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THAILAND TESOL ORGANIZATION is a professional non-profit and non-political organization established under the patronage of H.R.H. Princess Galyani Vadhana Krom Luang Naradhiwas Rajanagarindra. Its purposes are to support English language teaching and learning at all levels, to act as one of the ELT professional organizations, and to strengthen networking with ELT organizations nationally and internationally.
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THAITESOL JOURNAL (ISSN 2286-8909) is published twice a year, in June and December by Thailand TESOL Organization. It is intended to provide a forum for research and the exchange of information including opinion on theory and practice in the teaching of English to speakers of other languages.
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THAITESOL JOURNAL
Volume 28 Number 1
Published by Thailand TESOL Organization Established under the Patronage of Her Royal HighnessPrincess Galyani Vadhana Krom Luang Naradhiwas Rajanagarindra
CONTENTS
ARTICLES
The Relationship between MI Theory and ESL Students’ Reading Ability 1 AUNYARAT TANDAMRONG
Meaning Negotiation and Language-Focused Feedback in Text and Voice Chat 24 DO THI HA
Promoting Written Production and Critical Thinking Skills through BLOG Activities 54 HIROSHI NAKAGAWA DAVID WRIGHT
Sub-disciplinary Variations in Marine Engineering Research Article Sections 78 JU CHUAN HUANG
Relationship between Japanese EFL Learners’ Learning Attitude and 93 Demotivational Factors YUUKI OGAWA SAKI INOUE
Using a Self-Assessment Model in an Indonesian EFL Writing Class 116 TAUFIQULLOH
BOOK REVIEW Research Methods for Applied Language Studies: An Advance Resource Book for 139 Students Reviewed by MONTHON KANOKPERMPOON
EDITORS
Editor Leslie Barratt Roi-Et Rajabhat University, Thailand Indiana State University, USA
Managing Editor Paneeta Nitayaphorn Flight Crew Resource Training Department, Thai Airways International Thailand
EDITORIAL REVIEW BOARD
Anchalee Chayanuwat Walailak University Apisak Pupipat Thammasat University, Thailand Chaleosri Pibulchol Distance Learning Foundation, Thailand Chongrak Liangpanit Khon Kaen University, Thailand Chutamas Sundrarajun Assumption University, Thailand Ira Rasikawati Universitas Kristen Krida Wacana, Indonesia Janpanit Surasin Burapha University,Thailand Jason Loh National Institute of Education, Singapore Kantatip Sinhaneti Shinawatra University, Thailand Kittitouch Soontornwipast Thammasat University, Thailand Nopporn Sarobol Thammasat University, Thailand Panna Chaturongakul Thammasat University, Thailand Pattamawan Jimarkon Zilli Kasetsart University, Thailand Pragasit Sitthitikul Thammasat University, Thailand Singhanart Nomnian Mahidol University, Thailand Stephen M. Ryan Stamford International University, Thailand Suchada Nimmannit Chulalongkorn University, Thailand Supanit Kulsiri Srinakarinwirot University, Thailand Supatra Sutjaritrak Kasetsart University, Thailand Supakorn Phoocharoensil Thammasat University, Thailand
Supong Tangkiengsirisin Thammasat University, Thailand Toshiyuki Takagaki Onomichi City University, Japan Unchalee Sermsongswad Rose Marie Academy, Thailand Ubon Sanpatchayapong Rangsit University, Thailand ______Assistant Editor Witcha Wisuthipranee Thai Airways International, Thailand Yimpeingyao Wiyaporn Kasikorn Bank
THAILAND TESOL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Advisory Board: Ubon Sanpatchayapong Rangsit University Maneepen Apibalsri Rangsit University Chaleosri Pibulchol Distance Learning Foundation Suchada Nimmannit Chulalongkorn University Naraporn Chan-Ocha Distant Learning Foundation Duncan Wilson British Council Joelle Uzarski RELO, US Embassy Michael Kelley AUA Language Center Wanna Chongdarakul Ministry of Education Watinee Kharnwong Dept. of Education and Training, Australian Embassy Past Presidents: Nopporn Sarobol Thammasat University Immediate Past President: Unchalee Sermsongsawad Rose Marie Academy President: Pragasit Sitthitikul Thammasat University First Vice President: Anamai Damnet Kasetsart University Second Vice President: Paneeta Nitayaphorn Thai Airways International Secretary: Sukanda Sa-Ngaphan Thammasat University Assistant Secretary: Jaruda Rajani Na Ayuthaya Kasetsart University Treasurer Payupol Suthathothan Chiang Mai University Webmaster Wajirawit Kributr Thai Airways International Thairath Kulkrachang Thailand Post Co., Ltd. Assistant Webmaster: Vorakorn Tuvachit Assumption University Public Relations: Supong Tangkiengsirisin Thammasat University Publications: Leslie Barratt Rot-Et Rajabhat University and Indiana State University Paneeta Nitayaphorn Thai Airways International Nopporn Sarobol Thammasat University Membership Coordinator: Apisara Sritulanon Panyapiwat Institute of Management Sita Yiemkuntitayorn Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University Archival Unit: Phachara Saiphet Thammasat University
Members-at-large: Kitthitouch Soontornwipast Thammasat University Singhanat Nomnian Mahidol University Supanit Kulsiri Srinakharinwirot University Regional Affiliates Upper Northern: Suchanart Sitanurak Chiang Mai Rajabhat University Paksiri Tongsen Maejo University Lower Northern: Phongsakorn Methitham Naresuan University Central: Tossapol Peakew Bodindecha (Sing Singhaseni) School Surachai Yusuk Nakhon Pathom Rajabhat University Upper Northeastern: Dararat Khampusean Khon Kaen University Lower Northeastern: Saowadee Kongpeth Ubon Ratchathani University Upper Southern: Sujin Nukaew Nakhon Si Thammarat University Lower Southern: Noppakao Na-phatthalung Thaksin University
Join us at
36th Annual Thailand TESOL International Conference The Changing Landscape of ELT: Empowerment through Glocalization
Pullman Raja Orchid Hotel Khon Kaen, Thailand January 29 – 30, 2016
www.thailandtesol.org
EDITORIAL
Welcome to the third issue of THAITESOL Journal. As your new editor, I found the articles impressive particularly because of their authors’ attempts to integrate technology and innovative practices into teaching English in their contexts.
As teachers search for better ways to meet the needs of their learners, studying learner differences is critical. In the first article, The Relationship between MI Theory and ESL Students’ Reading Ability, Aunyarat Tandamrong examines the connection between reading scores and multiple intelligence profiles of students at a military university. Although the number of participants was small, the findings suggest a possible relationship between existential intelligence and reading proficiency. Large-scale research is needed into this area with respect to other populations.
Next, in Meaning Negotiation And Language-Focused Feedback in Text and Voice Chat, Do Thi Ha used spot-the-difference tasks with pairs of learners and found that voice chat produced more negotiation about meaning than text chat, which is counter to Pellettieri (2000) who found that text chat would promote more monitoring and higher proficiency than oral negotiation. This study supports the use of speaking or voice chat in task-based activities to encourage negotiation of meaning.
The following article also concerns the use of technology in teaching. Promoting Written Production and Critical Thinking Skills through Blog Activities by Hiroshi Nakagawa and David Wright explores the use of electronic journals to increase students’ writing skills. The results of their study indicate that such blogs combined with oral discussion produced the highest gains in writing and that students had a positive reaction to the peer interactions.
Genre-based pedagogy has gained popularity as research has shown great variation in academic writing in different disciplines. Taking this notion one step deeper, Ju Chuan Huang examines Sub-Disciplinary Variations in Marine Engineering Research Article Sections. The examination of nouns and verbs revealed that numerous differences exist throughout articles written in different sub-fields even within a single discipline of marine engineering. While this study focused on marine engineering, its findings have implications for all instructors of ESP and, ultimately, for language instructors in general.
Relationship between Japanese EFL Learners’ Learning Attitude and Demotivational Factors is the topic of the contribution by Yuuki Ogawa and Saki Inoue. Using questionnaires with first-year university students, Ogawa and Inoue found differences in the general learning attitude of students with lower and higher TOEIC scores but not substantially in what influenced their lack of motivation for learning English. The authors suggest that more opportunities for students to personalize their study and to use English in communication would foster motivation, particularly among lower-level students, who are simply studying to pass the exam.
In the final article of this issue, Using a Self-Assessment Model in an Indonesian EFL Writing Class, Taufiqulloh describes a study that supported the hypothesis that self-assessment can improve writing competency, particularly with field independent students. Field independent students also developed better reflective practices and were more enthusiastic about self - assessment.
In addition to the articles outlined briefly above, this volume contains a book review of Research Methods for Applied Language Studies: an advance resource book for students, which was written by Keith Richards, Steven Ross & Paul Seedhouse and published in 2012. The review by Monthon Kanokpermpoon emphasizes the book’s usefulness to both novice and experienced researchers and gives examples of chapters that different readers might find particularly helpful.
I hope that my brief summaries will prompt you to read the full articles yourself. As you will see, the authors have carried out extensive research projects that attempt to advance our knowledge in the field, particularly with regard to the types of practices others might implement in teachi ng writing and the types of learners who can benefit most from those practices. Thank you to all of the authors for your hard work and your diligent revisions, to the reviewers for evaluating the selections, and to the leadership and membership of Thailand TESOL for all of the work you do in advancing the field.
Leslie Barratt Editor
THE AUTHORS
Aunyarat Tandamrong is currently a PhD candidate and research assistant at the Faculty of Education, Monash University, Australia. She holds a Master Degree in Applied Linguistics (TESOL), and Graduate Diploma in Linguistics from the University of Melbourne. Her current research focuses on teacher professional identity, learner-centered education, teacher professional development, teacher learning, teachers’ beliefs and practices, TESOL curriculum development, and multiple-intelligence (MI) theory.
David Wright has taught, as a Junior Associate Professor. His collaborative research has involved the tracking of oral proficiency using automated systems and an aviation English study that examines English communication in the cockpit.
Do Thi Ha is currently working as a lecturer at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education, Vietnam. While previously teaching English in a high school for gifted students, she was awarded NZAID scholarship to go for her Master’s degree in New Zealand in 2010. She then realized her interests in CALL and Language Testing, which motivated a shift in her teaching position.
Hiroshi Nakagawa completed Master of Science degree in TESOL from Fort Hays State University in Hays, KS. He has specialized in cultural diversity and English language learning.
Ju Chuan Huang is an assistant professor of the Institute of Applied English at National Taiwan Ocean University. Her research interests include English for Specific Purposes, English for Academic Purposes, and academic writing, especially writing for publication in English.
Saki Inoue graduated from a Master’s program TESOL at Soka University. She is teaching mainly basic and elementary level university students. Besides teaching, she works at the English learning consultation room and TOEFL iBT speaking center. Her research interests are Content-Based Instruction, Self-access centers and language policy.
Taufiqulloh is a teaching staff in the English Education Department, Teacher Training and Education Faculty, Pancasakti University Tegal Central Java, Indonesia. He is interested in teaching and conducting some researche in the area of academic writing, phonology and language asssement. He is currently studying at the Post-Graduate program of Semarang State University,
Indonesia majoring in English Education and developing research about self-assessment in EFL academic writing class for Indonesian students.
Yuuki Ogawa currently works at Soka University, Tokyo, Japan. She graduated from Soka University Graduate School Master’s Program in International Language Education TESOL. She teaches English to university students, who are regarded as false beginners. Her research interests are international understanding education, academic advising, and critical thinking.
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY
Aunyarat Tandamrong
A PhD candidate, Faculty of Education, Monash University, Australia
Abstract
Multiple intelligences (MI theory) has been studied in many fields including in applied linguistics, particularly in second language (L2) acquisition. There is a general assumption that a person with linguistic intelligence would perform language assessments better than other intelligence types (Gardner, 1999). This quantitative study was carried out on 46 ESL students in Australia investigating whether a relationship exists between the students’ MI profiles and their reading ability. The samples were students in Australia as well as ESL teachers in their home countries. The results revealed that only existential intelligence was statistically significant. This study suggests that ESL/EFL teachers should employ the MI questionnaire to investigate their students’ profiles so they could adjust teaching strategies and classroom practices that suit students’ existential knowledge.
Keywords: Multiple intelligences (MI theory), reading ability, ESL learners, English language reading test, existential intelligence
Introduction
Multiple Intelligences (MI theory) was introduced by Howard Gardner –the American psychologist in his published work ‘Frames of mind’ in 1983 (Gardner, 1983). Gardner developed his theory based on a corroborating evidence-based research from other fields such as anthropology, developmental psychology, brain research, cognitive science, and biographies of exceptional personalities (Popescu, 2010). Gardner postulated that human intelligence is a multi- faceted phenomenon rather than a single entity; he classifies human intelligences into at least nine types, which are verbal-linguistic; mathematical-logical; visual-spatial; musical rhythmic; bodily-kinesthetic; intrapersonal; interpersonal; naturalistic; and existential intelligences (see Appendix A). 2 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
MI theory describes human cognitive competence in terms of a set of abilities, natural aptitudes, and the capacity to learn from one’s past experience, particularly how the brain works when it receives information. Gardner suggested that there are many different capabilities that result in different ways of understanding of the world; therefore, intelligence for him is not only an ability to solve problems, but also to respond successfully to new situations (Gardner, 1983, 1993).
According to Gardner (1999) a person with high verbal-linguistic intelligence would perform better in language assessments than a person with low verbal-linguistic intelligence since this intelligence type is thought to be closely related to language competency. Gardner (1999) states that “it (verbal-linguistic intelligence) involves sensitivity to spoken and written language, the ability to learn languages, and the capacity to use language to accomplish certain goals” (as cited in Fahim, Bagherkazemi,& Alemi, 2010, p.2). To support this argument, Fahim et al.’s (2010) study on 163 EFL learners’ intelligence profiles and their reading scores of TOEFL and IELTS suggested that verbal-linguistic intelligence marked a significant correlation to both tests. Nonetheless, there are discrepancies in the previous research results regarding different groups of participants. This is because different individuals have different way to demonstrate the intellectual ability.
MI theory raised a call for more studies concerning the relationship between Gardner’s theory and language competencies, particularly in second and foreign language acquisition. Many researchers (e.g. Davis, Christodoulou, Seider, & Gardner, 2011; Popescu, 2010) believe that MI theory should be applied in many classrooms in different disciplines. One of the studies conducted in EFL contexts is Li, Wang, Kai, & Wang (2010) in China on the MI theory implemented in the multimedia and network technology. Li et al.’s study found that students were able to improve their English skills according to their cognitive level. This is because an online course they introduced, Multimedia Intelligence Course has given the students flexibility and more freedom to choose their own learning contents and learning methods that suit their preferences and individualized learning although all the students were learning the same topic (see, Li et al., 2010). MI theory has also been used in a special education for children with disabilities (see, Stanford, 2003). More importantly, in the field of education, MI theory provided a better way to understand an individual’s intelligence; such knowledge are useful to improve teaching strategies that suit learners best because the learners could become aware of the areas of intelligence they are less or more proficient in. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 3 Aunyarat Tandamrong
It should be noted that MI theory has been challenged by some scholars (e.g. Collins, 1998; Gottfredson, 2004; and Willingham, 2004) such as a lack of solid research support in terms of students’ MI profile exists in some classroom (for details see, Armstrong, 2009).
Literature Review
The relationship between MI theory and reading ability
Reading is one of the most complex cognitive processes, which involve a number of operations (such as word recognition and language comprehension), particularly for information processing (Gough & Tunmer, 1986; Hoover & Gough, 1990; Hudson, Pullen, Lane, & Torgesen, 2009). The human brain functions as a centre of the human mind to perform mental activities, such as thinking, criticizing, and remembering data which is similar to a language learning process. According to Koda & Zehler (2008), these cognitive processes are actually similar to other language processes of how people acquire language skills such as speaking, and listening. Moreover, reading is viewed as a psycholinguistic construct, and as such, the requisites for its acquisition are conceptualized as the cognitive and linguistic resources needed for print information extraction (decoding) and for text meaning construction (comprehension).
Similarly, Taylor et al. (1995) posited that when one reads something, the brain involves the whole process of mental activities, such as perceiving, remembering, analyzing, and interpreting. To support this issue, Sadeghi (2008) described reading as ‘a detective act’ in which readers use their cognitive ability in connecting all the relevant data to solve the problem; therefore, it is assumable that the readers’ comprehension can be affected by their cognitive abilities, particularly human intelligences. In addition, the MI theory mentioned an issue of reading as their crucial concern since reading ability is not only a skill to comprehend the information that the brain receives, but also to recognize data across literature. For example, when one reads a philosophical text, the brain uses more than vocabulary and linguistic knowledge but also existential intelligence that allows the reader to question the existence of life in order to comprehend the reading text. Therefore, the cognitive processes of mental activity are closely linked to reading processes.
Apart from verbal-linguistic intelligence, Armstrong (2003) pointed out that other intelligences play important parts in reading activities as well. For example, in terms of a written 4 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
text with descriptive scenario, the readers who have highly visual artistic skills or visual-spatial intelligence would be at more of an advantage at visualizing in reading comprehension than those who do not. Reading skills actually involve more than motivation and high interest in the reading materials. They also require other factors such as readers’ prior experiences and other skills such as word recognition, self-questioning, and thematic comprehension (Gough & Tunmer, 1986).
Empirical studies
A number of studies have been conducted investigating the correlation between the MI theory and reading competency. This section includes an account of the four studies that are most relevant to the present one (McMahon, Rose, & Parks, 2004; Marefat, 2007; Razmjoo, 2008, and Rahimi, Mirzaei, & Heidari, 2012).
McMahon et al. (2004) aimed to find the relationship between intellectual preferences and reading achievement, in which there were 288 students solicited from two Illinois school districts in the United States. The students were asked to complete the Gates-MacGinitie Test of reading, which is a national test used in many schools across the US in order to measure students’ reading comprehension, whereas their intelligence preferences were measured by the Teele Inventory of Multiple Intelligences (TIMI test). The findings indicated that the students’ reading skill significantly showed a correlation between linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences.
In contrast, Marefat (2007) conducted research in order to find a connection between students’ MI profiles and their writing products under the topic of MI and voices from an EFL writing class. The results revealed that bodily-kinesthetic, existential, and interpersonal intelligences made the greatest contribution toward predicting writing scores conducted from 72 EFL students in Iran. Since writing is fundamental to thinking about and learning ideas in all fields and as a means of communicating that knowledge, writing skill seems to require more than one intelligence type.
Unlike the findings from the two studies above, which showed a correlation between students’ MI profiles and their language competency, the more recent study conducted by Razmjoo on PhD candidate students’ MI and their language proficiency in 2008 yielded an extraordinary result that there was no significant relationship between these two factors. The result indicated that none of the intelligence types was indicated as the predictor for English language proficiency. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 5 Aunyarat Tandamrong
Despite contradictions in the previous research, the most recent study on the relationship between EFL readers’ MI profiles and their reading strategies conducted by Rahimi, Mirzaei, & Heidari (2012) revealed a similar result to McMahon et al.’s study in terms of a significant correlation between linguistic, logical-mathematical intelligences and students’ MI profiles. One of the potential reasons for the similar results between these two studies is that reading does not solely consist of linguistic acts, which involves all of the intelligences, but also many areas, nerves, and functions of the brain that are involved in literacy acquisition (Armstrong, 2000). Armstrong (2003) stated that although reading is a linguistic process, which is considered as an element of linguistic intelligence, the other eight MI types could, however, make an impact on a reader’s experience of reading. For instance, in order to comprehend the input passage, the reader has to think critically and logically, which reflects the logical- mathematical intelligence. It is probable that a reader’s reading ability partly consists of more than one intelligence type.
Previous studies have revealed different results in the study of students’ MI profiles and their reading ability; therefore, we may assume that diverse groups of participants reflect the relationship of these two variables differently. Despite a growing amount of research being conducted on EFL learners, however, it remains a relatively underexplored research on a certain group of occupations. Most studies investigated the participants with the same background such as age group and education while there is little research done on participants with different cultural and educational background yet who share a certain aspect in life. One of the most significant characteristics of the present study is to show different results obtained from overseas military students as a diverse group of EFL learners with different cultural and educational backgrounds, yet sharing the same occupation, particularly in the military service and interests in English language.
Research Questions
This study is aimed to answer two research questions:
(1) Is there any relationship among the military students’ MI profiles at the Australian Defence Force’s Defence International Training Centre (DITC) and their reading ability? Which types of MI are correlated with their reading scores? 6 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
(2) What type of intelligence is a potential predictor of students’ reading ability in a general English proficiency-reading test?
Methodology
This study aimed to find out if there are differences in the MI profiles of the military students who display varying levels of reading competency. Specifically, this study examined what type of MI profiles that are correlated with the participants’ reading test scores, and to discover the relationship between the two variables.
Participants
The participants for this study were 46 military students from all services - the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force in Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Asia Pacific region, who were participating in two intensive English courses: Special Australian English Language Course (SAELC) and Advanced Australian English Language Course (AAELC) at the Australian Defence Force’s Defence International Training Centre (DITC). Participants were convenient samples and approached by a third party to ask for their approval and permission. Approximately 80% of the students were male, which is not surprising given the participants’ occupation in military services.
Instrumentation
Data were collected over a four-week period in August and September 2012. To determine the student’s intelligence profiles, the MI questionnaire used in this research was created by McKenzie (1999). The questionnaire consists of 90 statements, which allow the participants to rate themselves according to the statements which they felt best described themselves. The highest possible rating of each section is 10, and lowest score is 0. Due to the nature of the questionnaire assessment, it is important to note that the reliability of the result is based on the students’ judgments on characteristics described in the questionnaire. Since this assessment type is based on the self-evaluation, the questionnaire results may not fully represent the actually personality of the participants. Therefore, the reliability and validity of the MI assessment is mainly based on the participants’ self-reports without the control from this study.
The reading test used was part of the DITC’s assessment –Australian Defence Force English Language Profiling System (ADFELPS), which is comprised of five tasks. The raw THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 7 Aunyarat Tandamrong
reading scores ranged from the possible lowest score of 0 up to the total score of 50. To complete the test, participants had to read news articles focused on military topics and then answer three types of questions: multiple choice; short answer; and gap-filling. For DITC test raters, ADFELPS is a graded test starting from general comprehension tasks such as reading for main idea to complex tasks such as inferring meaning.
Data Collection
In this study, the MI questionnaire and the reading test were administered separately. Four steps were taken: 1) the questionnaire on personal background was distributed; 2) the students were asked to complete the MI questionnaire task (as homework); 3) the military students completed the English reading test to test their reading ability (one hour); and 4) students were asked to provide a brief comment on MI questionnaire results.
Data Analysis
A Pearson’s correlation was used to verify research questions by Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20. Correlation analysis was performed to confirm or disconfirm if any relationship exists between the students’ MI profiles and their reading scores. To answer research question 2, the multiple regression analysis is used to indicate a potential predictor(s) of reading ability from the participants’ MI profiles. The demographics of participants included the fact that there were more men (n=38) than women (n=8). The majority of the participants had completed a Bachelor degree (15) or had been educated at a Military academy (14) and had completed Master degree (8). In terms of a first language (L1) background, the students came from Indonesian (n= 13), Vietnamese (n=8), Thai (n=7), Timor (n=5), and Arabic (n=4).
Results
The first step taken in this study was to test the reliability of the two tests: the MI questionnaire and the ADFELPS reading test, which were analyzed by Cronbach’s alpha (in Table 1 and Table 2). Second, to answer the research questions, the students’ intelligence profiles and reading scores were computed with descriptive statistics analysis. The Descriptive Statistics of the 46 valid cases’ performance on the reading test scores are presented in Table 3, and the 8 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
results of the MI questionnaire are presented in Table 4. These included descriptive statistics (Mean and Standard Deviation of both variables).
Table 1. Reliability Statistics of MI questionnaire of 46 valid students' cases
Cronbach’s Alpha N of items
.921 9
In Table 1, the calculation of Cronbach’s alpha score is .921, which indicates that the scale has high internal consistency or reliability. Referring to Kane (2006), if the alpha value is above .9, this means that there is a high level of reliability among the items in the questionnaire.
Table 2. Reliability Statistics of Reading test containing 33 questions
Cronbach’s Alpha N of items
.761 33
In contrast, the calculation of Cronbach’s alpha score for the reliability of the reading test is .761 (scores above a borderline of reliability). At this stage, in statistical terms, the reading test is less consistent than the MI questionnaire. Initially, the Cronbach’s alpha methods were used containing 50 questions; however, the reliability was unacceptably low (.591) because the correlation between particular items and the sum of the rest of the items was unacceptably low. Therefore, 17 items of the 50 questions were deleted. Those deleted items from the reading test were simple questions such as ‘true or false questions’ and ‘fill in the blank with numbers of date and time’ which allowed participants to give straightforward answers. Therefore, by removing poorly performing items, the total reliability of the remaining items were increased from .591 to.761.
