Vocabulary knowledge is an important component of the writing skill and it has many dimensions, such as size, depth, and productive, in interaction with writing skill. To evaluate this relation and determine which dim...Vocabulary knowledge is an important component of the writing skill and it has many dimensions, such as size, depth, and productive, in interaction with writing skill. To evaluate this relation and determine which dimension is the most effective for second language writing quality, the present study was conducted. Turkish EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learners' lexical competence and writing abilities were examined through their vocabulary profiles and academic essays. The results of each vocabulary measure indicated that the participants had a limited vocabulary size, containing words mostly from 2,000 to 3,000 frequency bands and thus, the productive vocabulary knowledge of the participants mostly consisted of lk + 2k words and the use of academic words in their essays was very low. The results of the study revealed that the lexical competence covering the main components of vocabulary knowledge was a good predictor of the students' quality of writing performance.展开更多
Although the story continuation writing task(SCWT) has attracted much research attention, few studies have investigated the construct of the task, particularly with respect to which language competence it focuses on. ...Although the story continuation writing task(SCWT) has attracted much research attention, few studies have investigated the construct of the task, particularly with respect to which language competence it focuses on. In addition, although some studies have demonstrated that China’s Standards of English Language Ability(CSE) provides comprehensive insights into the development of Chinese learners’ English language proficiency, little research has investigated the relationship between CSE and SCWT. This study drew upon the CSE to develop an SCWT language use inventory to address the above research gaps. A total of 358 high school students were asked to complete the questionnaire, of which 277 valid responses were analyzed. Exploratory factor analysis(EFA) on the CSE-based questionnaire revealed the presence of six factors, namely language correctness, language variety, task planning, connecting-and-generating, selecting-andmining, and organizing. The strategy of connecting-and-generating was the only significant predictor of the learners’ SCWT scores. The paper also discusses the findings relating to the SCWT rating and other integrated writing tasks.展开更多
Among the many possible ways to assessing writing by giving feedbacks, the peer evaluation method is viewed as a relatively effective one for students. Traditional one-way teacher feedback with which the teachers usua...Among the many possible ways to assessing writing by giving feedbacks, the peer evaluation method is viewed as a relatively effective one for students. Traditional one-way teacher feedback with which the teachers usually make great efforts to mark out all errors had been proved to be unscientific. In this article, based on the specific situation in two English major classes in Wenhua Institute attached to HUST, a series of training and experiments were designed with the aim of proving the effect of peer evaluation in writing class. It is emphasized that language teachers should recognize the practical value of peer evaluation, and try to help students be involved in making peer responses in the writing process actively, so that students can get meaningful experience from evaluating their peers' writing, which, in turn, will enhance their own ability to produce more satisfactory essays.展开更多
The axis tlhesis of this paper is that, today, it is ESP (English for Specific Purposes) in particular, rather than General English, that is the agent of the spread of globalization. Currently, ESP is witnessing an ...The axis tlhesis of this paper is that, today, it is ESP (English for Specific Purposes) in particular, rather than General English, that is the agent of the spread of globalization. Currently, ESP is witnessing an unprecedented spread, to a point of almost taking over the relevance and frequency of teaching of General English. Hereby, we look at the phenomenon of globalization as a social concept that demands of education that students are taught performativity, therefore just skills needed for the global economy functioning, and not education as a move towards change, refinement, and individuation of a personality. ESP is taught as a sort of socially neutral language, as it presumably deals only with the language of some specific science or profession. Relying on the relevant work of the acclaimed social theorists, it is our claim that as there is no socially and/or ideologically neutral language, and that this fact applies for ESP. It is because of this, that we hereby advocate a strong and urgent need for the application of critical pedagogy and critical literacy stances in the practice of ESP, and we give some broad directions of how that can be achieved.展开更多
This work aims at discussing the concept of critical and plurilingual English teaching within the context of the Interdisciplinary Higher Education Program recently implemented at the University of Campinas, Brazil. T...This work aims at discussing the concept of critical and plurilingual English teaching within the context of the Interdisciplinary Higher Education Program recently implemented at the University of Campinas, Brazil. This program aims at widening possibilities for public students to have access to Higher Education. The teaching of English as a foreign language is part of the curriculum and one of the challenges faced was to design a language course that meant to be meaningful to students and able to develop the necessary knowledge and literacies for active citizenship as well. A discursive approach to language was adopted and, this way, Bakhtinian theories, re-contextualized to the educational field, support the claim for the development of critical literacy in the process. Along with the concept of multiliteracies, linked to the notion of speech genres, the idea of a plurilingual, plurivocal, and pluristylistic language teaching is theoretically discussed and briefly illustrated. The results show that such an approach successfully led to meaningful and critical practices in the language classroom in Higher Education.展开更多
