fostering learner autonomy through empowering students
TRANSCRIPT
英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue): 39-85 DOI: 10.6330/ETL.2012.36.3.02
Fostering Learner Autonomy Through Empowering Students in EFL Writing
Karen Chung-chien Chang
National Taipei University
Abstract In most EFL countries, teaching composition has remained a challenging area for teachers due to the heavy workload associated with grading students’ work, and students’ lack of interest and readiness in developing their writing skills. This paper reports on a study that investigated how some new components of a writing course could foster a higher level of learner autonomy among the participating students. The research design focused on giving the locus of control to students so that they could choose topics of their own interest for their essays throughout the two semesters of the writing course. In addition, a process-oriented approach (involving three drafts) was adopted to help students learn how to improve their writing. For each assignment, comprehensive electronic feedback was provided to guide students in revising their essays. The students would turn in the first two drafts for comments and the last draft for a grade. All three aspects (freedom in making writing choices, electronic feedback and the multi-drafting process) were designed to determine if students could learn to take more responsibility in becoming better writers. The data in this study included the drafts of each assignment, a survey on learning attitudes and outcomes, and interviews. Results showed that students took more responsibility for their own learning, invested more time and effort in information collection and revision on the topics of their own choice, and improved their writing performance in terms of both longer word counts and richer content. It is concluded that to foster autonomy in EFL students, both student empowerment and teacher feedback are essential components in the writing course design. Key Words: learner autonomy, process-oriented approach, electronic
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
INTRODUCTION
The study of learner autonomy originated in the West with
explicitly political goals to “insist on the need to develop the
individual’s freedom by developing those abilities which will enable
him to act more responsibly in running the affairs of the society in
which he lives” (Holec, 1981, p. 1). Over the past three decades, the
concept has been further researched by scholars in different countries
and learning systems. One line of argument has focused on whether
such a concept is unique to westerners only. More specifically, many
researchers have focused on whether learner autonomy can be
promoted in Asia where most cultures are of a collectivist nature
(Chan, 2001; Jin & Cortazzi, 1993). For example, Pierson (1996)
described students in Hong Kong as dependent, reticent and passive,
and Biggs (1991) found that students in Hong Kong favored rote
learning over creating learning, were highly dependent on the syllabus,
and lacked intellectual initiative. Although quite a few studies have
explored the development of learner autonomy in Taiwan, the focus
has not been placed on how this factor manifests itself in EFL writing.
Therefore, this current project aimed to build a writing course with a
strong emphasis on student empowerment and involvement and
examines how having some locus of control could assist students in
taking a more active role and becoming more autonomous in the EFL
writing context.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
LITERATURE REVIEW
This literature review first distinguishes learner autonomy and
self-directed learning and narrows its focus on the development of
learner autonomy in the Taiwanese context. Although both terms put
an emphasis on learners, they each have specific features and scopes.
To explain the concept of learner autonomy, Holec (1981, p. 3)
provided the classic definition of this term and described autonomy as
“the ability to take charge of one’s own learning.” One central idea in
this definition is the concept of knowing how to learn. Pemberton, Li,
Or, and Pierson (1996, p. 3) also highlighted that Holec viewed
autonomy “as an ability or capacity that needs to be acquired” and “as
separate from the learning that may take place when autonomy is
being or has been acquired” (this learning is labeled by Holec as self-
directed learning). Self-directed learning is defined as both the
process of and the techniques used in directing one’s learning and the
change of consciousness resulting from such learning (Brookfield,
1985). What can be synthesized from the features of these two
concepts is that autonomy is a capacity and self-directed learning is
an approach in which learning is carried out.
What needs to be examined further is how the concept of
autonomy manifests itself in real practice. When considering the level
or degree of autonomy in real practice, Little (1991, p. 5) emphasized
that “the freedoms conferred by autonomy are never absolute, always
conditional and constrained” because all humans share the essential
need to interact with others. Benson and Voller (1997) suggested that
autonomy in EFL learning entails the concepts of rights, skills,
exercise, and situations. Learners have the right to determine the
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
direction of their learning; they should learn and apply certain skills in
self-directed learning, exercise their sense of responsibility for their
learning, and be supplied with situations in which they study
completely on their own.
However, realizing that Asian teachers and students seem
unfamiliar with the notion of autonomous learning, Littlewood (1999)
proposed two levels of learner autonomy: proactive and reactive. In
proactive autonomy, learners are able to take charge of their own
learning, determine their own goals, select their own methods, and
evaluate their learning results. Then in reactive autonomy, learners do
not create their own directions, but once a direction has been
identified, learners organize their own resources autonomously in
order to reach their goals. Since autonomy, whether proactive or
reactive, is not something that teachers can simply hand over to
students, this concept needs to be developed within students by
themselves.
This study was grounded in reactive autonomy and aimed at
investigating how students in a writing course exercised their freedom
of choice, determined the level of investment, and changed their
learning habits. To help students cultivate reactive autonomy, they
need to know the details of course direction and expectations. For this
study, although the students in this study did not choose the direction
of their learning, they needed to understand why they were asked to
complete certain learning tasks. Sinclair advised that, for a learner-
training task to be successfully implemented, the learners should
know “it is a learner-training task” and understand “its general
significance in the scheme of the course” (Sinclair, 1996, p. 153). The
rationale was that if learners did not know in advance which aspect of
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
a course to focus on, they may “regard the time spent on such
activities as time wasted” (Sinclair, 1996, p. 153). Moreover, Reeve
indicated when teachers provided students who encountered an
uninteresting lesson with a convincing and satisfying rationale (from
the students’ view), students would understand why they were asked
to “invest their attention and effort” (Reeve, 2006, p. 230) in the
requested activity. Clearly, when a writing course requires students to
invest time in revision, quite a time-consuming task, they should be
informed of the aims of such an activity. The instructor should also
explain the importance of the multi-drafting process. When the
students become receptive to the idea of multiple revisions, how they
manage and arrange their resources to meet this requirement may
shed light on their development of reactive autonomy.