Since the reliability of the reading test is slightly low or the test is not a reliable test by comparison to the MI questionnaire; thus, the results from this analysis may be somewhat distorted and inaccurate. It is important to note that there was a number of limitations in this study (such as the time constraint, and a small number of participants); therefore, this reading test used by DITC was sufficient to provide initial results in terms of an indicator of students’ reading ability in this study. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 9 Aunyarat Tandamrong
Table 3. Descriptive Statistics of the Reading Score
MinimumN Maximum Mean Std. Deviation
Reading Score 46 26 43 34.04 4.422 (Total score of 50)
The descriptive analysis in Table 3 illustrates statistical information on the distribution of the military students’ reading scores. Based on the results, the mean score of ADFELPS Reading Test is 34.04. It is moderate when compared to a minimum score of 26 and a maximum score of 43.
Table 4. Descriptive Statistics of MI questionnaire
Intelligence types Minimum Maximum Mean Std. Deviation
Natural 0 10 4.72 2.465
Musical 1 8 4.46 1.846
Logical 1 8 4.91 1.749
Existential 1 10 5.61 2.038
Interpersonal 1 9 5.30 1.965
Kinesthetic 1 9 5.80 2.104
Linguistics 0 9 5.43 2.146
Intrapersonal 1 10 6.26 2.225
Visual 1 10 5.41 2.146
Table 4 shows that students’ MI profiles were strongly based on two intelligence types: intrapersonal and bodily-kinesthetic intelligences, which indicate mean scores of 6.26 and 5.80 respectively. The two other intelligence types which seem to be most highly developed from these participants were existential (mean = 5.61) and verbal-linguistic intelligences (mean 10 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
=5.43). At the same time, the lowest mean score was in musical rhythmic intelligence (mean = 4.46). Because the MI questionnaire was based on self-identified, it is possible to produce an initial intelligences profile for individual students and an overall picture of the different perceptions. In terms of the standard deviation that shows the variability of the data set, naturalist intelligence was highest (Std. Deviation = 2.465).
To answer Research Questions 1, Pearson’s correlation coefficient was applied to identify if there was a relationship between the military students’ reading scores and their MI profiles. The results of this test are shown in Table 5.
Table 5. Pearson’s correlation coefficient
-
-
Reading Score Natural Musical Logical Existential Inter personal Kinesthetic Linguistics Intra personal Visual
Correlation -.078 -.174 -.071 -.319* -.025 -.097 -.157 .082 .003
Sig.(1-tailed) .302 .124 .319 .015 .436 .261 .149 .293 .493
Pearson’s correlation coefficient was used since it simply presents a general direction and the strength of relative position on the two variables being investigated in this present study; in other words, it shows how much the two variables are related to each other (Blaikie, 2003). However, I am aware that there is more than one way to analyze the quantitative data such as multivariate data analysis.
Table 5 shows that there was only one of the nine intelligence types which correlated to the students’ reading scores, that is existential intelligence (p=.015, r=.319). According to Salkind’s rule of thumb (2011), any correlation coefficient between .2 to .4 is considered as a weak relationship. In response to Research Question 1, Is there any relationship among the military students’ MI profiles at the DITC and their reading ability? -Which types of MI are correlated with their reading scores? The answer is that there is a relationship between the students’ reading scores and their intelligence profiles, particularly existential intelligence, even though it was considered as a weak relationship. The r value of .319 from Table 5 suggests that there is a negative relationship between the two variables. That is, if the students get a high score in the reading test, they may show a low score in the existential intelligence section or the other way around. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 11 Aunyarat Tandamrong
To answer Research Question 2, what type of intelligence is a potential predictor of students’ reading ability in a general English proficiency-reading test? A multiple linear regression analysis was carried out to determine what type of intelligence is a potential predictor(s) of students’ reading ability. The students’ reading scores were determined as a dependent variable, whilst the nine intelligence types were selected as independent variables. This is because each intelligence type is utilized differently, and they are not identical among different individuals. For example, one student may develop a particular intelligence better than others since the human brain receives and processes the data differently. Therefore, the MI types were best accounted for as independent variables.
Table 6. Regression of ADFELPS reading scores and MI scores (coefficients)
Model Unstandardized Coefficients Standardized t Sig. Coefficients
B Std. Error Beta
(Constant) 35.876 2.183 16.432 .000
Natural .315 .359 .176 .878 .386
Musical -.918 .607 -.383 -1.511 .140
Logical -.323 .555 -.128 -.582 .564
Existential -1.585 .503 -.731 -3.150 .003
Interpersonal .733 .672 .326 1.091 .282
Kinesthetic .248 .503 .118 .493 .625
Linguistic -.314 .415 -.152 -.757 .454
Intrapersonal .778 .412 .391 1.889 .067
Visual .509 .439 .247 1.159 .254
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The result in Table 6 indicates that there is only one significant predictor of reading ability in the MI profiles. Because there was only one intelligence type that made a statistically significant contribution to predict students’ reading score, which is existential intelligence with (p= .003), and since the rule of thumb stated that a significant value is less than .05, the answer to Research Question 2 is that the potential predictor of MI types within this group of participants was existential intelligence, or it is an indicator of the strongest contribution to the students’ reading ability.
It should be noted that the regression analysis is generally used with a large sample sizes in order to predict the possible outcome in the relationship of how the independent variables are related to the dependent variable. These predictions would also be testable if a large amount of data is available. Nevertheless, one of the main reasons that I still chose a regression analysis is because this model is often useful in terms of making assumptions to predict the outcome variables of this study to some extent. At this stage, the regression analysis used in this study is justified to present suggestive results from this particular participant group.
Discussion
The aim of this study was to investigate whether any relationship exists between the students’ MI profiles and their reading ability. The results suggest that there may be a relationship existing between the two variables, specifically it was considered as a weak relationship. The regression model revealed that existential intelligence was the only intelligence type that was related to the students’ reading ability. The results from this present study could be useful in terms of developing a teaching technique in order to help the military students at the DITC improve their reading scores in a general English proficiency-reading test.
Unlike the findings from previous studies, the results from the current study suggest that there was only one intelligence type that significantly affected students’ reading scores, that is existential intelligence. That is, within a group of these participants, the readers’ reading comprehension can be most affected by this intelligence type. According to Gardner (1999), existential intelligence is an individuals’ internal ability when learning and interacting with others; including the ability to be sensitive to conceptualizing and tackling deeper topics such as human existence; putting things in perspective; and seeing the big picture. Gardner revised his definition of existential intelligence again in Multiple Intelligences: New Horizons in theory and Practice (2006a) to include the idea that when people possess a strong existential intelligence, THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 13 Aunyarat Tandamrong
they have the capacity to “ponder the most fundamental questions of existence”. For example, why do we live? Why do we die? (Gardner 2006a, 2006b; Checkly, 1997; McCoog, 2010).
McCoog (2010) suggests that a person with a strong existential intelligence is very introspective. They normally recognize everything surrounding them since they are first aware of themselves. For example, they are able to explain and answer philosophical questions to themselves as well as to others such as an origin of human beings. McCoog suggested that people with this intelligence type would often have intrapersonal intelligence as well. In the current study, we can see from Table 6, that the significant value of intrapersonal intelligence was also relatively low in comparison to other intelligence types. In other words, intrapersonal intelligence slightly contributed to the military students’ reading ability. Therefore, the results from this study may support to some extent to what McCoog (2010) argued.
Returning to the teaching of reading, Goodman (1968) suggested that L2 language reading generally involves the interaction of an array of processes and knowledge between an author’s ideas and a reader’s understanding. The reader firstly accesses the text by decoding skills such as word recognition and then goes to higher level of cognitive skills such as inference and interactional skills. In particular, the latter one –interactional skills– requires individuals’ existential intelligence type to align, decode, and position oneself with the author’s point of view (Goodman, 1988). In addition, existential intelligence helps one to answer fundamental questions, and their complexity. In other words, existential intelligence refers to an ability to question and to answer the existence of something when one is trying to understand/comprehend the main idea of a reading passage.
To support this issue, a study from Marefat (2007) mentioned earlier found that existential intelligence was one of the three intelligence types that significantly contributed toward EFL students’ scores. In the group of participants in the current study, the results have suggested that it is not necessarily the case that verbal intelligence makes the strongest contribution to the dependent variable of the military students’ reading ability. Indeed, it was existential intelligence.
Apart from the MI influences, various factors were also expected to have an effect on students’ learning ability, including students’ prior knowledge, topic familiarity of a reading text, and language proficiency level, in terms of vocabulary, grammatical knowledge, and lexical structure. Importantly, these overseas military students were a diverse group of EFL learners who 14 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
had different cultural and educational backgrounds. That is, some of them had graduated from a military academy, while others had graduated from non-military schools. Therefore, their intelligence types and reading proficiency level may have developed differently regarding their previous educational background, oral language and logical capacities. According to Brunton, et al. (2006), there are two factors which help students to store the information longer in their brain as well as increase their reading competency, which are 1) each individual’s learning styles; and 2) teaching or instructional styles. Individual’s learning styles refer to different learning techniques and students’ capacities to learn and understand the world. Teaching style suggests how to teach the individuals to make use of the information that they read and be more effective at reading. In regard to the two factors, particularly in classroom settings, a language teacher would be the main trigger that draws out students’ cognitive competence, a set of abilities, motivation, and mental skills or what is called ‘human intelligences’. At this stage, the results suggested by this study only presented data gathered from this participant group, which may not generalize the same result with other EFL learners.
It is possible that given the topic of the reading test, which was based on military services and the military academy, and the fact that the participants of this study were all in military services, that participants had some advantage from a topic familiarity. This could allow them to fully utilize their existential intelligence. Gardner (1999) mentioned that “an existentialist has the capacity to locate oneself with respect to the furthest reaches of the cosmos…and a related capacity to locate oneself with respect to such existential features of the human condition” (p.60). Moreover, Bartone and Snook (2002) suggested that military organizations are places that emphasize the importance of effective leadership. One of the most important programs is to train the military students to have good problem-solving abilities. In order to be able to answer all questions and strengthen their leadership, perhaps these military students were trained to develop their existential intelligence in the military schools in previous years such as through a compulsory course or an activity that required them to participate in military academy and associated with military topics.
Limitation
There were three potential anticipated problems in this present study, which were 1) the number of participants in this study was limited due to a time constraint and participants’ availabilities; 2) the techniques learned in the English language courses may have helped students easily tackle the reading test; and 3) the questionnaire may not fully reflect real answers THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 15 Aunyarat Tandamrong
from students. Firstly, the number of participants was limited because they were from the two intensive language courses at DITC at that time, thus, the study was unable to capture the MI profiles of military students in general. Secondly, the two language courses mainly focused on student’s English language performance; thus, students may have learned and developed special strategies to complete the reading test without the support of multiple intelligences. Therefore, these test techniques may have interfered with the study results. Thirdly, there was a possibility that the students’ questionnaire answers may not have fully reflected their real intelligence profiles because participants had the potential to put marks on all of the statements even if they only partially described their personalities. Furthermore, some questions in the questionnaire were more complicated for some students to interpret; thus, it may hhave caused a misinterpretation of the question, wich could have led to an inaccurate result.
Implications
Gardner (1999) believed that one may be highly gifted in one domain and less in others, so understanding of abilities in different domains can be beneficial for both students and teachers. Since the MI theory provides a way to understand an individual’s intelligence, teachers could use it as a guideline for developing language classroom activities that address multiple ways of learning and knowing (Armstrong, 2005). Specifically, it is important for EFL/ESL teachers to find out individual students’ differences such as intelligence types, preferences, and learning styles; this is because learners are different from each other in many ways and have different areas of interests, different ways of expressing themselves, and different strengths and weaknesses.
This present study aimed to raise the awareness of the language teachers at DITC to be more aware of students’ intelligence profiles, which would allow them to develop their teaching strategies and classroom practices specifically for individual needs and needs of all of their students. The results of the regression analysis indicated that the only intelligence type that influences participants’ reading score is existential intelligence. Existential intelligence refers to people who take a philosophical approach and question the existence of everything; thus, they like activities that help them to develop problem-solving and analytical skills. Therefore, English language teachers at DITC could develop English language courses, teaching materials, and tests that are more critical, analytical, and logical, which might fully allow the participants to utilize their existential intelligence since they are quite sensitive to conceptualizing and questioning the 16 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No.1
existence of what is surrounding them. More details and examples of studies conducted under EFL contexts and the MI theory-based teaching are Chao (2004) in Taiwan, and Popescu (2010), who give practical suggestions of how to apply MI theory in the English language classroom. Particularly, Chao’s (2004) study provided results that students’ English language ability and confidence were improved after the intervention of Gardner’s MI theory-based teaching in English language classroom.
Furthermore, apart from the results from these participants, further study of Multiple Intelligences and students’ reading ability could also help English language teaching (ELT) in general. In other words, EFL/ESL teachers can develop future teaching strategies (instructional practices), and include exams that suit the participants’ intelligence types. For example, teachers could introduce classroom activities that help learners to better acquire English language according to their collection of intelligences such as learning English through music (which may help students with musical intelligence to acquire English language skills effectively); or teaching English through visual arts and pictures (for learners who have visual-spatial intelligence); and teaching English through groups of English words and chunks of passages which require learners to recognize common features and patterns of the language (for learners who have linguistic intelligence) (Popescu, 2010). These classroom activities and teaching strategies are aimed to fill the gap between learners’ intelligence profiles and how they acquire language in action (more details of how teachers could implement the MI theory in their instructional practices, see, Stanford, 2003).
In summary, learners should have choices of their learning regarding their intelligence; that is, the students should experience learning that allows them to engage all of their intelligences, and to explore their own intelligences and how they can impact their learning, and they need to be offered choice in how they learn and are assessed (Kelly and Tangney, 2004).
Conclusion and Suggestions for Future Research
The main purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the relationship between the military students’ MI profiles and their reading ability. The findings reported that in general there was a relationship between existential intelligence and the students’ reading competency. However, this present study was conducted only on the military students at DITC in Melbourne, Australia; thus, it could only provide a picture of a limited number of participants, not a whole picture of all of ESL/EFL students. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 17 Aunyarat Tandamrong
At this stage, it is suggested that more studies could be conducted with MI theory and different groups of students or based on different language skills, which will increase the understanding of the relationship between Gardner’s MI theory and students’ second and foreign language abilities (L2 and FL). Particularly in the education field, it may also indicate a need to re-evaluate traditional subjects typically taught that suit learners best. For example, there may be an introduction of new subjects that put more emphasis on sociocultural norms, different cultures, arts, and nature that would benefit learners to learn about their surrounding environment and different cultural background. Moreover, teacher educators could encourage learners to realize what areas of talent they have; thus it allows them to pursue their preferable studies. Likewise, teacher educators would benefit in terms of resource development if they could target multiple classroom intelligences and thereby develop a range of classroom materials that might suit diverse learners and making them effectively acquire new knowledge.
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Appendix A. Gardner’s Taxonomy of Multiple Intelligences
1. Verbal-Linguistic Intelligence
Verbal-linguistic intelligence describes people who primarily learn and think through auditory and verbal methods. They are highly sensitive to words structure, meaning, order/function, and sound. People in this group have a great extent of auditory skills. Examples include poets, translators, and lawyers.
2. Mathematical-Logical Intelligence
This intelligence indicates people who have a high level of reasoning and logic, and exhibit great ability to solve problems. They are able to master and make connections between pieces of information that are outstanding in logic and order. People who defined to have mathematical-logical intelligence are a statistician, a computer programmer, a mechanical, and engineer.
3. Visual-Spatial Intelligence
Visual-spatial intelligence suggests characteristics of people who learn through visualization; that is, those who predominantly think in images and pictures. Examples of these types of people are designers, photographers, and sculptors, who are interested in shape, space, and the relationship that exists between these elements.
4. Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence
Bodily-kinesthetic intelligence is the ability to learn through body sensations and physical activities. It refers to people who tend to use their body skillfully to solve problems, and to handle objects adroitly. These individuals usually include surgeons, trainers, and athletes.
5. Musical-rhythmic Intelligence
Musical-rhythmic intelligence refers to people who are good at making and composing music, singing and appreciating music. This intelligence is said to emerge earlier than other intelligences since babies are sensitive to sounds around them; thus, it is assumed to be an early THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MI THEORY AND ESL STUDENTS’ READING ABILITY 23 Aunyarat Tandamrong
stage of exposure of intelligences. Examples of this group are composers and song writers.
6. Intrapersonal Intelligence
Intrapersonal intelligence describes characteristics of people who focus on the inner self. This means those who know their strengths and weaknesses well. In other words they possess the capacities of self-awareness and understanding of their inner feelings. Examples of this group are politicians, leaders, and writers.
7. Interpersonal Intelligence
Intrapersonal intelligence is the ability to understand other people’s behaviors. These people work well with others through interaction. These types of people would enjoy working in group activities, and learn through a collaboration learning process. Examples are teachers, counselors, and sales people.
8. Naturalist Intelligence
This intelligence type refers to those who are talented at observing, understanding, and organizing patterns. People who are more sensitive to the ecological environment. They are most passionate about nature. They are likely to spend much time outdoors. Examples are biologists, and veterinarians.
9. Existential Intelligence:
Existential intelligence refers to individuals who like to question the existence of life. Such people have insight into the meaning of life, put things in perspective, and see big pictures. Examples are philosophers, and psychologists.
(Adapted from Tracey, M., & Richey, R. (2007). ID model construction and validation: a multiple intelligences case. Educational Technology Research & Development, 55(4), 369-39-, doi:10.1007/s11423-006-9015-4)
MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT
DO THI HA
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
Abstract
This paper explores how the non-native speakers (NNS) of English negotiated meaning online to see which communication mode is more conducive to language-focused peer feedback. Six pairs of students participated in three spot-the-difference tasks using the text and voice chat tools provided by Blackboard and Sony VirtuosoTM. The data collected from the tasks was analyzed and coded for Language-Related Episodes (LRE). The results show that students negotiated meaning more when involved in voice chat. The content modifications were focused most in both media types. Lexical triggers were not found in text chat, and less dynamic than spelling/phonological ones found in voice chat. The task-based synchronous exchanges among NNS, therefore, tend to encourage fluency rather than accuracy. With respect to linguistic accuracy, the learners seemed to ignore each other’s mistakes, as they were focusing more on meaning than on form during the conversation.
Key words: Meaning negotiation, language-focused feedback, text chat, voice chat, information- gap tasks
Introduction
Traditionally, language learning used to take place in the classroom through face-to-face interaction between learners and teachers. These days, students are able to achieve their learning goals through the Internet, regardless of time and geographic boundaries (Swan, 2003). Thanks to the development of Internet technology, computer-mediated communication (CMC) has been integrated into language teaching and learning with two distinct formats: synchronous and asynchronous (Hines & Pearl, 2004). Synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) resembles face-to-face conversation in that immediate responses are given to the interlocutors (Murray, 2000). SCMC can happen in such contexts as instant messengers, IRC (Internet Relay Chat), and other online chat systems. Language functions used online are similar to those in face- MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 25 Do Thi Ha to-face communications (Chun, 1994; Warschauer, 1997). Asynchronous CMC occurs in delayed time and does not require instant reactions, which is not the concern of this study.
Recent research suggests that SCMC is facilitative to second language acquisition (SLA) (Blake, 2000; Kitade, 2000; Pellettieri, 2000; Smith, 2003). Payne and Whitney’s study (2002) reported a significant difference between the oral proficiency of a group that spent two of four hours of classroom time per week chatting, and a control group which did not have the chat session. The SCMC group demonstrated greater gains in oral proficiency than the control group thanks to slower pace and longer processing time compared to normal conversations (Payne & Whitney, 2002; Lai & Zhao, 2006). Some other general positive effects of SCMC are to reduce interlocutors’ anxiety and to motivate the use of target language, both of which promote communicative competence (Beauvois, 1992; Kern, 1995). It has been proved that the students who often stayed quiet in face-to-face discussions turned out to be much active in SCMC (Beauvois, 1992; Kern, 1995; Warschauer, 1996).
Because of the unavailability of nonverbal cues in CMC, learners need to indicate more explicitly their comprehension of what their partner says than in oral conversations (Smith, 2004). Chun (1994) found that more questions and feedback were given by students in the CMC condition. Beauvois (1997), when investigating the results of speaking exams, also noticed that students with CMC treatment got higher scores than those who received the same instruction in classroom lessons. However, other research findings indicated that although students who used CMC produced more language than their counterparts, there was no difference in the quality (Abrams, 2003) and less attention to grammatical accuracy (Kern, 1995). Kung (2004) even found a lot of misspelled words and grammatical errors in the chat transcripts. In quick network-based interactions, learners tended to ignore each other’s mistakes, as they were focusing more on overall meaning than on structure (Meskill& Anthony, 2005; O’Rourke, 2005).
In voice chat, it is difficult for learners to correct their own ungrammatical sentences produced a while ago, but text users can review the language used in their previous utterances, examine their errors, and see whether any corrective feedback was provided by their partner(s). Although text-based online chat, involving written oral-like conversation, was assumed to have a great potential to increase noticing linguistic productions (Shekary&Tahririan, 2006), Jepson (2005) noted that text chat contained fewer repair moves than voice chat. In other words, students using text chat did not pay much attention to linguistic form. The differences between the two modes imply that each provides distinctive language learning opportunities. Therefore, further 26 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
research is needed to shed some light on the impacts of online interaction on students' language production.
Literature Review
Negotiation of meaning in SCMC
Negotiation of meaning is defined as “modification and restructuring of interaction that occurs when learners and their interlocutors anticipate, perceive, or experience difficulties in message comprehensibility” (Pica, 1994, p. 495). The Interaction Hypothesis proposed by Long and Robinson (1998) states that the conditions for SLA are mostly stimulated by having L2 learners negotiate meaning with other speakers. This will increase input comprehensibility through language modifications. After receiving input, learners produce a type of modified output that may be necessary for grammatical competence to develop in oral interaction.
Studies have shown that negotiation of meaning in task-based interactions does occur in CMC (Varonis & Gass, 1985; Pica, 1994; Mackey, 1999; Toyoda & Harrison, 2002). Sotillo (2000) found that SCMC presented discourse functions "similar to the types of interactional modifications found in face-to-face conversations that are deemed necessary for second language acquisition" (2000, p. 82). In Pellettieri’s (2000) study, four components of negotiation moves were examined for the influential role of SCMC in fostering L2 acquisition. The negotiation moves are percentage of triggers, frequencies of negotiated modifications, corrective feedback, and incorporation of the feedback. He concluded that non-native speakers (NNS) paid more attention to lexical items than grammatical features while negotiating for meaning in both networked and face-to-face environments.
It has also been shown that the type of task may affect conversations quantitatively and qualitatively (Pica et al., 1989). Negotiation of meaning is facilitated more when interactions are goal-oriented and task-based than in casual conversations (Pellettieri, 2000). In such collaborative tasks, learners need to work in pairs and communicate both language form and content (Swan, 2001). To be specific, two-way tasks which require information exchange by both or all parties produce significantly more negotiation work than one-way tasks (Doughty & Pica, 1984). In addition, Lee (2004) demonstrated that native speakers (NS) of Spanish helped foreign learners a lot in expressing ideas and enhancing good grammar. Nevertheless, meaning negotiation was reported to be more prevalent among NNS-NNS dyads than NS-NNS dyads (Long, 1980), and learners negotiated more with other learners from different first language backgrounds (Varonis & MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 27 Do Thi Ha
Gass, 1983; Blake, 2000; Pellettieri, 2000). There has been support for peer-to-peer interaction in CMC contexts when non-understanding arises (Blake, 2000; Smith, 2003). Put together, the different L1 backgrounds, NNS-NNS dyads and two-way tasks contribute to promoting more negotiation of meaning.
Language-focused feedback in SCMC
A research study by Skehan (2003) has documented the positive effect of form-focused feedback on language acquisition within communicative contexts. Gass (1997) also argued that negotiation of meaning steered students’ attention to linguistic form, and they could receive feedback on their output, which is a condition for learning. Some recent studies suggest that CMC may promote language-focused peer feedback which involves language features such as pronunciation, spelling, vocabulary, grammar, and discourse (Nation, 2007). Such form-focused feedback can explicitly indicate the language problem or implicitly signify it through negotiation strategies (Pellettieri, 2000; Lee, 2002).
While voice chat often focuses on correcting pronunciation (Jepson, 2005), text chat has been found to promote form-noticing (Fiori, 2005; Lai & Zhao, 2006) and collaborative dialogue (Zeng &Takatsuka, 2009). This is because it is easier for the interlocutors to notice and fix any linguistic problems by scrolling the text messages backward and forward. Kern (1995), in addition, indicated that sentences turned out to be simpler and shorter in computer sessions since such sentences tended to elicit more responses than long complex ones.
However, there has not been much research considering the amount of “language-focused learning” (Nation, 2007) in text-based versus voice online chat when students negotiate meaning and give each other feedback in information-gap tasks. For instance, spot-the-difference tasks are supposed to induce the use of precise lexical items and grammar points (e.g. description of specific objects or scenes in the picture) to achieve a common goal (Lee, 2008). As Swain contended, this kind of task can “encourage learners to reflect on language form while still being oriented to meaning making” (2000, p. 112). For these reasons, the effects of information-gap tasks on students’ negotiation of meaning and language-focused feedback during SCMC deserve further investigation.
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Previous research into text-based and voice online chat
Jepson (2005) investigated the characteristics of modifications in text-based and voice online chat of NNS. The results revealed that the number of repair moves in voice chat was significantly higher than that in text chat. According to the qualitative analysis, most repair work in voice chat concerned phonological problems. Although ten sessions of text and voice chat were conducted, the durations were short (five minutes each), and the participants’ levels of proficiency were not controlled, which might have influenced the number of repair moves.