For many years, the lack of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) classes and training has led to many difficulties in Chinese college students' writing English academic papers. This paper is designed to offer genre-...For many years, the lack of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) classes and training has led to many difficulties in Chinese college students' writing English academic papers. This paper is designed to offer genre-based methods to Chinese teachers of English concemiug teaching the college-level writing of the introduction for academic papers. It argues that genre-based teaching approaches can teach students to write in terms of move structures or conventional sections of academic papers (Swales, 1990) and its underlying motivation which not only makes students aware of the stylistic features of introductions but provides them with the strategies to reproduce these features in their own writing. The teaching approaches proposed in this paper include modes for teachers to present the findings of generic analysis of research article introductions as well as task-based activities for students' practice.展开更多
This study attempted to investigate the similarities and differences regarding the conceptions of translation eternality among a small group of Iranian people of different social positions and different ages. Sixty-tw...This study attempted to investigate the similarities and differences regarding the conceptions of translation eternality among a small group of Iranian people of different social positions and different ages. Sixty-two participants were selected based on the maximum variation sampling. To gather data, semi-structured interview was utilized. The participants were asked a list of 11 questions collected from the existing literature on the similar topics. Then, the interviews were transcribed for analyzing the data. Besides, Erikson's (1959) theory of development was used to classify participants of different ages in four groups of teenager, young, middle age, and old. The high frequency factors were found and analyzed with the use of Bronfenbrenner's (1979) nested ecological model. Moreover, the participants were classified in 11 groups based on their social positions and their conceptions were analyzed with the same method. Broadly speaking, 17 central tendencies in the interviews were obtained: People mainly focused on subjects of the books, translation fluency, author's competence in writing, and translator's competence, translations which have common grounds with social events of Iran, advertisement, existence of movie or cartoon adaptation of the book, translator's awareness of the content of the book, existence of cultural similarities between the source and target culture, popularity of the translator, author, and the original book, conversational language in translation, translation fidelity, being both translator and author, and effect of censorship on translation. Besides, old participants seemed to have more precise view on translation eternality and teenager's concerns were mostly about the appearance-related issues.展开更多
It is increasingly important for students to develop reading and writing abilities. Teachers should focus on the teaching of English textual patterns, which plays an important part in sending writers' messages. The p...It is increasingly important for students to develop reading and writing abilities. Teachers should focus on the teaching of English textual patterns, which plays an important part in sending writers' messages. The patterns used in the text help readers unfold the writer's message positively and actively. Students can write texts following textual patterns and using appropriate discourse signaling vocabulary. The importance of teaching the lexical signals and specific vocabulary is emphasized here. And the common core patterns in English texts are also analyzed. Besides, some instructional activities are discussed to develop students' reading and writing abilities, including raising awareness of textual patterns, focusing on signaling factors, reformulating and making a frame or a diagram.展开更多
In Desire Under the Elms, Eugene O'Neill not only adopts some elements from Greek tragedies, but brings more different ideas for readers, such as supernaturalism, and the degeneration of the tragic heroes or the peas...In Desire Under the Elms, Eugene O'Neill not only adopts some elements from Greek tragedies, but brings more different ideas for readers, such as supernaturalism, and the degeneration of the tragic heroes or the peasant like language and sets more comic elements. Under his powerful pen, a marvelous drama is displayed before the audience, which combines the traditional elements and modem creations perfectly. This paper aims to explore the important elements in the play and compare those with what are used in Desire Under the Elms so as to draw the conclusion that Eugene O'Neill not only uses the traditional written skills but also improves the development and inheritance of Greek tragedies.展开更多