Past Studies of Learner Autonomy in Taiwan
Although Taiwanese scholars have shown interest in exploring
and developing learner autonomy, most effort has been invested in
self-directed learning, revealing the scarcity of evidence for
cultivating learner autonomy in writing. Among the studies, many
have applied Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) to
promote learner autonomy. The model proposed by Y. N. Yu (2003)
involved a task-based learning syllabus, strategy-based instruction
and computer-mediated communication. Additionally, in C. F. Yu’s
(2005) experiment, she established a multimedia website as a self-
directed learning resource. However, that study did not generate
positive outcomes as most of the students only used the website to
complete the course-required activities. Therefore, C. F. Yu (2005)
suggested that more online activities be incorporated into the course
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design and students’ preferences about on-line learning resources be
taken into consideration to pave the way for autonomous learning.
Besides, Wang’s (2006) study conducted in a CALL center indicated
students’ self-reported improvement in listening, vocabulary,
speaking, and reading. H. Y. Lo (2007) examined how students
became self-directed learners through undertaking the assignments of
collecting information online and found more than 50% of the
students demonstrated an increase in vocabulary. With a teacher-
driven agenda and a set of mandated course activities, Cheng’s (2007)
study showed that the required outside-class learning activities were
helpful in strengthening EFL university students’ learning motivation
and fostering autonomy. In Chang’s (2007) study, the researcher had
two groups of students: one learning in a semi-autonomous learning
approach and the other in the traditional structural teaching approach.
The results indicated that the experimental group made more progress
in areas such as listening, reading and vocabulary. Chen, Chen, and
Lee (2008) attempted to cultivate autonomy in young EFL learners
through Internet-assisted language teaching (InALT) and found that
the students displayed a significant gain in vocabulary and perceived
the InALT instructional approach as helpful and interesting. Most
recently, Chu (2011) investigated university students’ use of an online
English program, and the results indicated that 40% of the students
developed a higher degree of autonomy. They seemed to demonstrate
the following characteristics: stronger motivation in English learning,
greater awareness of the need to form a habit of actively practicing
English online, more willingness to practice the materials of other
levels, and more frequent use of online English programs in their free
time.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
In Taiwan, only a few studies carried out in the field of learner
autonomy are related to writing. Y. Yu’s (2000) review of
conventional practices of a writing class highlighted the barriers to the
development of learner autonomy in the traditional writing curriculum.
According to Yu, in a writing class, a teacher is responsible for
assigning grades and correcting students’ writing. With this
traditional role, teachers are in total control of all the decisions, and
students are left with little freedom to make choices, let alone to take
charge of their own learning. Trying to change this traditional mode,
several researchers have incorporated different strategies and
components into their writing courses with the aim of encouraging
students to be more autonomous. For example, C. F. Yu (2003)
looked at students’ writing of emails and short summaries of their
learning experience. Her results showed that students felt positive
about expressing themselves in these two formats, and their level of
motivation was positively correlated with the amount of class
interaction. In addition, Lan and Wang (2007) examined the effects of
an English writing portfolio project on the attitudes and achievements
of writing among junior college students. Their findings showed that
writing portfolios had positive effects on motivating students to write
and enhancing their writing achievement. Also, S. C. Lo (2007)
investigated how high school students were encouraged by the use of
writing portfolios to become more active in their learning. The results
revealed that portfolio assessment enabled the students (1) to become
confident in shouldering the responsibility for their own learning, (2)
to assess their writing, (3) to feel empowered in making choices, and
(4) to think critically and independently. This research also
highlighted the importance of a sound relationship between the
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teacher and the students, for example, through mini teacher-student
conferences during which teachers enhanced their understanding of
the needs of the students.
What can be concluded is that the previous studies have
focused on either using email writing to encourage students’
engagement or adopting portfolio assessment for facilitating student
empowerment and self-assessment. However, no studies have been
conducted regarding how injecting new elements into a traditional
writing course can help the development of learner autonomy. The
present study set out to bridge this gap and discover whether new
course components, namely the empowerment of students in choosing
topics, the use of comprehensive electronic feedback, and multiple
drafting, can help students to become autonomous learners in their
writing class.
THE STUDY
Background of the Study and Research Question
This study was designed to discover how a writing course with
three features (freedom in choosing their own writing topics,
electronic feedback provision, and a multi-drafting process) could
help foster student autonomy in writing. This section will introduce
the old course design first, followed by the revised course design and
the research question.
The course, Advanced Grammar and Guided Writing, is offered
to all freshmen for two semesters at the foreign language department
where this study was carried out. Typically, this course is offered two
hours a week and the instructors need to cover both grammar and
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
writing in the instructional hours. Even though the course instructors
(usually four of them) are well aware of the difficulty in covering the
syllabus in two hours, the curriculum has been in place for more than
10 years. The institutional expectations state that students are to
produce four to six pieces of writing per semester (eight to 12 pieces
in one academic year), and each composition should at least be 300
words in length. However, no specific approach to feedback provision
or the number of drafts is mandated by the department. The
instructors are, to some extent, allowed some flexibility in how much
they want to accomplish in two semesters. In an 18-week semester,
the biggest challenge for teachers is how to motivate their students to
shoulder more responsibility and play a more active role in their
learning so that the institutional requirement can be met.
