• Cross-Cultural Studies
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• v.20
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• pp.67-111
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• 2010

This paper examined the role of intermediate texts in the writing process in the context of an EFL composition class. From the tradition of teacher research, this study examined how the Korean college students in different proficiency groups created intermediate texts and used them while composing their own writing. The students produced various types of intermediate texts during the compositing process, which could serve as a basis of their writing. However, the patterns of using these intermediate texts differed widely across the proficiency groups. A writing cycle for the low proficiency group, or "surface reading-few intermediate texts-writing," indicates that less proficient students tended to engage in reading in separation of writing practices and thus produced few intermediate texts through their literacy practices. On the other hand, the students in the higher proficiency groups revealed the more integrated pattern (i.e., purpose reading/intermediate texts/writing), indicating that they often engaged in reading with specific writing purposes, practiced reading in connection to other writing practices, and elaborated written intermediate texts produced. This study argues that, to shift our student writers to a higher level category, we as teachers need to help them engage in reading and writing practices in the way they produce and use intermediate texts appropriate to their specific writing purposes.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.57 no.6
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• pp.977-998
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• 2011

The purpose of this study is to investigate prospective teachers' perceptions of the peer review comments readily available to them during the writing process in a teacher training class. Given these needs, we employ a qualitative method of inquiry giving voice to the learner's own view of peer feedback. The data we wish to consider is first-person narratives elicited from four EFL college students, who are prospective teachers of English. With regard to the EFL students' narrative considered here, all were attentive to the feedback they received. Moreover, the way in which these EFL writers talk about peer response activity reflects that they still welcome peer feedback because of the benefits to be accrued from it. Although this study, covering only four EFL students in total, can hardly be considered conclusive, we attempt to offer a synthesis of their stories. First of all, students indicate that they received responses from "authentic readers" (Mittan 1989, 209). We do note, consequently, that students gain a clear understanding of readers' needs by receiving feedback on what they did well and on what seems unclear. Perhaps the greater effect of peer feedback claimed by these students is that they take active roles in utilizing peer comments. Since they feel uncertain about the validity of their classmates' responses, students feel that they have autonomy over their own text and can make their own decisions on whether they should accept their peer comments or not. This contrasts with their treatment of teacher comments that they accept begrudgingly even if they disagree with them. Four EFL writers talked a lot, typically in a positive way, about peer response to their writing, yet they have expressed reservations about the extent to which they should put any credence in comments offered by their fellow students. Perhaps this is because their fellow students are still developing writers and EFL learners. In turn, they were sometimes reluctant to accept the peers' comments. Thus, in EFL contexts, L1 use can be suggested during peer feedback sessions. In particular, we have come to feel that L1 use enables both reviewers and receivers to have more productive peer review experiences. Additionally, we need to train students not "to see peer feedback as potentially bad advice" (Silva et al. 2003, 111). Teachers should focus on training students to utilize their peers' comments. Without such training, students will either ignore feedback or fail to use it constructively.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.127-152
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• 2006

For the past 20 years the process approach to writing has been popular in second language writing classrooms. However, there have been very few studies conducted in Korea with regard to the composing processes and the effects of proficiency on writers' usage. The present study attempts to begin to fill this gap. Three groups of college students with different writing proficiency participated in the study: the advanced group, the intermediate group, and the beginning group. The verbal protocol of their writing processes revealed that they approached writing tasks differently. While the advanced writers focused on generating texts and ideas and examined their writing at both global and local levels, the other two groups of students tended to focus on evaluating text at the local level and generated fewer ideas and less text. The findings from this study are then compared to those of some major studies of the composing process as conclusions are subsequently drawn about the specific needs of Korean college writers.

• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• no.4
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• pp.1-14
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• 1998

The present paper explores rationales for the process-oriented approach to teaching writing and their implications for EFL writing classes. The product-oriented traditional approach to writing has put too much emphasis on linguistic aspects of writing. It fails to see the enormous complexity of the act of composing. In the process-oriented paradigm, writing is regarded as a messy process leading to clarity and the writer discovers meaning instead of merely' finding an appropriate structure in which to package ideas already developed from the beginning. Based on the underlying assumptions, some suggestions are made for EFL writing classes. Firstly, practitioners should be aware that writing is a recursive activity in which the writer moves backward and forwards between drafting and revising, with stages of re-planning in between. Secondly, writing teachers should help the student writers build an awareness of themselves as a writer and encourage their sense of confidence in writing. Lastly, students should be encouraged to pay their attention to content revision at first, and delay editing changes until the last draft.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.56 no.6
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• pp.1255-1279
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• 2010

Much has already been learned about what goes on in the minds of second language writers as they compose, yet, oddly enough, until recently little in the L2 research literature has addressed writing and mental imagery together. However, images and imaging (visual thinking) play a crucial role in perception (the basis of mental imagery), in turn, affecting language, thinking, and writing. Many theorists of mental imagery also agree that more than just language accounts for how we think and that imagery is at least as crucial as language. All of these demands, to be sure, are compounded for EFL students, which is why I investigate EFL students' writing process, focusing on the use of mental imagery and its relationship to the writing. First I speculate upon some ways that imagery influences EFL students' composing processes and products. Next, I want to explore how and whether the images in a writer's mind can be shaped effectively into a linear piece of written English in one's writing. I studied two university undergraduate EFL students, L and J. They had fairly advanced levels of English proficiency and exhibited high level of writing ability, as measured by TOEFL iBT Test. Each student wrote two comparison and contrast essays: one written under specified time limitations and the other written without the pressure of time. In order to investigate whether the amount of time in itself causes differences within an individual in imagery ability, the students were placed under strict time constraints for Topic 1. But for Topic 2, they were encouraged to take as much time as necessary to complete this essay. Immediately after completing their essays, I conducted face-to-face retrospective interviews with students to prompt them for information about the role of imagery as they write. Both L and J have spent more time on their second (untimed) essays. Without time constraint, they produced longer texts on untimed essay (149 vs. 170; 186 vs 284 words). However, despite a relatively long period of time spent writing an essay, these students neither described their images nor detailed them in their essays. Although their mental imagery generated an explosion of ideas for their writings, most visual thinking must merely be a means toward an end-pictures that writers spent in purchasing the right words or ideas.