scholarly journals Wiki-mediated Writing: design, media, writing strategies and feedback in online text production

2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvana Sofkova Hashemi

Bringing social media arenas, such as wikis, into the classroom invites teaching approaches that engage students in authentic, participatory and creative writing processes. This case study examines the online text production of primary school students in a wiki environment and how the key functionalities for commentary, discussion, logging skills of text and multimodal expression are utilized in practice to develop writing. Exploring the design of assignments and analysing the nature of final texts, writing strategies and feedback reveals an iterative process of writing dominated by strategies of expanding texts with new information and occasional surface editing. The students composed individual narratives on selected themes augmented by drawings, images, speaking avatars and video clips. Feedback was mainly provided by the teachers in the form of encouraging comments and corrective revisions directly in the students’ texts. Peer response was rare, in one project taking the form of discussion posts. Revising indicating increased language awareness was observed among second language learners. Overall, the study demonstrates a tension between instructional design, the affordances of the writing arena and the space for creativity when engaging students in advanced, participatory and reflective composing and revising of texts.

1990 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 147-170 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Karniol

ABSTRACTThis paper presents a case study of second-language acquisition of Hebrew via immersion in daycare between 1;10 and 3;0. A period of silence was followed by rapid onset of L2 production simultaneously with many references to language itself. Eight types of language awareness were identified, and of these, several types may be prerequisites for starting L2 production. The nature of L2 speech during the first stages of production suggests that to crack the sematic code of L2, the child relies on identifiable contingencies between utterances and subsequent behaviours by speakers and listeners. As a result there are many more imperatives and interrogatives in L2 than are evident in L1 speech, and these appear to be learned by rote in an unanalysed manner. The transition to complex constructions occurs via the juxtaposition of known but syntactically unanalysed chunks, and results in patterns of syntactic errors similar to those of adult second-language learners. Reliance on L1 as a fall-back strategy was also evident. Several implications of these data for cognitive development in general are discussed.


Languages ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 90
Author(s):  
Kim B. Kurz ◽  
Kellie Mullaney ◽  
Corrine Occhino

Constructed action is a cover term used in signed language linguistics to describe multi-functional constructions which encode perspective-taking and viewpoint. Within constructed action, viewpoint constructions serve to create discourse coherence by allowing signers to share perspectives and psychological states. Character, observer, and blended viewpoint constructions have been well documented in signed language literature in Deaf signers. However, little is known about hearing second language learners’ use of constructed action or about the acquisition and use of viewpoint constructions. We investigate the acquisition of viewpoint constructions in 11 college students acquiring American Sign Language (ASL) as a second language in a second modality (M2L2). Participants viewed video clips from the cartoon Canary Row and were asked to “retell the story as if you were telling it to a deaf friend”. We analyzed the signed narratives for time spent in character, observer, and blended viewpoints. Our results show that despite predictions of an overall increase in use of all types of viewpoint constructions, students varied in their time spent in observer and character viewpoints, while blended viewpoint was rarely observed. We frame our preliminary findings within the context of M2L2 learning, briefly discussing how gestural strategies used in multimodal speech-gesture constructions may influence learning trajectories.


1982 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Craig Chaudron

Subject-matter lessons taught to English as a second language learners in several school levels were transcribed and analyzed. Characteristics of the teachers' speech when elaborating vocabulary were isolated and described, with a view to determining which characteristics would be helpful and which harmful to the students' comprehension and acquisition of vocabulary. It is seen that a major problem for the student may lie in the teacher's overelab-oration of vocabulary meanings through increased redundancy; the non-native listener may find it difficult to decode the exact message, because he cannot discern whether the same information has been provided redundantly or whether new information has been supplied.


2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 25
Author(s):  
Safnil Arsyad

It is widely accepted that the use of learning materials which accommodates students� schemata is much more effective than the ones outside student�s present knowledge background. The objectives of this study are to describe the students� learning style distribution and their perception on local oriented and learning style-based English learning materials in Bengkulu Province. The respondents were senior high school students in Bengkulu Province. The results show that : 1) the English learning materials can present a well-designed English learning materials for senior high schools students; 2) the English learning materials with picture stories and visual and audio learning media help students learn English; 3) the learning materials have been designed very well according to the students; 4) as reported by the students the strengths of the English learning materials is that it provides new information on tourism places in Bengkulu Province for the students, 5) the learning materials (the text books and VCD/CD) could improve their motivation to learn English. It can be concluded that local oriented and learning style-based learning materials can be not only more effective but also preferred by the students.


2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 440-459
Author(s):  
Federico Gelsomini ◽  
Kamen Kanev ◽  
Reneta P. Barneva ◽  
Lisa Walters

Memorization is essential when new knowledge is based on association with existing knowledge. It is key in acquiring logographic languages, such as Chinese and Japanese. Such languages present challenges to students possessed of alphabet-based mother tongues. To meet these challenges, we discuss a technology-enhanced learning method to address the needs of second language learners and support the development of appropriate logographic skills. Our novel approach facilitates the memorization of pictograms through the augmented method of loci. We detail augmented method of loci, discuss its wide impact in a range of disciplines, and provide a case study of its application.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 733-760
Author(s):  
Carla Cristina Munhoz Xavier

ABSTRACT One of the major challenges when teaching second language learners is to maintain them motivated and eager to learn and work on the proposed activity. The literature showed that a combination of social constructivism and technology-integrated learning is crucial for achieving the goals set by modern educational objectives. However, in order to have a robust response from students, one should take into account the psychological aspect of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. This paper proposes a gamified activity in Portuguese L2 that aims to intensify the students’ motivation. Ten undergraduate students participated in this study. Their responses show that novel studies based on awards and gamification can boost the students’ motivation when learning Portuguese.


2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thi Minh Phuong Tran ◽  
Phuong Dzung Pho

The field of second language acquisition has grown enormously in the past decades. Many studies have been done on how learners acquire English as a second language; however, research on how visually impaired learners acquire English as a second or foreign language has been relatively scarce. It is even more difficult to find such studies in Vietnam. Based mainly on in-depth interviews with two visually impaired Vietnamese adults who have been successful in acquiring English, the present study seeks to answer two main questions: (1) How Vietnamese visually impaired learners acquire English as a second language; (2) What difficulties they have in learning English, and how they overcome their difficulties. The findings of the present study can contribute to the theory of second language acquisition and language teaching. The study can also provide strategies for practicing and learning a language not only for visually impaired learners but also for second language learners in general.


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