Process genre approach to L2 academic writing: An intervention study

Abstract

The paper presents the research study of academic writing of Czech university students in an English Language Teacher Education study program. The authors apply an interdisciplinary approach integrating the perspectives of linguistics and language pedagogy in the evaluation of the design of the Academic Writing course and its impact on the development of students’ academic writing skills. Adopting a process genre approach (Badger, White, 2000) to writing instruction as a key design principle, our study combines the genre analysis framework (Swales, 1990) and the intercultural rhetoric perspective (Connor, 2004) to design an innovated academic writing course for graduate students focusing on developing critical thinking skills and context-aware writing. The course, informed by an analysis of the academic writing needs of the students, aimed at familiarizing them with the rhetorical structure of academic texts with a focus on the genre of the Master’s thesis and at introducing them to the academic writing conventions in the area of soft sciences. Piloted in 2019, the course was implemented as a blended course, where the contact sessions were complemented by online support in VLE Moodle. Apart from analyses of written texts, classroom writing, and homework tasks, it also included discourse editing tasks and peerreviewing with peer-reviewer feedback and teacher feedback. We believe that our research findings will shed light on the potential of academic writing courses based on the process-genre approach to contribute to the enhancement of the quality of English academic texts by non-native academic writers, and specifically Czech graduate students.

Scripting success: a systematic literature review of the process genre approach for writing in Asian education

“…Reading & writing quarterly [7] The evaluation of a teaching intervention in Iranian EFL writing The Asia-Pacific education researcher [23] Teaching academic writing through a process-genre approach: A pedagogical exploration of an EAP program in China TESL-EJ [24] The effects of process genre-based writing and process writing approaches on Asian EFL pre-university students' writing performance Journal of language teaching and research [25] Need analysis of academic writing teaching model based on process-genre approach: What do they really need?…”

“…Figure 8 is shown below to show the frequency of dependent variables researched. PhD English academic writing skills; Feasibility of the approach for a doctoral EAP program [25] Asian EFL pre-university students' writing performance; Writing quality; Learners' engagement [26] Needs of university students and lecturers in writing instructions [27] Effectiveness of a writing course; Senior ELT students' writings in pen-and-paper (portfolio) work and online work [28] Master degree program's students' academic writing skills; Students' perceptions [29] Challenges faced by the lecturer of an academic writing course for pre-service EFL teachers [30] Writing competence in an English Teaching Program from the trainee English teachers/students' perspectives [31] Senior high students' writing skills of report text [32] Undergraduate students' EFL academic essay writing; Students' perceptions [33] College students/L2 learners' overall writing accuracy and errors [34] Vietnamese university EFL students' writing performance, self-efficacy and autonomy [35] University students' academic writing competence on HOTs, students' attitudes and expectations on their learning experience [36] University students' writing improvement [37] Primary school EFL teachers' incorporation of focus on writing program; Primary school students' writing performance; Factors facilitating change in the writing classroom; Challenges teachers face [38] Undergraduate students' individual writing performances; Levels of the cognitive load [39] College L2 students' perceived metacognitive strategy; Students extent of metacognitive strategies deployment…”

“…Instruments used [6] Students' narratives ; Researcher's reflective journals [7] Argumentative essays [23] Extended essays [24] Students' written tasks with peer-feedback and revisions (individual reflective commentary, group commentary, in-class report, simulated research proposal); Onsite researcher's observation notes; Interviews [25] Opinion essays [26] Qualitative questionnaires; Interviews [27] Portfolio work; Online work; Research journal; Structured interviews [28] Academic writing; Feedback questionnaire; Field notes [29] Reflective journal; Qualitative interviews [30] Writing tests; Focus group interviews [31] Report texts, Participant observation [32] Opinion essays; Unstructured interviews [33] Argumentative essays [34] Writing entry test; Writing exit test; Questionnaires of writing self-efficacy and autonomy [35] Writing test; HOTs test; Semi-structured interviews [36] Narrative essays; Argumentative essays [37] Interviews; Survey; Writing; Exam scores [38] Essays; Cognitive load rating questionnaire [39] Metacognitive strategy questionnaires; Think aloud protocols…”