In this first book-length treatment of collaborative writing in second language (L2) classrooms, Neomy Storch provides a theoretical, pedagogical and empirical rationale for the use of collaborative writing activities in L2 classes, as well as some guidelines about how to best implement such activities in both face-to-face and online mode. The book discusses factors that may impact on the nature and outcomes of collaborative writing, and examines the beliefs about language learning that underpin learners' and teachers' attitudes towards pair and group work. The book critically reviews the available body of research on collaborative writing and identifies future research directions, thereby encouraging researchers to continue investigating collaborative writing activities.
Since the introduction of communicative language teaching, collaborative learning has played an important role in the second language (L2) classroom. Drawing from sociocultural theory, which states that human cognitive development is a socially situated activity mediated by language, studies in L2 pedagogy advocate the use of tasks that require learners to work together. Collaborative dialogue encourages language learning, and research shows that the solutions reached by students in this process are more often correct with a lasting influence on their language comprehension. This volume includes ten chapters that illustrate the benefits of collaborative dialogue in second foreign language classrooms. The volume considers key issues dealing with collaborative tasks and implications for language teaching.
While assessment and feedback tend to be treated separately in the L2 writing literature, this book brings together these two essential topics and examines how effective classroom assessment and feedback can provide a solid foundation for the successful teaching and learning of writing. Drawing upon current educational and L2 writing theories and research, the book is the first to address writing assessment and feedback in L2 primary and secondary classrooms, providing a comprehensive, up-to-date review of key issues, such as assessment for learning, assessment as learning, teacher feedback, peer feedback, portfolio assessment, and technology enhanced classroom writing assessment and feedback. The book concludes with a chapter on classroom assessment literacy for L2 writing teachers, outlines its critical components and underscores the importance of teachers undertaking continuing professional development to enhance their classroom assessment literacy. Written in an accessible style, the book provides a practical and valuable resource for L2 writing teachers to promote student writing, and for teacher educators to deliver effective classroom writing assessment and feedback training. Though the target audience is school teachers, L2 writing instructors in any context will benefit from the thorough and useful treatment of classroom assessment and feedback in the book.
Digital L2 Writing Literacies offers an up-to-date overview of digital writing in L2 contexts and illustrates how digital media have expanded the options for research and teaching language and writing in particular. Written by two of the leading educators and researchers in the field, this volume offers a comprehensive review of the literature along with cutting-edge theoretical perspectives on multilingual and multimodal composing for those conducting research and practical ideas for curriculum and instruction for those working with multilingual students in second language, foreign language, and heritage language classrooms. As an up-to-date review of research and practice, the book will also be of value to researchers and graduate students in areas of study involving writing, language teaching and learning, and digital media.The main chapters provide the necessary background of definitions, key research findings and descriptions of practices, along with detailed sample learning projects and ideas for reflection and discussion that those involved in L2 writing should find interesting and relevant. The authors begin with a wide-ranging review of digital tools and environments and how these are influencing communicative practices and written genres. They address how those tools and environments encourage interactive and collaborative writing in online environments, present innovative multimodal forms of composing such as digital storytelling, and provide new avenues and modes for expression of multilingual writer voice and identity. They further discuss how feedback, revision, and assessment practices for L2 writing must change to reflect the changing processes and products of digital composing. At the end of the book, the authors provide a model of theoretical and pedagogical factors that impact digital L2 writing and include a future-oriented discussion of L2 writing and digital practices in the 21st century, making for a stimulating set of implications and take-away messages to ponder.As the most comprehensive and current state-of-the-art treatment of its subject matter, Digital L2 Writing Literacies: Directions for Classroom Practice is simply the must-read book for all those with an interest in L2 digital writing and language teaching.
