The Effect of Explicit Instruction in Expository Text Structure on the Writing Performance of Arab EFL University Students Mosheer Amer Department of English, Faculty of Arts The Islamic University of Gaza Abstract This action... more
The Effect of Explicit Instruction in Expository Text Structure on the Writing Performance of Arab EFL University Students
Mosheer Amer Department of English, Faculty of Arts The Islamic University of Gaza
Abstract This action research study investigates the relationship between explicit instruction in the organizational patterns of comparison/contrast texts, regarded as a major type of expository English, and EFL writing performance. The study also examines whether students’ metacognitive and cognitive knowledge of the text structures of comparison/contrast texts improves their in-class writing performance. 22 Palestinian EFL university students enrolled in an academic writing course participated in the study. The study spanned over three weeks during which the subjects received nine hours of explicit instruction in the organizational structures of compare/contrast texts. Data gained from pre- and post-test mean scores point to a direct correlation between explicit instruction in text structure and improved writing performance. The interviews with student participants provided evidence that students felt more comfortable and confident about writing when they are explicitly taught the organizational structures of expository texts. The pedagogical implications of this study are of significant value to EFL writing teachers and curricula developers who should make explicit instruction in text structure an integral part of EFL writing courses. Key Words: text structure, comparison/contrast, explicit instruction, EFL Arab students, writing performance
The fact of learning different Languages beside our mother tongue has raised a possibility that the mother tongue may interfere with the language which we want to learn. Many students are committing mistakes due to languages... more
The fact of learning different Languages beside our mother tongue has raised a possibility that the mother tongue may interfere with the language which we want to learn. Many students are committing mistakes due to languages interference. In this paper we are going to talk about Arabic Language Interference in English in terms of “phrasal verbs and collocations”. Arab students who are learning ESL may make many mistakes in writing or speaking because of the influence of their mother tongue -Arabic- on English. One of those influences is phrasal verbs which case a huge source of difficulty for Arab students to learn English language; we are going for further details about it later on this paper. The other source of difficulty - as we are going to read later - is “Collocations” In this paper we are going to discuss these sources of difficulties in term of, their meanings, how they can be a source of a difficulty to our Arab students, some students’ mistakes analysis from the data we previously collected, how we can as future teachers teach such matters, and we suggested recommendations for the other teachers. The reason behind choosing these particular areas is; we conducted a research on foundation year students in RCOAS and find out that most mistakes they made are in these two areas (phrasal verbs, Collocations)
