scholarly journals English academic writing proficiency in higher education: Facilitating the transition from metalinguistic awareness to metalinguistic competence

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingunn Ofte
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Metalinguistic Awareness ◽  
Metacognitive Skills ◽  
Writing Proficiency ◽  
Academic Vocabulary ◽  
Initial Questionnaire ◽  
English Academic Writing ◽  
Further Development

Students entering higher education are expected to develop into proficient academic writers in the course of their studies. The article focuses on metalinguistic awareness in the development of English (L2) academic writing proficiency in higher education. It builds on an on-going study investigating the role of metacognitive skills in the development of L2 academic writing proficiency in higher education. It bases its findings on an initial questionnaire which aimed at clarifying the students’ understanding of “an academic text” and “academic writing” in English, and how well they perceived themselves to mastering L2 academic writing. The article sheds light on the extent to which metalinguistic awareness of L2 academic vocabulary and language is present in the students’ thoughts about L2 academic writing as expressed in their responses to the questionnaire, and discusses the findings and their implications for how to further facilitate students’ development of L2 academic writing proficiency. The analysis reveals that the students possess elements of metalinguistic awareness about L2 academic writing but that their awareness is limited, particularly in relation to practical use of academic vocabulary. The results also indicate that the students lack the metalinguistic competence necessary to put their awareness into practice. The study concludes that raising students’ metalinguistic awareness is necessary to facilitate their further development in L2 academic writing proficiency. It argues that metalinguistic conversations can be an important tool in this process, and emphasizes that greater focus on such conversations as facilitators of L2 academic writing proficiency is needed within L2 higher education.

scholarly journals Linguistic Markers and Stylistic Attributes of Hedging in English Academic Papers Written by Native and Non-Native Speakers of English

MANUSYA ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Amara Prasithrathsint
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
Linguistic Markers ◽  
Native Speakers Of English ◽  
English Academic Writing ◽  
The Impact

Hedging means mitigating words so as to lessen the impact of an utterance. It may cause uncertainty in language but is regarded as an important feature in English academic writing. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the style of academic writing in English with particular reference to the significant role of hedging and the linguistic features that mark it. The data was taken from academic articles in the humanities written by native speakers of English, Filipino speakers of English, and Thai speakers of English. It is hypothesized that speakers of English as a foreign language use fewer and different hedging devices than native speakers of English. The result of the analysis shows that the prominent linguistic markers of hedging are the auxiliaries may, might, could, the verbs suggest, appear, seem, and the adverbs perhaps and often. They are divided into three groups according to their stylistic attributes of hedging; namely, probability, indetermination, and approximation. The use of hedging found in the data confirms what Hyman (1994) says; i.e., that hedging allows writers to express their uncertainty about the truth of their statements. It is also found that English native speakers use hedges most frequently. The Filipino speakers of English are the second, and the Thai speakers of English use hedges the least frequency. This implies that hedging is likely to be related to the level of competence in English including knowledge of stylistic variation, and that it needs to be formally taught to those who speak English as a second or foreign language.

scholarly journals Avoiding plagiarism using Mendeley in Indonesian higher education setting

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 686
Author(s):  
Andi Anto Patak ◽  
Muhammad Tahir
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Sampling Technique ◽  
Scientific Work ◽  
Complex Problem ◽  
Scientific Writing ◽  
Academic Environment ◽  
Academic Honesty ◽  
Time Restriction

<span>People who plagiarize have a complex problem. Plagiarism could be by accident, by mistake, or on purpose. This research aims at exploring the reasons for plagiarizing and the significance of citing and referencing using Mendeley to avoid plagiarism. Four Indonesian Mendeley Advisors were interviewed online using convenient sampling technique. This study revealed that reasons for plagiarizing are time restriction, laziness, and busy. The significance of citing and referencing using Mendeley to avoid plagiarism are (1) confirm, justify, and claim the issue conveyed in scientific work; (2) highlight a particular idea; (3) criticize or approve the premise of others, and (4) build argument. Mendeley usage acquaintance for scientific writing is expected to be practical tools for avoiding plagiarism and promote academic honesty in the setting of higher education. However, the role of supervisor is crucial to provide useful feedback for their students’ writing to help students avoid plagiarism. Besides, university should create comfortable academic environment by providing free seminar and workshop on academic writing to educate students avoid plagiarism.</span>

scholarly journals Teaching Second Language Vocabulary: the Role and Application of the AWL

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 52
Author(s):  
Ge Yan
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Word Frequency ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Word List ◽  
Research Articles ◽  
Academic Vocabulary ◽  
Writing Assignments

This paper focuses on the role and application of AWL in science-related subjects, namely the issue of whether or not students in science-related majors is advantaged or disadvantaged in using the Academic Word List (AWL) in their academic writing assignments as the imbalance of word frequency in AWL. Participants (n=18) are obliged to answer the Questionnaire. Furthermore, if needed, a brief interview would be arranged on some uncertain questions. Results show that learning and acquiring academic vocabulary would benefit participants in research articles, while AWL is inadequate for students in science-related disciplines in their academic writing. We claim that students in science-related majors may be disadvantaged than other majors’ students in using Coxhead’s Academic Word List, and a wordlist screened out from science-related corpus perhaps more suitable for ESP students. Meanwhile, AWL, as a role of reference, would aid language learning or acquisition.