A study by Lai and Zhao (2006) explored the role of text-based online chat in enhancing learners’ noticing of their mistakes and of the interactional feedback. In this study, twelve ESL learners were put in six mixed-proficiency dyads working on two spot-the-difference tasks, one via text and the other through face-to-face conversations. Stimulated recall sessions were held afterwards to identify instances of noticing. It was found that text-based online chat promotes noticing more than face-to-face conversations. However, the results might have been skewed due to students’ different levels of language proficiency. Familiarity with the technology was another problem as four of the participants admitted to not chatting online before.
Lee’s (2008) article reported how 30 students of mixed-level pairs negotiated corrective feedback when working on three different tasks—jigsaw, spot-the-difference and an open-ended question. The findings indicated that text chats corroborated the focus-on-form procedure through collaborative dialogue. Although the experts were able to help raise the novice’s attention to non- target-like forms which provided conditions for correcting linguistic mistakes, they needed to be cautious of getting too involved.
The above-mentioned research conducted on the topic suggested new design considerations when it came to students’ engagement in information-gap tasks. Some contributing factors including learners’ language proficiency and motives for language learning appear to influence the process of feedback negotiation (Lantolf, 2000). Therefore, additional investigation into their conversational activities is necessary to fill such a gap.
Research Questions
The current study explores the potential of SCMC to facilitate meaning negotiation and language-focused feedback. It aims at answering these two questions:
1. Do students negotiate meaning more when involved in text chat or voice chat? MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 29 Do Thi Ha
2. Are text-based interactions more conducive to language-focused feedback than voice-based interactions?
Methodology
Setting
The setting for the online chat group was a language computer lab. In this study, seats were arranged so that members of the same pair were not placed in close proximity to one another.
Participants
Twelve ESL/EFL learners of intermediate English proficiency participated in this study. There were an equal number of males and females with diverse first language (L1) backgrounds: Arabic (3), Thai (3), Vietnamese (3), Chinese (1), French (1), and Persian (1). They were recruited from the English Proficiency Program (EPP), a preparation language course for their undergraduate and postgraduate study in a university in New Zealand. Students in this summer course were placed in classes of different proficiency levels on the basis of their performance on the placement test. Five participants were recruited from Levels 1 and 2 (the high-intermediate classes) and the other seven were recruited from Levels 3 and 4 (the low-intermediate classes). The participants were intentionally paired to form three same-level pairs and three mixed proficiency dyads of low-high intermediate English level for the purpose of facilitating negotiated interaction (Iwashita, 2001; Porter, 1986). The age of the participants ranged from 17 to 35 (M = 23.83, SD = 4.99). The length of time spent learning English ranged from 2 to 14 years (M = 8.83, SD = 3.69). All participants had previous online chat experience.
Instruments
1. Task type
The participants were instructed to spot the differences in three sets of paired pictures (see Appendix): a pair based on a beach scene (1a and 1b), a pair based on a picnic scene (2a and 2b) and another pair based on a traffic jam scene (3a and 3b). These pictures were modified from three originals by Heaton (1966) using The Adobe® Photoshop®. The picture selection followed the guidelines of Gass and Mackey (2007): 30 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
. Picture items and their locations are appropriate for the intended level . Pictures with great detail help promote negotiation and interactional feedback
This kind of task was used as it has the motivating feature of split information and helps students to achieve the goal of the speaking activity (Nation, 1989). Each dyad worked on three tasks via a chat tool in Blackboard (Blackboard Learn TM, http://www.blackboard.com) and voice chat using Sony VirtuosoTM.
2. Tools
2.1 Sony VirtuosoTM
The Sony Virtuoso™/Soloist® Language Learning System is a contemporary language lab which enables a multimedia-based learning environment where teachers and students can share course materials and work together or independently to develop language proficiency. The software suite operates on Windows™-based PCs within a local area network and requires no additional software or hardware to maximize sound quality, so the system adapts easily to almost any classroom application.
2.2 Blackboard
Similar to other chat programs, the chat tool in Blackboard presents users with a split screen; in the top half they view the replies from their interlocutors, and in the bottom half they view their own messages as they type them. It can record all of the written transactions entered in a chat window with a date and time stamp, which distinguishes it from the text chat function of Sony Virtuoso™.
Data Collection
1. Experimental task design
Participants filled in a short profile containing demographic information (gender, age, nationality, mother tongue, exposure to English, and familiarity with online chatting). Ten minutes was given to each dyad before each session as time given for preparation would help to reduce anxiety (Fulcher, 1996). The instructions were clearly processed such as time limit (20 minutes) and the number of differences (at least ten) so that students could be aware of how well they were doing (Ur, 1981). After that, they worked in pairs spotting the differences between two MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 31 Do Thi Ha corresponding pictures (two-way information-gap task) in three picture sets. They were not allowed to see each other’s pictures. Half the pairs did text-based chat first, and the other half conducted the voice chat first in order to eliminate sequencing effects. The third task completed by the participants was in the same chat mode as the first task (see Tables 1 and 2). The three sets of pictures which were selected to be equal in difficulty level were printed out and assigned to each dyad randomly to release any contaminating effect caused by the pictures. A time limit of 20 minutes was imposed on the three tasks.
There were two sessions in a Latin square design as follows:
Table 1. Session one
Task 1 Task 2 Task 3 Level Student Picture Chat Picture Chat Picture Chat
2 A 1a Text 2a Voice 3a Text
4 B 1b Text 2b Voice 3b Text
4 C 2a Text 3a Voice 1a Text
4 D 2b Text 3b Voice 1b Text
1 E 3a Text 1a Voice 2a Text
1 F 3b Text 1b Voice 2b Text
32 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Table 2. Session two
Task 1 Task 2 Task 3 Level Student Picture Chat Picture Chat Picture Chat
2 A 1a Text 2a Voice 3a Text
4 B 1b Text 2b Voice 3b Text
4 C 2a Text 3a Voice 1a Text
4 D 2b Text 3b Voice 1b Text
1 E 3a Text 1a Voice 2a Text
1 F 3b Text 1b Voice 2b Text
Data transcription and coding
The data was collected and the voice chat was transcribed. This was not a phonological transcription, but the spoken text was simply recorded "as is" in a written form. When voice chat was coded, corrections for some mispronounced words were given in brackets based on the coder’s assumption. To be consistent, all of the data was double-checked. Students’ names had been replaced with pseudonyms (letters from A to L). The excerpts of text chat remained unchanged with a date and time stamp.
1. Turns
The nature of the communication medium changes the nature of the turn-taking concept. Consequently, the turn-taking system in text chat bears little resemblance to the voice-based interactions. As the former is filled with parallel threads rather than a linear sequential pattern, the notion of turn-taking in SCMC easily causes confusion and the message exchanges are often MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 33 Do Thi Ha highly overlapped (Murray, 1989). What matters in this research are students’ negotiated turns, so a turn was counted each time there was a transfer of floor from one interlocutor to the other.
In the excerpt below, there are a total of five turns.
1 K: just a question 19/01/2011 2:25:21 PM K: do you see radio and ball? 19/01/2011 2:25:37 PM
2 L: yeah 19/01/2011 2:25:47 PM
3 K: and bag 19/01/2011 2:25:48 PM K: sorry, no ball, bag 19/01/2011 2:25:58 PM
4 L: radio beside fat man 19/01/2011 2:25:58 PM L: bag behind him 19/01/2011 2:26:07 PM
K: ok 19/01/2011 2:26:14 PM 5 K: i don't see the ball so that's ok 19/01/2011 2:26:26 PM K: then 19/01/2011 2:26:30 PM
2. Negotiation routines
Varonis and Gass (1985) developed a framework for analysing negotiation of meaning, which was expanded in Smith’s (2003) paper. A negotiation routine or negotiation episode herein includes a trigger that caused the non-understanding in the utterance, an indicator or signal of non- understanding on the part of the listener, a response to the indicator and finally an optional reaction to the response (please refer to the example below). Two phases added by Smith (2003) are confirmation and reaction to the confirmation to clearly indicate understanding. This framework has been widely employed to analyse sequences of negotiation including studies of negotiation in the CMC environment (Blake, 2000; Pelletieri, 2000; Smith, 2003; Toyoda & Harrison 2002); hence, by using the same model, a comparison across studies in network-based contexts can be made.
34 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Below is an example of a six-stage negotiation routine (NR):
T K: Uh huh. And there is a dog, too.
I L: Dog?
R K: Yeah. Dog.
RR L: I don’t have dog.
K: You don’t have dog? OK. Because I have between the policeman and the C guy who is repairing his car.
RC L: Yeah.
3. Language-Related Episodes (LRE) or Metatalk
The data collected from the tasks was analysed and coded for Language-Related Episodes (LRE). LRE is defined as “any part of a dialogue where the students talk about the language they are producing, question their language use, or correct themselves or others” (Swain &Lapkin, 1998, p. 326).
3.1 Outcomes of LRE
According to Swain (1998), the LRE falls into one of three possible outcomes: outcome 1 is when the problem or question was solved correctly; outcome 2 is when LREs were left unresolved or abandoned; outcome 3 is when LREs were resolved incorrectly. Examples follow:
Outcome 1 – Solved correctly (phonological-based LRE) H: OK. Let’s talk about the boats. In your picture, how many the boats in the sea? G: How many bots? H: Boats. Yes. G: 1,2,3,4,5,6. H: OK. The same.
MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 35 Do Thi Ha
Outcome 2 – Unsolved/Abandoned (lexical-based LRE) C: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s vehicle. D: I don’t know. C: Vehicle? D: Vehicle. What is vehicle? C: It’s vehicle. Wheel. D: So what next?
Outcome 3 – Solved incorrectly (content-based LRE) H: No, not a baby and a woman. G: What? H: I have a man besides him. G: Another man? H: No, just a man besides the camera man. G: I don’t have that one.
The LRE coding followed Smith’s (2003) expanded model with categories of lexical, morphosyntactic, discourse and content. Further problems inherent in text and voice chat are spelling and phonological respectively. Four types of triggers were found in this study: lexical as shown in Outcome 2, where the listener had no idea of the lexical item “vehicle” in the speaker’s utterance; content as shown in Outcome 3, where the content of the whole previous message was wrongly processed; phonological as shown in outcome 1, where the pronunciation of the word “boats” was triggered; and spelling found in text chat only.
Data Analysis
Statistical testing procedures were conducted on the numbers for comparison and contrast in the two different communication modes.
Research Question 1. Do students negotiate meaning more when involved in text chat or voice chat?
Table 3 shows the number of total words, turns and negotiated turns in both text and voice chat. There is no difference in the number of words per turn (7 words per turn) across media. Of a total of 688 turns in text chat, occurrences of negotiated turns amounted to 123, which took up 17.88% of all turns. In voice chat, out of 2614 turns, 964 turns or 36.88% were negotiated 36 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
turns. The results illustrate how the SCMC environment influences interactions of NNS. As can be seen from Table 3, learners when involved in voice chat negotiated meaning twice as much as in text chat.
Table 3. Total turns and negotiated turns (NT) during text-based and voice online chat Words per Percentage of Media N of Words N of Turns NT Turn NT (%) Text chat 4995 688 7 123 17.88 Voice chat 17622 2614 7 964 36.88
Because the hypothesis is non-directional, two-tailed t-test was applied to compare the means of the two modes of chat to see if they were significantly different (Mackey &Gass, 2005). According to Table 4, p-value is less than 5%, so the difference between the two media types is significant.
Table 4. Comparison of percentage of NT to total turns across media Media N of Dyads M SD T Df p-value Text chat 6 13.08 9.50 -8.47 10 0.00001 Voice chat 6 103.17 24.25
Linell (1990) claimed that learner’s language level played an important role in setting up a dominance of topic. Therefore, two t-tests were conducted to explore the interaction of same- different proficiency on the proportion of negotiated turns. According to Tables 5 and 6, both the p-values are higher than 5%, the significance level, which means their differences are not significant. In other words, minor differences in students’ level of L2 proficiency do not influence the results stated above.
Students’ level of proficiency
Table 5. Text chat Level N of Dyads M SD T Df p-value Same 3 11.33 11.02 0.41 4 0.70141 Mixed 3 14.83 9.75
MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 37 Do Thi Ha
Table 6. Voice chat Level N of Dyads M SD T Df p-value Same 3 108.83 16.33 -0.53 4 0.62442 Mixed 3 97.50 33.28
In order to answer the question if the pictures used act as a moderator variable, two one- way ANOVAs (one between groups, and one within groups) were run. The results in Tables 7 and 8 (with both p-values > 5%, the significance level) suggest that the differences of the three pictures do not have any significant effects on students’ negotiation of meaning.
ANOVAs between and within groups
Table 7. Text chat Source of Variation SS df MS F p-value F crit Between Groups 194.67 2.00 97.33 0.89 0.46 5.14 Within Groups 655.33 6.00 109.22 Total 850 8
Table 8. Voice chat Source of Variation SS df MS F p-value F crit Between Groups 1606.22 2.00 803.11 1.02 0.41 5.14 Within Groups 4706.67 6.00 784.44 Total 850 8
It is important to see how negotiation of meaning was carried out during SCMC based on information-gap tasks. According to Varonis and Gass’s (1985) model, a complete negotiation episode consists of at least a trigger, an indicator and a response. Table 9 shows 15.63% (text chat) and 6.45% (voice chat) of negotiation routines did not go through the three obligatory stages (consisting of only a trigger and an indicator). 38 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Table 9. Stages of negotiation routines (NR) completed by dyads across media Text chat Voice chat Negotiation NR % NR % T – I 5 15.63 14 6.45 T – I – R 8 25 52 23.96 T – I – R - RR 11 34.38 44 20.28 T – I – R – RR - C 3 9.38 38 17.51 T – I – R – RR – C – RC 5 15.61 69 31.8 Total NR 32 100 217 100
Notes:T = Trigger, I = Indicator, R = Response, RR = Reaction to the Response, C = Confirmation, RC = Reaction to the Confirmation
The negotiation with three levels completed reached 25% and 23.96% in text and voice chat respectively. Because audio cues were removed, the entire burden of text chat was on written characters. Smith (2003) suggested that in text chat, learners tend to carry on the negotiation of meaning to an explicit closure. In the current study, there was a high occurrence of the reaction to response phase in text chat (34.38%), which was less dynamic in voice chat (20.28%). However, the participants tended to carry on negotiation routines well past the reaction to the confirmation stage in voice chat (31.8%) compared to 15.61% in text chat.
Research question 2. Are text-based interactions more conducive to language-focused feedback than voice-based interactions?
As mentioned earlier, students negotiated meaning more often in voice chat than in text chat. Because of the high occurrence of phonological errors and accents, phonological features, an area which does not exist in text chat, triggered more negotiation routines (12.44%) than lexical ones (11.6%). Typographical mistakes were prevalent, but it was not a frequent reason for negotiating. In fact, there was only one negotiated episode with spelling mistake as a trigger in text chat (3.13%).
MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 39 Do Thi Ha
Below is a demonstration of a spelling-based LRE found in text chat:
F: how about first flore ? 17/01/2011 2:46:50 PM E: 1st floor u mean? 17/01/2011 2:47:03 PM F: yeah 17/01/2011 2:47:08 PM F: :D 17/01/2011 2:47:12 PM
Unlike what Pellettieri (2000) and Chapelle (2001) contended about the strong focus on form in text chat, text users when involved in information-gap tasks negotiated mostly on the content of the messages (97.87%). The content triggers in voice chat also accounted for more than half of the total (76.5%), which reveals it as a major problem leading to negotiation. The results go against Lee’s (2008) assumption that spot-the-difference tasks require the use of correct lexical items and grammar points.
The following excerpt from text chat contains examples of content triggers. In the text transcript, student A mentioned a bank, which led to student B’s question of where it was. After A clarified its position, B expressed his/her disagreement. Finally, they concluded that it was a difference when B confirmed there was no bank in his/her picture.
A: there s a bank 17/01/2011 2:43:08 PM B: where? 17/01/2011 2:43:23 PM (Requesting clarification) A: n the top left side 17/01/2011 2:43:31 PM B: for me its dentist 17/01/2011 2:45:46 PM (Expressing disagreement) A: I hv dentist n the left side 17/01/2011 2:44:03 PM A: the bank is n the top almost n the middle 17/01/2011 2:44:19 PM B: oo yeah but i=on right hand side i dont have bank 17/01/2011 2:44:31 PM (Confirmation)
Lexical triggers can be noticed in the following voice transcript. A requested a confirmation from B about what to call a piece of clothing. They were not satisfied with the other’s differentiation between “T-shirt” and “shirt” at first, but then B expressed an approval of what A said by giving a confirmation.
B: Yeah, one towel, one black jeans and one T-shirt. A: Shirt. Not T-shirt, just shirt. Right? (Seeking confirmation) B: For me it’s just T-shirt. 40 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
A: But shirt with long sleeves. (Expressing disagreement) B: Oh no no. It’s shirt. Hum. All the time I thought T-shirt is with long. A: T-shirt the short one. (Confirmation) B: Ok thanks. He got black short jean. Something like that.
Table 10. Focus of LRE in negotiation routines (NR) during CMC Text chat Voice chat LRE Outcome N % N % N % N % 1 19 79.17 Lexical 2 5 20.83 24 11.06 3 0 0 1 1 100 25 92.59 Spelling/ 2 0 0 1 3.13 2 7.41 27 12.44 Phonological 3 0 0 0 0 1 23 74.19 149 89.76 Content 2 6 19.35 31 96.87 7 4.22 166 76.5 3 2 6.46 10 6.02 Total NR 32 100 217 100
Notes: Outcome 1 - Solved correctly, Outcome 2 – Abandoned, Outcome 3 - Resolved incorrectly
Based on Table ten, it can be concluded that, for both modes, the LRE heavily focused on content, and voice chat is more conducive to language-focused feedback (phonological and lexical) than text chat.
Negotiation outcomes
Most of the content problems were solved successfully (74.19% in text chat and 89.76% in voice chat). There were a reasonable number of abandoned cases related to lexical (20.83%), which are more disruptive than phonological aspects (7.41%). However, when dealing with lexical and phonological triggers, there was no misleading result compared to twelve cases of content LRE which were incorrectly solved in both chat modes. Outcomes 2 and 3, when students gave up or went astray from the topic, indicate no learning gained. There are two possible explanations for the high rate of abandonment of negotiation by NNS: one is their failing to MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 41 Do Thi Ha identify signals or forgetting to reply; the other is that they were incapable of providing responses in the target language. Ehrlich, Avey and Yorio (1988) reported two types of abandonment: 1) Explicit negotiation abandonment (telling their partner that “I cannot explain”). 2) Implicit negotiation abandonment (switch to a new topic). Most of students opted for the second type to maintain the flow of the communication.
Discussion
Task variables which have been shown to have an impact on linguistic output including task conditions, task complexity (Robinson, 2001) and task type (Pica et al., 1993) were given careful consideration. The findings from this study provide evidence that information-gap tasks do stimulate negotiation of meaning between non-native speakers in SCMC.It was found that voice chat provided an environment conducive to negotiation twice as much as text chat. This is possibly due to the more instantaneity of voice chat, which pushes learners to respond without delay.
As Blake (2000) acknowledged, chat negotiations focused more on lexical items, which have a positive effect on vocabulary development rather than grammatical competence. It was observed that the learners explicitly asked the meaning of certain words to each other. However, Meskill and Anthony (2005) were supported in that learners tended to continue with discussions rather than pay attention to each other's mistakes. There were fewer numbers of repair moves in text chat in comparison to voice chat contexts as in Jepson’s (2005) study. The results suggest that students in the chat room did not see the need for accuracy, especially when they got engaged in reaching the task goal with no worries about teacher assessment.
In this study, correctly solved LRE constituted the highest percentage of all LRE (87.15%). This result supports previous studies on face-to-face communication. Leeser (2004) reported that between 60% and 75% of the total LRE was solved correctly. Nevertheless, it was inferred from Table 10 that 4.82% of the total LRE (all content-based) was incorrectly solved, and a considerable number of LRE (8.03%) was left unresolved. It is interesting to find that spelling/phonological LRE did not cause any misleading effect. Pedagogically, language teaching aims at correctly solved LRE, but other LRE outcome types can be of value for research.
Text chat
Because turn-taking between the interlocutors in text-SCMC is full of overlaps and delays (Smith, 2003), learners may miss out the feedback given by their partners. Although text 42 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
chat uses the written medium, the language produced is less correct, less complex, and less coherent than standard written language (Danet & Herring, 2007). In this study, chat scripts were full of typographical errors as learners often tried to type quickly.
A typical example of nonlinguistic elements found in the text-chat data were the use of emoticons like smiles, and capitals. Since typing is much slower than speaking, the length of messages is kept short, and space-saving strategies are exploited involving the use of acronyms (e.g. lol for “laughing out loud”), symbols, shortening of words (e.g. thx = thanks), and the exclusion of pronouns (Werry, 1996). Furthermore, the mixing of lower-case and capitals, the use of emoticons (e.g. :) or :-) for happy, :D for a big grin) may be used to express agreement, incomprehension, dislike, and confusion, which were also coded as stages in negotiation routines. These symbols function as discourse makers, similarly to facial expressions and gestures in face- to-face communication.
Voice chat
It is contrary to Pellettieri's (2000) corroboration that in text chat learners monitored their speech, which in turn led to higher-quality speech than in oral interactions. The chat scripts contain a lot of morphosyntactic mistakes which did not trigger negotiation of meaning. Students seldom gave each other recasts on those mistakes. However, to an extent, learning still happened. Let’s look at how a morphosyntactic problem was corrected implicitly and incorporated in the next utterance. (It was not included in the data as there was no negotiation episode).
Morphosyntactic - Implicit correction H: Yeah. He is fixing his wheel. And have another wheel in the road, in the road? G: No, no. I didn’t have any wheel on the road. H: Hum. In my picture, he has…he left his car wheel on the road.
In general, the errors fell into four categories: grammatical, lexical, spelling and phonological. In Sotillo’s (2000) study, 47% of the errors in the L2 learners’ output consisted of grammatical (morphosyntacitic) errors. The participants in this study tended to omit third person singular, and past participles as well as use incorrect plural forms of nouns.
MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 43 Do Thi Ha
Pedagogical Implications of The Research
This project provides useful insights into students’ negotiation of meaning during text- based and voice online chat as well as their language-focused feedback. The findings suggest that the voice chat increases students’ meaning negotiation, and students pay attention to meaning rather than form in information-gap tasks. Information-gap tasks, therefore, are suitable for fluency practice, one of the four strands in language learning (Nation, 2007). Despite the importance of promoting communication and fluency, which is the key for SLA, students should be aware of the need to maintain a balance between fluency and linguistic accuracy in CMC (Levy & Kennedy, 2004; Nation, 2007). It is contended that if the task is more structured, it will draw more learners’ attention to forms, and create more language-related talk (Storch, 1998).
Moreover, interactive negotiation in SCMC may provide opportunities for learners to identify gaps between their interlanguage and the target language. During the interactions, they sometimes discussed how to pronounce a word and assisted each other in providing the right words for description. It appears that negotiation of meaning in CMC affects modification of output based on feedback. In addition to this, the nature of CMC helps alleviate learners’ anxiety and increase learner autonomy. The importance of interaction with peers should not be underestimated for these reasons.
From an assessment point of view, having the logs of learners' interactions printed out is a useful monitoring and assessment tool for students studying at a distance. The immediacy of real- time oral interactions via computer provides a snapshot of learners' interlanguage as it might occur in an oral setting. When using these chat tools, teachers can monitor and retrieve the chat scripts and audio recordings for evaluation. Learners can also practice with each other during self-study time and submit their chat logs for teachers’ feedback.
Limitations & Directions for Future Research
This article reports on a small-scale study (six dyads) in one specific context (language lab room), lasting for a short period of only two hours. The participants, high and low intermediate English learners, reported to be used to chatting, but it does not ensure their typing skill. Further research might examine students’ speaking development over a greater period of time across other online contexts. A longitudinal study of the long term effects of these two communication modes would contribute important data to the current investigation. Opportunities to interact with native 44 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
speakers of the target language may be limited for some language learners. SCMC provides a chance for L2 production to occur outside the classroom, which research has shown to be beneficial to language learners.
The current study focuses on the types of peer feedback given by NNS through synchronous online communication. A comparison of the negotiation strategies used via synchronous communication with those used via asynchronous discussions is needed. ACMC with distinguishable features (e.g., more accurate, complex, formal, and longer utterances than those in synchronous interactions) should promote longer and more complicated utterances in text-based interactions. It is also necessary to investigate reasons why certain task types may cause difficulties to students and which task will stimulate more textual interaction.
Conclusion
The study has provided some more empirical evidence for the capacity of SCMC to promote negotiation of meaning. Voice chat in this study was more powerful in all aspects. Indeed, one-third of total turns in voice chat were spent negotiating. The majority of triggers focused mostly on content rather than language features. The data also suggests that information-gap tasks induce more lexical triggers in voice chat than in text chat. Although most of the communications were solved successfully, a small number of LRE was left unsolved or solved incorrectly. The majority of peer feedback was dedicated to repeating and repeating with elaboration. MEANING NEGOTIATION AND LANGUAGE-FOCUSED FEEDBACK IN TEXT AND VOICE CHAT 45 Do Thi Ha
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Appendix. Spot-the-difference tasks
The three sets of pictures were modified from three original ones on pages 1, 9, 15 respectively by Heaton (1966).