This researcher, also one of the course instructors, was keenly
aware of the insufficient time for course instruction and the difficulty
in covering all the grammar and writing objectives in a two-hour class.
In modifying the writing course, the instructor followed the
institutional requirement of having students produce four to six
assignments per semester. The new course design incorporated three
major features. First, students were allowed to choose their own
writing topics. This element aimed at both encouraging a higher level
of student involvement and empowering them to gain more control in
their learning. Moreover, it was hoped that, in the process of selecting
topics, students would learn to examine the suitability of their topics
to the genres they would be studying, and when the topics were
chosen with a higher level of personal interest, the students might
demonstrate a higher level of engagement in learning how to write.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
The second part of this modified course design was the
provision of electronic feedback. The instructor made use of
Comments, a Microsoft Word application, to highlight the
weaknesses and problematic areas in the students’ essays. Electronic
feedback was provided for two reasons. First, the students in this
study were expected to revise their essays. To fulfill this expectation,
the students must be supplied with sufficient suggestions and
feedback to guide them in the revision process. Second, the choice of
using electronic feedback for comments was to offer students better
readability for comprehension as well as more detailed explanation. In
the department where this study was carried out, most writing
instructors still provided students with handwritten comments or
simple underlines. Although handwritten comments were helpful,
some students expressed difficulty in understanding their instructors’
handwriting. In addition, many of the students whose drafts were
marked with underlines didn’t know what was wrong with the
underlined text.1 To address these two concerns, this researcher chose
to use electronic feedback to draw students’ attention to the weak
areas in their writing. Electronic feedback, covering issues such as
grammar, mechanics, essay structure and organization, was
consistently provided to pave the way for the responsibility for
learning to be gradually transferred to the students.
Third, a process-oriented approach was incorporated in the
modified course design. The adoption of a multi-drafting process
aimed at training students to become better writers through a process
1 Although these issues were not specifically investigated in this study, these two difficulties were shared by students in their regular meetings with their mentor teachers.
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of continuously improving the quality of their writing. For each
writing assignment, the students would turn in three drafts. In the first
draft, the students received feedback primarily on essay structure and
organization to ensure their understanding of the learned genres. Also,
at this stage, the instructor provided the students with suggestions to
enrich their essay content. For example, a student might have been
advised to provide an example to illustrate his/her point. Next, the
focus of feedback on the second draft was shifted to grammar and
mechanics as the content of the second draft was expected to be more
solid.
Based on the aforementioned modifications to the original
course design, this study attempted to answer the research question:
How do the main features of the new course design (allowing the
students to choose their own writing topics, providing the students
with specific electronic feedback, and a multiple-drafting process)
affect students’ writing performance and involvement (in terms of
autonomy) in the writing course? Writing performance in this study
was measured in terms of both word count and improvements in the
content. The former focused on students’ ability in developing their
ideas further based on the feedback and comments received whereas
the latter examined both essay content and structure/organization. For
essay content and structure/organization, the students were expected
to demonstrate their knowledge about the learned genres as well as
rhetorical strategies. Moreover, in examining the level of student
involvement, this study explored the records of assignment
submission, the students’ strategies for time management in
completing drafts, and their handling of feedback for revision.
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Participants
The participants were 14 freshmen students at a public
university in northern Taiwan. Among these students, three were male
and 11 were female. The students were English majors, indicating
they might have stronger motivation in improving their overall
English proficiency. Before this group of 14 students entered
university, some of them had taken the General English Proficiency
Test (GEPT) at different levels or the Test of English as a Foreign
Language Internet-based test (TOEFL iBT). The GEPT is a test
established in July 2002 in Taiwan. Appendix A offers the alignment
references between the GEPT and other tests (Wu & Wu, 2010).
To better understand the proficiency levels of the 14 students in
this study, all their previous test scores were interpreted in terms of
the TOEFL iBT equivalent scores. These can be found in Table 1.
Table 1
Students’ English Proficiency Levels
Participating
students Three males and 11 females
GEPT intermediate
GEPT high-intermediate
GEPT advanced
No record
Number of students 7 1 1 5 Equivalent TOEFL
iBT score 79 92 100
Among these 14 students, the one with the highest test record
spent her elementary and junior high years in the U.S., demonstrating
a much higher level of English fluency compared to her peers.
Another seven students pointed out that they had taken the GEPT-
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
Intermediate test at least one and a half years before they entered
university; two had even passed the test three to four years before
entering university.
Data Collection and Analysis
The data collection of this study consisted of three parts:
students’ writing samples (word counts of their first and final drafts,
reduction in the totals of feedback received on the two drafts, and
grades), a learning survey, and interviews. For the writing samples,
both the length and the quality of the revised drafts were examined.
First, the word counts of the 12 assignments for each student were
tallied and plotted into line graphs to show their improvement. The
word count for each ungraded draft was calculated by the built-in
Word Count function of Microsoft Word. Second, to make sure the
students did not just write more words but also composed quality
content, the first and final drafts of Assignment 2 and Assignment 11
were selected to illustrate students’ improvement in essay quality.
Between the first and final drafts of these two assignments, the
students showed a great reduction in the amount of
feedback/commentary received. Third, the first and final drafts of all
assignments were read by two instructors (the researcher and a
writing instructor2 at another institute) to verify the quality of the
content. The evaluation of the drafts was based on a pre-designed
rubric that emphasized structure, content, and grammatical accuracy.
The component of “structure” evaluated students’ grasp of the
2 This instructor has earned a master’s degree in TESOL and has been teaching for at least four years. She teaches writing regularly and her students are freshmen in a foreign language department.
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structure of the target genres; “content” reflected the improvement
and richness of essay details; “grammatical accuracy” was evaluated
based on what the students had learned in the grammar portion of the
course. The percentages for these three aspects were 30%, 40%, and
30% respectively.
