scholarly journals Investigating Cohesion and Coherence Discourse Strategies of Chinese Students with Varied Lengths of Residence in Canada

2012 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krista Leo
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
First Language ◽  
Chinese Students ◽  
Discourse Markers ◽  
Generation 1.5 ◽  
First Year ◽  
Writing Proficiency ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Cohesive Devices ◽  
Discourse Strategies

This study examines how three age-on-arrival (AOA) groups of Chinese-background ESL students use two types of cohesive devices on a standardized essay exam. A discourse analysis of 90 first-year students’ expository writing samples was conducted to ascertain how factors such as first language (L1) and length of residence (LOR) in Canada influence a student’s ability to create cohesive and coherent writing. The study uses both quantitative and qualitative methods to explore how Canadian-born Chinese (CBC) students use lexical and referential discourse markers. Twelve essay features of this group of Generation 1.5 students are compared with those of two other cohorts of Chinese students with a shorter LOR. Key writing variables that measure academic writing proficiency were quantitatively analyzed to compare the expository writings of the CBC cohort with those of the later AOAs. Results indicate that synonymy and content words distinguish the writings of the CBC students from those of their later-arriving peers. A qualitative analysis of one CBC essay reveals that a more flexible and contextualized approach to evaluating writing by longterm Generation 1.5 students is required to acknowledge fully the productive lexical and discoursal strengths of these students.

scholarly journals Error Analysis of Students Essays: A Case of First Year Students of the University of Health and Allied Sciences

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 54
Author(s):  
Benjamin Amoakohene
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Error Analysis ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Communicative Skills ◽  
Daunting Task ◽  
Integral Role ◽  
The University

Writing is considered as a daunting task in second language learning. It is argued by most scholars that this challenge is not only limited to second language speakers of English but even to those who speak English as their first language. Thus, the ability to communicate effectively in English by both native and non-native speakers requires intensive and specialized instruction. Due to the integral role that writing plays in students’ academic life, academic literacy has garnered considerable attention in several English-medium universities in which Ghanaian universities are no exception. It is therefore surprising that prominence is not given to Academic Writing and Communicative Skills at the University of Health and Allied Sciences (UHAS). In this paper, I argue for much time and space to be given to Academic Writing and Communicative Skills, a programme that seeks to train students to acquire the needed skills and competence in English for their academic and professional development. This argument is based on the findings that came out after I explored the errors in a corpus of 50 essays written by first year students of  UHAS. The findings revealed that after going through the Communicative Skills programme for two semesters, students still have serious challenges of writing error-free texts. Out of the 50 scripts that were analyzed, 1,050 errors were detected. The study further revealed that 584 (55.6%) of these errors were related to grammatical errors, 442 (42.1%) were mechanical errors and 24 (2.3%) of the errors detected were linked to the poor structuring of  sentences. Based on these findings, recommendations and implications which are significant to educators, policy makers and curriculum developers are provided. This study has implications for pedagogy and further research in error analysis. 

scholarly journals The Prevalence and Frequency of Authorial Identity among Undergraduate Students in Fiji

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (6) ◽  
pp. 136
Author(s):  
Jasbir Karneil Singh ◽  
Ben K. Daniel
Keyword(s):  
Academic Success ◽  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
First Year ◽  
Esl Students ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Student Writers ◽  
Authorial Identity ◽  
National University ◽  
Authorial Voice

Expressing an authoritative voice is an essential part of academic writing at university. However, the performance of the authorial self in writing is complex yet fundamental to academic success as a large part of academic assessment involves writing to the academy. More specifically, the performance of the authorial self can be complex for English as a Second Language (ESL) student-writers. This research investigated the extent to which ESL first-year students at the Fiji National University perform their authorial voice using interactional metadiscourse in their academic writing. The study employed a quantitative analysis of corpus produced by 16 Fijian ESL undergraduate students enrolled in an EAP course. The research found that the ESL authorial voice was predominantly expressed through boosters and attitude markers, with relatively little usage of other interactional metadiscoursal elements such as hedges, engagement markers and self-mentions. Further, the research showed that this particular cohort expressed their authorial voice and identity through boosted arguments and avoiding language that directly mentions the authorial self. The study concludes that the ESL authorial self for this cohort manifests itself in a selected range of selected interactional metadiscoursal elements, requiring the need to raise the awareness of self-reflective expressions for ESL students. The study also encourages further exploration of ESL authorial identity construction in academic writing at undergraduate level and beyond.

