Assessment for Improving ESL Learners’ Writing Skills among Undergraduate Students: A Case Study of Skyline University College | #journalsummary
Hi readers,
It’s kinda funny but
let me tell you… I said the last journal summary was the last assignment I did,
but it’s actually not LoL
Now, I present you another one but using a different
format.
Here we go…
Assessment for Improving ESL Learners’ Writing Skills among Undergraduate Students: A Case Study of Skyline University College
Mohsine Khazrouni
Source:
International Journal of English Language Teaching, Vol.7, No.1, February 2019
Published by
European Centre for Research Training and Development UK
A.
Summary of the
content
This
journal is discussed assessment activities to improve the writing skills of
learners by giving feedback on their written assignments. The research approach
used in the present study is the qualitative interpretive approach. The
research engaged the undergraduate students.
Effective
academic writing is essential for success in higher education. Writing skills
are one of the important skills that learners need to develop for their
academic success. They are required to write assignments, essays, reports, and
a thesis. Writing requires the ability to generate an idea, find appropriate
references, summarize and paraphrase, the right choice of vocabulary,
knowledge, spelling, and the ability to link ideas grammatically and
semantically. There are some reasons behind the student’s inability to write
effectively:
·
Many students
rarely read. When they are read, they develop their ability in spelling, grammatical
constructions, vocabulary, and have a good writing style.
·
Students do not
see any importance of the writing course.
·
The different
style between Arabic and English language gives complicated problems to the
students. Mona Baker (2011) summarizes some of the differences between Arabic
and English as follows:
1). English, compared to Arabic, generally prefers
to present information in relatively small chunks and to signal the
relationship between these chunks in unambiguous ways, using a wide variety of
conjunctions to mark semantic relations between clauses, sentences, and
paragraphs.
2). English relies on a highly developed punctuation
system to signal breaks and relations between chunks of information.
3). Arabic, unlike English, prefers to group
information into very large grammatical chunks. It is not unusual for Arabic
paragraphs to consist of one sentence. This is partly because punctuation and
paragraphing are relatively recent development in Arabic (Baker 2011).
The result of the data
questionnaire shows that grammar and vocabulary are the main difficulties
students face in writing. The students give some suggestions such as using
Information Technology in teaching, providing them with texts and materials
related to their specialization, creating interaction and fun atmosphere, and having
more class activities and worksheets that can improve their vocabulary and
grammar. It also shows that most students are not interested in reading.
The assessment was
useful as it shows the weaknesses of students. The researcher can now give
feedback to learners, plan activities, and use suitable teaching strategies
that can deal with those issues.
B.
Discussion
The journal is very
informative. It tells us about the struggle of undergraduate students in Arab
to write effectively. It has a clear explanation so I can understand the result
of the research. The writer presents the table result of the research and a list
of questions below the references. I think it inspires people to do a small
research about the students’ difficulties. It also tells us that assessment is
an important thing to do.
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