The second data collection tool was a learning survey. The
survey included 16 questions that asked the students to mark their
responses on a 5-point Likert Scale, with 1 as Strongly Disagree and 5
as Strongly Agree. These 16 questions covered two major
components of this course design (freedom in choosing writing topics
and feedback for revision) and the issue of teacher dependence (see
Appendix B). In the first question, the students were asked to evaluate
their experience in this EFL writing class. The following three
questions (Questions two to four) explored how students responded to
the choice of selecting their own topics and whether this freedom
affected their likelihood in allotting more time for conducting
research as well as collecting information. Then the students were
asked if they regularly set aside time for the weekly revision of their
essays. The purpose of this question was to find out if students
allotted time to improve their writing. The second category of
questions focused on the specificity of feedback and comments
provided by the instructor. The students were asked to evaluate if the
feedback was specific and whether the comments/feedback helped
them understand the weaknesses in their essays. The underlying
rationale was that the more specific the feedback and comments were,
the better the students would know how to revise their essays.
Consequently, when the students knew the necessary changes they
needed to make to improve their writing, they displayed less
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dependence on the teacher thereby fostering learner autonomy.
Finally, the last category of questions attempted to find out how
students viewed themselves in terms of taking the initiative as well as
the responsibility in their learning. The responses to these questions
would aid the researcher’s understanding of the development of
autonomy among these students.
The Pearson correlation test was chosen to identify if
significance could be established between factors such as the freedom
in topic choice and the investment of time and effort in collecting
information and revising essays or the understanding of instructor’s
feedback and the effort made in the revision process. Moreover, to
understand if specific feedback would encourage students to work on
their own (a feature of an autonomous learner), open-ended questions
were asked as well. To determine if students knew how to manage
their time for revision purposes, a question was also asked regarding
how students managed their time to meet deadlines.
Lastly, individual interviews were conducted to gain a better
insight into what these students gained in this year-long grammar and
writing course. Interviews were conducted by the researcher and
focused on five questions (two major ones and three follow-up ones,
see Appendix C) to explore how students viewed the instructor’s
feedback, in particular, its impact on their revision effort and quality,
and how students managed their time for assignment submission. Five
students volunteered to participate in the interviews, and they were
asked to describe in detail how they allotted time for assignment
completion and how teacher feedback affected their revision. The
answers were presented to shed light on the students’ development of
autonomy.
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RESEARCH FINDINGS
Insights from Changes in Essay Length
The students in this course were informed that their writing
assignments should meet a minimum of 300 words in length.
However, no maximum word count was imposed, for the purpose was
to encourage students to fully express their ideas. One initial
observation indicated that all students in this study surpassed the
requirement set by the department. Moreover, throughout the two
semesters of this research project, the students showed a capability to
incorporate the instructor’s feedback into their drafts, leading to
improvements in their writing. The word counts of drafts were tallied
and learning graphs were plotted to see how students’ learning had
developed. The students were coded into students one to 14 and their
assignments were coded into assignments one to 12. An overall trend
that could be concluded from students’ year-long learning was that all
students demonstrated the ability to compose longer essays. The
analysis focused on two aspects: the improvement between the first
and the final draft of each assignment and the improvement
throughout the 12 assignments in the two semesters. First, all 14
students were able to revise their essays to a greater length. In a total
of 168 revisions submitted (12 assignments for 14 students), only 17
revised works (10%) showed a slight decrease in the word count. In
other words, 90% of the revised essays were longer, indicating that
the students were able to make use of the revision process to increase
the length of their essays. Second, over the course of the two
semesters, the students gradually learned to write longer essays. Take
the first drafts of the 12 assignments for example. Ten out of fourteen
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
(10/14) students showed an increase in essay length by 250 words or
more.3 A similar trend was also found in the final drafts. Twelve out
of fourteen students were able to increase their essay length by 250
words or more. 4 The line graphs plotted in Appendix D clearly
indicate the students’ improvement in these aspects over the two
semesters.
Naturally, word counts could not be directly interpreted as a
sign for improved writing ability among students. Therefore, the
entire set of first drafts and final drafts (a total of 336 essays) was
evaluated by the two instructors. The purpose was to verify if the
content, structure and accuracy of the essays met the rubric criteria to
earn the assigned grades. With the aid of the rubric, the two
evaluators were able to reach 90.3% of inter-rater reliability in
determining the progress of these students.
Insights from the Writing Samples
Although word counts could not exactly represent students’
improvement in their writing ability, this tool did show that the
students were willing to challenge themselves by putting in more time
and effort to elaborate on the content of their compositions.5 Content
analysis by both evaluators showed improvement in the solidness and
soundness of the essay content, demonstrated by the coherence
between ideas and supporting details. More specifically, the
3 Four of these 10 students even demonstrated a significant increase of more than 350 words. 4 Six of these 12 students showed a significant increase of more than 350 words. 5 These students were aware that the institutional requirement was 300 words per assignment and most classmates in other classes were doing paragraph writing instead of essay writing in the two semesters.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
improvement in content and essay length between the first and final
drafts suggested that a process-oriented approach with an emphasis on
feedback might have encouraged the learners to revise their writing.
In particular, the learning graphs of Students one, three, five, six, nine
and 14 (see Appendix D) demonstrated a more distinguishing increase
in word counts in the final drafts submitted in the second semester
(see the graphs of Essays seven to 12). For other students, the
increased lengths could also serve as an indicator of students’ effort in
revision.
In this multi-drafting process, the students earned grades only
on their third and final drafts but received feedback/comments on all
three drafts. Consequently, a comparison between the problematic
areas pointed out in these two drafts could serve as an indicator of
how students improved as a result of feedback from the instructor.
