The Impact of Wiki-Based Collaborative Writing on English L2 Learners' Individual Writing Development
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Portland State University PDXScholar Dissertations and Theses Dissertations and Theses Summer 8-29-2014 The Impact of Wiki-based Collaborative Writing on English L2 Learners' Individual Writing Development Gina Christina Caruso Portland State University Follow this and additional works at: https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/open_access_etds Part of the First and Second Language Acquisition Commons Let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Caruso, Gina Christina, "The Impact of Wiki-based Collaborative Writing on English L2 Learners' Individual Writing Development" (2014). Dissertations and Theses. Paper 2004. https://doi.org/10.15760/etd.2003 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of PDXScholar. Please contact us if we can make this document more accessible: [email protected]. The Impact of Wiki-based Collaborative Writing on English L2 Learners’ Individual Writing Development By Gina Caruso A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages Thesis Committee: Nike Arnold, Chair Susan Conrad Tanya Sydorenko Portland State University 2014 ABSTRACT 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 i 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. ii DEDICATION I dedicate this work to all those who have encouraged, supported, and inspired me throughout my three years at Portland State University. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I’d like to extend my gratitude to my dear friend and colleague Domminick McParland. Without his help and cooperation, this study would not have been possible. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................................. i DEDICATION ............................................................................................................................................ iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...................................................................................................................... iv LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................................................. viii LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................... 1 Purpose of the Study ............................................................................................................................. 1 Motivation for the Study ...................................................................................................................... 2 Overview .................................................................................................................................................... 4 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................... 5 Collaboration in the L2 Classroom ................................................................................................... 5 Collaboration in L2 Writing ............................................................................................................. 12 Peer Feedback in L2 Writing ........................................................................................................................ 13 Jointly-written L2 Texts ................................................................................................................................. 16 Defining the Developmental Measures of CAF...................................................................................... 17 Fluency .................................................................................................................................................................. 19 Complexity ........................................................................................................................................................... 19 Syntactic Complexity .................................................................................................................................. 20 Lexical Complexity ....................................................................................................................................... 22 Accuracy ............................................................................................................................................................... 23 Learner Perceptions of Collaborative Writing Activities ................................................................. 30 Wikis: Background and Use for Collaborative Writing ........................................................ 31 Wikis in L2/FL Education ................................................................................................................. 34 Tasks in Wiki-based Collaborative Writing ........................................................................................... 35 Perceptions of Wiki-based Collaborative Writing ............................................................................... 36 Product-oriented Collaborative Writing ................................................................................................. 38 Process-oriented Collaborative Writing .................................................................................................. 39 Research Questions ............................................................................................................................. 45 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ........................................................................................................ 46 Research Design ................................................................................................................................... 46 Participants ............................................................................................................................................ 47 The Course .............................................................................................................................................. 50 Selection Procedures .......................................................................................................................... 50 Task Design ............................................................................................................................................ 51 Procedure ............................................................................................................................................... 55 Wiki Selection and Design ............................................................................................................................. 56 v Pilot Study............................................................................................................................................... 58 Sequencing of the Present Study ................................................................................................................ 59 Pretest ............................................................................................................................................................... 60 Orientation/Wiki Training Session ...................................................................................................... 61 Collaborative Writing Treatments .......................................................................................................