Word processing: its impact on children's writing

This paper describes the effects of using a word processor on the creative writing of a small group of children with learning disabilities. Each week the children wrote one word-processed and one handwritten story. The effects of using a word processor seemed to be influenced by the particular problems the children were experiencing with written work. For the children with severe spelling problems, using a word processor seemed to result in fewer spelling errors, while for the children who were still predominantly concerned with the mechanics of the writing task, using a word processor seemed to result in longer stories.     

The mediation of technology in ESL writing and its implications for writing assessment

The present study investigated the influence of word processing on the writing of students of English as a second language (ESL) and on writing assessment as well. Twenty-one adult Mandarin–Chinese speakers with advanced English proficiency living in Toronto participated in the study. Each participant wrote two comparable writing tasks under exam-type conditions—one on a Macintosh computer that traced and recorded their writing and revision processes and the other written with pen. Think-aloud protocols were also recorded. It was found that participants paid more attention to higher order thinking activities while evaluating their written texts in the computer session, that they revised significantly more at most levels on the computer, and that their computer-generated essays received higher scores in argumentation than the hand-written ones, suggesting that educators should seriously consider the impact of computers on writing assessment.     

They Think Less of My Handwritten Essay If Others Word Process Theirs?

A study was undertaken to determine the effects on essay scores of intermingling handwritten and word-processed versions of student essays. A sample of examinees, each of whom had produced both a handwritten and a word-processed essay, was drawn from a larger sample of students who had participated in a pilot study of a new academic skills assessment battery. Students'original handwritten essays were converted to word-processed versions, and their original word-processed essays were converted to handwritten versions. Analyses revealed higher average scores for essays scored in the handwritten mode than for essays scored as word processed, regardless of the mode in which essays were originally produced. Several hypotheses were advanced to explain the discrepancies between scores on handwritten and word-processed essays. The training of essay readers was subsequently modified on the basis of these hypotheses, and the experiment was repeated using the modified training with a new set of readers.     

Speaking versus typing: a case-study of the effects of using voice-recognition software on academic correspondence

This paper contributes to the discussion about the effects of new technology on writing by assessing whether or not an experienced writer's style of writing changes when a new technology is introduced. 14 typed word-processed letters from ES to JH were compared with 14 dictated word-processed letters from ES after he had changed to using a voice-recognition system (Dragon Naturally Speaking). The results showed that, although there were large differences between the methods and experience of writing with the two technologies, there were no significant differences between the average letter lengths, numbers of paragraphs written and number of sentences used in each group of letters. Nor were there any significant differences in terms of readability, or typographical and grammatical errors. However, the dictated letters did have significantly shorter sentences, significantly fewer particularly long sentences (ie, those containing more than 50 words), and used the first-person pronoun more frequently. The overall results thus indicate that using the voice-recognition software had only marginal effects upon the written products, despite the fact that it had a strong effect on ES's experience of the writing process.     

Effects of composition mode and self-perceived computer skills on essay scores of sixth graders

This study was conducted to gather evidence regarding effects of the mode of writing (handwritten vs. word-processed) on compositional quality in a sample of sixth grade students. Questionnaire data and essay scores were gathered to examine the effect of composition mode on essay scores of students of differing computer skill levels. The study was replicated across two writing prompts; essays were assessed on six elements of writing on which a Writing Process Model theoretical framework predicted differences across modes. Statistically significant effects for mode and computer skills were found for some essay elements, although no statistically significant effects were found for others. These results were inconsistent across writing prompts. With the surge in high-stakes testing in American schools and with increasingly more importance being placed on writing skills in many areas, it is critical that test developers ensure that the composition mode of these tests is not putting certain students at a disadvantage. Accordingly, this article concludes with implications for writing instruction and assessment.     

The Effects of Task Choice on the Quality of Writing Obtained in a Statewide Assessment

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of presenting a choice of writing tasks on the quality of essays produced by 11th-grade students. The effects of task choice were examined for interactions with the gender and race of students. Fifteen writing tasks, designed to elicit persuasive essays, were administered to 34,200 students in Georgia. Approximately half the students received an assigned task, whereas the other half were presented a choice of two tasks. A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted using four domain scores as the dependent variables assessing writing quality and four independent variables (gender, race, writing tasks, and choice condition). The student characteristics of gender and race and the writing task variable had a significant effect in the MANOVA and all four univariate analyses. Female students wrote essays of higher quality than male students and White students wrote essays of higher quality than Black students. The choice condition had no substantive effect on the quality of essays. The writing task variable had a significant interaction with the other independent variables.     