Table 2 compares Assignment 2 (in the first semester) and
Assignment 116 (in the second semester) of these 14 students to show
the amount of reduction in feedback received between the two drafts.
The results revealed that the students made great efforts to address the
feedback received in their first drafts. Their success could be
concluded from the greatly reduced amount of feedback received in
their final drafts. Such improvement also illustrated student
engagement in revision, an autonomous decision of learners.
6 The reason for not choosing Assignment 1 was that most students experienced unfamiliarity with feedback and revision in their first assignment. Moreover, Assignment 12 was not selected because its first draft was administered as the final exam of that semester.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
Table 2
Feedback/Comment Reduction in the First and Final Drafts
of Assignment 2 and Assignment 11
Amount of feedback/ comments received
S1 S2 S3 S4 S5 S6 S7 S8 S9 S10 S11 S12 S13 S14
Feedback Totals in the Drafts of Assignment 2 First draft 44 33 29 26 38 40 45 41 28 37 37 21 22 27 Final draft 18 6 17 6 21 19 11 18 23 16 14 4 11 13 Reduction in amount 26 27 12 20 17 21 34 23 5 21 23 17 11 14 Feedback Totals in the Drafts of Assignment 11 First draft 47 56 119 37 79 73 109 74 30 86 61 45 48 57 Final draft 19 8 31 2 33 17 22 15 15 13 23 9 4 19 Reduction in amount 28 48 88 35 46 56 87 59 15 73 38 36 44 38
Findings from Survey Questions
The first positive outcome from this survey indicated that 86%
of the students (twelve out of fourteen) enjoyed this EFL writing class
(see Figure 1), a result not often found in Taiwanese college settings.
Dibello (2003) pointed out that the fear of writing in English was
widespread in Taiwan. For many writing instructors, one common
difficulty is how to encourage their students to take an interest in
writing.
Though the learning survey contained 16 questions, the results
obtained from SPSS showed more significant correlations among the
following 10 questions. Therefore, to focus on the explanation of the
significant correlations, the following questions were selected.
1. I enjoyed English composition in my first year of college
(VAR01).
2. I liked choosing my own topics for different writing
projects (VAR02).
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
Figure 1 Students’ Perceptions of the EFL Writing Class
3. I felt a stronger sense of freedom when I could choose my
own topics (VAR03).
4. I am more likely to invest more time on researching a topic
of my own choice (VAR04).
5. I set aside the time for essay revision each week (VAR08).
6. The comments are specific for me to revise my essays
(VAR10).
7. Looking back to my first year of English composition, I feel
that I took the initiative in making my writing better
(VAR13).
8. I believe it is my responsibility to invest time and effort to
improve my own writing (VAR14).
9. Through the feedback and comments from my instructor, I
understand my weaknesses in composing an essay (VAR15).
10. I believe it is necessary to spend time working on revisions
in order to improve my writing ability (VAR16).
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
As shown in Table 3, the most significant correlations occurred
between three sets of variables. The first significant correlation
existed between VAR02 and VAR04 at .785*. This result indicated a
strong correlation between students’ sense of freedom and their
likelihood of time invested in revising the essay. The second
significant correlation occurred between VAR08 and VAR14 at .689*,
indicating that for the students who regularly set aside time for
revision, they tended to see improving their writing as their own
responsibility. This result also indicated that students would take
more responsibility once they developed the habit of regularly
revising their work. The third significant correlation was found
between VAR10 and VAR15 at .673*, showing that specific feedback
helped students know their weaknesses in composition.
In addition to these three correlations at the 0.01 level (two-
tailed), other findings were quite helpful for the instructor in
understanding the students’ development in this course. First, the
correlation of .539 between VAR01 and VAR08 revealed that
students who enjoyed this writing class were also those who set aside
regular time for revision. Moreover, when the students enjoyed a
course, they were more likely to take the initiative to meet the course
requirements and to improve their writing as shown in the correlation
of .548 between VAR 01 and VAR13. Second, one feature in this
course was students’ choice in selecting their own topics. The
correlation of .640 between VAR02 and VAR03 showed that the
students felt more freedom when they could choose their own topics.
In addition, one interesting correlation of .602 was found between
VAR13 and VAR15, signaling that when students had a better
understanding of their weaknesses, they took a more active role in
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
improving their performance. Moreover, the correlation of .609
between VAR16 and VAR08 informed the researcher that when
students viewed learning as their responsibility, they would be more
likely to invest time in revising. Finally, the correlation of .645
between VAR14 and VAR16 indicated that those who held the view
that improving one’s writing required time were also the ones who
were willing to invest more time and effort.