In China, it is widely believed that teacher feedback plays a crucial role in EFL writing course, exerting a great impact on the improvement of Chinese EFL students' writing abilities so that teachers have been requi...In China, it is widely believed that teacher feedback plays a crucial role in EFL writing course, exerting a great impact on the improvement of Chinese EFL students' writing abilities so that teachers have been required to deliver feedback on students' writings. Teachers, consequently, spare no pains to give feedback, expecting their students would make progress in their writing, but it seems that things go contrary to their wishes. Although there are various complicated factors contributing to the situation, one of the important factors lies in the teachers, a number of whom do not grasp a systematic and effective mechanism of delivering feedback on EFL student writing. Much importance has been attached to Chinese EFL student writing, however, rare attention has been paid to conducting research on concrete ways of delivering feedback on Chinese EFL student writing in China. Therefore, this paper serves to fill the gap, mainly devoting itself to exploring concrete methods of delivering teacher feedback on EFL student writing.展开更多
This study aimed at investigating the effect of Facebook on grammar discussion and writing skill in English as a foreign language for university students, The study sample consisted of 60 students at Oklt AI Sqoor Col...This study aimed at investigating the effect of Facebook on grammar discussion and writing skill in English as a foreign language for university students, The study sample consisted of 60 students at Oklt AI Sqoor College of Science and Arts in Saudi Arabia and was divided into two groups: 30 students for the experimental group and 30 students for the control group. The instrument of the study was an EFL grammar and writing test. Students in both the experimental and the control group were pre-tested using the EFL (English as a Foreign Language) grammar and writing test, After that the experimental group was taught using Facebook while the control group was taught using the traditional method. Finally, students in both groups were post-tested using the EFL grammar and writing test. Results of the study showed that the experimental group outperformed the control group in the post-test of EFL grammar and writing. This difference can be attributed to using Facebook.展开更多
This paper figures out the problems the Chinese students often meet with when they try to obtain the English language ability. In order to assist my students crack down on such problems, I take up the approach of givi...This paper figures out the problems the Chinese students often meet with when they try to obtain the English language ability. In order to assist my students crack down on such problems, I take up the approach of giving them opportunities to play the active roles in English reading activity and requiring them to write reading response journals and to have frequent discussions in the reading class. The approach aims at improving the students' ability and getting them to be trained and improved effectively in the language skills concerned. The approach has come out with remarkable achievements. My understanding is that the process of learning a foreign language is a process indeed of accumulation, including both the language and culture knowledge. The accumulation can be gained by means of reading a lot, thus improving the students' language competence, enlarging their cultural and language field of vision on the western world. We teachers play the function of bridge leading the students to succeed in mastering and applying English as a practical tool in their life and work to come. This paper introduces what I have been trying to assist my students in solving their problems through my teaching practice during the past years.展开更多
Weblogs, writing logs on the web, have been popularly used as an instructional tool to facilitate, reading and writing instructions in ESL (English as a Second Language)/EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classro...Weblogs, writing logs on the web, have been popularly used as an instructional tool to facilitate, reading and writing instructions in ESL (English as a Second Language)/EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classrooms. This study employed weblogs to support the writing process of Thai EFL students and provided an opportunity for them to participate in a Thai-Japanese weblog exchange project. The results showed that student bloggers: (1) enjoyed blogging due to their perceived reading and writing incentives, the exchange of cultural knowledge, and networking; and (2) employed the writing process to complete their written assignments. Findings suggest that weblogs can foster EFL learners' motivation, development of reading and writing skills, and development of cultural knowledge, and facilitate their writing process via cyberspace.展开更多
As a main international communication tool, English is becoming more and more important in China. Listening, speaking, reading, writing are the four basic skills of English. Nowadays, many college students fred that w...As a main international communication tool, English is becoming more and more important in China. Listening, speaking, reading, writing are the four basic skills of English. Nowadays, many college students fred that writing is the most difficult thing in their English study, especially in CET-4. With the hope of improving college student's writing ability, this paper aims to analyze some effective ways on how to improve students' writing ability.展开更多
