however, researchers have begun to investigate the advantages of collaboration on written work. More specifically, with the advancements in computer technology and web-based collaborative platforms like wikis, there has been a growing awareness of the educational possibilities of wikis to enhance L2 writing instruction. This study followed a pretest/posttest repeated measures design to investigate the impact and students' perceptions of wiki-based collaborative writing activities on individual writing performance. The study involved 12 university students in a TOEFL preparation course at a large university in Bogota, Colombia. Students were divided into two groups: the experimental group (n=8) engaged in a series of wiki-based collaborative writing activities and focused practice between pre and posttests, while the control (n=4) received no treatment. Two individual writing samples (pre and posttest) composed by each participant under timed conditions were quantitatively analyzed using the three linguistic developmental measures of complexity, accuracy, and fluency. While statistically significant differences were not evident for measures of fluency or accuracy, descriptive statistics showed an overall positive impact for collaborative writing on individual learners' written fluency. Analysis of complexity measures revealed mixed results with respect to learning gains. Further analysis of perception data reported by learners in an exit survey disclosed their positive attitude towards perceived linguistic benefits with regard to the wiki-based collaborative writing activities. Both theoretical and pedagogical implications of the study, limitations, and directions for future research are presented.

Chinese students learning English as a foreign language seem to get good marks in tests, but are poor or limited in their ability to write in English. This dilemma of China's EFL writing instruction seems to be related to the decontextualized EFL writing practices. This study aims to examine how Chinese EFL college students respond to changes in their writing instruction that pays attention to the context of EFL teaching and learning. In this study, context refers to three levels: linguistic context, situational context and cultural context. Using the mixed methods approach, I conducted the study by engaging 60 second-year undergraduate students from a university in China and five Chinese students studying in a joint program in a university in the United States. The Write-to-learn Model based on my context-oriented framework was used in the study. The findings of the study show that following a 5-month training with the Write-to-learn Model, the experimental group improved significantly more than the control group with respect to English writing, indicating that adding context to EFL teaching and learning created positive writing outcomes for EFL students. In addition, the results of this study also demonstrate that the Chinglish phenomenon was related to decontextualized EFL writing practices and thought patterns resulting from culture. Adequate comprehensible input of authentic materials was found to be a good remedy to minimize EFL students' Chinglish expressions. This study found that the Write-to-learn Model was an effective approach in China's EFL writing classes.