Table 3
Correlations between Learning Attitude, Feedback Clarity, and
Autonomy
VAR03 VAR04 VAR08 VAR10 VAR13 VAR14
Pearson Correlation
-.047 .040 .539* .495 .548* .032
Sig. (2-tailed) .874 .892 .047 .072 .043 .913
VAR01
N 14 14 14 14 14 14 Pearson Correlation
.640* .785** .139 -.283 .108 -.038
Sig. (2-tailed) .014 .001 .635 .327 .712 .896
VAR02
N 14 14 14 14 14 14 Pearson Correlation
.073 -.062 .689** .028 .141 1
Sig. (2-tailed) .805 .833 .006 .923 .630
VAR14
N 14 14 14 14 14 14 Pearson Correlation
.027 -.184 .349 .673** .602* .111
Sig. (2-tailed) .927 .530 .221 .008 .023 .706
VAR15
N 14 14 14 14 14 14 Pearson Correlation
.047 -.040 .609* .147 .411 .645*
Sig. (2-tailed) .874 .892 .021 .617 .145 .013
VAR16
N 14 14 14 14 14 14
*Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed); **Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
Insights from Assignment Submission
Students’ reactions and levels of commitment in this project
could be interpreted as very positive. This observation was concluded
from the students’ performance. This entire project lasted one
academic year in which the participating students submitted one draft
each week, totaling 18 drafts per semester. In the two semesters, the
students completed a total of 12 projects (coded Project 1 to Project
12 in Appendix D). In the fall of 2010, when the students first started
this course, they demonstrated some initial unfamiliarity with the on-
line assignment submission system. Such unfamiliarity was observed
in their missing of the deadlines for the first few drafts (in Project 1
and Project 2). Nevertheless, this situation quickly improved when
students became more settled into the semester. Moreover, in the
spring of 2011, at least two-thirds of the students started
demonstrating a higher level of self-discipline and time management,
for those students were often observed to have submitted their drafts
two or three days before the assigned deadlines. Take the submissions
of two assignments in both semesters for a comparison. The selected
assignments were Project 4, Project 5, Project 10, and Project 11
respectively. The submission records of these four projects were
retrieved from the Digital Learning Center (DLC) at the university.
The reason for not choosing the submission records of the first two
assignments (Project 1 and Project 2) was that the students initially
experienced some difficulty in using the DLC for homework
submission in the fall of 2010. Projects 3, 6, 9, and 12 in the two
semesters were excluded because they were administered as midterm
and final exams separately. As the students manually completed their
midterms and finals, the electronic submissions were completed later
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
just for record-keeping. Table 4 shows students in the second
semester turned in their drafts earlier. The numbers for the
assignments turned in five hours before the deadlines and for the late
submissions fell in the second semester, a potential indicator for
students’ being more conscientious about their time management.7
Table 4
Submission Records for Projects 4, 5, 10, and 11
Assignment number
Two or more days early
One to two days early
On time (5 hours prior to the
deadline)
Late submission
Project 4 1 9 3 1 Project 5 0 6 4 4 Project 10 4 6 2 2 Project 11 4 10 0 0
Findings from Individual Interviews
The following selected responses shed light on the students’
viewpoints. Overall, the interviewed students perceived the feedback
provided by the instructor as clear and helpful for revision.8 One
student, Charlotte, stated that when she received feedback from the
instructor, she would first read all the comments and started the
revision on the second day. When asked why she would start the
revision so soon, Charlotte said,
I don’t like to see so many comment boxes on my paper. I am not saying I
don’t like the feedback from my teacher. What I am saying is that the
7Later, in the interviews, the students’ answers confirmed this view. 8The students were given pseudonyms.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
existence of the comment boxes makes me want to start revision as soon as
possible. Once I have addressed the issues pointed out by my teacher, I can
delete the comment boxes; then I gain a sense of achievement.
Another student, Janice, expressed how she felt about the feedback
from the instructor. Janice said,
Personally, I felt the comments were clear to me most of the time, especially
those related to grammar. If there was something that I did not understand, I
would schedule an appointment with my teacher. Before I went to see her, I
would go over my questions so I would know what to ask.
One shared response from all five interviewed students was the clarity
of the feedback and comments. Two students (Vanessa and Stephanie)
expressed that they preferred revising the essays on their own based
on what they had received from the instructor. When asked if they
preferred face-to-face discussions with their teacher for essay revision,
all five of them indicated that they rarely needed to have formal talks
with their instructor.9
When asked about their time management in writing or revising
a draft, these students shared the following answers.
I usually started revising my essays on the second day after I got the
feedback. As to new tasks, I usually start choosing my topics the very next
9 Among these five students, only Bill and Janice would make appointments to discuss the questions in their essays. Bill usually used a combination of email and face-to-face talks to clarify his questions, while Janice would first try to work on her own and came to talk to the teacher when the problems required more explanation or guidance.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
day (Wednesday) and collecting information on Thursday and Friday. I
prefer finishing my assignments on Saturday or even a bit before the
deadline. [by Charlotte]
Looking at the feedback provided by my teacher, I would first estimate the
time I needed for revision. For example, I might need two days to work on
the problematic areas in my papers. Then I would set aside one extra day to
review the final work to ensure everything is okay. On average, I usually
turned in my assignments on Friday night so I could have my weekend off.
[by Bill]
I usually begin revising my essays three days before the deadline. I don’t
like to revise my essays the last minute because some unexpected incidents
may happen and keep me from completing what I need to do. Besides, I like
to start revision early because I can save more time for refining my work.
[by Vanessa]
Usually, I would revise some trivial problems like grammar mistakes on
Thursday or Friday. Then I would have an overall look at the original
writing and begin to consider how I could improve my writing. I would start
to revise the rest of my essay including the structure of the paper or message
clarity on Friday night or Saturday. If I am not occupied by other school-
related events such as tests or projects, usually I have sufficient time for
revision. [by Stephanie]
I always worked on my essay as soon as possible. Since I didn’t have classes
on Wednesday afternoons in the first year, it was the time that I usually
devoted myself to writing. However, if feedback came back late, I would do
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
revision on either Thursday evenings or Saturday afternoons. I think time to
finish revisions was quite adequate. [by Janice]
These responses proved that the students worked on their revisions at
their own pace. Echoing the idea of reactive autonomy, once the
direction was set, revising their essays in this case, the students
learned to manage their time and develop the most suitable timetables
for themselves. Moreover, the students learned when to work on their
own and when to seek help from their instructor, an indicator that
they had become autonomous learners and writers.
