Student r reflection on on g grammar correct ection on in rewr writing practice: ce: a d data-led em emphasi sis s Trinh Ngoc Thanh Tamkang University
Over ervie iew of of t the e study • Reformulating in writing (Levenston 1978) • The efficacy to rewrite grammatical errors identified from student academic writing • Data from retrospective interviews
Purpose of t the study • Re-assessing both etic (i.e. the researcher) and emic (i.e. the participants) perspectives (Headland & Pike 1990) • How WCFs are processed and noticed by the student writers as participants • How insights upon the research methodology being applied in the current study are reflected by the participants
Main f focus o of the study • Re-analyse interview data with 5 Chinese EFL students in 2012 • Applying activity theory (Engestrom 2000) in data analysis • artefact (i.e. the tool) • subject (i.e. the main character) • object (i.e. the target) • rules (i.e. certain types of behaviours) • community (i.e. the relevant context) • division of labour (i.e. associated roles and responsibilities)
Signi nificanc nce of the study dy • So far very limited study on the topic of WCFs has integrated a sociocultural approach to discuss in further details on contextual factors that influence the practice of giving WCFs and mediate student learning (Lee 2014)
Research q question • How did retrospective interviews inform the efficacy of rewriting practice to writing performance ? • How did retrospective interviews reveal insights about draft revising and think-aloud treatments ?
Proc oced edure e of d data collec ection • Writing first drafts • Rewriting first drafts • Think-aloud task: the difference between their first drafts and the rewritten drafts • Rewriting their second drafts. • A few days later, retrospective interviews were scheduled with participants • Have you ever tried to think-aloud when you received feedback from your teacher? • Do you think aloud to help you recognize our feedback better? • What are some significant remarks in our corrective writing? • Do you think you can write the second draft better than the first draft? • Have you use any of our feedback in your revision? If yes, what types of feedback?
Proc oced edure e of d data collec ection • The interview data was then transcribed and cross-checked with another collaborative researcher • While conducting qualitative interpretations, content analysis methodology (Weber, 1990) was employed as the guideline to draw out the key patterns and themes emerging from the data.
Findings-Miss Gao
Miss Gao-Prescriptive rules • (Emic) She noticed the change of long to short sentences and “you” to “we” as two most significant WCFs in the re-writing of her first draft • (Etic) The effort to appropriate prescriptive rules which fit the ideology about language use in academic discourse.
Miss Gao-No identified community • It seems that it was due to no identified community from Miss Gao’s interview that leads to impression as the determined factor for memorizing the given WCF on second personal pronoun and linking words in the future
Miss Gao-Evaluation of think-aloud • Since there are no contextual factors to reinforce her memorization, she considered the usefulness of thinking-aloud as the strategy to impress her memory and to amend for the habit of forgetting • However, the earlier part of her interview raises the concern of Miss Gao’s own perception about short-term memory in a short time-span (after one hour) • Interviewer: So do you think you can memorize in a long-term or in a short- term? • Miss Gao: Short-term only in a short-term…maybe after one hour I will forget.
Findings-Miss Lu
School context • Interviewer: Have teachers given feedback like…rewriting everything for you? • Miss Lu: In China, never. But in Singapore, the last term I have English speaking and listening the teacher gives me the feedback (accuracy) …not rewrite everything but mistakes I made. • Interviewer: Can you recognize if they rewrite everything? • Miss Lu: Can’t…because there’s too much…some sentences are too long to remember (concentration) .
Friendship • Interviewer: In the future if your teacher asks you to write an essay, will you think aloud to rewind the feedback? • Miss Lu: If I share my mistakes with my friend.
Limitation of reformulating • Interviewer: Do you think you write a better second draft? • Miss Lu: The most significant one I can remember…but here I wrote this but in fact here is are…something like that...I think if I did not check mine after I finish it, I think I will write it again (remembering).
Limitation of reformulating • Interviewer: You just only use this…or the rest you use own knowledge or you just copy from 1st draft? • Miss Lu: No, not just copy with the 1st draft. If you see my second draft, the last paragraph, I changed. Maybe a lot (long-term effect ).
Opportunities for future research • The role of relevant learning context for the success and shortcomings of correcting grammatical errors in student writing. • The inclusion of reflective practice in the present study requires an attention for “…more data-led accounts of both reflection and any interaction involved” and an aim “…to identify, formulate, and share tools that promote dialogic, engaged, and evidence-based practice” (Walsh & Mann 2015: 360)
Opportunities for future research • Reports on limitations of research methodology call an attention to the role of working memory on second language comprehension and production (Linck et al 2014) so as to enhance the implementation of think-aloud in research practice.
Teaching implementationo • Teacher’s effort to provide grammatical correction for EFL learners. • To what extent learners and teacher goals for improving grammar correspond with each other (Zhou et al 2013) • How learners notice their solutions for grammatical errors and apply in the subsequent drafts (Hanaoka & Izumi 2012) • “…the nature of the learners’ engagement with the feedback received to gain a better understanding of why some feedback is taken up and retained and some is not” ( Storch & Wigglesworth 2010).
Thanks for listening!
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