Educators often employ various training techniques to reduce raters’ subjectivity. Negotiation is a technique which can assist novice raters to co-construct a shared understanding of the writing assessment when rating collaboratively. There is little research, however, on rating behaviors of novice raters while employing negotiation techniques and the effect of negotiation on their understandin...

This study aimed to investigate the impact of task sequencing, along +/- reasoning demands dimension, on writing task performance in terms of accuracy.  The study was motivated by Robinson’s Cognition Hypothesis (CH) as well as previous studies investigating the relationships between task complexity and second language production. The participants of the study were 90 intermediate students at t...

In an effort to expand the disciplinary discussions on transfer in L2 writing and because most studies have focused on transfer as reuse and not as an adequate adaptation of writing knowledge in new contexts, the present study as the first of its kind aimed to explore the issue of adaptive transfer in an English for General Academic Purposes (EGAP) writing course. The study thus focused on type...

Ismail Ibrahim Elshirbini Abdel-Fattah El-Ashri Al-Azhar, Egypt Abstract The purpose of the present study was to investigate the effect of the Post-Process Writing Approach on developing the required writing skills in English for first year secondary institutes in Al-Azhar. Reviewing teaching writing books, literature and related studies, the researcher came up with the most suitable writing sk...

this study explored the effects of 2 different types of strategies—translatedwriting vs. reading to write—in the writings of some of iranian efl learners inesfahan payamenoor university. the results showed no significant differences inthe students’ writings (in the 2 experimental groups and 1 control group) for thepretest topic. with respect to the posttest, the results, however, indicated that...

How do teachers define failure when learning to write? We don’t ask the question often enough. In this article, I attempt to offer a definition and critique of the nature and production of failure in writing classrooms and programs. I argue that the production of failure in writing assessments can create more purposeful consequences, particularly for those historically most likely to suffer “fa...

There are many challenges involved in developing and running Writing Centres in tertiary contexts in South Africa. These challenges include recognizing the role Writing Centres need to play in the redress of basic academic literacies. They also involve emphasizing writing as a mode of learning where higher cognitive functions such as analysis and synthesis are developed through verbal and writt...

The course syllabus alludes to a grading rubric for final submissions, comprising a diverse set of writing standards for good writing in physics (well, for good writing defined as such for the course Physics 480W), including, for example, the rules for acceptable formatting established by the American Institute of Physics (AIP), as set forth in the AIP Manual of Style. These categories are elab...

This article is a follow up to an earlier publication that developed the rationale for using conversation as a metaphor to teach research writing. We presented this proposed teaching approach at several conferences, including WILU in May 2005 at Guelph, Canada. The discussions with participants in these presentations validated the tenets of the conversational metaphor for research writing. Here...

A research synthesis was conducted to examine the relationship between a written emotional expression task and subsequent health. This writing task was found to lead to significantly improved health outcomes in healthy participants. Health was enhanced in 4 outcome types--reported physical health, psychological well-being, physiological functioning, and general functioning--but health behaviors...