This volume encompasses the range of research questions on language-related problems that arise in language teaching, learning and assessment. The [150] chapters are written by experts in the field who each offer their insights into current and future directions of research, and who suggest several highly relevant research questions. Topics include, but are not limited to: language skills teaching, language skills assessment and testing, measurement, feedback, discourse analysis, pragmatics, semantics, language learning through technology, CALL, MALL, ESP, EAP, ERPP, TBLT, materials development, genre analysis, needs analysis, corpus, content-based language teaching, language teaching and learning strategies, individual differences, research methods, classroom research, form-focused instruction, age effects, literacy, proficiency, and teacher education and teacher development. The book serves as a reference and offers inspiration to researchers and students in language education. An important skill in reviewing the research literature is following a study’s “plan of attack.” Broadly, this means that before accepting and acting upon the findings, one considers a) the research question (Is it clear and focused? Measurable?), b) the subjects examined, the methods deployed, and the measures chosen (Do they fit the study’s goal and have the potential to yield useful results?), and c) the analysis of the data (Do the data lead to the discussion presented? Has the author reasonably interpreted results to reach the conclusion?). Mohebbi and Coombe’s book, Research Questions in Language Education and Applied Linguistics: A Reference Guide, helps budding researchers take the first step and develop a solid research question. As the field of language education evolves, we need continual research to improve our instructional and assessment practices and our understanding of the learners’ language learning processes. This book with its remarkable 150 topics and 10 times the number of potential research questions provides a wealth of ideas that will help early career researchers conduct studies that move our field forward and grow our knowledge base. Deborah J. Short, Ph.D., Director, Academic Language Research & Training, Past President, TESOL International Association (2021-22) As a teacher in graduate programs in TESOL I frequently come across the frustration of students at centering their research interests on a particular topic and developing research questions which are worth pursuing so as to make a contribution to the field. This frustration stems from the fact that our field is so vast and interrelated, that it is often impossible to properly address all that interests them. Hence, I wholeheartedly welcome this most relevant and innovative addition to the research literature in the field of TESOL and Applied Linguistics. Coombe and Mohebbi have created a real tour de force that stands to inform budding researchers in the field for many years to come. Additionally, the cutting-edge depiction of the field and all it has to offer will no doubt update the research agendas of many seasoned researchers around the world. The 150 chapters are organized in a most powerful, yet, deceptively simple way offering a positioning within the topic, suggesting questions that might direct inquiry and offering a basic set of bibliographic tools to start the reader in the path towards research. What is more, the nine sections in which the chapters are organized leave no area of the field unexplored. Dr. Gabriel Díaz Maggioli, Academic Advisor, Institute of Education, Universidad ORT del Uruguay, President, IATEFL
Bridges the gap between the fields of second language acquisition (SLA) and second and foreign language (L2) writing. This title intends to advance our understanding of written language learning by collecting theoretical meta-reflections and empirical studies that shed light on two crucial dimensions of the theory and research in the field
Best of the Journals in Rhetoric and Composition 2019 represents the result of a nationwide conversation—beginning with journal editors, but expanding to teachers, scholars and workers across the discipline of Rhetoric and Composition—to select essays that showcase the innovative and transformative work now being published in the field’s journals. Representing both print and digital journals, the essays featured here explore issues ranging from classroom practice to writing in global and digital contexts, from border rhetorics to social justice research. Together, the essays provide readers with a rich understanding of the present and future direction of the field. The anthology features work by the following authors and representing these journals: Amber Simpson and Kristi Girdharry | Elaine Richardson and Alice Ragland (Community Literacy Journal ) | Shari J. Stenberg (Rhetoric Society Quarterly) | David Riche (Literacy in Composition Studies) |Eileen Kogl Camfield, Lara Killick, and Ruth Lewis ( Journal of Teaching Writing) | Elizabeth G. Allan (Pedagogy) | Christina Saidy (WPA: Writing Program Administration) | Anthony Warnke and Kirsten Higgins (Teaching English in the Two-Year College) | Cati V. de los Ríos and Kate Seltzer (Research in the Teaching of English) | Romeo García (Writing Center Journal) | Wendy Pfrenger (Journal of Basic Writing) | Janine Butler (Rhetoric Review) | Pamela Takayoshi (College Composition and Communication) | Maria Novotny and John T. Gagnon (Reflections) | Kate Vieira (Writing on the Edge)
This book is the first to bring together a collection of recent empirical studies investigating languaging, an important construct first introduced by Swain in 2006 but which has since been deployed in a growing number of L2 studies. The contributing authors include both established and emerging authors from around the globe. They report on studies which elicited languaging in oral or written form, via a range of individual and group tasks, and from a diverse range of student populations. As such these studies extend the scope of extant research, illustrating different and novel approaches to research on languaging. The findings of these studies provide new insights into the language learning opportunities that languaging can afford language learners in different educational and linguistic contexts but also the factors that may impact on these opportunities. As such the book promises to be of relevance and interest to both researchers and language teachers.
The aim of this pioneering volume is to advance our understanding of written language learning in instructed SLA by offering a collection of empirical studies in which the contribution of diverse theoretical perspectives to our understanding of L2 writing development will be explored. As such, the book represents a further attempt to situate written language learning at the core of applied linguistics research, in general, and SLA research, in particular, hence attempting to redress the oral bias of theoretical and empirical work in these fields. It adds a further building block onto recent TESOL initiatives aimed at understanding "development" in second and foreign language learning. Continuity from one chapter to another is provided by adherence to a consistent chapter model. The volume will be of great interest to academics in the disciplines of second/foreign language acquisition (SLA) and second/foreign language (L2) writing.