Who Needs Music at Worcester College of Higher Education?

1993 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-31
Author(s):  
Jenny Hughes
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Small Community ◽  
Local Media ◽  
Further Development

This paper will examine the wide variety of musical needs which manifest themselves in the relatively small community of Worcester College of Higher Education. The various ways in which these needs are met will be discussed. Contacts with groups and individuals outside College will be considered, as will the role of the local media in both providing information on College activities and acting as a stimulus for further development within College.

The role of genre in information structuring in English

2012 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 143-159
Author(s):  
Elma Kerz
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Traditional View ◽  
Specific Information ◽  
Subordinate Clauses ◽  
Research Article ◽  
Information Packaging ◽  
English Academic Writing

In a recent paper, Biber and Gray (2010) provide empirical evidence for the dramatic increase of compressed structures in English academic writing over the last 100 years. According to their corpus findings, the grammatical complexity of academic writing displays a phrasal rather than clausal character, the corollary of which is a compressed rather than elaborated discourse style (the latter one being typical of spoken registers). Given this finding, the question arises as to how far the traditional view that information structure should be viewed as a single partition of information within a given utterance adequately accounts for genre-specific information packaging strategies. To provide an answer to this question, the current study sets out to explore and compare information structuring within what will be referred to here as ‘compression strategies’, namely the use of adverbial subordinate clauses, -ING constructions, and complex NP constructions across two different genres: the highly compressed genre of research article abstracts, and fiction. The findings reported here suggest that in more compressed discourse styles such as academic writing, there is a higher probability of encountering information structure partition not only at the clausal but also at the phrasal level. The present paper highlights the importance of genre variation as one predictor of variation in information structuring within constructions.

scholarly journals Game facilitators in higher education: Analysis of current competencies and their potential optimization (Preprint)

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jannicke Baalsrud Hauge ◽  
Heinrich Söbke ◽  
Thomas Bröker ◽  
Theodore Lim ◽  
Angelo Marco Luccini ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Serious Games ◽  
Online Questionnaire ◽  
Specific Instruction ◽  
Powerful Learning ◽  
Competency Models ◽  
Training Courses ◽  
Further Development

UNSTRUCTURED Serious games are often said to be a powerful learning tool in higher education. The games used are often facilitated, and literature indicates that the success of the players’ learning outcomes depends on the facilitators’ competencies. Facilitators in most commercially offered game-based training have undergone specific instruction, but for facilitators in higher education, this is hardly documented. We therefore assume, that the latter is not the case. This article presents a study addressing the actual competencies of occasional game facilitators and their possible perceived competency deficits. As the authors have many years of experience as facilitators themselves, the authors defined requirements for the role of the occasional game facilitator. Based on these results, guided interviews with additional occasional game facilitators were conducted (N=4). Thereafter, an online questionnaire based on existing competency models, was answered by occasional game facilitators (N=30). The measurements primarily determine (i) Which competencies are particularly needed by the facilitator and what are training needs for the facilitator? (ii) What do current training courses for occasional game facilitators in higher education look like? (iii) How do the competencies of occasional game facilitators differ from other competencies? The results contribute to the further development of a competency model for game facilitators and consequently to the enhancement of serious games' efficiency.

scholarly journals Examining the Application of Grammatical Metaphors in Academic Writing

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Ying Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Students ◽  
Writing Instruction ◽  
Academic Writing ◽  
Efl Learners ◽  
Lexical Density ◽  
Academic Register ◽  
Text Cohesion ◽  
English Academic Writing ◽  
Writing Competence

English academic writing is a challenging task for Chinese EFL learners. For graduate students, they need systematic and explicit guidance to improve their academic writing competence. Grammatical metaphors are important resources for constructing academic discourse, and nominalization in ideational metaphors is regarded as the most powerful tool for achieving formality, objectivity, lexical density and text cohesion typical of academic papers. This article focuses on the role of grammatical metaphors in the production of quality academic written texts. It analyzes the function of grammatical metaphors in academic register and the application of these grammatical metaphors in creating academic meanings. The paper also provides some pedagogical implications for academic writing instruction for advanced EFL learners.

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