Another interesting observation concluded from the assignment
submission records was the early submission of revisions from nearly
half the class (about eight to 10 students). In the first semester, the
students abided by the deadlines and did not seem to make extra effort
to turn in their work early. However, in the second semester, when the
teacher announced that she would read the essays and provide
feedback according to the submitted sequence, nearly half of the
students started to demonstrate a tendency of early submission. To
understand why such a phenomenon occurred, Question 5 was
included in the interviews. When asked about early submissions of
assignments, all five interviewees expressed they usually turned in the
assignments one to two days earlier (sometimes even three, as shown
in the DLC). When asked about their rationale of early homework
submissions, the students expressed that they would like to receive
feedback sooner for revision purposes. Again, the knowledge of their
own working paces had helped the students to shape their learning
habits.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
From the students’ responses to the close-ended, open-ended,
and interview questions, it was evident that the students had learned
to work on their own in revision without much assistance from the
instructor, for they perceived the feedback received from the
instructor as clear and specific. Furthermore, when the students had
the locus of control to choose their topics, they felt a stronger sense of
freedom and became more likely to invest time and effort in
information collection. Most importantly, the students had learned to
use their resources (including time, information, and feedback) for the
betterment of their writing quality, a strong indicator of the
development of reactive autonomy, which focuses on how learners
organize their own resources autonomously in order to reach their
goals.
CONCLUSIONS
This study has generated encouraging results. Although the size
of this class is small and the results may not be applicable to all
students learning composition, the results still offer several directions
for writing instructors. First, students are capable of taking more
responsibility in their own learning when they are guided and assisted.
When the students in this study were encouraged to compose essays
rather than just paragraphs, they exhibited the readiness to take on
bigger challenges. Second, when provided with detailed and specific
feedback and comments, students can engage in revisions without
much assistance from the instructor. The students in this study
verified that they did not need to arrange individual conferences with
their instructor because the feedback was perceived clear and specific.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
This result is especially important because when the class size in
Taiwan remains large, writing instructors can definitely benefit from
more independent learners. Third, writing teachers should sometimes
try to allow their students to choose the topics of their own interest.
Fourth, the process-oriented approach of incorporating multiple drafts
allows students to see their own improvement. For the students in this
study, they highly agreed that a revision process helped them improve
the quality of their work.
This study revealed that autonomy can be fostered in a writing
course when the design heavily involves the learners and allows them
the freedom to make decisions. When allowed to choose the topics of
their interest, students are more likely to invest time and effort in
collecting information as well as revising essays. When students
become more active in taking responsibility for their learning, writing
instructors may find a class of 25 to 35 students more manageable.
Moreover, electronic feedback allows instructors to give clearer and
more detailed explanations to attract their students’ attention. This
type of feedback may “physically” challenge students to address the
problems in their own writing because they have to respond to the
comments in the comment boxes inserted in students’ essays. In
addition, a multi-drafting process allows students to have many
opportunities to improve their writing and to understand that it takes
time to produce good work. It is hoped that the findings in this study
would encourage more teachers to provide students with choices,
deliver electronic feedback, and adopt a multi-drafting process to help
their students become more autonomous writers and learners.
Despite the encouraging results from this study, a few
limitations of the study have to be noted. First, this group of target
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
students was small, with only 14 students. To enhance the
applicability of the findings, a study on a larger scale (preferably
more than 30) may be desirable. However, realistically, this
recommendation may present some challenges to teachers. Even with
Ferris’ (1999, p. 4) suggestion of providing students with “selective,
prioritized, and clear” error correction, the task of providing feedback
to a class of 35 or more students is still daunting, let alone the idea of
combining feedback provision with a multi-drafting process. Second,
as learner autonomy is described as a fluid concept, to assess whether
students have indeed become autonomous writers, a longitudinal
study for an additional two to three semesters in other subjects or
disciplines may be helpful in gaining better insights into the topic of
learner autonomy. Third, past research has indicated that the
closeness between a teacher and a student may greatly influence the
level of trust that the student has for the teacher. In this study, the
target group of students had a very close relationship with their
writing instructor. Though no specific questions were asked regarding
how this level of trust affected students’ learning outcomes, such a
feature should be taken into consideration for other teachers who
might plan to adopt a similar course design. Different findings might
have been generated had this instructor demonstrated a more distant
relationship with her students.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The author would like to thank the reviewers and editors for
their helpful comments and suggestions.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Karen Chung-chien Chang is an assistant professor in the
Department of Applied Linguistics and Foreign Languages at
National Taipei University. Her current research interests include
second language writing, learner autonomy, rhetoric, and
translation/interpretation studies.
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Appendix A
LTTC GEPT-CEFR Alignment Reference
GEPT CEFR IELTS TOEFL iBT
Second stage 7.5 110 Advanced
First stage C1
7.0 100 Second stage 6.5 92
High-Intermediate First stage
B2 6.0 79
Intermediate Second stage B1 5.5 Below 79 Note. This reference is also available on http://www.lttc.ntu.edu.tw/E_LTTC/E_
GEPT/alignment.htm
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Appendix B
Learning Survey for Advanced Grammar and Guided Writing
Please reflect on your learning experience in this course and mark the answers that
best reflect your opinions.
Questions Strongly agree
Agree Fair Disagree Strongly disagree
1. I enjoyed English composition in my first year of college.
2. I liked choosing my own topics for different writing projects.
3. I felt a stronger sense of freedom when I could choose my own topics for writing.
4. I am likely to invest more time on researching a topic of my own choice.
5. If a topic is assigned by my teacher, I will try equally hard to complete the research and the writing.
6. I like receiving feedback related to my essays.
7. The feedback and comments are clear for me to revise my essays.
8. I set aside the time for essay revision every week.
9. I prefer discussing the comments for revision with my teacher to spending time on revision first.
10. The comments are specific enough for me to revise my essays.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
11. I regularly visited my
teacher during her office hours for essay revision.