Picture 1a
Picture 1b
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Picture 2a
Picture 2b
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Picture 3a
Picture 3b
PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES
Hiroshi Nakagawa Tokai University
David Wright Tokai University
Abstract
This practical research study reports on the implementation of Video and Blog based writing activities in integrated speaking and listening classrooms. The aim of the study was to examine if blog based writing activities would have greater salience to learners when compared to paper-based activities drawn from audio-visual and textbook based content (i.e. input), and in so doing result in a greater increase in writing proficiency test scores. An electronic format was chosen given that a carefully structured blog activity could provide an ideal learning environment, which according to Murphy (2012), in terms of critical thinking, includes variety, autonomy, collaboration, and emotional content. The Participants (N = 90) were university students with English levels ranging from intermediate to high intermediate levels, in one of three required integrated speaking and listening English classes. Each class was randomly assigned to one of three groups: a Control group, a Blog group, and a Blog/Oral Discussion group. Those groups followed the standard syllabus for the class, with homework in a paper-based format (for the Control group) or in an electronic format (for the Blog group and Blog/Oral group). All groups watched short videos in the semester and completed the writing assignments. To see the effect of the blog assignments, the control group completed 7 writing assignments on paper. The Blog group posted 7 writing assignments on a blog during class time (e.g. on a smartphone) and for homework. After completing the writing tasks (e.g. posting a paragraph-long blog post), the learners had the opportunity to receive written feedback, in an electronic format, from the instructor and classmates in the form of replies to their blog posts. The Blog/Oral Discussion group completed the blog activities, in the same manner as the Blog group, and then discussed the content of the blogs during class. In addition, the control group and the Blog group were assigned to do reading comprehension and vocabulary building activities. Those activities were done to determine if English oral communication would increase the learners’ awareness of their own writing ability. The three groups received pretest and posttest writing measures, which were used PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 55 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright to quantify their writing improvement. Testing measures included a common Writing Proficiency Exam, which was administered to all students in the English Language program at the authors’ home institution. At the end of semester, 5 students from the treatment groups were randomly selected for 10-minute interviews, regarding their perceptions of the experiment. The results of the writing measures indicate that all three treatment groups had significant writing improvement, with the Blog/Oral group showing greatest score improvement, followed by Blog groups, and finally the Control. While the results did not show a significant difference among the groups, the authors note that the use of blogs and discussions relating to blogs are as effective as paper-based activities. Furthermore, the results of the exit interview of a subset of the participants indicate that learners have a preference for the use of such activities. Given the practical nature of the study, the results provide support for a growing body of literature that shows the positive effects of the use of blog activities in foreign language classrooms.
Keywords: second language acquisition, technology enhanced learning, Blog, writing skills, cooperative learning, artifacts.
Introduction
The cognitive demands on language learners become more complex as new forms of digital communication are constantly being developed. This relates to the dual process of adapting to a new mode of message communication (e.g. a blog posting), while creating message content in a new (e.g. second, third, etc.) language. Hung et al. (2013) succinctly identified the need to revise language teaching pedagogy to be in line with such developments, by proposing a new form of language assessment rubric, as well as the integration of activities designed to foster the development of digital literacy skills and language skills simultaneously. In light of the pace of technological developments, the challenge for language practitioners is to first identify and develop digital tools that are accessible to the instructors themselves. This means that language instructors need to become instructional technologists as well. They then need to validate systems that work in their particular language-teaching context.
The current study, as part of a larger research project, examines the employment of social network service (SNS) based videos (i.e. YouTube) and electronic journals (i.e. blogs) in integrated speaking and listening courses at a university in Japan. One of the practical ways to teach ELL students with Internet connectivity is through blogging (Sun, 2009). However, most blogs are in a textual format, where exchanges are posted and read in an asynchronous manner; 56 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
however, there are, in fact, several different types of blogs which can be used for educational purposes (e.g. Noytim, 2010). The expanded list includes Podcasts as audio blogs, Flicker as photo blogs, and Youtube as video blogs (Vlog), all of which are established online blog formats. The use of blog-based activities in ELL learning is supported by the constructivist approach, which emphasizes the manner in which ELL learners are influenced by society and culture (Du & Wagner, 2007). Therefore, blogging in the ELL classrooms can be viewed as a tool for constructing language skills, building knowledge, and creating meaning. For example, journal writing through blogging is one useful activity for ELL students to produce English sentences, as well as a way to create additional content based on review of peer writings by reading through classmates’ blog posts and writing comments (i.e. replies). In tandem with these two somewhat familiar technologies, the use of an emerging form of digital literacy, known as a Vlog, was effectively included in classroom assignments (Sun, 2009). A Vlog allows a learner to video record their spoken language production, post it on a website, and then to receive text-based comments about the video. The process incorporates spoken language production and listening skills into the more standard text-based blog community. In the context of the current research by Sun (2009), the use of a limited access website, allows the learners a more comfortable environment to post content, as opposed to the more public version of commenting found natively on sites where video can be posted online. As noted above, the incremental use of digital tools to improve language proficiency builds on previous SLA research studies that examine technology and language learning. For example, Nam (2010), found that students’ oral skills were improved by the presentation of video materials during class activities. A more in-depth examination of this subject in the literature is provided below.
Literature Review
Digital literacy in the classroom has become essential in education pedagogy. Concomitantly, there is increasing demand for both instructors and students to learn how to effectively use different types of modern technology. This trend is particularly important in language classrooms, as learners master the use of new language forms and new methods of digital communications simultaneously. The insertion of technology tools into a language-teaching context relates to how best language skills (e.g. writing skills) can be developed. In other words, there is a need to identify what new technologies can significantly promote second language acquisition. One area of focus in the literature is on how best to improve one particular skill. A central tenet of this line of research is the manner in which lesson content is structured. Recently, PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 57 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright many research studies that have sought to create language instruction in terms of skill-linked learning strategies, in which listening, speaking, reading, and writing strategies are cross-linked and used in English language activities. One line of the research finds that by providing multiple forms of input, learners can enhance specific forms of output, while the other finds that a more narrow focus provides more noticeable increases in proficiency. In terms of the latter, ELL experts demonstrated the effectiveness of strategies linked to only one particular skill, such as reading or writing (e.g. Peregoy & Boyle, 2001). However, inherent in such an approach is limited ancillary effect on other language skills. On the other hand, Oxford (1996) stated that many strategies, such as asking questions, discussing with peers, analyzing the context from the activities, synthesizing, planning, and predicting, are all applicable across skill areas, and common ELL strategies help weave and integrate those skills together. The results point to the added value of combining, or integrating, learning strategies in language classrooms. The crossover of the use of a variety of skills maximizes the effects upon each individual student’s inter-language development, as Lee (2010) found with the use of blogs. The current study seeks examine if teaching ELL students to improve their language proficiency in one skill area can enhance performance in other language skills, as found by (Oxford, 1996). One manner to promote integrated learning is through peer-to- peer collaboration.
The promotion of cooperative learning in the classroom is very important in language classrooms. While giving and receiving help from peers during activities, students may share many interests, ideas, thoughts, and opinions. This interpersonal form of communicative interaction emphasizes the need for adept social skills, and it motivates students to react better with their peers. Tomlinson (1999) suggests that when teachers introduce new academic concepts to students, it is important to guide learners, so as to allow them to consider how their differing socio- economic status, cultural background, use of the language, and other possible factors affect their learning. Therefore, it is important for students to share and react to each other in the class in terms of both linguistic input and output. In this way, students can utilize their life experiences and their own ideas. Within a carefully scaffold activity, the students will be able to link content related to their lives with the learning of new linguistic items. In addition, as they think critically about their own perceptions and those of their classmates, they will build a stronger emotionally connection with the instructor and their peers, noted by Vygotsky (1978) as the zone of proximal development. This will allow them to produce authentic content about themselves and their peers in a variety of oral and written communication activities. 58 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Furthermore, when learners are not formally guided by teachers, they may spontaneously react and cooperatively communicate to guide each other. Lin, Groom, & Lin. (2013) stated a supportive peer- assisted learning environment with interactive feedback could help learners reflect on their professional attitude and provide them with evidence-based practice. Therefore, setting up a student-centered cooperative learning environment, such as providing group discussions and debate activities, provides learners the chance to make their own decisions about how to conduct the course, which empowers and in that way, helps them enhance their motivation towards learning. This is, in essence, the creation of a social learning environment. Such a context is directly applicable to the many forms of social media that developed from recent advances in communications technology. Furthermore, the creation of social learning environment has positive effects on learner motivation.
At the end of every school semester, many students realize they have learned something valuable from language classes and intuitively store the improved language ability in their memory. However, it is the students’ work (e.g. written materials), which is the content that they produce, in most cases, that is frequently left over and useable to review, long after the class is finished. However, in the case of oral production, it is very difficult for students to specifically recall what they have learned in their working memory during class. Thus, it is important to design the class so as to preserve learning goals in the form of artifacts. Fortunately, technology is particularly adept at providing a storage area for such content. There are a variety of free and fee- based websites that allow users to post written content, such as blog posts, as well as more recent forms that allow the recording of audio-visual content, known as video logs (Vlog).
On these websites the content remains so long as the site is operational. Furthermore, the content can be reviewed, and the thoughts of others can be recorded in the form of comments, a form of reply, based on the original posting, or on comments themselves. For language learners, this provides not simply a chance to interact in the target language with their classmates in a novel format (e.g. outside of the classroom context), but also to receive comments from other users of the target language in the public forum. It is this point that highlights the value of Vlogs for language learners (Ward, 2004). From the student’s perspective, they are provided a chance to review a product of their language learning while they simultaneously continue their language development. Providing students free, unstructured writing practice and a medium of communication helps students who have difficulties expressing themselves because it provides opportunities for them to reflect and describe their learning and to develop writing strategy awareness and metacognitive awareness (Palfreyman, 2005). In this way students are freely PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 59 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright allowed to recall and extend the resonating neural networks beyond the several months of focused instruction, and the web record acts to remind students of learning goals once again. According the Freire (1993), the primary artifact that historically represents and reminds students of the course is the textbook. Freire found that when the student’s books were annotated by their peers, it restored the ideas and thoughts of the contents that they had learned through the semester. There were many students who liked to take notes and remind themselves of the topics studied outside of the classes. However there were also several students who were drawn to go back to notebooks and textbooks.
There is a growing interest of using creative and authentic teaching materials with ELLs. Yashima (2011) has claimed that having interest in international matters in general should help ELLs be motivated to use English. She argued that ELLs who have more global sense are more likely to have the willingness to communicate in English under globalized circumstances. It was anticipated that students were motivated to learn English through constructing their views in writing blog posts about them and sharing them with the public. In addition, by reading blog posts not only from peers but also from people all over the world, learners will receive input on to authentic English vocabulary and writing styles. Hwang (2005) stated that when learners truly enjoy authentic materials, they could be gradually hypnotized into the pattern of the target language. Regarding previous studies on the use of the blog, most of focus is on “written” language. One of the notable empirical studies on the use of videos in integrated practice in teaching English is Shih (2010),. Shih suggested that learners would enhance and improve their English writing proficiency, when they are within a meaningful context, which is comprised of speaking activities. Thus, creating and providing a platform where students may access and preserve the artifacts of discourse is important for critical thinking pedagogy. The use of the blogs is a modern iteration of textbook annotation. While, in the current context, there are a variety of artifacts available for use in language instruction, and teaching in general, the Vlog has not been examined in detail. However, the prior research provides support for the use of the technology in language classrooms. The current study addresses this gap in the literature by proposing the following research questions.
Research Questions
1. Will participants in the Blog group improve their writing ability after completion of the blog-based activities? 2. Will participants in the Blog/Oral group improve their writing ability after completion of the blog-based activities and the oral communication feedback sessions? 60 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
3. Will there be differences among the writing abilities of the treatment groups and the control group across the testing measures? 4. How will students perceive the effectiveness of the treatment measures?
Methodology
Research setting and participants
The present study was conducted a University in Kanagawa, Japan. A total of ninety Japanese sophomore students (N = 90), were drawn from three required integrated English reading and writing courses. Upon signing the consent form to verify their intentions, they willingly expressed their desire to participate in the research. They were duly informed that they could withdraw from the project at any time, with no effect on their performance their respective course. English courses at the university where the study was conducted are divided into three levels: advanced, intermediate, and basic. Those participants were placed in the advanced levels. There were 30 participants (n = 30) in each class. The classes were randomly assigned to a control group, Blog group, and Blog/Oral group. Each class was 90 minutes long, and the participants met twice a week throughout the semester. All classes followed a curriculum, which meant that the students were taught the same material over a full academic semester, 15 weeks in total. The curriculum covers 4 main chapters from the textbook, including 15 minutes short paragraph reading activities, comprehension questions and vocabulary building. Given the aim of the research was to investigate the effect of structured blogging activities, and the related written analysis of such posts, the students in both Blog and Blog/Oral group were required to complete 7 writing assignments on the blog through the semester and to post on a class blog site. Instead, the control group was required to complete paper-based writing. Assignments for all the groups were related to short video presentation. To specifically see how oral discussion may affect writing proficiency, the Blog/Oral group also engaged in discussion activities during the treatment sessions. This consisted of 15 minutes of English oral discussion based on the content of the blogs. This differed from the Control group and the Blog group, which instead spent 15 minutes on self-reflection exercises, which involved writing a paragraph based on a textbook reading activity. The Summary of the activities is shown in Table 1 below.
PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 61 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright
Table 1. Summary of activities that each group have taken
Number of assignments Control Group Blog Group Blog/Oral Group
Followed Unified Curriculum
7 15 min. Video presentation & in-class paper-based activities
7 15 min. Short- 15 min. Short- 15 min. Discussion Paragraph reading Paragraph reading of previous blog and vocabulary and vocabulary content activities activities
7 Paper-based writing Blog-based Blog-based assignments – one assignments – one assignments – one paragraph paragraph paragraph
Course design
The treatments were designed to take advantage of advances in portable computing devices. Drawing on prior research (e.g. Ward, 2004), the authors noted how technology based approaches had been deployed successfully in language classrooms. In addition, from course design perspective, technology has also been found to be effective, for example, in the way Nam (2010) identified the positive impact of using video materials during class activities. Nam found that speaking and writing skills increased by the integration of reading materials, when accompanied by computer-assisted language learning (CALL) based vocabulary practice. Considering Nam’s use of CALL, the authors identified, as noted above, the value of integrating technology-based artifacts. They selected the smartphone and the personal computer as appropriate tools, given the ubiquity of such objects in the researchers’ teaching context. The audio and video recording ability of such devices allowed the use of recall sessions. The students in the Blog group and the Blog/Oral group were given the choice to self-record themselves individually or in pairs during the activities. They then watched the recordings of their own language usage, to prompt self–correction. This process differed from that of the control group, where the participants were in conversation dyads for the entire duration of the fluency activity. In this way, by reviewing their recorded video clips, students in the treatment groups were prompted to remember in-class activities as well as learning contents, examples of accurate and inaccurate language production, their own opinions, and their thoughts in the classroom context and outside of the classroom. This was made possible by the use of smartphones to review class content during their commute to and 62 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
from school. Other classes were able to reflect using traditional mediums, such as notes from the class. Apart from the content of the activities, all of the classes were taught in the same classroom setting, as noted above, using a unified syllabus and schedule. All participants in both treatment groups had access to a personal computer, a laptop, or a cellphone to connect to the blogging website: www.blogspot.com, while those in the Control group were not allowed access to such devices. Therefore, the students in the treatment groups had online access to conduct their blogging activities at any time. Students were assigned to post writing assignments on the teacher- managed blog page and were encouraged to leave comments for their classmates’ writing entries. The design was linked to the construct of collaboration, as defined by Murphy (2012), who noted from a neuroscience perspective that students can learn best from following 4 elements: variety, autonomy, collaboration, and emotional content. This approach involved providing learners in the treatment groups (Blog group & Blog/Oral) with a large sample of different tasks or topics (variety) from they would generate content for the blogs. This was done while allowing them the freedom to address the targets in their own way (autonomy) as well as at a time of their choosing. At the same time, the learners worked together to construct a shared understanding (collaboration) on the content, so as to generate and reflect on it. The Blog group reflected using synchronous chat features of the blog website, while the Blog/Oral group did the same, with the addition of face-to-face, collaborative interactions with their peers and the instructor. Further, the open-ended nature of the blog activities allowed for range of views to be expressed (i.e. on a blog post) and debated (i.e. via chat-based reply for both treatment groups or in a discussion for the Blog/Oral group.), which represents emotional content. Students in all 3 groups received the teacher’s feedback about their writing and grammatical errors throughout the semester. However, the control groups submitted paragraphs on paper, where feedback and corrections were provided directly (hand written) on their papers, whereas both treatment groups received feedback and corrections on the blog website, with the Blog/Oral group also receiving verbal comments during the discussions. The instructor provided feedback and corrections in a positive and encouraging manner. Further, the students were informed such feedback would help them develop their English language abilities and should therefore be aware of the influence of their feedback practices on their expectations and attitudes (Lee, 2008). It should also be mentioned that the website offered numerous creative functions to post a variety of content in each blog entry, such as inserting pictures, voice recordings, hyperlinking specific websites, posting YouTube videos, and so on. In terms of SLA pedagogy, this provided the learners with a high degree of learner autonomy (e.g. Irie & Stewart, 2011).
PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 63 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright
Treatments
The content that the Treatment sessions were based on were created by the classroom instructor and were assigned in the classes to participants in all the groups, including the Control group. First, the students were presented with three to five minutes of English education-related videos from YouTube or TED Talks in the class. There were a variety of topics, many of which were courageous, persuasive, informative, and inspiring videos (e.g. TED talk sub-categories), and several of them had multi-language subtitles, again allowing a degree of autonomy (Murphy, 2012). Second, students were able to take notes and had discussions about the video with classmates. Third, the instructor gave students the worksheet and asked students to check the comprehension and vocabulary from the videos. Finally, students watched the video again and summarized the story in English in the class. Both the video content and the reading materials were selected based on the potential to be emotionally engaging to the participants. It was after this point that the differentiation of the groups began.
For each writing assignment, the students wrote about a life/moral lesson, which was derived from the video. Intentionally, the instructor was able to ensure a level of emotional content (Murphy, 2012), to ensure the students would be engaged in each video. The students then wrote the reason(s) why they chose the life/moral lessons. Next, the students would apply the life/moral lesson from the story and connect it to their own life experiences. They were asked to describe it in detail. Finally, students completed their writing paragraphs and submit the writing paragraphs. For the control groups, the writing assignments were always hand written. For the Blog and the Blog/Oral group, they would post their writings on the blog to share with classmates. In class, all groups had the opportunity to share their writings and give feedback to each other. Also, the instructor collected the papers from the control groups to provide the corrections and feedbacks for students to revise their grammar mistakes and content corrections. In this assignment, students were also able to annotate their writings with pictures and movies so that the students were able to express themselves with text-based, visual, or audio content. Students in control and the Blog groups were encouraged to use diagrams and mind mappings to express their ideas on the notes. Further, the Blog/Oral group was able to record and post video messages of themselves to enhance the emotional impact of their writings. So as to ensure an incidental focus on accuracy. The Control group received corrective feedback, in the form of hand written notes, on assignments that were based on the selected readings. 64 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
The instructor also provided general content on a special page of the blog site that included grammar tips, new vocabulary, or academic website links for the students; therefore, students could individually revise their writing. This feedback was provided in a paper-based format for the Control (e.g. hand-written notes) and electronically for the treatment groups (e.g. using a track changes feature). Student-specific feedback was also provided in the form of comments to each student’s blog post, and in-class peer review activities for all of the groups were also provided. Since the videos were designed to be of relevant emotional content to the learners and linked to students’ own learning, the students were encouraged to leave comments and view the feedback from other students in their own time via the Internet. In this way, students were able to explore classmates’ writing to individually apply their knowledge and complete the assignments. Peer feedback was primarily content related, with students often showing a level of agreement or asking a follow-up question. Since this process serves as a valuable tool to collaboratively develop the ideas with peers and teachers (i.e. Jones & Brader Araje, 2002), it creates a dynamic student-centered classroom. More specifically, through the blog activities: posting online, sharing the opinions, and commenting on the feedback, students were able to interact with peers and transfer their own knowledge and thoughts by reading the paragraphs and writing to produce their own posts. For the control group, students were given opportunities to exchange their paragraphs (i.e. their papers) and peer reviewed their writing in classes. Murphy (1993) explains that supportive comments from students’ journals, essays, action logs, and reflections on class activities can greatly enhance the effectiveness of the classroom activities when they are given the appropriate amount of exposure. Therefore, as evidenced by the many comments the students wrote for each other, the instructor found that students were impressed by the provision of feedback and, therefore, put more effort into their own writing.
The aim of this activity was focused on building the students’ schema (Littlemore, 2012), which refers to the belief that the students’ cognitive framework will be stimulated by their interest in a given topic. Because a schema network helps students organize and interpret information, the students’ learning styles will be shaped by their own learning experience and coded in their brains. Since they described the story of the video, described the moral lesson, and applied the moral lesson to their own life experience in the class, they were able to rehearse and follow the same structure when they created the blog post for each writing assignment. It was hoped, as found by Littlemore (2012), that the students would be able to build their ‘schema’ and connect their existing language ability and any new concepts presented in the videos, which would then developed during interaction and mediation with their peers and the instructor during the activity. This would help the students learn the core content of the video, which would allow them to fill PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 65 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright the gap in their minds, which then would result in improved writing ability (Jenkins, 2012). An analysis of the data was conducted to verify the extent to which that might have occurred.
Data Collection
At the beginning of the semester, all students in each group took a pre-test. The students were all given an identical writing topic to write about for a maximum of 60 minutes. At the end of the semester, the students took a final writing exam as a post-test to identify any changes in their English proficiency in writing. All writing exams were evaluated by a standardized writing rubric, which contained 5 different evaluation categories: Contents (15 points), Organization of paragraphs (10 points), Grammar (10 points), Vocabulary (10 points), and Mechanics (5 points). The maximum score is 50 points (see Appendix 1). The tests were evaluated by 2 English teachers, and both scores for each test were then averaged to ensure the consistency of the scores. To ensure inter-rater reliability, at the beginning of the semester, the teachers who rated the testing measures participated in a professional development session to ensure accurate and consistent writing evaluations. In relation to the research questions, and based on the review of the literature, the following hypothesis was proposed.
Hypothesis
1. Participation in the blog assignment activity will improve the writing proficiency of both the Blog group and the Blog/Oral group, in terms of scores on written testing measures. 2. Participation in 15 minute speaking activities will impact on Blog/Oral group’s writing skills so as to outperform the other groups (e.g. Blog group, control group) on written post-tests.
Data Analysis
Statistical Analysis between groups is explained. Pre-test and post-test results between the control group, the Blog group, and the Blog/Oral group were analyzed by a two-way ANOVA. As noted above: n = 30 for each group. Table 2 shows the pre-test scores between the groups, F(2, 174) = .70, p = .50, not significant. As a result, there was no statistical significance between pre- tests. Therefore, it indicates that at the beginning of the semester, the writing skills within the groups were of nearly the same levels. This allows for the employment of teaching strategies, such as those included in the treatments, to impact the test group’s scores on a writing test. Each group followed a similar lesson structure, with two 90 minutes class a week through a 15 week 66 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
semester. The treatment period included 7 assignments, based on some form of input (e.g. a reading for the Control group and the Blog group and a video for the Blog/Oral group). There was then a writing activity and a discussion based on the content. Given that students in all groups were enrolled in a writing course, writing proficiency improvements, from pre-test to post-test for all groups, were expected. Further, an analysis of the data indicated that the treatments were as effective as the Control, with all groups showing significant improvements. An analysis of two factors: the oral discussion treatments and the blog assignments, demonstrates a possible explanation. For each factor, the differences between each group’s post-test scores were examined, as seen in Table 2. The post-test results between the groups, F(2, 174) = 18.17, p < 0.1., indicated that test scores were statistically significant.
Table 2. Pre- and post-test results between the groups **p<.01 *p<.05 SS DF MS F P Pre-test 14.02 2 7.01 .70 .50 1747.40 174 10.04 Post-test 365.00 2 182.50 18.17 .00 ** 1747.40 174 10.04
By using a Bonferroni analysis, the significant differences were examined (see Table 3). First, between the control and the Blog groups, the p value was smaller than .1, which showed that average scores of the Blog group, were statistically higher than control group. Next, between the control and the Blog/Oral group, the p value was also smaller than .1, which also demonstrated that average scores of the Blog/Oral group are statistically higher than the other. In contrast, between the Blog and the Blog/Oral group, the p value showed 1.0, which meant there was no statistically significant difference between the average score of those two groups. This finding indicated that oral discussion did not have much effect on students’ writing improvement.
PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 67 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright
Table 3. Results of two-way ANOVA test results (Bonferroni) **p<.01 *p<.05 Average Average Score 1 Score 2 Difference SE F P Pre-test Control Blog 34.83 33.87 .97 .82 1.18 .72
Control Blog/ Oral 34.83 34.33 .50 .82 .61 1.00
Blog Blog/ Oral 33.87 34.33 .47 .82 .57 1.00
Post-test Control Blog 37.73 41.73 4.00 .82 4.89 .00 **
Control Blog/ Oral 37.73 42.23 4.50 .82 5.50 .00 **
Blog Blog/ Oral 41.73 42.23 .50 .82 .61 1.00
Statistical Analysis within the groups:
To see if there is any improvement in English writing proficiency within the groups, the pre-test and post-test results of the control group, the Blog group, and the Blog/Oral group are also analyzed by two-way ANOVA (see Figure 1). Table 4 shows the pre-test and post-test scores within the groups. The authors found that all groups significantly improved their writing proficiency: control group: F(1, 174) = 12.56, P<0.1, Blog group: F(1,174) = 92.43, p < 0.1, and Blog/Oral group: F(1,174) = 93.22, P < 0.1 are (see Table 4 and Table 5). Therefore, this improvement indicates that through the semester, the writing skills within the groups were improved. However, there is no significant difference between the Blog and the Blog/Oral group, even though the average scores of the Blog/Oral group were higher compared to the other groups.
68 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Figure 1. Average Score for each group
Table 4. Pre-test and post-test scores within the groups **p<.01 *p<.05
SS DF MS F P
Control 126.15 1.00 126.15 12.56 0.00 **
1747.40 174.00 10.04
Blog 928.27 1.00 928.27 92.43 0.00 **
1747.40 174.00 10.04
Blog/Oral 936.15 1.00 936.15 93.22 0.00 **
1747.40 174.00 10.04
PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 69 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright
Table 5. Results of two-way ANOVA test for post-test (Bonferroni) **p<.01 *p<.05
Average Average Difference E F P Score 1 Score 2
Control Pre-test Post-test 34.83 37.73 2.90 0.82 3.54 0.00 **
Blog Pre-test Post-test 33.87 41.73 7.87 0.82 9.61 0.00 **
Blog/Oral Pre-test Post-test 34.33 42.23 7.90 0.82 9.65 0.00 **
Discussion
The results noted above shows that all of the classes had significant improvement in writing scores, and therefore the blog and blog/oral activities are not shown to be more effective than paper-based activities. However, the degree to which the learners in the treatment groups improved, demonstrates the use of blogs in ELL classrooms can have a very positive impact on their writing improvements and are a viable alternative to paper-based activities. The authors find the reason for this is that such activities allow students to scaffold learning for each other while navigating their writing tasks and to process their academic writing knowledge, as well as to help them negotiate and better understand their identities as academic writers. As the constructivist perspective on learning argues, effective learning involves the active process of linking learners’ existing knowledge and experience with new ideas for them to make sense of a new situation. In the study reported here, students had the range of different writing-related topics, which were discussed, shared, and explored with peers on their blogs. Students also came to a new understanding of their experiences, their performances, and their roles in writing. Within the context of the current study only, the results support the need for continued research on the topic.
While considering the similarity of the scores among the experimental groups, the treatment groups did show greater numerical improvements, as shown by increases on their writing scores through the semester, as compared to those of the Control group. The data shows that the Blog/Oral group had the highest score increase, and its F value of the post-test, F = 9.65, indicates that there is a positive effect of combining blog activities with oral discussions. While again acknowledging that there were not significant differences among the three groups, the authors find the results to generally support the research into the use of blogs in language teaching contexts. A future study, with a larger number of treatments over a longer duration may allow a 70 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
more meaningful comparison of the treatments and the Control group. In addition, it should be noted that the enhancement of writing scores may also be attributed to other causes and circumstances, such as learning in other classes or self-study. However the positive results of post- test show that execution of blog assignments through computer devices contributed to the development of their writing skills. Stated another way, learning writing skills through blogs likely had a positive effect on the development of English writing proficiency, and is thus suitable for use in Japanese university language classes.
Student Feedback
After the completion of the testing measures, 5 students from the Blog and the Blog Oral group volunteered to individually participate in 10-minute interviews, with the classroom instructor, to give feedback on the use of blogs in the experiment. The interview questions were designed to elicit how the students perceived the use of blogs. The following responses are evidence of such assertions and reflections and which demonstrate the increased level of social communicative learning through the semester, as related to the constructivist theory (e.g. Du & Wagner, 2007).
I had a fear for using technology and didn’t know how to even use Microsoft Word to type my writing assignments. However, through the semester, I used my cellphone and conveniently writing my English paragraphs. My train commute from my house to my class became my study time to stay on my writing assignment. (Student A from the Blog group)
As noted in the comments immediately above and below, the participants in the Blog group had contrasting view on preferred communication styles. Student A was averse to the use of technology, particularly in an academic context. Student B was in fact less enthusiastic about the prospect on face-to-face interactions, and therefore, less likely to be motivated by such interaction types. However, both seemed to benefit from the use of an electronic format, both in terms of studying outside of class, as noted by Student A and on discovering a more palatable way to receive feedback, as noted by Student B. This relates to Murphy (2012), by allowing both learners a sense of autonomy, in terms of the format and context in which they learn.
I don’t like face-to-face conversation with other students, so it was easier to exchange our opinions with other classmates through blog comments. My teacher highlighted my grammar mistakes, so it was easier for me to see them through my computers and find PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 71 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright
answers using the Internet. Also, the personal resume and my classmates’ writings on tour blog at the beginning of semester helped me write sentences more. (Student B from the Blog group)
The interviewees from the Blog/Oral group, not surprisingly, highlighted the value of conversational interactions. With Student C noting the sense of community that developed between them (e.g. Murhpy, 2012), particularly in terms of the ability to openly express opinions with classmates. While the testing measures did not provide differentiation among the experimental groups, the responses of this small subset of the participants does support the use of blogs in language classrooms, as a way to appeal to students of different learning styles, as shown in the excerpts below.
I started to know more about my classmates through the oral conversation activities, and I enjoyed exchanging our opinions. After watching the videos, finding the Life/Moral lessons and sharing our unique experience were very tough, but we had opportunities to know more about our interests. Now we know them more and don’t hesitate to talk and share ourselves in English. (Student C from the Blog/Oral group)
Building on the response from the previous student, that one by Student D seemed to be a classic example of the goals of the study. Student D perceived the value of using technology both in and out of the classroom. In addition, the student found that the use of conversational interactions, when paired with blog based activities, allowed for better retention of course content. While beyond the scope of the current study to measure concretely, the student’s comment on using knowledge gained from the activities, to help draft new written work is a positive form of feedback. It is certainly the goal of the second language writing teachers to promote the transfer of knowledge to subsequent writings. The authors hope that in a future study this could be examined further.
I enjoyed reading my classmates writings and getting the comments from them. It’s like Facebook, but I can practice English. The Oral discussion also helped me generate a lot of English sentences because I usually spend a lot of time to complete one English paragraph. In discussions, even our English was not perfect we repeatedly provide our opinions to each other. I remembered our class discussions and numerous ideas, which became very useful for me to compose my writing paragraphs. (Student D from the Blog/Oral group) 72 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
As the students’ feedback shown above demonstrates, through a technology enhanced learning environment, the students gained confidence in writing ability and developed motivation towards the use of the cellphone and computers in language classes. Learners who had anxiety towards face-to-face conversational interactions were able to enjoy and produce their personal opinions and exchange their thoughts through written comments. Based on the comments by the participants drawing on Murphy (2012), once learners have gained confidence (i.e. motivation) in their abilities towards using education technologies more efficiently and developed the skills to communicate with peers (i.e. collaboration & community), they tend to gain more, not simply in terms of writing scores, but as means of self-improvement (autonomy).
Conclusion and Future Research
The results of the current study support the claim that blogging activities can be utilized effectively to help language learners improve their writing. As noted in the literature, a more complex interaction of inputs leads to writing performance improvements. Oral communication skills and other non-writing related language skills develop during interactions in a social environment. Through the blogging and oral discussion activities, students in the classroom did not simply improve multiple language skills, but they also exchanged their personal information and their background experience in a foreign language. Most importantly, their interpersonal relationships were enhanced, and they learned and better understood themselves. When the students posted written passages on the blog, it helped them build strong interpersonal relationships (i.e. collaboration), which seemed motivated by the very same interactions with their peers. In addition, the use of blogs extended the context of a communicative classroom from standard academic tasks to dual purpose academic skills improvement (i.e. improved writing scores) and learning community building activities (i.e. students shared and reacted to their classmates in novel ways), which links to the constructivist approach. The authors provided students with a collaborative social learning environment, and the learners then generated their own peer learning and peer teaching strategies. Peer learning is an extension of the concept of teaching learning strategies to students, as in this case the students themselves developed and taught the strategies to each other. With this broad focus through the semester, they developed autonomy (i.e. Murphy, 2012), which prompted language acquisition through the development of their oral skills, critical thinking skills, and writing skills. It is true that students can obtain these multiple skills in variety of academic and professional settings in order to expand multiple English language skills, in an efficient manner. Thus, regarding further research, one key area be PROMOTING WRITTEN PRODUCTION AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS THROUGH BLOG ACTIVITIES 73 Hiroshi Nakagawa & David Wright investigated is whether learners’ oral communication scores will increase during Blog assignments and in Blog/Oral discussion assignments. Going further, the results of oral proficiency measures could be correlated with writing scores.
Limitations
While the results of the current study generally support the use of blog activities, as an alternative way to foster second language acquisition in integrated listening and speaking classes in Japanese universities, the authors note that further studies are needed to verify if such data can be obtained in other contexts, specifically in terms of academic settings in other countries. Further, there is a need to have a large pool of practical classroom teachers implement the activities shown here to confirm if similar results can be established from replication studies. While the current study was practical by design, a study with an experimental design, with a true control group (i.e. where participants do not receive language instruction in any form) would allow a more thorough analysis of the effects of blogs on writing proficiency. The authors hope to conduct such studies in the future, so as to address these limitations, through collaboration with international researchers and instructors at their home institution.
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Appendix 1. Writing score rubric
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SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS
Ju Chuan Huang
National Taiwan Ocean University
Abstract
Corpus-based research helps uncover hidden patterns of word choices and linguistic features in a specific genre. So far, abundant corpus research has examined language features within a single discipline and compared them across disciplines. However, little research has attempted to understand whether variations exist within one single discipline, especially in research articles. This study attempted to fill in this gap by investigating potential sub-disciplinary variations in marine engineering research articles. Specifically, the most frequently used nouns and verbs were examined across three subfields in marine engineering and four research article sections. The investigation into the frequent nouns and verbs across three subfields revealed more differences than similarities, confirming the presence of sub-disciplinary variations. In addition, the examination of nouns and verbs across sections also indicated that variations exist across sections and that some words might correspond to the function of each section. Based on these findings, several pedagogical implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.
Keywords: Marine Engineering; research articles; corpus-based research; sub-disciplinary variations
Introduction
Corpus-based research has played an important role in the fields of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and English for Academic Purposes (EAP). According to Murison-Bowie’s (1996, p.184) definition, if dictionaries show “a generic set of meaning potentials,” then corpus research “seeks to make this set as representative as possible of the common and typical examples evidenced by the corpus.” In other words, corpus-based research can make it easier for newcomers of a discourse community to move toward fuller participation (Lave & Wenger, 1991) by helping them understand the hidden pattern of language use in their discourse community. Findings of corpus-based investigations, therefore, can be used as pedagogical materials for exploring SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 79 Ju Chuan Huang language use in context. For example, the data-driven learning approach proposed by Johns (1991) asks students to discover the patterns of a target word from a list of concordances. Mudraya (2006) also demonstrates several instructional activities that exploit the most frequent engineering vocabulary.
With the pedagogical potential of corpus-based research, a large body of literature has been devoted to uncovering patterns of linguistic features and words in academic genres. Linguistic features examined include interactional metadiscourse (Gillaerts & Van de Velde, 2010) and first person pronouns (Kuo, 1999). Examining these features, Hyland (2001, 2004) found variations of language use between hard sciences and soft sciences, suggesting that disciplinary preferences exist. In addition to linguistic features, some studies focus on academic vocabulary. Coxhead (2000) compiled an academic word list that is believed to be common for most of the disciplines; Mudraya (2006) also compiled a list of frequently occurring words for engineering and found that semi-technical vocabulary dominated the list. On the other hand, Vongpumivitch, Huang, and Chang (2009) compiled an academic word list for applied linguistics and identified some differences between their list and Coxhead’s list, confirming that each discipline may have its own preferences for lexical choice.
Despite existing literature on disciplinary preferences of language use, little research has compared similarities and differences in language use among subfields within a single discipline, and little research has examined the field of marine engineering. The two gaps are important for several reasons. First, Samraj (2005) examined research article sections in two closely related fields and found differences between the two, indicating that variations do exist even when the two fields are very similar. In other words, variations may also be found within one single discipline, and novice writers who are unaware of that may still write in ways that do not meet the expectations of their target readership. In addition, sub-disciplinary variations may be particularly obvious for applied disciplines such as marine engineering. Marine engineering is a field that consists of all types of knowledge related to ships. It has three main subfields. Automatic control (AC) deals with the electric and electronic devices of ships and is related to electronic engineering; structure and dynamic (SD) contains the physics of ocean waves and materials of ship building, and its knowledge comes from physics and material science; heat and flow (HF) seeks to enhance the power of ships and is related to power engineering. Such an applied discipline that encompasses knowledge from various fields may thus have important sub-disciplinary variations that characterize each subfield. Therefore, to fill in the gaps, this study investigated frequently 80 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
used words in different research article sections in marine engineering and compared similarities and differences among subfields and sections. Three research questions guided this study:
1. What are the frequently used nouns and verbs in each research article section in the subfields of marine engineering? 2. What are similarities and differences in word choice among three subfields? 3. What are similarities and differences in word choice among four sections?
By answering these questions, it is hoped that this study can identify sub-disciplinary variations, if any, within marine engineering and in turn can provide pedagogical implications for teaching academic English writing within a single discipline.
Methods
For the purpose of the study, a small specialized corpus was compiled. The corpus consists of 60 research articles in marine engineering, in which each subfield (AC, SD, and HF) has 20 research articles. To compile these articles, two disciplinary experts of each subfield were asked to recommend three prestigious journals in their subfield, and three journals with highest impact factors were selected for each subfield. Then, research articles were randomly selected from issues in 2013 on the premise of two criteria. First, the first author and the corresponding author were both affiliated with universities in the U.S. In doing so, it was assumed that language quality was ensured by native English speakers or by experienced English writers who have native-like proficiency. Second, the research articles had to be empirical studies; as a result, theoretical research and reviews of research were excluded. In the end, 20 research articles in AC were compiled from International Journal of Electrical Power and Energy Systems, IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy systems, and IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 20 articles in SD were selected from Journal of Materials Processing Technology, Journal of Power Sources, and Costal Engineering, and 20 articles were identified from Journal of Fluid Mechanics, International Journal of Thermal Sciences, and Fuel. The articles in each subfield were then coded as SD1 to SD20, AC1 to AC20, and HF1 to HF20.
After the articles were identified, nouns and verbs were tagged by computer and examined manually by the researcher and a research assistant. Then, WordSmith 6.0 (Scott, 2012) was used to create wordlists for nouns and verbs. Words with little lexical semantic meaning were then deleted, such as pronouns (including personal pronouns), numbers, BE-verbs and delexical verbs, that is, verbs with little semantic meaning when they stand alone (e.g. “make”). SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 81 Ju Chuan Huang
After the wordlists were finalized, the nouns and verbs were examined in their contexts. They were compared across three subfields and four sections, namely introductions, methods, results and discussions, and conclusions. Results and discussions were counted as one section as the two sections were mostly combined in the research articles in the corpus.
Results
The frequently appearing nouns and verbs were examined in three subfields and in four sections. The following sections first report the most frequently used nouns across three subfields and four sections, followed by the most frequently used verbs across three subfields and four sections.
1. The most frequently used nouns across three subfields Table 1. The frequently used nouns in each section across three subfields Section AC SD HF Introduction System Wave Heat Power Surface Flow Control Model Oil Section/ Approach Energy Temperature Paper Study Number Methods Power Wave Temperature Control Model Flow/Time Function Water Pressure Time Current Velocity Fuzzy Data Heat Results and Discussions Result Wave Figure Control Surface Time Case Discharge Flow Time Phase Case System Velocity Result Conclusions Control Wave Perturbation System Model Time Algorithm Flow Flow Power Surface Equilibrium Approach Height Result
Table 1 presents the most frequently used nouns for each section across three subfields; for convenience only the single form of nouns is presented. The order of the words from top to 82 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
bottom signifies the level of frequency. For example, the most frequent noun in introductions in each subfield is “system,” “wave,” and “heat,” respectively. As can be seen from Table 1, each subfield has its preferences for word choices. For example, in introductions, the AC field uses many instances of “section;” an examination of the concordances of these words shows that researchers in the AC field tend to outline the sections of their research articles more frequently than the researchers in the other two subfields. In addition, the AC field often uses “paper” to refer to research whereas the SD field uses “study” to refer to research, as shown in the following examples:
This study is concerned with plunging regular waves. [SD9] This paper presents an optimal and direct-current vector control mechanism for a VSC- based STATCOM. [AC8] As indicated in the above sentences, AC and SD prefer to use different nouns to refer to the research itself. Neither of the words, however, is on the top five in the HF field.
In methods, no frequently used nouns are shared across the three subfields; on the other hand, it seems that the topic of each subfield can be inferred from the most frequent words in methods. The AC field deals with “power” and “control” of electric and electronic devices; the SD field mainly investigates the physics of waves and thus has keywords such as “wave,” “water” and “current;” the HF field focuses on the power of ships and therefore has keywords such as “heat” and “temperature.” The most frequently occurring words in methods tend to be terms that contain specific disciplinary meanings.
In results and discussions, similarly, no frequently used nouns are used by all of the subfields, though the AC field seems to share some nouns with the HF field. Specifically, the AC field often uses “result” to refer to its findings, and the HF similarly frequently uses “result” and “figure.” When closely examining these words in the HF articles, it was found that the HF articles often present findings in figures, explaining why “figure” tops the list. On the other hand, the SD field uses these words less frequently. The following are two examples of how the AC field and the HF field use “result” and “figure” in the results and discussions:
The following result follows directly from Proposition 9. [AC7] Figure 2(c) shows the potential vorticity q of the basic state and the equilibrated Vorticity [HF11] SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 83 Ju Chuan Huang
As can be seen, the AC field uses “result” to refer to what is obtained from calculations and simulations, whereas the HF field uses “figure” to show their findings. Both words occur in the SD field as well but with a lower frequency.
In the conclusion section, no frequently used nouns are shared by the three subfields either. In addition to the words that relate to the content of each subfield, the AC field frequently uses “algorithm” and “approach,” the SD field uses “model” more often, and the HF field uses “result” more frequently, confirming sub-disciplinary variations. Three examples are illustrated as follows:
Therefore, the multi-physics model developed in this study is shown to be a more comprehensive solution for analyzing the surface microstructure alteration in hard turning. [SD3]
The algorithm is suitable for real-time application. [AC10]
The results presented here confirm the complexity of the dynamic of phenomena occurring at the interface in the presence of asphaltenes and also stress the complex synergistic behavior of NA and asphaltenes. [HF3]
Since variations across subfields are identified, it is of interest to understand whether variations are present across sections as well. The next section reports the frequently used nouns across sections within the same subfield.
2. The most frequent nouns across sections within one subfield Table 2. The most frequently used nouns in the AC field Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions
System Power Result Control
Power Control Control System
Control Function Case Algorithm
Section/ Approach Time Time Power
Paper Fuzzy System Approach
Table 2 shows the most frequent nouns across sections with the AC field. As can be seen in Table 2, “control”, which relates to the topic of the AC field, is used across sections. On the other hand, the most frequent nouns in each section seem to correspond to the function of each 84 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
section. For example, “section” and “paper” are used more often in introductions, whereas “result” is used more often in results and discussions.
Table 3. The most frequently used nouns in the SD field Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions Wave Wave Wave Wave Surface Model Surface Model Model Water Discharge Flow Energy Current Phase Surface Study Data Velocity Height
Table 3 lists the most frequently used nouns across sections in the SD field. Similar to the AC field, “wave,” which is the topic of the field, is used predominantly. In addition, “model” is frequently found in all sections except for results and discussions, probably because the two sections focus more on the findings derived from models.
Table 4. The most frequently used nouns across sections in the HF field Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions Heat Temperature Figure Perturbation Flow Flow/Time Time Time Oil Pressure Flow Flow Temperature Velocity Case Equilibrium Number Heat Result Result
Table 4 lists the most frequent nouns across sections in the HF field. While no words are shared across sections, the most frequent nouns seem to relate the two topics of the subfield, heat and flow. For the topic related to heat, nouns such as “temperature” and “heat” can be found; as for the topic of flow, nouns such as “perturbation,” “equilibrium,” and “flow” are the most frequent words. Therefore, it seems that the most frequently used nouns are often disciplinary terms in the HF field.
In summary, a comparison among the most frequent nouns across the three subfields reveals sub-disciplinary variations, as each subfield seems to have its own preferences of word choices. In addition, when examining these nouns across sections within one subfield, it becomes clearer that the nouns that are often used in more than one section are mainly words with SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 85 Ju Chuan Huang disciplinary meanings. Moreover, some nouns seem to correspond to the purpose of each section, such as “paper” and “study” in introductions, as well as “result” and “figure” in results and discussions.
3. The most frequently used verbs across three subfields Table 5. The frequently used nouns in each section across three subfields
Section AC SD HF Introduction Use Use Investigate Present Produce Study Consider Report Increase Develop Provide Measure Use Provide Give Consider Methods Use Use Use Consider Measure Calculate Give Obtain Obtain Present Provide Give Show Compute Form Note Results and Discussions Show Show Show Use Increase Give Give Measure Increase Consider Observe Observe Obtain Use See Conclusions Use Measure Predict Present Suggest Show Predict Provide Investigate Use Cause Cause Demonstrate Indicate Consider Obtain Observe Develop Test Obtain Form Use Reduce
Table 5 lists the most frequently used verbs in each section across the three subfields. Some sections contain more verbs because these verbs have the same frequency; for convenience, only the present form of the verbs is presented. Sub-disciplinary variations are present in the verbs 86 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
used across the three subfields, as indicated by Table 5. In the following, the verbs preferred in each section are reported and compared across subfields.
In introductions, except for “use,” which is frequently used in all subfields, the verbs used each subfield vary. Specifically, the reporting verbs that the HF field frequently uses are “investigate” and “study,” while the AC field often uses “present” and “provide,” and the SD field frequently uses “provide” and “report.” Interestingly, when introducing its own study, the SD field does not uses any specific verbs particularly often, whereas the AC field often uses “present” and the HF field frequently uses “investigate.” Two sentences can illustrate this point:
Then we present new asymptotically valid procedures that lessen conservativeness due to the SC assumption. [AC5] We investigate various measures of amplification and select a suitable measure that simultaneously maximizes the sum of all perturbation fields. [HF12]
In methods, except for “use,” which frequently occurs across the three subfields, each subfield has its preferred verbs, most of which refer to actions. For example, the AC field uses “consider,” the SD field employs “measure,” and the HF field has “consider” and “calculate.” The preferred verb in each subfield is illustrated in the following examples:
Here, we consider a simplistic model in which R(V,U) is linear as illustrated in Fig. 7. [AC17] Then the testing cell was measured in the temperature range from 10°C to 80°C. [SD16] The amount of newly evaporated water vapor is calculated by deducting this remained amount of water from the amount of water at the stage inlet. [HF17]
The methodology used in each subfield may influence the verb choice in this section. The AC field, for example, tends to use more simulations and calculations, and thus often needs to “consider” some conditions of formulae. The SD field, on the other hand, often conducts experiments and may need to “measure” samples. The HF field uses both types of methods and therefore uses “consider” and “calculate.”
In results and discussions, it is not surprising to find that “show” is the most frequent verb for all subfields. In addition, the AC field tends to “obtain” mathematical solutions, whereas the SD field and the HF field tend to “observe” findings. Below are two examples:
This DC solution is obtained in 60s. [AC14] SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 87 Ju Chuan Huang
Only homogeneous shade is observed in the film without PEGDL. [SD16] As a result, we can observe reduction in the concentration of calcium naphthenates from 1 to 2 days of aging. [HF3]
As predicted, because the HF field adopts both simulations and experiments as methodology, it shares several verbs with the AC and SD fields in methods, results and discussions.
Finally, except for “use,” which is used by all subfields in conclusions, no other verbs are shared across three subfields. In addition, in this section a wide range of verbs are used. The finding is expected as the content of conclusions is relatively flexible compared with other sections such as methods and results.
4. The most frequent verbs across sections within one subfield This section reports the most frequent verbs across sections within each subfield.
Table 6. The most frequently used verbs in the AC field Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions
Use Use Show Use
Present Consider Use Present
Consider Give Give Provide
Provide Present Consider Cause Consider Give Compute Obtain Develop Form
Table 6 lists the most frequently used verbs in the AC field. As can be seen from Table 6, the only verb that is used across sections is “use,” but in general, the verbs used in each section are similar. However, only methods “compute”, and only results and discussions would “show” and “obtain,” three action verbs that particularly correspond to the purposes of the two sections. 88 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Table 7. The most frequently used verbs in the SD field
Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions
Use Use Show Measure
Produce Measure Increase Suggest
Report Obtain Measure Predict Use Provide Observe
Develop Cause Measure Indicate Provide Form Use Observe Obtain Reduce
Table 7 presents the most frequently used verbs across sections with the SD field. Similar to those in the AC field, while several verbs are shared by more than one section, other verbs are found to correspond to the function of sections. For example, introductions tend to “report” research; methods would “form” samples and “measure” data; results and discussions then “show” the findings, and conclusions “suggest” future implications.
Table 8. The most frequently used verbs in the HF field
Introductions Methods Results & Discussions Conclusions
Investigate Use Show Predict
Study Calculate Give Show
Increase Obtain Increase Investigate
Use Give Observe Demonstrate Obtain Show Consider See Test Note Use
Table 8 lists the most frequently used verbs across sections within the HF field. Unlike the AC and the SD field, the HF field has no frequent verbs used in all sections. It is probably because that the HF field focuses on more than one topic (as indicated by Table 4), and it combines both simulations and experiments. On the other hand, some verbs seem to imply the function of sections. For example, introductions would “study;” methods often “calculate” mathematics and SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 89 Ju Chuan Huang
“note” conditions; results and discussions usually “show” and “see” figures, and conclusions would “demonstrate” what has been investigated. It is also interesting to find that when “figure” is a highly frequent noun in results and discussions in the HF field, “see,” which often accompanies “figure” in phrases such as “See Figure 1,” is also one of the most frequent verbs in the same section.
Discussion
This study aimed to identify sub-disciplinary variations by investigating the frequently used nouns and verbs across three subfields of marine engineering: automatic control, structure and dynamic, and heat and flow, as well as across four sections: introductions, methods, results and discussions, and conclusions. First, the findings indicate that several words are highly frequent across three subfields, such as “show” and “use”, which are among the top frequent words in Mudraya’s (2006) list in engineering. Second, except for these words, each subfield has its own preferences for nouns and verbs, suggesting that disciplinary and sub-disciplinary variations exist (Pho, 2008; Samraj, 2005).
In addition, the nouns used in each subfield seem to correspond to the topic of that subfield, such as “control” in the AC field, “wave” in the SD field, and “heat” in the HF field. The verbs used, on the other hand, seem to correspond to the methods used in the subfield. For instance, the AC field, which deals mainly with simulations, would use verbs such as “consider;” the SD field, which conducts experiments, tends to “measure,” and the HF field adopts both methods and uses verbs similar to those in the other two subfields.
An examination of nouns and verbs across sections reveals that some words appear to correspond to the function of each section. For example, in the HF field, “see” and “figure” are the words that only occur in results and discussions, the section that reports findings with graphs. This finding is similar to Pique-Noguera (2012), who examined research article abstracts in business and found that certain reporting verbs (e.g. “show”) were only present in the sentences reporting results. Overall, the fact that more differences than similarities in word choice across three subfields confirm the presence of sub-disciplinary variations, and some words that are particularly frequent in a section may help imply the function of that section.
The results of this study can provide important pedagogical implications for ESP and EAP instructors. First, the ESP and EAP instructors should make students aware of sub- disciplinary variations, especially when the students come from the same discipline. For example, the ESP/EAP instructors can adopt Lee and Swales’ (2006) course design by asking students to 90 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
compile a small corpus in their own subfield and analyze the linguistic features. In addition, the ESP/EAP instructors can also borrow Johns’ (1991) concept of the data-driven learning approach, where students who are grouped by subfields can analyze wordlists and concordances of research article sections and compare their findings. In doing so, students can link words to their contexts and understand how language varies and functions in each subfield. They can also make informed word choices when they write in their own subfield.
This study also provides several directions for research. As the corpus compiled in this study is very specific and small, the findings should be seen as tentative. Future studies, therefore, can replicate this study with a larger corpus and examine word choices in different disciplines, especially those applied fields. Second, while this study examined the frequently occurring words in concordances, the contexts where these words are situated in are not purposefully compared. Since a highly frequent word can occur in different subfields and different sections, it would be of interest to compare how it is used in different contexts. Finally, an investigation of frequently used verbs indicates that some choices might be influenced by methodology. Future research will be needed to validate this assumption by examining the variations in terms of methodology rather than content of knowledge.
Conclusion
This study has investigated the extent to which sub-disciplinary variations exist by examining frequently used nouns and verbs in three subfields and in four sections in Marine Engineering research articles. The findings not only support the existence of sub-disciplinary variations but also indicate word choices may vary across sections. Based on the findings, this study has offered ESP/EAP instructors pedagogical advice on how to make students aware of sub- disciplinary variations and help them link isolated words to their contexts. This study has also provided several directions for future research. It is hoped that more similar studies and pedagogical efforts can help novice writers be aware of potential sub-disciplinary variations; in turn, these novice writers cannot only critically read in their discipline but also make informed choices when they write in their own subfield.
Acknowledgement
This study is funded by the National Science Council in Taiwan (Now named as the Ministry of Science and Technology), under the contract No. NSC 102-2410-H-019-006. SUB-DISCIPLINARY VARIATIONS IN MARINE ENGINEERING RESEARCH ARTICLE SECTIONS 91 Ju Chuan Huang
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Moving from available specialized corpora to self-compiled corpora. English for Specific Purposes, 25, 56-75.
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Pique-Noguera, C. (2012). Writing business research article abstracts: A genre approach. Iberica, 24, 211-232.
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Vongpumivitch, V., Huang, J.Y., & Chang, Y. C. (2009). Frequency analysis of the words in the academic word list (AWL) and non-AWL contents words in applied linguistics research papers. English for Specific Purposes, 28, 33-41.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS
Yuuki Ogawa Soka University
Saki Inoue Soka University
Abstract
Demotivation is defined as a specific external force that reduces or diminishes a behavioral intention or an action which is based on the motivation (Dornyei, 2001). In addition to motivation, demotivation is one of the factors which determine learners’ successful language learning achievement (Dornyei, 2001). Although the influence of demotivational factors on learners’ language learning in the field of second language acquisition has been explored, relatively little research focusing on the relationship between learners’ demotivators and their learning attitude has been conducted. This research aims to identify the demotivational factors and learning attitude of English learners in a Japanese university and to investigate how these two elements are correlated. This research also focuses on the comparison between the lower-level students and the higher-level students, who were divided based on their score from the Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC). The results indicated that there is significant difference in their learning attitude, but they identify similar elements as their demotivators. Finally, practical implications for English classrooms were introduced based on the findings.
Keywords: demotivation, learning attitude, Japanese EFL learners, higher education
Introduction
Since English language learning has been implemented in Japanese schools, English is the most frequently learned language, and English is one of the tools to assess an individual in various contexts in Japan. Recently, the curriculum of English education has been influenced by the wave of globalization (Butler & Iino, 2005; Nishino & Watanabe, 2008). The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) has shifted their policy of English education from exam-oriented to communicative oriented (Fujimoto-Anderson 2006). Along with 94 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
the policy change, many schools started putting emphasis on teaching practical English using English-mediated classes and the communicative approach. However, the passion of globalization and the desire to learn English is not completely shared with Japanese students. According to the survey, about 60% of junior high school students answered either that they are not good at English or dislike English (Benesse Research, 2009). Moreover, one of the research projects in a Japanese university investigated the English teachers’ impressions about the motivation of their students, and the result showed that 64.5 % of the teachers felt the motivation and the actual proficiency of their students has been decreasing (Research Committee, 2005). To answer the question why Japanese learners of English tend to be less proficient or dislike learning English, researchers have investigated demotivation among learners of English.
In the field of second language acquisition (SLA), many researchers have investigated motivation for learners’ attainment of second/foreign language proficiency (Hassaskhah, Zafarghandi & Fazeli, 2014; Kikuchi, 2009). Motivation is regarded as a key factor to determine learners’ success or failure in their language learning (Dornyei, 2001). In accordance with the research on motivation, what impedes or restrains learners’ language learning has gained a growing interest in SLA. Demotivation is defined as specific external forces reducing or diminishing a person’s behavioral intention or an ongoing action based on the motivational basis (Dornyei, 2001). Dornyei (2001) categorized demotivators into nine components: the teacher; inadequate school facilities; reduced self-confidence; negative attitude toward the second language (L2); compulsory nature of L2 study; interference of another foreign language being studied; negative attitude towards L2 community; attitudes of group members; and course books used in class. In the L2 classrooms, demotivated learners are those who are motivated at one time but decrease their level of motivation and become demotivated by internalizing an external demotivation trigger. In this sense, demotivated learners are differentiated from learners with no motivation, a state of a motivation (Falout, Elwood, & Hood, 2009).
The number of research projects on demotivational factors in English language learning in the Japanese context has been conducted. For instance, Hamada (2011) explored the differences between demotivators for Japanese junior high school and high school learners by conducting a questionnaire and interviews. Among eight demotivational factors set in the questionnaire, (1) Tests, (2) Nature of English and (3) Reduced self-confidence were the top three demotivators for Japanese junior high school students while (1) Lesson style, (2) Reduced self-confidence and (3) Textbooks were the vital demotivational factors for high school learners in this study. Hamada attributed these results to the type of assessment at junior high school and to preparation for RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 95 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue university entrance examination at senior high school. That is, junior high school students may regard the test score as the only benchmark to assess their academic performance, which results in putting significant pressure on them, and they may reduce self-confidence if they perform poorly at tests. On the other hand, teachers’ examination-oriented English lessons for entrance examinations are demotivating for high school students due to the lack of communicative activities. For both junior high and senior high school students, tests seem to be strong demotivators and deeply interrelated with their level of self-confidence.
Falout and Maruyama (2004) also investigated the demotivating factors between lower proficiency and higher proficiency learners of English by distributing and analyzing a questionnaire at a Japanese university. In their study, the TOEIC test was employed to categorize participants into two groups; a lower-proficiency group whose TOEIC score corresponds to 300 and a higher-proficiency one whose average score is 347. The findings from the study indicated that both groups regarded self-confidence as the primary demotivators in English study. In addition, while both groups of students got demotivated before, the lower proficiency group tended to have a negative attitude toward English earlier compared to that of the higher proficiency students.
In addition to exploring demotivators, Al-Sharief (2013) investigated the relationship between the potential demotivational factors and the level of motivation among Saudi Arabian English learners in higher education. In this study, 265 Saudi Arabian freshmen majoring in English first answered a questionnaire to assess their level of motivation. Based on the four motivation levels: Integrated; Identified; Introjected; Rejection/Avoidance. A second questionnaire was employed to determine the participants’ demotivational factors in five areas: Language/Culture; Teachers; Environment; Materials; and Methods. The result indicated that Environment, Materials, and Methods were the top three demotivators across all of the participants’ groups of the four motivational levels. Contrary to the researcher’s expectation, on the other hand, the factors such as Language/Culture and Teachers were relatively low demotivational factors for the highly-motivated students while approximately 40% of the least motivated students who were categorized as Rejection/Avoidance considered Language/Culture as a stronger demotivator.
While investigating the demotivational factors for learners in English classrooms is significantly important, considering individual differences such as their learning attitude in general is also of great importance. In other words, some students see learning as meaningful and valuable 96 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
to their life; others may find it hard to realize its value and to find the reason for their studying, which often results in their passive and negative attitude toward learning including subjects such as English. In order to explore students’ learning attitude, Shimoyama and Hayashi (1983) developed a questionnaire to investigate the “willingness to learn” of a person. They defined willingness to learn as a driving force to help a person to achieve his/her learning goal. This questionnaire, which assesses eight different types of learning attitude such as autonomy, obedience or self-reflection, showed the participants have a tendency either to promote or restrain their own learning.
The research conducted by Shimoyama and Hayashi (1983) made the researchers query whether there is a relationship between the learners’ general learning attitude and their attitude toward English. In other words, further study should be conducted to investigate whether students are positive or negative toward learning in general and how this attitude influences their English language learning.
Research Hypothesis
Based on the previous research and the literature, the researchers formed two hypotheses for this research. 1. There is a correlation between English language proficiency and general learning attitude. 2. The demotivational factors for lower-level learners of English in a Japanese university are Language/Culture, Material, and Teacher.
Hypothesis II was formed based on the previous literature and our research context. The previous research indicated that reduced self-confidence, which mainly results from their experience of getting low marks on the tests, has a significant impact on lower level learners’ attitudes toward English learning for Japanese junior and high school students (Hamada, 2011; Falout & Maruyama, 2004). That is, their past experience of failure may become one of the demotivational factors. In addition, materials mainly focused on improving learners’ TOEIC test score by drill practice or test-taking strategies in our research context may cause students to become demotivated. Teacher has been mentioned as one of the greatest demotivators in the previous research (Arai, 2004; Falout & Maruyama, 2004; Ikeno, 2002; Kikuchi & Sakai, 2007)
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 97 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
Background of the Study
This study was conducted in a university in Tokyo where English language learning is highly encouraged by the university due to the needs of globalization in Japan. There are approximately 8,000 students and eight faculties, which are law, economics, literature, business, education, engineering, nursing, and liberal arts. In the university, there are five different levels of English classes, and students are placed in English classes based on their TOEIC score. Students have to take English classes in order to fulfill a graduation requirement. The researchers are currently teaching the lowest group of students in terms of their TOEIC score. Students often show lack of motivation toward English language learning in classes, and the students seem not to have personal goals related to English learning other than increasing their TOEIC scores, which the university emphasizes when they entered the university. The classes in which the researchers are involved also set two main goals; students will be able to (1) learn English not as a subject but as an actual communication tool with the aid of Japanese explanations, and (2) achieve a score of 285 or higher on the TOEIC test conducted in December.
Method
Data Collection
The data was collected via two different types of questionnaires. The first questionnaire aims to explore learners’ general attitude toward learning, and the second questionnaire is about learners’ demotivational factors. Both were written in Japanese because students in the elementary and the basic levels might not have understood the contents of the questionnaires if it were written in English. Both of the questionnaires are four point likert-scale questionnaires, in which the number four means strongly agree, and the number one refers to strongly disagree. The first questionnaire was developed by Shimoyama and Hayashi et al (1983), and consists of 39 questions aiming to find out learners’ general learning attitude. Even though this questionnaire was created more than 30 years ago, the university at which this study was conducted employed this questionnaire to measure learning attitudes of students who have difficulty learning by themselves. Moreover, the questionnaire is still used as an effective method to measure students’ learning attitude in other studies (Nishiyama, 2015; Tanaka et al, 2005). The questionnaire assesses eight characteristics related to learning attitude, which are (1) Autonomy, (2) Responsibility, (3) Challenge to achieve goals, (4) Obedience, (5) Self-reflection, (6) Lack of persistency, (7) Avoid making mistakes, and (8) Lack of sense on the value of learning. Shimoyama and Hayashi (1983) 98 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
further categorized these eight characteristics into two major groups which promote learning and restrain learning.
Table 1. The characters in the first questionnaire
Characters which promote learning promote which Characters The attitude which is able to set own goals and make 1. Autonomy plans for oneself,
2. Challenge to To make efforts, and challenge hard tasks to achieve goals achieve goals
3. Responsibility The character which fulfill one’s task
4. Obedience To accept advices from others to achieve goals
5. Self-reflection To reflect or evaluate learning by oneself
Characters which promote promote which Characters A learner cannot continue or concentrate on study when 6. Lack of there is other things which is more interesting and persistency enjoyable for the learner
learning
7. Avoidance of A leaner escapes or cannot challenge tasks due to the fear of making mistakes making mistakes
8. Lack of sense on To that a learner does not understand the value of learning the value of and cannot use the sense as a motive of learning. learning
The questionnaire was originally developed to target elementary and junior high school students in Japan, so the wording was carefully modified to make the language level more suitable for university students by the researchers. Other studies have employed this questionnaire with adults since the contents of the questionnaire are applicable for adult learners as well (Tanaka et al, 2005).
The second questionnaire was developed by Al-Sharief (2013), and the questionnaire was targeting Saudi Arabian English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. As explained in the literature review section, this research used two variances, which were the participants’ types of motivation and demotivation, and investigated the correlation between them. Thus, the research RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 99 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue had a similar context with this current research, and this questionnaire was employed in this study. The questionnaire consists of 25 questions, which can be categorized into five demotivators, namely Language/Culture, Teacher, Environment, Methods, and Materials.
Table 2. The categories of demotivational factors in the second questionnaire
Demotivating factors Example statement
Language/Culture Q1: English is a difficult language.
Teachers Q2: I always have a good relationship with my English teachers.
Q3 I will learn English better had I learned it in an English-speaking Environment environment.
Materials Q4: I don’t find difficulty studying my English textbook.
Methods Q10: I often enjoy the methods used in teaching English.
The original questionnaire was in English, so the researcher translated the questions into Japanese. The Japanese version was counter-translated into English by the researchers, whose native language is Japanese to determine the accuracy of the translation. Furthermore, the results of students for some of the questions were flipped because the result would be opposite due to the meaning of the questions. For example, the question(Q) 7 is “Most English teachers who I met are qualified as an English teacher”. If students put the number 4, it means the students do not consider his/her teacher as demotivator, so the result has to be flipped, and this was also done in the original study by Al-Sharief (2013).
A pilot study was conducted in the researchers’ own classes prior to the other classes. Based on the results, the researchers confirmed the effectiveness of using the two questionnaires. After the pilot study, the data collection took place in 13 different classes. The researchers visited each class to distribute the two questionnaires at the same time. When the researcher explained about the procedure, the researcher put emphasis on the difference between the two questionnaires, specifically that the general learning attitude questionnaire aimed to investigate not only English language learning but also learning in general, and the second questionnaire was about English language classes.
100 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Participants
In order to support the hypothesis, a questionnaire study was conducted in a Japanese university described in the previous paragraph. This study included a total of 270 students of Japanese learners of English. All of them were freshman, majoring in various disciplines such as education, law, and letters. In the university, freshman students take English classes based on their score of the TOEIC test, which they took at the beginning of the semester. Among five levels, intermediate, elementary, and basic level students participated in this questionnaire survey. The target classes were randomly chosen based on the level of the class and the schedule.
Table 3. The number of participants in each group
Intermediate Elementary Basic Total (400 – 485) (285 - 395) (below 280)
Number of class 5 5 5 15
Number 70 115 85 270
Analysis
The data was quantitatively analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software (Version 22; IBM 2013). In order to investigate differences and similarities between groups, descriptive statistics and one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) were conducted. Since the difference in the TOEIC score between the elementary group and the other two groups was not great, the result of the intermediate and the basic level groups were described in this particular study.
Results and Discussion
The First Questionnaire
The results of the first questionnaire showed the characteristics of students’ learning attitudes in general.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 101 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
Table 4. The Result of Descriptive Statistics
Intermediate Basic (N=70) (N=85)
Mean SD. Mean SD.
1. Autonomy 2.76 .81 2.45 .78
2. Challenge to achieve goals 2.79 .83 2.47 .86
3. Responsibility 3.06 .84 2.91 .86
4. Obedience 2.76 .91 2.47 .88
5. Self-reflection 2.62 .9 2.62 .88
6. Tendency to avoid mistakes 2.41 .98 2.48 .98
7. Lack of persistency 2.62 .98 2.91 .89
8. Lack of sense on the value 2.18 .91 2.51 .97 of learning
According to the result of the descriptive statistics, (3) Responsibility received the highest score from both the intermediate and the basic level students. In addition, 7 Lack of persistency also was rated at the highest level in the basic level group. The second highest characteristics in the intermediate level group were the category 1. Autonomy, 2. Challenge to achieve goals, and 4. Obedience. In all three characteristics, the basic level group showed lower average scores than the intermediate group. Moreover, the lowest score in the intermediate level group was for category 8. Not sense the value of learning, and that indicates that the participants from the intermediate level group see the value of learning more than the participants from the basic level group. The score of the two groups was similar in the category 5. Self-reflection and 6.Tendency to avoid mistakes.
Table 5. The Results of one-way ANOVA in each questions and category between Intermediate and Basic level groups
Mean Deviation Standardized Error Significance Probability
Q1 .259* .126 .041
Q2 .449* .120 .000
Q3 .371* .121 .002 102 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Q4 .349* .133 .009
Q5 .093 .132 .484
Q6 .347* .147 .019
Q7 .345* .117 .003
Q8 .333* .126 .008
Q9 .242 .125 .054
Q10 .334* .121 .006
Q11 .339* .113 .003
Q12 .236 .132 .076
Q13 .028 .143 .847
Q14 -.126 .116 .279
Q15 .244* .104 .019
Q16 .403* .139 .004
Q17 .196 .134 .146
Q18 .214 .125 .087
Q19 .405* .126 .001
Q20 .221 .144 .127
Q21 .255 .130 .051
Q22 .058 .146 .689
Q23 .257 .140 .068
Q24 -.250 .138 .071
Q25 -.275* .132 .038
Q26 -.128 .136 .349 RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 103 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
Q27 -.133 .136 .331
Q28 -.068 .142 .631
Q29 -.061 .139 .664
Q30 .044 .131 .739
Q31 -.491* .135 .000
Q32 -.561* .129 .000
Q33 -.300* .129 .020
Q34 -.248 .143 .084
Q35 .158 .106 .136
Q36 -.310* .149 .038
Q37 -.245 .133 .067
Q38 -.628* .169 .000
Q39 -.161 .151 .290 p.< .05
The result of one-way ANOVA shows the statistically significant differences between the intermediate and the basic level students in more than half of the questions. Four out of five questions in the category 1 and 2 showed significant difference at the .05 level or below. Autonomy is one of the popular topics in recent second language teaching and learning (Barfield and Brown, 2007), and previous literature demonstrated the connection between autonomy and English proficiency (Little, 2009; Nakata, 2010). However, the difference between the intermediate and basic group cannot be seen in the category 5. Self-reflection. Self-reflection is one of the key skills in autonomy (Littlewood, 1999).
In addition to the differences, the two groups demonstrated similarity. Both of the groups reported high rating in responsibility section. The basic level students gave a higher rating than the intermediate level students in the Q14“I am responsible for the work which is for my club activity or other community that I belong”. In other words, they are more responsible for work in which 104 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
they are interested than they are for their learning. Another similar point is related to the characteristics of self-reflection and tendency to avoid mistakes. These results were rather surprising because both characteristics are expected to be low since Japanese learners tend not to be familiar with doing self-reflection and are often afraid of making mistakes. This would be connected to the Japanese educational culture in secondary education. That is in junior and high schools, students usually do not have opportunity to do self-reflection about their learning. Teachers often assess their learning by testing, and students may not be accustomed to doing self- reflection. In addition, teachers mostly check their accuracy, so students try to correctly answer to teachers’ questions. That is why Japanese students are often characterized as silent in English classrooms due to fear of making mistakes (Ellwood & Nakane, 2009). However, the rating of tendency to avoid mistakes was not high compared to other categories, and self-reflection was relatively higher than other components.
Hypothesis I is that “there is positive correlation between English proficiency level and general learning attitude”. This hypothesis was supported in some categories. The higher level learners tend to find more value in their learning and have more persistency and autonomy, and these are categorized as the characteristics which promote learning. On the other hand, the lower level learners showed lower rating in these categories. Furthermore, the basic level students had higher rating in the characteristics which restrain learning than the intermediate level learners. Therefore, there would be a correlation between proficiency level and general learning attitude.
The Second Questionnaire
The second questionnaire examined demotivational factors in English classrooms such as Language/Culture, Teachers, Environment, Methods and Materials.
Figure 1. The mean result of the second questionnaire about demotivation in English classroom
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 105 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
The overall results of the second questionnaire did not demonstrate significant difference. The top three demotivators for the intermediate level students were Environment, Teacher, and Materials while the top three demotivators for the basic level learners were Materials, Environment, and Methods. Basic students had higher rating in the Language/Culture category, but the difference was relatively minor.
Table 6. The mean of each question in the second questionnaire
Intermediate Basic Intermediate Basic
M SD M SD M SD M SD
Q1 2.76 .86 3.25 .85 Q14 2.34 .70 2.36 .75 Q2 2.34 .95 2.32 .95 Q15 2.21 .76 2.29 .81 Q3 3.6 .62 3.38 .72 Q16 1.47 .65 2.01 .83 Q4 2.34 .68 2.39 .75 Q17 1.93 .81 2.21 .75 Q5 2.32 .91 2.47 .83 Q18 1.81 .86 1.92 .83 Q6 1.68 .93 2.02 .96 Q19 2.54 .86 2.02 .85 Q7 2.87 1.04 2.75 .94 Q20 1.94 .97 2.42 .86 Q8 1.82 .71 1.98 .75 Q21 1.63 .92 1.74 .93 Q9 2.32 .96 2.67 .80 Q22 2.94 1.00 2.14 .87 Q10 2.09 .97 2.34 .91 Q23 2.53 .88 2.65 .84 Q11 2.4 .88 2.45 .90 Q24 2.21 .93 2.4 .81 Q12 1.72 .94 2.15 1.02 Q25 2.9 .86 2.61 .77 Q13 2.44 .85 2.4 .83
Even though there was no significant difference in the rating, some notable outcomes were seen in each question. For example, the question which received the highest rating among the basic level students was Environment. The mean of the Q3, “I will learn English better if I had learned it in an English speaking environment”, was 3.38, so more than half of the students think that learning English is difficult in a Japanese context. The second highest point was seen in the Q1, language and culture category “English is a difficult language”, and the mean is 3.2. On the contrary, the highest and second highest factor in the intermediate level group was Teacher. One of the questions about teachers is Q22, “I would have learned English better if my teachers had been native speakers of English”, and other questions is Q7, “Most teachers who taught me English are not qualified”. The mean of Q22 was 2.94 and Q7 is 2.9. Interestingly, intermediate level students 106 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
were more likely to prefer native speakers of English as their teacher and tend to be critical about their past teachers.
Despite general agreement with many survey items, some questions received lower ratings, which mean the participants disagreed with the ideas. For instance, the basic level students put lower ratings on Q21 and Q18. The questions were Q21“Learning English is not necessary these days”, and Q18 “My classmates in English classes do not contribute in making learning the language more enjoyable”. The mean score was 1.7 for Q21 and 1.92 for Q18. This result implies that most of the basic level students might understand the importance of learning English and think classmates can make English classes more enjoyable. For the intermediate level participants, Q6 “Learning English is not very important to me” and Q20, “I do not find a lot of opportunities to practice English in class” received low scores. The mean of Q6 was 1.7, and Q20 was 1.9. Thus, the intermediate level participants may consider learning English as important, and they were mostly satisfied with the current opportunities to practice English in their class.
Hypothesis II is “The demotivational factors for lower-level learners of English in the Japanese university are Language/Culture, Materials, and Teacher.” In the results, for lower-level learners, Environment, Materials, and Method were the top three demotivational factors, so Hypothesis II was correct only about Materials. Since there is less opportunity to use English in Japan, the students may not see the value of learning English in Japanese context. As the researcher expected prior to the research, Materials was one of the high demotivators for the participants. This may be related to the emphasis on increasing their score on TOEIC test. Before conducting this research, the teacher was expected to be a major demotivator since the previous literature demonstrated that teachers can be students’ biggest demotivator (Arai, 2004; Falout & Maruyama, 2004; Ikeno, 2002; Kikuchi & Sakai, 2009), but the result was not notable in this study. Teaching method was higher than teacher among the basic level learners. This might be also correlated with test-oriented classes in which students practiced TOEIC exercises and focused on grammar learning.
Conclusion
This study investigated the potential relationship between the demotivational factors in English learning and general learning attitudes of Japanese EFL learners. The participants were divided into two groups; lower English proficiency and higher English proficiency groups, and their proficiency was one of the important variables. RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 107 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
In the first questionnaire, the characteristics which promote students’ learning were seen more in the responses of the intermediate level students. In contrast, the characteristics which restrain students’ learning appeared more in the answers of the basic level students. From this difference in results, the students’ attitudes may have a connection with their English proficiency. According to the result of the second questionnaire, the participants chose similar elements as their demotivator in general, but the results significantly vary in some specific questions. The basic students understood the importance of English, but they felt it is difficult to learn English in a Japanese context since there would be fewer opportunities to use English. However, there was no distinguishing demotivator between the two groups, which may indicate that there would be other demotivational factors for the participants in this context.
Pedagogical implication
The findings of the present research provide better understanding of Japanese EFL learners. Based on the findings of this study, the three recommendations might be beneficial to those who teach, especially for those working with false beginners. First, it is recommended that students have the opportunity to personalize their English learning by setting both long and short term goals. The results showed that the majority of participants regarded learning English as necessary these days while they need more support to continue learning in general. There are two possible reasons students’ understanding may not always lead to studying English or even to continuing it. One reason is that it is mandatory for students to take English classes in the university where this study was conducted, and the other is they might not be sure whether the English language is necessary for them and their life although they understand the importance of studying English in general terms. Therefore, in addition to striving for increasing their TOEIC score, which is one of the institutional goals required by the institutions, students could consider their own goals for the long term and short term and the possible ways to achieve these goals. By setting their own “destination” and a route to it, they may be able to personalize their English language learning, which provides the purpose of studying English.
Second, teachers should take time to build rapport in classroom. In this study, students considered their classmates as one of the sources to make their learning more interesting. This may indicate the importance of establishing the good relationship not only between the teacher and students but also among students. In English classrooms, teachers could incorporate pair or group work to help students establish good relationships with one another. Tasks which require 108 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
collaboration or support from peers, the information gap activity, for example, are ways to create the interactive learning environment.
Third, it should be borne in mind that students have ample opportunities for English output in class. The result of the second questionnaire indicated that intermediate level of students enjoy the opportunities to practice English. Although one of the goals of the basic level of English class is to improve TOEIC scores, focusing entirely on test-taking skills does not allow students any chance to engage in communication in English, so test-only focus should be avoided. Teachers need to keep the balance between lessons for the test and ones for communication in English, and even if students learn test-taking skills, they could learn it in a communicative way such as by discussing the possible answers to the questions of TOEIC, which may increase the opportunities to produce output in English.
Limitations and Ideas for Further Study
There are several limitations to this present study. Firstly, this research only employed questionnaires and quantitative analysis, of the data. Future study could incorporate different data collection methods such as qualitative study by interviews for in-depth understanding of the students. Secondly, this study surveyed only the basic and the intermediate proficiency groups of students, whose TOEIC scores were 480and below. Therefore, it would provide new findings if further study includes more advanced students. In order to know correlation between general learning attitude and demotivational factors, the students could be categorized based on the results of their questionnaire rather than on their TOEIC scores. For example, the researchers could investigate the demotivational factors of the students who reported m high ratings on the Autonomy category. Lastly, this research employed the five demotivational factors based on the questionnaire of Al-Sharief (2013), so further study can include other demotivational factors. RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 109 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
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Appendix A. Questionnaire items: General Learning Attitude (Translated into English)
No Item
1 I would like to know various things, so I do self-study in addition to homework.
2 Without being told to study, I study by myself.
3 Without being told to do, I study subjects which I am not good at.
4 I set goals and make plans of my study.
5 I usually prepare for my classes.
6 I take notes of classes even though I am not interested in the classes.
7 Although the assignments is difficult, I never give up to the end if I think I can manage it.
8 Even I hate studying, I start doing immediately.
9 I often ask questions to my teacher, or search by myself to understand the questions which I could not solve in the test.
10 I am patient and deeply consider the difficult questions.
11 I try various ways to complete the assignment even though it is hard.
12 If I cannot complete the task, I will complete it later.
13 I try to finish one work within one day if I start.
14 I am responsible for the work which is for my club activity or other community that I belong
15 In group work, I always fulfill my work or study.
16 Although I do not feel good, I always do homework.
17 I listen to lectures even though I am not interested in the topic.
18 I reflect on how I did after I submitted or completed the task.
19 I check the grade whether it matches what I expected or not after my teacher return it. RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 113 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
20 I attend classes even though I am not interested in the contents.
21 I often consider whether my learning strategies are good or bad.
22 Right after the test, I check the answers.
23 When I take tests, I set the target scores and study.
24 While I take tests, if I find a difficult question, I cannot do well the rest of questions.
25 If I find the assignment difficult, I feel like I will not do well, and I cannot do well.
26 The more I feel the test is important, the more I would fail the test.
27 I am afraid of making mistakes and being laughed at, so I do not answer questions in front of everybody.
28 I set lower goal because I do not want to fail to achieve the goal.
29 I think I am not patient.
30 Even though I make plans, I cannot start studying when I am doing favorite things such as watching TV or internet-surfing
31 I soon get tired when I am studying.
32 When I am trying the hard task, I soon get tired and quit trying.
33 If I find other fun thing, I immediately stop studying.
34 I think I do not have to study if I do not feel like it.
35 I submit assignments even though I am not interested in the class.
36 If I can get high score on the test, I do not have to study.
37 It is better to ask someone who knows the answer than studying hard.
38 How wonderful it is if I do not have to study.
39 I often find it meaningless to study.
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Appendix B. Questionnaire items: Demotivator
No Item
1 English is a difficult language.
2 I always have a good relationship with my English teachers.
3 I will learn English better had I learned it in an English-speaking environment.
4 I don't find difficulty studying my English textbooks.
5 I often get help with my language mistakes in English classrooms.
6 Learning English is very important to me.
7 Most teachers who taught me English are qualified.
8 English classrooms do not represent suitable language learning environments.
9 English learning materials rely more on memorization than on thinking.
10 I often enjoy the methods used in teaching English.
11 One important use of learning English is the Western culture.
12 I like my English teachers.
13 I expect teachers to use enjoyable technology in English classes.
14 English materials are often above the students' level.
15 Teaching English is similar to the teaching of most theoretical subjects.
16 Teaching English should be restricted to save our Japanese identity and Japanese language.
17 Most English teachers do not help students love learning the language.
18 My classmates in English classes do not contribute in making learning the language more enjoyable.
19 The reading texts and exercises in English learning materials are mostly interesting.
20 I find a lot of opportunity in English classes to practice the language. RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN JAPANESE EFL LEARNERS’ LEARNING ATTITUDE AND DEMOTIVATIONAL FACTORS 115 Yuuki Ogawa & Saki Inoue
21 Learning English is a necessity these days.
22 I would have learned English better had my teachers been native speakers of English.
23 More time is needed in English classrooms to learn the language better.
24 Most exercises and practices we perform in English classrooms are really useful in learning the language.
25 Most teaching methods of English help students apply what they have learned.
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS
Taufiqulloh Pancasakti University, Tegal Central Java Indonesia
Abstract
This study presents a self-assessment model for an Indonesian EFL essay writing class. The model embraces self-assessment instruments, in particular, which can be used by the students to apply reflective practices relating to the dimensions of their writing and lead them to identify their writing strategies, figure out their interest and awareness, as well as their learning monitoring strategies. Using an experimental study with factorial design, the self-assessment model was tested for its effectiveness with100 students attending an essay writing class. As the factor inserted in the research was individual difference, the participants were split into two groups: a group of field independent students and a group of the dependent ones.The findings showed that the writing achievement of both groups improved. Students could perceive their strategies and enhance their interest and awareness in writing. However, some remarks were given on the bases of the findings of this study.
Keywords: Learners’ autonomy, self-assessment model, essay writing, EFL Learners
Introduction
In the EFL context of higher education, writing is considered an important skill since it is not only an object of education, but also it is a skill leading to professional development. Students must produce academic writing assignments as part of their study. However, many students think that writing is considered to be a complex task to do. During my observations as an EFL instructor in my university for thirteen years, many writing courses were set in traditional classroom settings where students obediently followed the teachers’ rules in copying models from their instructors rather than expressing their own ideas creatively. In terms of assessment, the teacher still played a central role in assessing students’ pieces of writing.
This current study introduces a self-assessment model and its effectiveness in EFL academic writing class at one of the universities in Indonesia. The idea of developing an effective model in teaching academic writing and creating learners’ autonomy is major concern in this USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 117 Taufiqulloh study. Learner autonomy is “the capacity to become competent speakers of the target language who are able to exploit the linguistic and other resources at their disposal effectively and creatively.” (Illes, 2012, p.509). Self-assessment is the key to using portfolios successfully in the classroom because it involves the students and enables them to see possibilities for reflection, redirection, and confirmation of their own learning efforts (O’Malley and Pierce, 1996, p.38).Throughout self-assessment, learners are encouraged to recognize their strengths and weaknesses in learning, and cope with various learning problems. Self-assessment promotes learning, raises learner’s awareness of their own learning, improve the goal orientation of individual learners, reduces teacher’s burdens of assessment, and entails a long-term effect on the learner’s autonomy (Oscarson, 1989, p.62). Brown (2004, p.270) views self-assessment as one of the primary foundation stones of successful learning.
Many previous studies claimed that self-assessment was effective in the context of ESL and EFL writing-development. Sadek (2011) investigated the effect of self-assessment on the EFL- learners’ expository essay writing. Birjandi (2010) explored the role of journal writing as a self- assessment technique in promoting Iranian EFL learners’ motivation. Oscarson (2009) explored a study on how upper secondary school students perceived their own general and specific writing abilities regarding syllabus goals and whether these perceptions were affected by self-assessment practices. Wang and Wang (2007) introduced both affect test and self-assessment into the traditional assessment scheme of non-English major post-graduates ESL writing classes. Brown (2005) conducted a small study of students on an independent learning program. Ferris (1995) developed and used a semester-long editing process approach to help advanced ESL writing students become more self-sufficient as editors.
Background Concept and Theories of Self-Assessment
The concept of self-assessment is reflectivity and the underlying theories are cognitive and social constructivism, metacognition, and social cognitive theory. Reflextivity is the central concept of self-assessment. It is about how we learn to regulate and think what we learn. It is a central concept to self-regulation and self-reflection (Oscarson, 2009, p.33). Reflection is the concept of enlightenment of individual autonomous learning. Through reflection, we learn how to improve ourselves in learning. The reflective learner is the one who possesses disciplined thought and openness to obtain meanings in their experience.
Relating to the constructivism theory, Rogers (1969) stated that “every individual exists in a continually chaging world of experience in which he is the center.” This theory teaches a 118 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
person to function as a whole person. One form of constructivism underlying self-assessment is cognitive constructivism. The theory posits that self-regulated learning emphasizes ona cogninitive sheme. In cognitive constructivism, learners have an active role to create or construct meaning from their experience (Oscarson, 2009, p.36). According to this theory, learner actively constructs knowledge from the surrounding world and in interaction with others. Different individuals will have different understandings of experiences and create meanings that are personal to them when knowledge is internal and personal to the individual. Being aware of one’s own learning should then construct their meanings in interacting with others. Another form of constructivism underlying self-assessment is social contsructivism. This theory views knowledge as something that grows and develops due to the interaction between the teacher and the learner in a social environment.This theory posits that learners are required to be aware of themselves so that they could monitor and regulate their own learning. Learners are supposed to be independent and autonomous. The teacher’s role here is facilitating them to achive their golas in learning. The central tenet of learning in the constructivist frameworks is very much students-oriented. Another theory underlying self-assessment is social cognitive theory. It emphasizes the notion that individuals have a system of beliefs about themselves that enable them to control their actions. It has been influential in research on social factors in self-regulation, which focuses on interdependent personal, behavioral, and environmental influences (Zimmerman, 2001, p.19). USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 119 Taufiqulloh
A Self-Assessment Model in EFL Writing Class The self-assessment model in EFL writing class developed in this study is shown in the following figure.
Mini Lesson - Modeling - Reviewing
Writing Learning Formative Assignment Outcome Assessment
Writing Writing Assignment Test
Writing Process Self-Assessment
Instruments
Planning Checklist of Writing Feedback Dimensions (CWD) Writing first draft Checklist of Writing Assessing Strategies (CWS) Revising Survey of Writing Interest and Awareness (SWIA)
Editing Questionnaire of Learning
Writing final Monitoring Strategies (QLMS) copy
Reflectio
n Figure 1. Self-Assessment Model in EFL Essay Writing Class Drawn from figure 1, classroom instruction begins with a mini lesson. It consists of modeling and reviewing. The teacher plays a central role in applying the mini lesson. This is about setting criteria with the involvement of the students so that self-assessment practices in the classroom can be worked out successfully. Defining characteristics of self-assessment is the involvement of students in identifying standards and/or criteria to apply to their work and making judgments about the extent to which they have met these criteria and standards (Boud, 1995, p.12). Throughout the mini lesson, the teacher presents some models of well-organized essays which have clarity in meaning, accuracy in format, mechanics, grammar, and sentence structures, and clarity in content and organization. Another part of the mini lesson is reviewing. Here the teacher 120 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
provides sample essays to be reviewed with students in the classroom to figure out their strengths and weaknesses.
After the mini lesion, a writing assignment is administered. This is where self-assessment practices include action associated with a process-based writing approach. Such an assignment should be conducted at least two times during the teaching and learning process of essay writing. The results of the first writing assignment are used to make refinements or improvements in the next one. In writing assignment, the teacher instructs students to develop essays on some topics using the steps of the writing process which consist of planning, writing, assessing, revising, editing, and writing the final copy. The self-assessment instrument, a checklist of writing dimensions, is employed by students in the assessing, revising, and editing stages. By using this checklist, students are engaged in the situations in which they figure out their problems or weaknesses in writing and find solutions to cope with them by gathering feedback from their peers and teacher. Students use rubrics in the assessing stage of the writing process to score their drafts before going to the polishing stage (revising and editing). At the end of the writing process, students do reflection. They fill out the self-assessment instruments: CWS, SWIA, and QLMS, intended to figure out their metacognitive aspects in learning related to their writing strategies, interest and awareness, and strategies of monitoring their learning.
At the end of the writing instruction, the teacher administers an essay writing test to the students to find out the effect of the self-assessment practices during the teaching and learning process of academic writing. This summative test is a timed one in which students develop and write an essay by choosing one of the topics given by the teacher that attracts them to write. The learning outcomes are then analyzed for reflecting or giving meaning toward academic writing instruction with self-assessment practices. Things that have not been passed or achieved would be noted.
Methodology
An experimental research with factorial design was conducted to test whether or not the model was effective to teach academic writing to the students, particularly essay writing. It was conducted at the English Department of Pancasakti University Tegal Central Java Indonesia from September 2014 to January2015. The participants of this study are the fifth semester students of the English Education Department who attended the academic writing class. The total number of the study population is about 116 students from five classes. The population was then identified in terms of two kinds of individual differences: field independent and field dependent students. The USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 121 Taufiqulloh identification was conducted through a questionnaire. It was designed on the basis of the learning style theory from Santostefano (1978) and the theory of reflectivity (Oscarson, 2009). According to Santostefano (1978, p.100), field dependence-independence is a cognitive control which defines wider aspects such as motoric behavior, perception and memory. Regarding the results of identification, 100 students were taken as the partcipants of this study: 50 students as the experiment group (25 independent and 25 dependent students) and 50 students as the control group divided in the same way.
An essay writing test was administered as the instrument of this study. A pre-test was conducted at the beginning of experiment to determine students’ ability in writing essays to both experiment and control group. The treatment was conducted for 10 meetings of 100 minutes per each to both groups.
In the treatment, the experiment group was taught using the self-assessment model. Throughout the model, teacher presented mini lesson at the beginning of instruction by providing samples of good and bad essays and critically reviewing them in terms of format and mechanics, content and organization, word and sentence use as well as grammatical patterns. Afterwards, teacher assigned the students to develop essays following the steps of writing process (planning, writing the first draft, assessing, revising, editing, and writing the final copy), and using self- assessment instruments (CWD, CWS, SWIA, and QLMS). In such an assignment, after writing the first draft, students assessed it using checklist of writing dimensions (CWD) and actively searched feedback from their peers and teacher for the refinement of their essays before submitting the final copy. Feedback is an important part in self-assessment. Tutor feedback and student learning are inseparable (Osmond, et.al. 2000). Students have the opportunity to recognize their quality, figure out what works best for them and what needs to be fixed in the subsequent drafts.It is an essential component of virtually of every model of the writing process as it motivates the writers to improve their next draft. Feedback during the writing process improves not only student attitude to writing but writing performance if students are given unlimited opportunities to respond to teacher feedback and continue writing (Ferris, 1995).
At the end of the assignment, students did reflection to figure out their strategies during, before, and after writing using checklist of writing strategies (CWS), their interest and awareness using survey questionnaire of writing interest and awareness (SWIA), and their learning monitoring strategies using questionnaire of learning monitoring strategies (QLMS). Such an assignment was conducted twice during the treatment of this group. A questionnaire was also 122 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
distributed to the students at the end of the instruction to figure out their responses on learning essay writing throughout the model.
Meanwhile, the treatment was also conducted to the control group. In the treatment, teacher presented the materials about essay writing at the beginning of the instruction and assigned the students to develop essays following the steps of writing process which consists of pre-writing, planning, writing (drafting), polishing and writing the final draft. (Oshima & Hogue, 2006, p.265- 278). Afterwards, a-post-test was conducted to find out the students’ ability after the treatment.
To analyze the data, a t-test and ANOVA were conducted. Paired-samples t-test was utilized to find out the effectiveness of implementing the self-assessment model in EFL essay writing class to both levels of students (field independent and dependent students) by comparing the scores of pre-test and those of post-test. Meanwhile, a two way ANOVA was used to figure out the differences of the essay writing achievement between field independent and dependent students who were taught using self-assessment model (experiment group) and those who were not (non- treatment group).
Results
The find out whether or not the use of self-assessment model was effective in the EFL essay writing class to field independent students, the null hypothesis was formulated: Self- assessment model is not effective to teach essay writing to field independent students (H0). By using SPSS 22, paired sample t-test was utilized to test such a hypothesis. It was conducted by comparing the scores of pre-test and post-test of field independent students taught using self- assessment model. If the significance value (sig.) of the 2-tailed test drops below the level of significance 0.05, the null hypothesis (H0) is rejected. Otherwise, it retains. The tests apply to three kinds of output: paired sample statistics, paired sample correlation, and paired sample test. The first output comprised the descriptive statistics to determine the difference between the mean scores of two variables (pre-test and post-test); the second output presents the correlation between two variables regarding the given treatment. If the significance value (sig.) is equal or less than 0.05, the correlation is significant. If it is greater than that, the correlation is not significant. Drawing a correlation can also be interpreted from the correlation value (r). Related to that, Pearson’s correlation coefficient was also utilized to perform more specific correlation with these scales: 0.00-0.19 (very weak), 0.20-0.39 (weak), 0.40-0.59 (moderate),0.60-0.79 (strong), and USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 123 Taufiqulloh
0.80-1.0 (very strong). And the last output determines whether or not there is a difference between two variables regarding the given treatment. The result can be seen in the following tables:
Table 1. Paired sample statistics
Mean N Std. Deviation Std.Error Mean Pretest 63.68 25 2.155 0.431 Posttest 77.60 25 3.266 0.653
As shown in table above, there is a difference on the mean scores of two variables. The mean score of post-test (77.60) is greater than that of pre-test (63.68).
Table 2. Paired sample correlations
N Correlation (r) Sig. Pretest & Posttest 25 0.739 0.000
Drawn from table 2, it was found the significance value is 0.000. The value is far below the level of significance 0.05. Thus, it can be said that the correlation between two variables is significant. According to Pearson correlation, these two variables have a moderate correlation shown by the correlation value (r) 0.739.
Table 3. Paired Samples Test
Paired Differences Std. Std. 95% Confidence Sig.
Mean Devia- Error Interval of the t df (2- tion Mean Difference tailed) Lower Upper Pretest & -13.920 2.216 0.443 -14.835 -13.005 -31.410 24 0.000 Posttest
Table 3 shows the degree of freedom as 24; the significance value (sig.2 tailed) is 0.000 which is far below the significance level 0.05 indicating that there was a difference in essay writing achievement before and after the field-independent students were taught using a self- assessment model. As the t-value is negative, the scores of the post-test are better than those of pre-test. The descriptive statistics also shows that mean score of the post-test is greater than that of 124 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
the pre-test (77.60>63.68). Therefore, it can be concluded that the null hypothesis (H0) is rejected: Self-assessment model is effective to teach essay writing to field-independent students.
The second null hypothesis said that “Self-assessment model is not effective to teach essay writing to field-dependent students. The results of statistical calculation using SPSS 22 to test this hypothesis are described in the following tables:
Table 4. Paired sample statistics
Mean N Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean Pretest 60.36 5 2.752 0.550 Posttest 74.92 5 1.631 0.326
The difference between the mean score of the pre-test and the post-test of the field dependent students taught using self-assessment model is shown in the table above. As can be seen the table, the mean score of the post-test is greater than that of the pre-test (74.92>60.36).
Table 5. Paired sample correlations
N Correlation (r) Sig. Pretest & Posttest 25 0.378 0.062
The table shows that the significant value is 0.062 which is lower than the significance level 0.05 meaning that the correlation is not significant. As the correlation value (r) is 0.0378, it can be categorized as weak.