The effects of content and audience awareness goals for revision on the persuasive essays of fifth- and eighth-grade students

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of revising goals focused on content and audience awareness on the persuasive writing of fifth- and eighth-grade students. Students were randomly assigned to three different goal conditions: a general goal; a goal to improve content; and a goal to improve content and communication with an audience. Final drafts of essays were scored for elements of persuasive discourse relevant to content and audience and for overall persuasiveness. Students in the audience goal group were more likely than both other groups to consider opposing positions and rebut them. Students in both the content and audience goal groups wrote essays that were more persuasive than essays by students in the general goal group. The results also indicate that eighth-grade students wrote more persuasively than fifth-grade students and that girls wrote more persuasively than boys.     

Children’s use of drawing as a pre-writing strategy

In this study the writing products of 60 third-grade students, who drew before writing a story on a self-selected topic, was compared with the writing products of 59 third-grade students who wrote without drawing. The students in the group which drew before writing tended to produce more words, more sentences and more idea units, and their overall writing performance was higher than the students who wrote without drawing. These findings were consistent for boys as well as girls. Implications for writing research and instruction are discussed.     

Development of software to support argumentative reading and writing by means of creating a graphic organizer from an electronic text

This paper describes the development of a software program that supports argumentative reading and writing, especially for novice students. The software helps readers create a graphic organizer from the text as a knowledge map while they are reading and use their prior knowledge to build their own opinion as new information while they think about writing their essays. Readers using this software can read a text, underline important words or sentences, pick up and dynamically cite the underlined portions of the text onto a knowledge map as quotation nodes, illustrate a knowledge map by linking the nodes, and later write their opinion as an essay while viewing the knowledge map; thus, the software bridges argumentative reading and writing. Sixty-three freshman and sophomore students with no prior argumentative reading and writing education participated in a design case study to evaluate the software in classrooms. Thirty-four students were assigned to a class in which each student developed a knowledge map after underlining and/or highlighting a text with the software, while twenty-nine students were assigned to a class in which they simply wrote their essays after underlining and/or highlighting the text without creating knowledge maps. After receiving an instruction regarding a simplified Toulmin’s model followed by instructions for the software usage in argumentative reading and writing along with reading one training text, the students read the target text and developed their essays. The results revealed that students who drew a knowledge map based on the underlining and/or highlighting of the target text developed more argumentative essays than those who did not draw maps. Further analyses revealed that developing knowledge maps fostered an ability to capture the target text’s argument, and linking students’ ideas to the text’s argument directly on the knowledge map helped students develop more constructive essays. Accordingly, we discussed additional necessary scaffolds, such as automatic argument detection and collaborative learning functions, for improving the students’ use of appropriate reading and writing strategies.

     

试论英文写作技巧的应用与语言的优美性

写作是英文学习中的一项重要内容,而写作技巧的应用与语言的优美性是英文写作成功与否的决定因素。针对英文写作技巧的运用问题,在修辞方法、句子策略、文体风格这三个方面进行了一些具体分析,以造就优美的语言,从而成就精彩的英文篇章。     

Patterns of student writing in a critical thinking course: A quantitative analysis

Two studies assessed student writing in a critical thinking course. The first study examined initial and final versions of a term paper. Linguistic inquiry and word count (LIWC) analyses of essays revealed significant differences in linguistic variables and some differences in cognitive variables. The second study examined student essays at the beginning and end of the semester. Taken together, the studies indicate that students express themselves with less tentativeness at the end of the semester, and are consistent with the suggestion that students move from relativism to commitment during the course of a semester. In addition, the results indicate that the LIWC may detect differences between different writing genres.     

The Phenomenology of Space in Writing Online

In this paper we explore the phenomenon of writing online. We ask, 'Is writing by means of online technologies affected in a manner that differs significantly from the older technologies of pen on paper, typewriter, or even the word processor in an off-line environment?' In writing online, the author is engaged in a spatial complexity of physical, temporal, imaginal, and virtual experience: the writing space, the space of the text, cyber space, etc. At times, these may provide a conduit to a writerly understanding of human phenomena. We propose that an examination of the phenomenological features of online writing may contribute to a more pedagogically sensitive understanding of the experiences of online seminars, teaching and learning.     