12. I prefer sending my questions related to essay revision via email to my instructor.
13. Looking back at my first year of English composition, I feel that I took the initiative in making my writing better.
14. I believe it is my responsibility to invest time and effort in my own writing.
15. Through the feedback and comments from my instructor, I understand my weaknesses in composing an essay.
16. I believe it is necessary to spend time working on revisions in order to improve my writing ability.
Please answer the following questions as best as you can.
1. What are your strategies in responding to the feedback from
your instructor? You may describe how you use it to revise
your essay or comment on the usefulness of the feedback.
2. Do you think the feedback and comments provided by your
instructor are enough for you to work on essay revisions?
Why or why not?
3. For a deadline to turn in a revision on Sunday, for example,
when did you usually start revising your essays? Did that
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
give you enough time to finish the revision? You may share
how you manage your time for revision.
4. Did you visit your instructor often to discuss your essays
face-to-face? If yes, why did you prefer doing that? If no,
how did you go about essay revision?
5. What more could the instructor have done more in helping
you improve your writing? Are you satisfied with your
progress in the first year? Please explain.
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
Appendix C
Interview questions (two major questions, Question 1 and
Question 4, and three follow-up questions, Question 2, Question 3
and Question 5):
1. How did the teacher feedback affect your revision effort?
2. Did you understand the corrections and suggestions and
were you able to revise the essays on your own?
3. Did you visit your instructor often for essay revision? Why
or why not?
4. For a task deadline set at late Saturday night (early Sunday
morning), what was your strategy in terms of time
management for a writing assignment?
5. Did you submit your revisions earlier than the deadlines?
Please explain.
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Appendix D
Word Counts of Student Essays and Learning Graphs
Student 1 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 212 235 235 224 237 253 407 675 694 499 531 516 Final 257 268 233 278 453 307 596 770 826 533 647 604
Student 2 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 205 409 364 367 518 312 1051 681 766 508 757 612 Final 241 397 385 374 534 360 785 627 773 905 814 715
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Student 3 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 208 228 336 278 649 275 341 437 462 390 820 539 Final 263 309 429 279 727 301 340 688 518 675 925 573
Student 4 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 137 304 366 279 252 356 473 318 707 638 532 452 Final 249 312 374 283 345 392 454 445 829 668 549 543
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Student 5 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 165 358 331 452 658 284 699 488 494 554 905 718 Final 179 356 338 578 701 311 931 625 679 643 1092 1149
Student 6 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 225 322 275 354 383 254 454 404 523 353 623 396 Final 327 358 263 399 462 327 452 547 595 440 655 618
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
Student 7 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 383 515 417 695 524 302 655 603 1043 521 950 528 Final 383 922 443 672 603 328 746 698 1070 868 1150 782
Student 8 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 155 552 318 518 429 307 478 425 694 490 949 647 Final 226 479 316 523 460 323 507 494 743 581 961 640
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
Student 9 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 156 266 299 296 272 207 412 336 429 417 357 539 Final 280 338 287 500 435 310 497 477 479 485 540 570
Student 10 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 246 300 319 352 372 271 434 475 484 452 548 503 Final 370 337 313 363 371 298 466 494 551 513 586 564
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Student 11 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 239 303 313 298 331 257 286 351 503 394 377 457 Final 326 310 329 269 327 300 334 429 539 456 453 480
Student 12 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 276 206 329 256 274 271 422 321 320 358 443 267 Final 224 231 334 309 340 346 503 408 340 390 566 592
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning 36. 3 (2012 Special Issue)
Student 13 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 252 223 351 224 552 301 480 366 784 395 571 528 Final 264 315 359 292 640 314 505 560 906 424 649 545
Student 14 Projects and Word Counts (First Draft and Final Draft)
Draft 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 First 187 232 310 232 285 263 240 279 276 408 441 446 Final 204 320 323 262 322 269 437 330 624 524 504 561
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英語教學 English Teaching & Learning Chang: Fostering Learner Autonomy through Empowering Students
大一英作課程設計:
培養學生學習自主之行動研究
摘要
本文著重於大一英文的寫作課程設計,透過不同的
課程重點,旨在探討此類設計是否可培養學生學習
自主的態度,鼓勵學生對其學習過程及結果,扮演
更主動的角色。此課程設計共有三大特色,第一,
學生在學習指定文體後,可自由選擇寫作題目,此
乃為提升學生寫作的興趣及投入度。第二,透過老
師的批改、回饋及評語,幫助學生達到自我檢討、
訂正之目標。第三,此課程強調多稿修改過程,每
個文體要求三稿,讓學生透過此機制,學習如何利
用老師評語、課外資源,來精進自身的寫作能力。
本研究對象為某國立大學應用外語系的大一學生,
共 14 人。資料蒐集包含一整學年的 12 個寫作計畫
(涵蓋教師回饋評語與學生學習歷程檔案)、學習問
卷調查及訪談。研究結果顯示學生透過教師回饋評
語、多稿修改機制,大幅提升作文寫作能力,相較
於一稿,三稿在架構及內容上更為精進,寫作長度
也大幅提升。學生更在此學習過程中,透過選擇自
身感興趣的寫作主題、收集資料,培養出高度學習
自主,知道如何掌控自己的學習時間、利用教師評
語回饋,每週修改文稿、提升自身的寫作能力,並
培養強烈的學習責任感,主導自身的學習歷程。論
文最後也提出建議及未來的研究方向。
關鍵詞:學生自主 寫作課程設計 線上寫作回饋
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