scholarly journals The Adaptive Capabilities of Chinese Students Studying In Chinese, British and Russian Universities

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Nina V. Bordovskaia ◽  
Charles Anderson ◽  
Natalia Bochkina ◽  
Elena I. Petanova
Keyword(s):  
Chinese Students ◽  
Self Control ◽  
University Education ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Adaptive Capabilities ◽  
Communicative Success ◽  
Group 2 ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Russian Universities

This article presents a comparative study of the personal adaptive capabilities of Chinese students studying in Chinese, British and Russian universities. The study involved 224 Chinese first-year students who formed 3 groups: Group 1, 96 first-year students studying in China; Group 2, 100 Chinese first-year students studying in Russia; Group 3, 28 Chinese first-year students studying in the UK. The instruments employed were: a Personality questionnaire (adapted Rogers-Dymond method), the Big Five and the Method of studying the Research Potential of students (Bordovskaia et al., 2017). The study found that for all Chinese students, the general predictors of adaptation to university education are "openness" and "agreeableness". The differences are that the personal resources for the adaptation of Chinese students in Chinese and Russian universities are "research potential", in the British university "neuroticism", "extraversion" and "conscientiousness (self-control)”. The findings point up the conditions for ensuring the future academic, social and communicative success of Chinese students in the educational environments of British, Russian and Chinese universities, and allow one to predict the reasons for the difficulties faced by individual students.

Voices from the margins: narratives of learning development in a Digital Age

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Abegglen ◽  
Tom Burns ◽  
Sandra Sinfield
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Exclusionary Practices ◽  
The People ◽  
Second Year ◽  
Learning Development ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Writing Practice

This paper explores how to facilitate the ‘bedding in’ and ‘becoming of’ undergraduate students who come from non-traditional backgrounds and struggle with what is, for them, the often alien world of academic writing and assessment.  To achieve their aims, the authors set up a partnership between the students of a second-year Peer Mentoring module and those of a first-year Becoming an Educationalist one.  By means of this creative partnering, and via reflective blog entries, they worked to harness quasi-academic writing to help such first-year students to become familiar with, and powerful within, the exclusionary practices (in particular, the written conventions of academic essays) of Higher Education.  They argue that this innovative ‘teaming-up’ of second- and first-year students not only models collaborative learning and writing practice, but also facilitates the ‘bedding-in’ of newcomers.  The paper itself models the partnership and creative writing methods used to help students find their ‘voice’ by being ‘co-produced’ by the people teaching across the two modules concerned.

An Empirical Contribution to the Identification of Second Language Skills

1979 ◽  
Vol 9 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 9-15
Author(s):  
J.C. Chamberlain
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Skills ◽  
First Language ◽  
Language Ability ◽  
Department Of Education ◽  
First Year ◽  
Language Abilities ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Training Schools ◽  
The Common

Two mutually exclusive hypotheses about the nature of second language skills are investigated. Hypothesis 1 (H1) states that second language skill is separable into components related to linguistically defined categories. Hypothesis 2 (H2) is that second language ability is mainly a unitary factor so that once the common variance on a variety of language tasks is explained, essentially no meaningful unique variance attributable to separate components will remain. Previous studies suggest greater support for H2. However, studies of first language abilities favour H1. Data from 547 first-year students at teacher training schools of the Department of Education and Training do not give unambiguous support to either hypothesis. The results suggest that the differentiation of second language ability into separately identifiable skills is related to the level of proficiency attained. The higher level of proficiency results in greater differentiation of separate language skills. Results are regarded as suggestive of further research, but in no way definitive.

scholarly journals THE SUBJECT “UNIVERSITY EDUCATION AND ACADEMIC WRITING” IN THE PROCESS OF TRAINING FUTURE TEACHERS OF THE EDUCATIONAL FIELD “ART”

2020 ◽  
pp. 96-107
Author(s):  
N. Sulaieva ◽  
V. Irkliienko
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
Educational Institution ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
University Education ◽  
First Year ◽  
Future Teachers ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Educational Field