Jan Bengtsson (1949–2013): A Phenomenological Scholar of Our Time

In this paper we explore the phenomenon of writing online. We ask, ‘Is writing by means of online technologies affected in a manner that differs significantly from the older technologies of pen on paper, typewriter, or even the word processor in an off‐line environment?’ In writing online, the author is engaged in a spatial complexity of physical, temporal, imaginal, and virtual experience: the writing space, the space of the text, cyber space, etc. At times, these may provide a conduit to a writerly understanding of human phenomena. We propose that an examination of the phenomenological features of online writing may contribute to a more pedagogically sensitive understanding of the experiences of online seminars, teaching and learning.     

中国英语学习者的写作模式初探

本文对中国大学生利用电子邮件与讲英语为本族语的交际对象进行互动交际和利用传统纸和笔写作这两种二语写作模式进行了比较分析,发现传统纸笔写作信息承载量大,注重形式上的连接,是典型的结果写作法;而利用电子邮件写作是在真实的环境下的一种循环式互动交际过程,所写语言具有口语化、个性化、真实化的特点,更加注重对写作内容的挖掘和拓展。因此,利用得当,电子邮件可以真正促进二语写作从结果写作向过程写作的转换。     

Enhancing self-efficacy for computer technologies through the use of positive classroom experiences

The effects of experience on attitudes toward computers and judgments of confidence, or self-efficacy, for specific computer technologies were investigated. Thirty-two students in a computer applications in physical education course participated in the study. The Computer Technologies Survey was used as a pretest and posttest measure to assess students' attitudes toward computers and perceived self-efficacy for electronic mail (e-mail) and word processing. Treatment conditions required the students to communicate with the instructor via e-mail, a word-processed note, or handwritten note. These conditions manipulated experience with e-mail and word processing while keeping instructor-student interaction constant. Students' judgments of computer capability significantly increased from pretest to posttest across all treatments. A direct relationship between time-on-task and levels of confidence was not found which suggests that quality rather than quantity of computer experience may be most critical.     

Fostering topic knowledge: essential for academic writing

Several researchers emphasize the role of the writer’s topic knowledge for writing. In academic writing topic knowledge is often constructed by studying source texts. One possibility to support that essential phase of the writing process is to provide interactive learning questions which facilitate the construction of an adequate situation model by initiating macro-strategies. In order to examine whether the provision of interactive learning questions during studying source texts leads to better results in academic writing both writing process and performance of a group supported by interactive learning questions was compared to a study-only group which read the source texts without learning questions. Results revealed that students provided with interactive learning questions wrote longer essays and spend significantly more time prewriting and writing/revising their essays than did the students of the study-only group. Studying source texts with learning questions resulted in text products of better readability and partly better accuracy and coverage of content. These findings suggest that engaging students in answering learning questions when reading source texts can positively affect both writing process and performance.     

From conception to performance: How undergraduate students conceptualise and construct essays

Interviews with forty six undergraduate students enrolled in either first or third year of a Bachelor of Education explored how they conceptualised and undertook an essay writing task. The conceptual structure of their essays was analysed using the SOLO Taxonomy. Comparisons between students who wrote essays of differing levels of complexity revealed that there were major differences between students at every stage of the essay writing process. Compared to students writing essays with simple conceptual structures, students writing more complex essays engaged in processes of reconstruction rather than knowledge telling, put more effort into finding references, used organisational systems for integrating their notes according to topics or themes, built arguments rather than presented information when structuring and drafting their essays, were concerned with improving ideas and arguments as well as mechanics when revising their essays, had a more sophisticated understanding of the concepts underlying the assessment criteria, and expected and received higher grades. The results suggest a developmental process in underlying conceptualisations of both the body of knowledge forming the content of the essay, and the essay writing processes themselves. As such, attempts to improve students' essay writing skills need to shift from a focus on discrete skills to an emphasis on the relationship between students' understanding of the content and their ability to write about it. As part of the writing process, students need help building understandings representing the body of knowledge they are writing about, and this help needs to be geared to their current level of operation.     

Penning the 3 AM Thoughts: What Students Say about Writing Personally in English Class

This article features student perspectives on the role of personal writing in English class. Key findings and quotations are shared from two in-depth interviews with students who wrote exceptional personal essays as part of a narrative nonfiction unit in a 10th grade English class. Participants reported that writing personally generated more investment than a traditional academic assignment, controlling the level of sharing was key to being able to write honestly and openly, and mentor texts and writers’ notebooks were key tools which empowered their successful writing.