Task response and text construction across L1 and L2 writing

This exploratory study, undertaken from a socio-cognitive perspective, aims to investigate the effects of intensive preparatory high school training in L1 and/or L2 essay writing for university entrance exams. The analysis focuses on the task response, organizational structure and discourse markers in L1 (Japanese) and L2 (English) essays written by first-year Japanese university students (N = 28). The results reveal that the L1 intensive training emphasized the importance of establishing clarity and demonstrating originality, for the sake of gaining the reader's approval, whereas the L2 training stressed the need to take a clear position on an issue and include a position statement at the beginning of an essay. Moreover, the interaction between intensive L1 and L2 training was found to reinforce the students' tendency to reflect on their writing structure, organizational patterns and process, and to foster the ability to control their writing by making decisions based on their meta-knowledge. In some cases, undergoing both kinds of training promoted a sense that writing in L1 and L2 is different, whereas in other cases, it led to a perception of L1 and L2 writing as being the same. The findings provide evidence for transferability of writing competence across languages

The Role of Academic Writing in Higher Education in Japan : Current Status and Future Perspectives

研究期間:平成11-12年度 ; 研究種目: 基盤研究C2 ; 課題番号:1168026

Factors relating to EFL writers' discourse level revision skills

This study investigated discourse level revising skills among three groups of Japanese EFL writers and the relationship between these skills and the two factors of English proficiency and writing experience. The three groups of university students (N = 53) differed in terms of their educational level and the amount of writing instruction they had received. Group 1, undergraduates with no writing instruction; Group 2, undergraduates with one year of English writing instruction; and Group 3, graduate students, were asked to revise English texts containing coherence problems at three discourse levels: intersentential, paragraph, and essay. The results showed that at the essay level, Group 2 outperformed Group 1, demonstrating revision skill close to that of Group 3, whereas Group 3 outperformed the other two groups overall, particularly at the intersentential level. While English proficiency and writing experience were both significantly related to revision performance, English proficiency was most strongly related to revision at the intersentential level. The results also imply that explicit instruction played an active role in students' essay level revisions and use of correction strategies

Transferability of Composing Competence across Languages : L1 to L2

研究期間:平成14-15年度 ; 研究種目:基盤研究C2 ; 課題番号:1458029

言語間におけるライティング能力の双向性に関する研究 : L2からL1へ

研究期間:平成16-18年度 ; 研究種目:基盤研究C ; 課題番号:1652034