• 제목/요약/키워드: EFL academic writing

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Effectiveness of Non-Face-to-Face Online Academic English Writing Instruction on Korean EFL College Learners' Writing Skills and Writing Anxiety

  • Hye Kyung Kim
    • International Journal of Advanced Culture Technology
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    • 제11권1호
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    • pp.12-17
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    • 2023
  • This study investigates the effects of online English writing instruction on university students' writing performance and their anxiety. A total of 34 participants completed the pre- and post- writing tests as well as the surveys regarding perceived anxiety toward English writing. Reflection papers and interviews were employed to triangulate the results of the questionnaires. Quantitative analysis of learners' writing outcomes and surveys revealed that online writing instruction helped improve students' writing skills and reduce writing anxiety. The interviews and reflection papers demonstrated that learners found the writing instruction helpful in reducing somatic anxiety, avoidance behavior, and cognitive anxiety. The current study suggests that adopting non-face-to-face online writing instruction aids EFL students in developing their writing and alleviating writing anxiety.

Putting Images into Second Language: Do They Survive in the Written Drafts?

  • Huh, Myung-Hye
    • 영어영문학
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    • 제56권6호
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    • pp.1255-1279
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    • 2010
  • Much has already been learned about what goes on in the minds of second language writers as they compose, yet, oddly enough, until recently little in the L2 research literature has addressed writing and mental imagery together. However, images and imaging (visual thinking) play a crucial role in perception (the basis of mental imagery), in turn, affecting language, thinking, and writing. Many theorists of mental imagery also agree that more than just language accounts for how we think and that imagery is at least as crucial as language. All of these demands, to be sure, are compounded for EFL students, which is why I investigate EFL students' writing process, focusing on the use of mental imagery and its relationship to the writing. First I speculate upon some ways that imagery influences EFL students' composing processes and products. Next, I want to explore how and whether the images in a writer's mind can be shaped effectively into a linear piece of written English in one's writing. I studied two university undergraduate EFL students, L and J. They had fairly advanced levels of English proficiency and exhibited high level of writing ability, as measured by TOEFL iBT Test. Each student wrote two comparison and contrast essays: one written under specified time limitations and the other written without the pressure of time. In order to investigate whether the amount of time in itself causes differences within an individual in imagery ability, the students were placed under strict time constraints for Topic 1. But for Topic 2, they were encouraged to take as much time as necessary to complete this essay. Immediately after completing their essays, I conducted face-to-face retrospective interviews with students to prompt them for information about the role of imagery as they write. Both L and J have spent more time on their second (untimed) essays. Without time constraint, they produced longer texts on untimed essay (149 vs. 170; 186 vs 284 words). However, despite a relatively long period of time spent writing an essay, these students neither described their images nor detailed them in their essays. Although their mental imagery generated an explosion of ideas for their writings, most visual thinking must merely be a means toward an end-pictures that writers spent in purchasing the right words or ideas.

Effects of Ongoing Feedback on Students' Attitudes towards Writing

  • Yang, Tae-Sun
    • 영어어문교육
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    • 제16권1호
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    • pp.171-188
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    • 2009
  • The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of ongoing feedback from the professor in students' processes of learning and developing writing skills. Specifically, the researcher was concerned with how ongoing feedback affected students' attitudes towards writing because in EFL contexts, motivating students to write is a first step to engage them in a challenging journey of academic writing. 20 freshmen taking a writing course, "Paragraph & Essay Writing", at A university participated in this study and they were asked to complete the questionnaire at the end of the spring semester 2009. The results revealed that receiving ongoing feedback from the professor had a positive influence on affective domain, was helpful to develop learning strategies, and was valuable in learning outcomes. However, they also expressed negative opinions: feeling a burden, focusing on forms, and feeling confused. To reflect their opinions, the following four suggestions were made to create a more effective learning environment: promoting learner autonomy, facilitating individual writing conferences, giving balanced feedback in between form and content, and using judicious feedback through careful streaming.