The paper substantiates the expediency of introducing the subject “University Education and Academic Writing” into the process of training future teachers of the educational field “Art”. The purpose, objectives of the course, and the results of educational activities are covered. Attention is focused on the first module of the subject “University Education” and its particular topics. It is emphasized that the first-year students of the higher pedagogical educational institutions consider the current problems of university education of the past and the present of Ukraine and other countries in the process of mastering this module. The importance of acquainting freshmen with the legal framework of Ukraine is emphasized, taking into account the peculiarities of the higher educational institution chosen by them for education. Attention is paid to the expediency of first-year students mastering the history of formation and development of the university (faculty), acquaintance with prominent figures associated with the educational institution in which they study. It is highlighted that it is important for a student to be self-aware as a full-fledged subject of the educational process, which has certain rights and responsibilities. Emphasis is placed on the need to acquaint the student with the regulations governing the process of obtaining educational services by the future teacher of the educational field "Art", in particular with the educational and professional program with the defined structural components; curriculum, the student work, and individual plan; work programs, syllabuses, subject descriptions, programs of practices in which the purpose is presented, the general and professional competences are formulated, expected results of training.It is emphasized that as a result of mastering the first module of the subject "University Education and Academic Writing", a first-year student will create a strong foundation for quality training in a particular institution of higher education.

Exploring Instances of Deleuzian Rhizomatic Patterns in Students’ Writing and in Online Student Interactions

2021 ◽  
Vol 20 (10) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Tlatso Nkhobo ◽  
Chaka Chaka
Keyword(s):  
Academic Writing ◽  
Linear Models ◽  
First Year ◽  
Student Interactions ◽  
Convenience Sample ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Online Student ◽  
Software Applications ◽  
Writing Models ◽  
E Learning

Globally, it is a standard practice to study students’ academic writing by using linear academic-writing models. This study investigated instances of Deleuzian rhizomatic patterns in students’ writing and in online student interactions at an open and distance e-learning (ODeL) institution in South Africa. A convenience sample of 13 students’ paragraph writing samples and of 370 first-year students was used. All the participants were enrolled in a level-one module, ENG1503, in the second semester of 2020. The study followed a mixed-method approach, and utilized AntConc and AntMover to analyse the students’ writing samples, as well as Microsoft Power Business Intelligence (MS Power BI) and Gephi, in order to analyse and visualise online student interactions. When students’ writing samples were analysed in terms of keywords (e.g., key themes) by using the software applications employed in this study, various rhizomatic patterns were detected in the students’ text files. For example, the key-word frequencies of key themes, such as religion and cult, showed that these two key themes were used differently at the end of each concordance spectrum, thereby underscoring their varying rhizomatic patterns of usage in students’ respective text files. Online student interactions on both myUnisa’s ODF and MS Teams were visualized rhizomatically. The findings of this study underscore the importance of investigating and analysing students’ writing – not only from linear models, but also from non-linear perspectives, such as a rhizomatic approach. Additionally, they underline the significance of leveraging the opportunities offered by students’ writing analysis technologies, such as those employed in this study.

scholarly journals First-year students’ essay writing practices: Formative feedback and interim literacies

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emmanuel Esambe ◽  
Cina Mosito ◽  
Subethra Pather
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Health Science ◽  
Formative Feedback ◽  
First Year ◽  
Participatory Action ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Essay Writing ◽  
Writing Practices ◽  
Academic Transitions

The varying literacy standards that undergraduate students represent are a reflection of their interim grasp of academic literacy (Paxton 2007). The aim of this study is to analyse a small group of undergraduate first-year students’ depiction of their interim grasp of academic writing and to reflect on how lecturers use formative feedback to respond to specific issues regarding students’ academic transitions within their discipline. Using an emancipatory methodology, this study was designed as a participatory action research. Qualitative data from focus group interviews with lecturers and photovoice presentations by first-year dental technology students were used to explore how students demonstrated their interim grasp of academic essay writing in a Health Science department at a university of technology. However, this article, which is part of a broader study, analyses a small class of first-year students’ depiction of their interim grasp of essay writing and reflects on how their lecturers use formative feedback to respond to these students’ academic transitions within their discipline. Using activity theory and morphogenetic realist theory to analyse essay writing activities during an intervention, the study reveals that images are potent artefacts that students and lecturers use to build meaningful dialogue during essay writing in an uneven terrain.

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