Academic writings, whether they are BA dissertations or semester papers, are important carriers of one's ideas and findings of their own study and research spheres. In academic papers, the most important part is the ...Academic writings, whether they are BA dissertations or semester papers, are important carriers of one's ideas and findings of their own study and research spheres. In academic papers, the most important part is the choice of topics which determines the macro direction of the paper. Important as it is, it is difficult for the English majors to choose the most appropriate topics with idea-invested thesis statements instead of some factual statements. Therefore, in order to make clear of the status quo and underlying obstacles of topic choosing, this paper is to study on 98 samples from China University of Political Science and Law's junior English majors. By observing and analyzing their writings, the paper intends to fred out some possible and accessible methods to improve English majors' academic writing and offer some insights for teachers to make some adjustments in accordance with the status quo.展开更多
To the issue on the superiority and inferiority of the "product approach" and the "process approach" writing teaching, an empirical study research of I00 non-English major students has been accomplished to testify...To the issue on the superiority and inferiority of the "product approach" and the "process approach" writing teaching, an empirical study research of I00 non-English major students has been accomplished to testify the relationship between these different approaches and the different writing levels. The results are the "product approach" is more helpful to the learners with lower writing level; whereas, the "process approach" is more effective to ones with higher level. Furthermore, the teaching approach itself cannot affirm the superiority and inferiority, and it would not be at work unless is applied for corresponding learners.展开更多
文摘Vocabulary knowledge is an important component of the writing skill and it has many dimensions, such as size, depth, and productive, in interaction with writing skill. To evaluate this relation and determine which dimension is the most effective for second language writing quality, the present study was conducted. Turkish EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learners' lexical competence and writing abilities were examined through their vocabulary profiles and academic essays. The results of each vocabulary measure indicated that the participants had a limited vocabulary size, containing words mostly from 2,000 to 3,000 frequency bands and thus, the productive vocabulary knowledge of the participants mostly consisted of lk + 2k words and the use of academic words in their essays was very low. The results of the study revealed that the lexical competence covering the main components of vocabulary knowledge was a good predictor of the students' quality of writing performance.
文摘Although the story continuation writing task(SCWT) has attracted much research attention, few studies have investigated the construct of the task, particularly with respect to which language competence it focuses on. In addition, although some studies have demonstrated that China’s Standards of English Language Ability(CSE) provides comprehensive insights into the development of Chinese learners’ English language proficiency, little research has investigated the relationship between CSE and SCWT. This study drew upon the CSE to develop an SCWT language use inventory to address the above research gaps. A total of 358 high school students were asked to complete the questionnaire, of which 277 valid responses were analyzed. Exploratory factor analysis(EFA) on the CSE-based questionnaire revealed the presence of six factors, namely language correctness, language variety, task planning, connecting-and-generating, selecting-andmining, and organizing. The strategy of connecting-and-generating was the only significant predictor of the learners’ SCWT scores. The paper also discusses the findings relating to the SCWT rating and other integrated writing tasks.
文摘Among the many possible ways to assessing writing by giving feedbacks, the peer evaluation method is viewed as a relatively effective one for students. Traditional one-way teacher feedback with which the teachers usually make great efforts to mark out all errors had been proved to be unscientific. In this article, based on the specific situation in two English major classes in Wenhua Institute attached to HUST, a series of training and experiments were designed with the aim of proving the effect of peer evaluation in writing class. It is emphasized that language teachers should recognize the practical value of peer evaluation, and try to help students be involved in making peer responses in the writing process actively, so that students can get meaningful experience from evaluating their peers' writing, which, in turn, will enhance their own ability to produce more satisfactory essays.
文摘The axis tlhesis of this paper is that, today, it is ESP (English for Specific Purposes) in particular, rather than General English, that is the agent of the spread of globalization. Currently, ESP is witnessing an unprecedented spread, to a point of almost taking over the relevance and frequency of teaching of General English. Hereby, we look at the phenomenon of globalization as a social concept that demands of education that students are taught performativity, therefore just skills needed for the global economy functioning, and not education as a move towards change, refinement, and individuation of a personality. ESP is taught as a sort of socially neutral language, as it presumably deals only with the language of some specific science or profession. Relying on the relevant work of the acclaimed social theorists, it is our claim that as there is no socially and/or ideologically neutral language, and that this fact applies for ESP. It is because of this, that we hereby advocate a strong and urgent need for the application of critical pedagogy and critical literacy stances in the practice of ESP, and we give some broad directions of how that can be achieved.