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Reference and Substitution as Cohesion Devices in EFL Writing

  • Eun, Ho-Yoon;Jeon, Byoung-Man
    • 영어어문교육
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    • 제15권4호
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    • pp.23-36
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    • 2009
  • This paper aims to investigate the use of reference and substitution as cohesion devices by advanced Korean EFL writers and English native writers. Twelve research articles (totaling 218 pages, 93,033 words) written in English were collected in academic journals. Half of the research articles were prepared by Koreans and the other half were written by native writers. Several demonstrative pronouns, personal pronouns and demonstrative adverbs were selected as referential cohesion devices for this study. Three substitutional cohesion devices were also chosen. Their frequency was investigated at first, after which their preference was analyzed. There was not much difference in the overall use of cohesion devices between the two groups. Some devices were used by Korean writers more often than native ones. Reasons for this could be high English proficiency of Korean writers, their hyper-correction or the influence of Korean culture. Other more distinctive cohesion features such as conjunctions are recommended for analysis of cohesion in future research.

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Citation Practices in Academic Corpora: Implications for EAP Writing

  • Min, Su-Jung
    • 영어어문교육
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    • 제10권3호
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    • pp.113-126
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    • 2004
  • Explicit reference to the work of other authors is an essential feature of most academic research writings. Corpus analysis of academic text can reveal much about what writers actually do and why they do so. Application of corpus tools in language education has been well documented by many scholars (Pedersen, 1995, Swales, 1990, Thompson, 2000). They demonstrate how computer technology can assist in the effective analysis of corpus based data. For teaching purposes, tills recent research provides insights in the areas of English for Academe Purposes (EAP). The need for such support is evident when students have to use appropriate citations in their writings. Using Swales' (1990) division of citation forms into integral and non-integral and Thompson and Tnbble's (2001) classification scheme, this paper codifies academic texts in a corpus. The texts are academic research articles from different disciplines. The results lead into a comparison of the citation practices m different disciplines. Finally, it is argued that the information obtained in this study is useful for EAP writing courses in EFL countries.

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한국 학생들의 영작문 전략: 텍스트 분석과 교사와의 인터뷰를 중심으로 (English Writing Strategies of Korean Students: Exploring Written Texts and Interviews with the Teacher)

  • 이영화;김선재
    • 한국콘텐츠학회논문지
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    • 제14권10호
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    • pp.829-839
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    • 2014
  • 본 연구의 목적은 한국의 한 대학에 개설된 영작문 수업에서 수사 패턴과 의미 구성을 통해 학생들의 영작문 전략을 살펴보는 것이다. 참여자는 선택 과목으로 개설된 영작문 수업의 교사와 학생들이며, 학생들이 작성한 영어 의견문과 교사와의 인터뷰가 주된 데이터이다. 데이터 분석을 위해 '주장-근거' 패턴이 사용되었다. 분석 결과, 89%의 학생들이 주장, 근거, 그리고 결론의 요소를 사용하였으며, 또한 89%의 학생들은 수업 시간에 사용된 교과서에 등장하는 모델 글의 내용을 그대로 모방하거나 혹은 미미한 수준으로 발전시켜 자신들의 글 내용을 구성하였다. 이는 작문에서 창조성과 상상력을 가장 중요시하는 교수자의 수업의도와는 매우 동떨어진 것이었다. 이러한 결과는 대학 수업에서 좋은 점수를 얻기 위한 학생들의 '수용'전략으로 해석되어질 수 있다. 본 연구의 결론은 학생들은 교사의 수업 의도와는 상관없이 재설정된 환경에서의 성공을 위해 자신들의 방식으로 영어 작문을 위한 나름의 전략을 구사한다는 것을 보여준다.

In My Opinion: Modality in Japanese EFL Learners' Argumentative Essays

  • Pemberton, Christine
    • 아시아태평양코퍼스연구
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    • 제1권2호
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    • pp.57-72
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    • 2020
  • This study seeks to add to the current understanding of learners' use of modality in argumentative writing. A learner corpus of argumentative essays on four topics was created and compared to native English speaker data from the International Corpus Network of Asian Learners of English (ICNALE). The relationship between learners' use of modal devices (MDs) and the devices' appearance in the school's curriculum was also examined. The results showed that learners relied on a very narrow range of MDs compared to those in previous studies. The frequency of use of MDs varied based on the topic and did not seem to be driven by cultural factors as has been previously suggested. Learners used more hedges than boosters on all topics, contradicting most previous studies. Curriculum was determined to have a direct correlation with MD use, and other important factors may include perception of topic and overreliance on certain MDs over others (the One-to-One principal). This research implies that learners' perception of topic should be explored further as a variable affecting MD use. Curricula should be designed based on frequency of MD use by English native speakers, and learners should receive instruction that teaches the norms of MD use in academic writing. The methodology used in the study to determine correlations between MD use and the curriculum has a wide range of potential applications in the field of Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis.