‘According to…’: The impact of language background and writing expertise on textual priming patterns of multi-word sequences in academic writing

2021 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 47-59
Author(s):  
Min Wang ◽  
Yiqiong Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
Language Background ◽  
Writing Expertise ◽  
The Impact

The Use of Multimedia and its Impact on Bangladeshi EFL Learners at Tertiary Level

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 150
Author(s):  
Farzana Sharmin Pamela Islam
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
English Language ◽  
Capital City ◽  
Tertiary Level ◽  
Language Classroom ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Impact

As 21st century is the era of modern technologies with different aspects, it offers us to make the best use of them. After tape recorder and overhead projector (OHP), multimedia has become an important part of language classroom facilities for its unique and effective application in delivering and learning lesson. Although in many parts of Bangladesh, a South Asian developing country, where English enjoys the status of a foreign language, the use of multimedia in teaching and learning is viewed as a matter of luxury. However, nowadays the usefulness and the necessity of it are well recognized by the academics as well as the government. The study aims to focus on the difference between a traditional classroom void of multimedia and multimedia equipped classrooms at university level by explaining how multimedia support the students with enhanced opportunity to interact with diverse texts that give them more in-depth comprehension of the subject. It also focuses on audio-visual advantage of multimedia on the students’ English language learning. The study has followed a qualitative method to get an in-depth understanding of the impact of using multimedia in an English language classroom at tertiary level. For this purpose, the data have been collected from two different sources. Firstly, from students’ written response to  an open ended question as to their comparative experience of learning  lessons with and without multimedia facilities; and secondly, through  observation of English language classes at a private university of Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh. The discussion of the study is limited to  the use of multimedia in English language classroom using cartoons, images and music with a view to enhance students’ skills in academic writing, critical analysis of image and critical appreciation of music. For this purpose, cartoons in English language, images from Google and music from You Tube have got focused discussion in this paper.

Rater variation in pragmatic assessment: The impact of the linguistic background on peer-assessment and self-assessment

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-85
Author(s):  
Sunni L. Sonnenburg-Winkler ◽  
Zohreh R. Eslami ◽  
Ali Derakhshan
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Speech Acts ◽  
English Language ◽  
Rating Scale ◽  
Peer Assessment ◽  
Self Assessment ◽  
Native Languages ◽  
Social Rules ◽  
Language Background ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThe present study investigates variability among raters from different linguistic backgrounds, who evaluated the pragmatic performance of English language learners with varying native languages (L1s) by using both self- and peer-assessments. To this end, written discourse completion task (WDCT) samples of requesting speech acts from 10 participants were collected. Thereafter, the participants were asked to assess their peers’ WDCTs before assessing their own samples using the same rating scale. The raters were further asked to provide an explanation for their rating decisions. Findings indicate that there may indeed be a link between a rater’s language background and their scoring patterns, although the results regarding peer- and self-assessment are mixed. There are both similarities and differences in the participants’ use of pragmatic norms and social rules in evaluating appropriateness.

scholarly journals The impact of mediated learning on the academic writing performance of medical students in flipped and traditional classrooms: scaffolding techniques

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Laleh Khojasteh ◽  
Seyyed Ali Hosseini ◽  
Elham Nasiri
Keyword(s):  
Medical Students ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Flipped Classroom ◽  
Second Language Learners ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Mediated Learning ◽  
Writing Classes ◽  
Writing Group ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Experimental Group

AbstractWriting as a multiple-step process is one of the most complex and demanding skills for graduate students to master. Foreign or second language learners who are required to write for academic purposes at the university level may even find it more demanding to master. One of the ways of decreasing the burden of mastering this skill for learners is mediation, using scaffolding techniques to teach writing. Hence, having a good understanding of the impact(s) of adopting mediating or scaffolding techniques in writing classes is absolutely indispensable. To this end, the present study employed an experimental research design to investigate the impact of mediation in the flipped writing classrooms of the students of medicine. To peruse this goal, 47 medical students were selected through purposive sampling and put into control and treatment groups. Medical students in the treatment group watched teacher-made video content(s) before their writing classes. The students in this group experienced organized-interactive writing group activities in their classes. Unlike the experimental group, the students in the control group received all the instructions in the classroom and were assigned homework. The findings obtained through the ANOVA and t-test indicated that the students in the experimental group significantly outperformed their counterparts in the control group in terms of their writing. A probable conclusion could be that by requiring students to study in advance and take responsibility for their learning, flipped classroom can provide the opportunity for learners to actively construct knowledge rather than receive the information passively in the classroom. Flipped classroom can also cultivate interactive class time for teachers and enable them to invest in more fruitful academic practices, instead of asking students to spend a substantial amount of time each week doing homework independently.

scholarly journals Teacher Learning Community and EFL Teacher Professional Development

2021 ◽  
pp. 54-58
Author(s):  
Hongmei Han ◽  
◽  
Jinghua Wang
Keyword(s):  
Professional Development ◽  
Learning Community ◽  
Teacher Learning ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Teaching Practice ◽  
Research Activities ◽  
Efl Teachers ◽  
Teachers Professional Development ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Teacher Learning Community

This study explores the impact of teacher learning community on EFL teachers’ professional development. The participants are 17 EFL teachers from Hebei University in China. A year-long study was conducted on these teachers' group leaning activities through participatory observation and in-depth interviews. The preliminary results are as follows: 1) Generally speaking, through conversation, interaction and online peer evaluation in learning community, participant teachers have improved professionally in terms of critical thinking, academic writing, reflective thinking and research awareness; 2) In learning activities of the community, the experienced teachers focused more on the construction of knowledge regarding research methodology, through interaction with others and participation in teaching-based research activities, to reconstruct their knowledge about teaching and research; while the novice teachers placed more emphasis on the reconstruction of knowledge regarding pedagogical theories and the way these theories are applied in teaching practice, through social interaction with other teachers.

scholarly journals Beyond Diversity

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Joris van Eijnatten
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
The State ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Impact

The overwhelming popularity in academic writing of such concepts as transnationalism, anti-essentialism and postcolonialism illustrate the impact of the postmodern critique of once-stable entities ranging from the nation and the state to culture and civilization. We no longer believe in the steady orderings of humanity bequeathed by ‘heavy modernity’. But does this mean that concepts like the nation and civilization are obsolete? This article takes issue with the current hype of transnationalism, and suggests a correction to the current focus on interconnectedness, networks and flows by introducing the concept of ‘reference cultures’. It claims that in the history of the world, robust collective mentalities act as a counter-balance to cultures in motion.

The impact of automated feedback on L2 learners’ written causal explanations

ReCALL ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-203 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aysel Saricaoglu
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
Evaluation System ◽  
Rank Test ◽  
Causal Explanations ◽  
Writing Evaluation ◽  
Cause And Effect ◽  
Specific Feedback ◽  
Signed Rank Test ◽  
Automated Feedback ◽  
The Impact

AbstractEven though current technologies allow for automated feedback, evaluating content and generating discourse-specific feedback is still a challenge for automated systems, which explains the gap in research investigating the effect of such feedback. This study explores the impact of automated formative feedback on the improvement of English as a second language (ESL) learners’ written causal explanations within two cause-and-effect essays and across pre- and post-tests. Pre- and post-test drafts, feedback reports for first and revised drafts from the automated writing evaluation system, and screen-capturing videos collected from 31 students enrolled in two sections of an advanced-low-level academic writing class were analyzed through descriptive statistics and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test. Findings revealed statistically significant changes in learners’ causal explanations within one cause-and-effect essay while no significant improvement was observed across pre- and post-tests. The findings of this study offer not only insights into how to further improve automated discourse-specific feedback but also pedagogical implications for better learning outcomes.

Mobile Computing and Mixed-Initiative Support for Writing Competence

2012 ◽  
pp. 327-341 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vive Kumar ◽  
Maiga Chang ◽  
Tracey L. Leacock
Keyword(s):  
Situated Learning ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Grade School ◽  
Learning Context ◽  
Core Skill ◽  
Early School ◽  
Mixed Initiative ◽  
The University ◽  
Writing Competence ◽  
The Impact

Writing is a core skill that learners are expected to develop in their early school years and use effectively throughout their later school years. Historically, writing has been considered the purview of grade school education, yet there is evidence that learners seem to lack basic writing skills even at the university level. Unfortunately, the challenges posed by the volume of data created when students write have hampered writing researchers’ attempts to study the impacts of grade school writing initiatives in depth. This chapter introduces two novel approaches to academic writing activities that hold the potential to enhance writing competence and make it easier for researchers to understand the impact of writing interventions. The first uses mobile devices in a situated learning context, and the second uses a mixed-initiative writing system in the classroom.

scholarly journals Sexual violence during research: How the unpredictability of fieldwork and the right to risk collide with academic bureaucracy and expectations

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luisa T Schneider
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Sierra Leone ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Early Career ◽  
Early Career Researchers ◽  
Competitive Disadvantage ◽  
The Right ◽  
The University ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Research Endeavour

In a contradictory fashion, researchers, their departments and universities simultaneously recognize the unpredictability of fieldwork experiences and outcomes and help establish a bureaucratic system of planning every component of their research. Ethnographic unpredictability and its consequences are a fact of fieldwork and it is essential that researchers and institutions are prepared to view these as part of interpretable data, to learn from them and not mask them. This article examines ethnographic unpredictability through the lens of sexual violence which I experienced during my doctoral fieldwork in Sierra Leone. I show how I redirected my research and renegotiated my position as an academic. I discuss the culture of risk and analyse the influence of neoliberalism on the university. I describe how ‘market logic’ conceptualizes unpredictability as competitive disadvantage. I show the impact that the imaginary ‘perfect academic’ has on early career researchers and the complicity of mainstream academic (re-)presentation in nourishing the image of the ‘in-control academic’ through muting personal field experiences and vulnerabilities and silencing unpredictable occurrences in academic writing. I conclude with recommendations on how personal situatedness, vulnerabilities, and transformations can be approached as factors in every research endeavour which must not pose threats to an institution’s competitive advantage.

The Impact of Knowledge of English Rhetorical Patterns of Organisation on BA Accounting and Finance Students' Writing Academic Genres

2020 ◽  
pp. 128-149
Author(s):  
Malika Kouti
Keyword(s):  
Direct Instruction ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Rhetorical Patterns ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Academic Genres ◽  
The University ◽  
The Impact

This chapter discusses the impact of knowing the English rhetorical pattern of organisation on BA Accounting and Finance students' academic writing. More specifically, it focuses on the knowledge of how to structure a letter of application for job hunting purposes. This case study involved the analysis of 40 letters of application written by 40 Accounting and Finance students in the Department of Accounting and Finance at the University of Ghardaïa, Algeria after they had been trained to structure this type of letter. The training lasted for two sessions in the Department of Accounting and Finance at Ghardaia University, Algeria. The training was a direct instruction in which students were shown activities that assisted them in mastering the rhetorical pattern of organisation that concerns letters of application. They were also shown the difference between formal and informal letters of application. The obtained results demonstrated the efficiency of the direct instruction in teaching Accounting and Finance students how to write a letter of application.

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