文摘This work aims at discussing the concept of critical and plurilingual English teaching within the context of the Interdisciplinary Higher Education Program recently implemented at the University of Campinas, Brazil. This program aims at widening possibilities for public students to have access to Higher Education. The teaching of English as a foreign language is part of the curriculum and one of the challenges faced was to design a language course that meant to be meaningful to students and able to develop the necessary knowledge and literacies for active citizenship as well. A discursive approach to language was adopted and, this way, Bakhtinian theories, re-contextualized to the educational field, support the claim for the development of critical literacy in the process. Along with the concept of multiliteracies, linked to the notion of speech genres, the idea of a plurilingual, plurivocal, and pluristylistic language teaching is theoretically discussed and briefly illustrated. The results show that such an approach successfully led to meaningful and critical practices in the language classroom in Higher Education.
文摘For many years, the lack of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) classes and training has led to many difficulties in Chinese college students' writing English academic papers. This paper is designed to offer genre-based methods to Chinese teachers of English concemiug teaching the college-level writing of the introduction for academic papers. It argues that genre-based teaching approaches can teach students to write in terms of move structures or conventional sections of academic papers (Swales, 1990) and its underlying motivation which not only makes students aware of the stylistic features of introductions but provides them with the strategies to reproduce these features in their own writing. The teaching approaches proposed in this paper include modes for teachers to present the findings of generic analysis of research article introductions as well as task-based activities for students' practice.
文摘This study attempted to investigate the similarities and differences regarding the conceptions of translation eternality among a small group of Iranian people of different social positions and different ages. Sixty-two participants were selected based on the maximum variation sampling. To gather data, semi-structured interview was utilized. The participants were asked a list of 11 questions collected from the existing literature on the similar topics. Then, the interviews were transcribed for analyzing the data. Besides, Erikson's (1959) theory of development was used to classify participants of different ages in four groups of teenager, young, middle age, and old. The high frequency factors were found and analyzed with the use of Bronfenbrenner's (1979) nested ecological model. Moreover, the participants were classified in 11 groups based on their social positions and their conceptions were analyzed with the same method. Broadly speaking, 17 central tendencies in the interviews were obtained: People mainly focused on subjects of the books, translation fluency, author's competence in writing, and translator's competence, translations which have common grounds with social events of Iran, advertisement, existence of movie or cartoon adaptation of the book, translator's awareness of the content of the book, existence of cultural similarities between the source and target culture, popularity of the translator, author, and the original book, conversational language in translation, translation fidelity, being both translator and author, and effect of censorship on translation. Besides, old participants seemed to have more precise view on translation eternality and teenager's concerns were mostly about the appearance-related issues.
文摘It is increasingly important for students to develop reading and writing abilities. Teachers should focus on the teaching of English textual patterns, which plays an important part in sending writers' messages. The patterns used in the text help readers unfold the writer's message positively and actively. Students can write texts following textual patterns and using appropriate discourse signaling vocabulary. The importance of teaching the lexical signals and specific vocabulary is emphasized here. And the common core patterns in English texts are also analyzed. Besides, some instructional activities are discussed to develop students' reading and writing abilities, including raising awareness of textual patterns, focusing on signaling factors, reformulating and making a frame or a diagram.
文摘In Desire Under the Elms, Eugene O'Neill not only adopts some elements from Greek tragedies, but brings more different ideas for readers, such as supernaturalism, and the degeneration of the tragic heroes or the peasant like language and sets more comic elements. Under his powerful pen, a marvelous drama is displayed before the audience, which combines the traditional elements and modem creations perfectly. This paper aims to explore the important elements in the play and compare those with what are used in Desire Under the Elms so as to draw the conclusion that Eugene O'Neill not only uses the traditional written skills but also improves the development and inheritance of Greek tragedies.