Table 6. Paired sample test
Paired Differences Mean Std. Std. 95% Sig.(2- Devia- Error Confidence Interval t df tailed) tion Mean of the Difference Lower Upper Pretest & -14.560 2.615 0.523 -15,640 -13.480 -27.836 24 0.000 Posttest
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 125 Taufiqulloh
Table 6 shows the difference of the two means is -14.560 (60.36-74.92). With the degree of freedom 24, it was also found that the significance value (sig.2 tailed) is 0.000. Referring to the value, the conclusion can be drawn that there is a difference between the scores of the pre- test and those of the post-tests due to the treatment conducted. The negation of the t value indicates that the mean score of the post-test is greater than that of the pre-test as is also shown in the pair sample statistics. Thus, it can be concluded that the null hypothesis (Ho) is rejected: The Self- assessment model is effective to teach essay writing to field-dependent students. However, the level of effectiveness is weak. It is also shown by the correlation table which indicates the very weak correlation between the two variables regarding the given treatment. Therefore, the teaching of essay writing using self-assessment didn’t give any significant effect to field-dependent students. Meanwhile, to draw the differences among variables, a two way ANOVA was conducted. The results are presented in the following tables:
Table 7. Tests of Between-Subject Effects
Dependent Variable: Essay Writing Achievement Type III Sum Source df Mean Square F Sig. of Squares Corrected Model 1460.200 3 486.733 63.988 0.000 Intercept 527947.560 1 527947.560 69405.902 0.000 Individual Difference 163.840 1 163.840 21.539 0.000 Learning Method 1296.000 1 1296.000 170.377 0.000 Individual Difference 0.360 1 0.360 0.047 0.828 * Learning Model Error 730.240 96 7.607 Total 530138.000 100 Corrected Total 2190.440 99 a. R Squared = .401 (Adjusted R Squared = .351)
The results as shown in table 7 can be interpreted as follows: 1) Relating to individual differences, it was found that the gained F-value is 21.539 with the significance value 0.000. As the value drops below 0.05, it can be said that there is a significant difference on writing achievement between field-independent and dependent students. The difference is further described in the following table:
126 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Table 8. Estimates
Dependent variable: output 95% Confidence Interval Std. Std. Individual_Difference Mean Std. Error Mean Error Deviation Field Independants 73.166 73.166 2.725 0.545 Field Dependants 70.606 70.606 3.300 0.660
Drawn from the table, it was found that the mean of field independent students is greater than that of the dependent ones (73.166>70.606). Thus, it can be concluded that in the treatment group, the field independent students received more improvement on their writing ability than the dependent ones. To compare the significance of the writing achievement between the two variables, see the following table:
Table 9. Pairwise Comparisons Dependent variable: output (I) (J) Mean Std. Sig. 95% Confidence
Individual_Difference Individual_Difference Differ- Error Interval for ence Difference (I-J) Lower Upper Bound Bound
Field Independants Field Dependants 2.560 0.552 0.000 1.465 3.655
Field Dependants Field Independants -2.560 0.552 0.000 -3.655 -1.465
Table 9 shows the multiple comparisons among the variables. With a 95% confidence interval for difference, it was found that no values pass 0 value, meaning that individual difference contributes different effects to students’ writing achievement. The mean difference is significant at the 0.05 level. The adjustment for the multiple comparisons in the table above is the least significant difference.
2) For the learning method, table 7 shows that the gained F-value is 170.377 with the significance value of 0.000. As it is lower than 0.05, it can be said that there was a significant USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 127 Taufiqulloh
difference on writing achievement because of the implemented learning treatment. Further difference is described in the following table:
Table 10. Estimates
Dependent variable: output 95% Confidence Interval Learning Method Mean Std. Error Std. Deviation Std. Error Mean Self-Assessment 76.260 0.390 75.486 77.034 Model Non Self- 69.060 0.390 68.286 69.834 Assessment Model
Table 10 shows that the mean of students taught using self-assessment model is greater than that of those taught without using the model (76.260>69.060). Thus, it can be said that students taught using self-assessment model received more improvement on their writing ability than those who were not.
To compare the significance of the writing achievemnt between the two variables, see the following table:
Table 11. Pairwise Comparisons
Dependent variable: output Mean Std. Sig. 95% Confidence Differ- Error Interval for Difference (I) Learning Method (J) Learning Method ence Lower Upper (I-J) Bound Bound Self-Assessment Non Self-Assessment 7.200 0.552 0.000 6.105 8.295 Model Model Non Self- Self-Assessment -7.200 0.552 0.000 -8.295 -6.105 Assessment Model Model
Table 11 shows the multiple comparisons among the variables. With a 95% confidence interval for difference, it was found that no values pass 0 value, meaning that learning method also contributes different effects to students’ writing achievement. The mean difference is 128 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
significant at the 0.05 level. The adjustment for the multiple comparisons in the table above is also categorized to be a least significant difference.
Discussions
This study has drawn a finding that the self-assessment model developed in this study was effective to teach essay writing to both levels of the students. Students’ previous ability in essay writing before learning throughout the model was low. The use of the self-assessment model in teaching essay writing was shown to be more effective to field-independent students than those of dependent ones. Independent students tend be reflective in learning. Through reflection, students are able to deepen their understanding of one experiences with other experiences and ideas (Rodgers, 2002, p.842). Reflective learners also possess displined thought and are open to obtain meaning meanings in their experience (Oscarson, 2009).
The results of the pre-test of the experiment group showed that relating to format and the mechanics of writing, many students had problems in formatting their essays into appropriate ones; many capital letters were absent in starting sentences. Many of them didn’t use proper diction and misspelled a lot of words. Relating to content and organization, many of their essays were less interesting to read. Students used many repeated ideas in their paragraphs. Most introductory paragraphs didn’t end with thesis statements. And they also encounterred many innacuracies in the use of sentence structures and grammar. In general, it can be said the students’ability to write was low. The result of preliminary observation before treatment showed that the teaching of academic writing classess in the department was still set in traditional ways. The teachers played a central role in teaching the subject matter. Many theoretical approaches about learning to write were introduced but not practically put in action. Students were assigned to write on a number of topics. They wrote whatever they had in mind relating to the selected topics. As soon as they finished their writing, they handed in their essays to the teacher without getting involved in self, peer or collaborative editing works. In terms of assessment, a single assessment was utilized. This type of assessment can result in potentially biased evaluations. (Matsuno, 2009, p.76). Similar problems are also found in the teaching and learning of writing in many universities in Indonesia. According to Alwasilah (2000), the teaching of writing in Indonesian schools is still teacher-oriented. The teacher still plays a dominant role in the writing classroom which focuses on presenting materials about grammar and rhetoric as well as sentence and paragraph structures. On the other hand, students are also required to write referring to the given norms or rules without having independent thinking and action. USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 129 Taufiqulloh
The results of post-tests of the experiment group showed that improvement on students’ ability to write essays was made. Yet, the improvement was better for field-indendepent students than that of field dependent ones. The field independent students were able to format and use mechanical aspects properly in their writing. Most of introductory paragraphs end with thesis statements. In terms of content and organization, the essays were rich in ideas; and the ideas were well organized. The sentences used also varied from simple into compound-complex sentences. Related to grammar, many grammatical aspects were also utilized properly in their writing. Meanwhile, field dependent students were also able to format and use mechanical aspects properly in their writing. However, their essays were poor in ideas; and the ideas were not well organized. In general, both groups encountered innacuracies in the use of grammatical patterns.
In addition, regarding the results of this research, it was found that field independent students gained more understanding in implementing the model. From the results of a questionnaire distributed to the students at the end of the instruction, it was found that they were more enthusiactic in making use of self-instruments embedded in the stages of the writing process. Those instruments helped them in working on their own in writing. They were also actively enganged in the situations in which they searched feedback from their peers and teacher. In other words, throughout this model, students gained more control as writers. Field independence and dependence are parts of cognitive control. Students who are considered to be independent in learning, particularly in learning to write, gained more control as writers. (Pierce and O’Malley, 1996). For field dependent students, the model also helped them to be autonomous in learning.
Drawbacks
Referring to the results as described above, it was found that the use of this model was effective to teach field dependent students. However, the level of effectiveness was still low. From the result of classroom observation, it seemed that they were still reluctant to make use of the instruments in the model for their writing. They were helped by both their teacher and their peers who were independent to employ the instruments. Moreover, the field dependent students were challenged in understanding difficult materials and, worked more with their friends instead of maximizing their own efforts to gain a deeper understanding of materials.
130 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Recommendations
Two recommendations can be made for future research. First, the mini lesson should be more elaborated. Teacher should give more sample essays to review with the students in the class before they attempt their own writing. Also, students should be more involved in the critical review so that they know what works best for their writing. Since the research only contributed weak significant improvement toward the writing ability of field dependent students, teachers should work more to assist them to make use of self-assessment instruments in_the model and also encourage them to work on their own as the key of self-assessment is promoting learners’ aoutonomy (O’Malley, 1996:151).
Conclusion
This study makes a significant contribution in the field of EFL teaching and learning theoretically, practically and pedagogically. Theoretically, the self-assessment model in academic writing instruction developed in this study not only deals with the cognitive theories of learning but also the metacognitive ones. It provides students with some meta-cognitive instruments which enable them to measure metacognitive aspects such as writing strategies, writing interest and awareness as well as learning strategies, when learning academic writing, particularly essay writing. Practically, the self-assessment model developed in this study can be an alternative method to teach essay writing in the higher education context. Both teacher and students collaboratively play an important role in implementing the model in the academic writing class. The model leads students to discover and identify their learning problems and learn to cope with them by gathering feedback from their peers and teacher. And pedagogically, the self-assessment model in this study provides a model of instruction in an academic writing class which is more student-centered. The practice of reflection throughout the self-instruments of the model enables students to learn to be more autonomus in learning to write essay. (See appendices for the instruments). Last but not least, the model can also be an alternative method to teach other kinds of writing in a higher education context by making adaptations or adjustments in its content.
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 131 Taufiqulloh
References
Alwasilah,A.C. (2007). Language, Culture, and Education: A Portrait of Contemporary Indonesia. Bandung: ADIRA.
Birjandi P. (2010). The Role of Self-Assessment in Promoting Iranian EFL Learners’ Motivation. ELT Journal, Vol.3/3 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education
Boud, D. (1995).Enhancing learning through self- assessment .London: Kogan Page.
Brown, A. (2005). Self-assessment of writing in independent language learning programs: The value of annotated samples. Assessing Writing Journal, 10:174-191.
Brown, H.D. (2004). Language Assessment Principles and Classroom Practices. New York: Pearson Education, Inc.
Brown, H.D. (2000). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching : Fourth Edition.San Fransisco State University ; Addison Wesley Longman, Inc.
Ferris, D. (1999). The Case for Grammar Correction in L2 Writing Classes: A Response to Truscott. Journal of Second Language Writing, 8 (1): 1-11.
Illes, E. (2012). Learner Autonomy Revisited. ELT Journal 66/4 505-513n
Matsuno, S. (2009).“Self-, Peer-, and Teacher- assessments in Japanese University EFL Writing Classrooms”. Language Testing, 29(1): 75-100.
O’Malley J.M., Pierce, V.L. (1996). Authentic Assessment for English Language Learners. New York: Longman.
Orsmond, P., Merry, S., &Reiling, K. (2000).The use of student derived marking criteria in peer and self-assessment. Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, 25(1), 23–38.
Oscarson, A.D. (2009). Self-Assessment of Writing in Learning English as a Foreign Language: A Study at the Upper Secondary School Level. Göteborg : Geson Hylte Tryck.
Oscarson, M. (1989).Self-assessment of Language Proficiency: Rationale and Applications. Language Testing, 6(1), 1-13 132 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Rogers, C. (1969) Freedom to Learn Columbus, OH: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Co.
Rodgers, C. (2002). Defining Reflection: Another Look at John Dewey and Reflective Thinking. Teachers College Record, 104 (4): 842-866.
Sadek, N. (2011). The Power of Self-Assessment in Language learning. LAP Lambert Academic Publishing
Santostefano, S. (1978).A Biodevelopmental Approach to Clinical Child Psychology. New York:Wiley.
Santosa, S. (2014). SPSS 22: From Essential to Expert Skills. Jakarta: PT. Elex Media Komputindo
Wang, H., & Wang, Y. (2007). The Addition of an Affect Test and Self-assessment into ESL Writing Assessment: Process and Effect. Asian EFL Journal, 20.
Zimmerman, B.(2001). Theories of Self-Regulated Learning and Academic Achievement: An Overview and Analysis.In Barry J. Zimmerman, & Dale, H. Schunk (Ed.) Self-Regulated Learning and Academic Achievement.Theoretical Perspectives.(Chapter 1: pp. 1-38). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers: Hahwah, New Jersey.
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 133 Taufiqulloh
Appendix 1
Checklist of Writing Dimensions (CWD)
Name : Date :
Topic :
Write your answer by circling the selected numbers interpreted in the following scale (shown in percentage)
1 : 85%-100% , excellent/perfect
2 : 75%-84%, good, few changes
3 : 61%-74%, fair, partly changed or replaced
4 : > 60%, poor, huge revision or removed
______
Format and Mechanics
The title is centered 1 2 3 4
The first lines of paragraphs are indented 1 2 3 4
Margins are used correctly on both sides 1 2 3 4
Each paragraph consists of more than three sentences 1 2 3 4
My words are spelled correctly 1 2 3 4
I use capitals correctly to start sentences and others 1 2 3 4
I use punctuation (periods, commas, etc.) correctly 1 2 3 4
______
Content and organization
My essay is easy to understand 1 2 3 4
I organize or map ideas as well 1 2 3 4
My essay is rich of ideas 1 2 3 4
My essay is interesting 1 2 3 4
I acknowledged the sources of references/quotations 1 2 3 4 134 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
My essay has introduction, body and conclusion 1 2 3 4
Type of introduction I used (funnel, historical background,
surprising statistics, dramatic story, etc.) ______
The introductory paragraph ends with thesis statement 1 2 3 4
The body has _____ paragraphs. The topics of the body paragraphs are as follows :
1. ______3. ______
2. ______4. ______
All paragraphs are on the topic (unity) 1 2 3 4
My essay flows smoothly from beginning to end (coherence) 1 2 3 4
I repeat key nouns 1 2 3 4
I use pronoun consistently 1 2 3 4
I use transition signals correctly 1 2 3 4
I use transition to link paragraphs 1 2 3 4
The conclusion summarizes the main points 1 2 3 4
Word/Sentence Use
I used some new vocabulary 1 2 3 4 What are they?
I checked my essay for the types of sentences used 1 2 3 4 Examples:
I used correct subject-verb agreement 1 2 3 4 Examples:
I used correct word order 1 2 3 4 Examples:
I used correct word class 1 2 3 4 Examples:
I used correct word choice 1 2 3 4 Examples:
______
Grammar Number found and corrected
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 135 Taufiqulloh
I checked my essay for errors in tenses ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in articles ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in verbs ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in prepositions ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in conjunctions ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in pronouns ______Examples:
I checked my essay for errors in modality ______Examples:
Adapted from Oshima and Hogue (2006)
136 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Appendix 2
Checklist of Writing Strategies (CWS) Name ______Date______
Check one box for each statement Before Writing Always usually rarely never 1. I talked to my teacher about the topic. □ □ □ □ 2. I talked to a friend or a partner about the topic. □ □ □ □ 3. I activated my prior knowledge about the topic. □ □ □ □ 4. I looked for some references about the topic. □ □ □ □ 5. I made a list of ideas about the topic. □ □ □ □ 6. I made an outline or a semantic map □ □ □ □ 7. I made the topic sentence of each paragraph □ □ □ □
During Writing 1. I wrote anything in my mind about the topic □ □ □ □ 2. I wrote all in English but I substituted words □ □ □ □ I didn’t know in my own Language 3. I used dictionary □ □ □ □ 4. I used books or other references □ □ □ □ related to the topic to support my writing 5. I paraphrased the ideas □ □ □ □ 6. I used my own ideas □ □ □ □ 7. My writing was time-based □ □ □ □
After Writing 1. I reread to see if my writing made sense □ □ □ □ 2. I added or took out some ideas □ □ □ □ 3. I edited my sentence structures □ □ □ □ 4. I checked my grammar □ □ □ □ 5. I edited spelling and punctuation □ □ □ □ 6. I edited the format of my writing □ □ □ □ 7. I checked my word choice (diction) □ □ □ □
Adapted from materials produced by the Georgetown University Evaluation Assistance Center (EAC) East (1990) cited in O’Malley (1996:154) cited in O’Malley and Pierce (1996)
USING A SELF-ASSESSMENT MODEL IN AN INDONESIAN EFL WRITING CLASS 137 Taufiqulloh
Appendix 3
Survey of Writing Interest and Awareness (SWIA)
Name ______Date______
Check one box for each statement A lot Fairly A Little Not at All 1. I like writing an essay □ □ □ □ 2. Writing an essay helps me to □ □ □ □ be a good writer 3. Writing an essay is fun □ □ □ □ 4. Writing essay is easy for me □ □ □ □ 5. I like writing about the topic of □ □ □ □ my interest 6. Writing an essay can increase my □ □ □ □ knowledge 7. Writing an essay can enhance □ □ □ □ my vocabulary 8. Writing an essay can help me □ □ □ □ understand better about others 9. I will continuously make efforts □ □ □ □ to improve my writing skill
Adapted from materials produced by the Georgetown University Evaluation Assistance Center (EAC) East (1990) cited in O’Malley (1996:154) cited in O’Malley and Pierce (1996)
138 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 28, No. 1
Appendix 4
Questionnaire of Learning Monitoring Strategies (QLMS)
Name ______Date______
Check one box for each statement
Always usually rarely never
1. I set up my own goals when learning this course □ □ □ □ (subject matter) to direct me in each period of learning 2. I find out the concepts of the materials □ □ □ □ I don’t understand well 3. I work on thinking through a topic □ □ □ □ rather than reading it 4. I change the way I study for □ □ □ □ difficult materials 5. I figure out questions to myself to make □ □ □ □ sure I understand the materials 6. When I get confused of something I learn in class, □ □ □ □ I go back to figure it out afterward 7. I make notes to summarize the materials □ □ □ □ 8. I identify my problems and share it with some friends □ □ □ □ to ask for solution on my learning problem
Book Review
Research methods for applied language studies: An Advanced Resource Book for Students Authors: Keith Richards, Steven Ross & Paul Seedhouse Publisher: Routledge 2012 ISBN: 978-•‐1-•‐425-•‐55140-•‐3(hbk) 978-•‐1-•‐425-•‐55141-•‐0 (pbk)
Reviewed by MONTHON KANOKPERMPOON Language Institute, Thammasat University, Thailand
Research methods for applied language studies: An advanced resource book for students is a comprehensive resource book of research methodology in the field of applied linguistics. The book covers eight chapters, covering a range of research methods in different areas of TESOL and applied linguistics. Each chapter consists of three main sections: 1) an introduction providing background theory of applied linguistics in relation to research methods; 2) an extension part leading the reader to engage in existing research articles and literature for research skill development; and 3) an exploration part for the reader to gain hands-on experience in criticizing and analyzing research in applied linguistics. In each section of the chapters, there are tasks related to the theory and research methods being discussed so that the reader can progress step- by-step and engage in the research experience.
Chapter 1 serves as a background to research design. It introduces a research design flow chart, suitable for formulating a research plan. Several elements of research, such as research question and characteristics of research, are explored so that a researcher could construct a model of research design. Following the research flowchart, Section B and C explore differences between quantitative and qualitative research methods, which are then formulated into a research design.
In Chapter 2, interaction and pedagogy are the main focus of discussion. Features of research into interaction and pedagogy, i.e. noticing and repair, are introduced with relevant examples. Both quantitative and qualitative methods into enquiring interaction and pedagogy are explained with engaging tasks. The chapter then progresses to practice in quantitative analysis of a study, which is discussed in the previous section regarding interaction. 140 THAITESOL JOURNAL Vol. 27, No. 2
Chapter 3 includes the language learning environment in the research discussion. It starts with a fieldwork study with ethnographic observation in enquiry. In this chapter, a mixed- method approach is introduced, exemplified by detailed analysis of both qualitative and quantitative methods in the subsequent sections.
Chapter 4 explores areas of affect and belief in language learning and an interviewing research method. Both qualitative and quantitative methods are introduced using authentic research articles in treating interview results. These examples are then supplemented in the following section with detailed analysis in both interview script analysis (qualitative method) and hierarchical regression analysis (quantitative method).
Chapter 5 offers an innovative research method in enquiring language learning tasks. The introduction explores a qualitative method (conversation analysis: CA) in gathering information concerning language tasks, which is supplemented with quantitative and mixed- methods in a subsequent section. A detailed example of the multimodal, CA-based research method is discussed in this chapter. In addition, another detailed analysis of ANOVA is included in the last section to offer different views on researching task-based learning.
In Chapter 6, ethnography and conversation analysis (CA) are discussed in terms of interaction, context and identity. Several extracts of interaction from existing research are used to exemplify tasks in CA, a qualitative method of enquiry. Examples of how to apply CA along with video interaction (multimodal method) are also provided to strengthen the quality of the qualitative method.
Chapter 7 introduces how to research language and constructs. In this chapter, examples from both the quantitative method of correlation and the qualitative method of interview transcription are explored and exemplified. This leads the reader to understand how different research methods reveal different valuable results in researching language and constructs.
Chapter 8 discusses mixed-methods studies and complexity theory. It introduces the concept of complexity in research design followed by conceptual frameworks for a mixed- methods approach. Examples for dealing with a mixed-methods research approach are highlighted using several studies for engagement. The chapter concludes with issues concerning validity and reliability of both qualitative and quantitative research methods and how these two concepts could contribute to the value of mix-methods research. Book Review 141 Research methods for applied language studies: An advanced resource book for students
Overall, the book covers important principles of research methodology in several applied language studies in an engaging way. Research and examples from key scholars are included in this book so that a reader can gain an insight of whose research to explore more in search of a field of language studies. Some important innovations in research, such as the multimodal research method in Chapter 5, can also pave the way for a reader to understand potential difficulties and how to solve them in conducting a qualitative method.
Quantitatively, a researcher could consult several chapters, e.g. Chapters 3,4,5,7, in using a computerized programme package for statistical analysis. Although it might seem challenging to research using a quantitative method, a reader can gain a step-by-step understanding of referential analysis when progressing from one task to another in each chapter. Alternatively, similar topics of applied language studies can be researched using different methods of enquiry, such as those discussed in Chapters 2, 3, and 7.
A more advanced reader might also benefit from Chapter 8, where the application of complexity theory is possible in an integration of research design. A mixed-methods approach into enquiry is also a possible solution when no single method could answer the question of applied language research, as in one of the examples in Chapter 5.
To conclude, this book is a useful reference book for both novice and advanced researchers because each chapter is centred on key issues of applied language research and how these issues can be researched systematically. A reader can also benefit from several authentic examples drawn from key scholars in the field so that writing a research paper can be enhanced. Finally, even though a reader might be familiar with the research method in one’s enquiry, exploring a different view presented in this book might help broadening that reader’s research skills in the area of applied language studies. THAITESOL Journal
Call for Papers
THAITESOL Journal is a semiannual, peer-reviewed, official, international journal of Thailand TESOL. It publishes articles, research papers, review articles and book reviews on applied linguistics and language learning and teaching. The journal serves as a platform for the scholars in the field to present their works to those who are interested.
Preparation of Manuscripts THAITESOL Journal accepts academic articles, research papers and review articles typed in English between 3,000 and 7,000 words and book reviews no longer than 2,000 words in length, using 11 point size of Times New Roman and 1.5 line spacing. References in articles should conform to the requirements of the APA referencing system. Please include cover letter comprising the author’s affiliation, location, mailing address, telephone number, and email address and adhere to the following guidelines.
Language and font: Manuscripts must be in English. Use Times New Roman 11 point and 1.5 line spacing. Set all margins to 2.5 cm.
Length: Articles, research papers, and review articles should be between 3,000 and 7,000 words. Book reviews should not be longer than 2,000 words.
Title: The title should be concise and informative with all capital letters.
Authors: Give the full name of all authors and their complete addresses, as well as contact information for the corresponding author, complete mailing address, and e-mail address.
Abstract: The abstract should not exceed 250 words, clearly summarizing the important findings of the paper. It should contain hard facts such as objectives, methods and major results.
Keywords: Provide 4-6 keywords which help direct readers through the article.
Introduction: The introduction must provide the necessary background of the paper and a brief review of related literature. A clear statement of the objectives should also be included.
Materials Describe the experimental procedures clearly enough for others to and Methods: repeat the same experiment so that the same result could be obtained. A careful discussion of the methodology will include exactly who the population was, how many subjects participated, what the procedures were, where the research took place, how long the research procedure lasted, and all other details of the instruments (including the exact survey questions, for example). In the case of experimental research, the description should include how the control group’s instruction covered the same content, length of time, and learning outcomes as that of the experimental group(s). In general, this part of the article will be at least 25% of the total article.
Results This section should contain “Results” and interpretation of the results and Discussion: in relation to existing knowledge. This section should begin with exactly what the data showed and then describe the author’s interpretation of the data.
Conclusions: State conclusion (do not summarize) briefly. Headings and sub- headings should be left aligned, with the first letter capitalized.
Other requirements: Indicate new paragraphs by using one extra line space. Short quotations should be incorporated into the text and enclosed with double quotation marks. Quotations of more than about 40 words should be set off from the main text body by indentation, without any quotation marks. Referencing should follow the APA referencing style. References in the text should be ordered alphabetically and contain the name of the author and the year of publication, e.g. (Thomas, 2001). For direct quotations, include the relevant page number(s), e.g. (Thomas, 2001, p.34). Tables, figures or diagrams should be numbered consecutively and included in the relevant part of the text. Each should have an explanatory title. Numbers up to and including ten should be spelt out and numbers over ten should be expressed as figures.
Standard Before submitting articles for consideration, authors are solely of English: responsible for ensuring that their manuscripts have been thoroughly proofread and edited to achieve the appropriate standard of professional English. Thailand TESOL should not be expected to improve the quality of the writer’s English. Manuscripts that do not meet this requirement will be rejected or returned to the authors for revision before the peer review process is undertaken.
Submission of Manuscripts Prospective contributors are required to email a copy of their papers as a Word document at [email protected] and send TWO hard copies of their papers to
Paneeta Nitayaphorn Managing Editor Flight Crew Resource Training Department (BZ) 14th Floor, Building 5 Thai Airways International Plc. Co. Ltd. 89 Vibhavadi Rangsit Bangkok 10900 Thailand
E-mail: [email protected]
All papers will be peer-reviewed by two readers. The DEADLINE for submitting the manuscript for the Vol.28 No.2 December 2015 issue is September 25, 2015.
For further inquiries, please contact Paneeta Nitayaphorn, Ph.D.at [email protected] or 0818592285.