文摘In China, it is widely believed that teacher feedback plays a crucial role in EFL writing course, exerting a great impact on the improvement of Chinese EFL students' writing abilities so that teachers have been required to deliver feedback on students' writings. Teachers, consequently, spare no pains to give feedback, expecting their students would make progress in their writing, but it seems that things go contrary to their wishes. Although there are various complicated factors contributing to the situation, one of the important factors lies in the teachers, a number of whom do not grasp a systematic and effective mechanism of delivering feedback on EFL student writing. Much importance has been attached to Chinese EFL student writing, however, rare attention has been paid to conducting research on concrete ways of delivering feedback on Chinese EFL student writing in China. Therefore, this paper serves to fill the gap, mainly devoting itself to exploring concrete methods of delivering teacher feedback on EFL student writing.
文摘This study aimed at investigating the effect of Facebook on grammar discussion and writing skill in English as a foreign language for university students, The study sample consisted of 60 students at Oklt AI Sqoor College of Science and Arts in Saudi Arabia and was divided into two groups: 30 students for the experimental group and 30 students for the control group. The instrument of the study was an EFL grammar and writing test. Students in both the experimental and the control group were pre-tested using the EFL (English as a Foreign Language) grammar and writing test, After that the experimental group was taught using Facebook while the control group was taught using the traditional method. Finally, students in both groups were post-tested using the EFL grammar and writing test. Results of the study showed that the experimental group outperformed the control group in the post-test of EFL grammar and writing. This difference can be attributed to using Facebook.
文摘This paper figures out the problems the Chinese students often meet with when they try to obtain the English language ability. In order to assist my students crack down on such problems, I take up the approach of giving them opportunities to play the active roles in English reading activity and requiring them to write reading response journals and to have frequent discussions in the reading class. The approach aims at improving the students' ability and getting them to be trained and improved effectively in the language skills concerned. The approach has come out with remarkable achievements. My understanding is that the process of learning a foreign language is a process indeed of accumulation, including both the language and culture knowledge. The accumulation can be gained by means of reading a lot, thus improving the students' language competence, enlarging their cultural and language field of vision on the western world. We teachers play the function of bridge leading the students to succeed in mastering and applying English as a practical tool in their life and work to come. This paper introduces what I have been trying to assist my students in solving their problems through my teaching practice during the past years.
文摘Weblogs, writing logs on the web, have been popularly used as an instructional tool to facilitate, reading and writing instructions in ESL (English as a Second Language)/EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classrooms. This study employed weblogs to support the writing process of Thai EFL students and provided an opportunity for them to participate in a Thai-Japanese weblog exchange project. The results showed that student bloggers: (1) enjoyed blogging due to their perceived reading and writing incentives, the exchange of cultural knowledge, and networking; and (2) employed the writing process to complete their written assignments. Findings suggest that weblogs can foster EFL learners' motivation, development of reading and writing skills, and development of cultural knowledge, and facilitate their writing process via cyberspace.
文摘As a main international communication tool, English is becoming more and more important in China. Listening, speaking, reading, writing are the four basic skills of English. Nowadays, many college students fred that writing is the most difficult thing in their English study, especially in CET-4. With the hope of improving college student's writing ability, this paper aims to analyze some effective ways on how to improve students' writing ability.
文摘Academic writings, whether they are BA dissertations or semester papers, are important carriers of one's ideas and findings of their own study and research spheres. In academic papers, the most important part is the choice of topics which determines the macro direction of the paper. Important as it is, it is difficult for the English majors to choose the most appropriate topics with idea-invested thesis statements instead of some factual statements. Therefore, in order to make clear of the status quo and underlying obstacles of topic choosing, this paper is to study on 98 samples from China University of Political Science and Law's junior English majors. By observing and analyzing their writings, the paper intends to fred out some possible and accessible methods to improve English majors' academic writing and offer some insights for teachers to make some adjustments in accordance with the status quo.
文摘To the issue on the superiority and inferiority of the "product approach" and the "process approach" writing teaching, an empirical study research of I00 non-English major students has been accomplished to testify the relationship between these different approaches and the different writing levels. The results are the "product approach" is more helpful to the learners with lower writing level; whereas, the "process approach" is more effective to ones with higher level. Furthermore, the teaching approach itself cannot affirm the superiority and inferiority, and it would not be at work unless is applied for corresponding learners.