How does Explicit and Implicit Instruction of Formal Meta-discourse Markers Affect Learners’ Writing Skills?

Journal of Language and Translation

دوره 10، شماره 3، مهر 2020، صفحه 67-81   

نوع مقاله: Research Articles

شناسه دیجیتال (DOI): 10.30495/ttlt.2020.678755

نویسندگان

Mohammad Ebrahim Moghaddasi¹؛ Mohammad Bavali²؛ Fatemeh Behjat^{* 3}

¹PhD candidate in TEFL, Department of Foreign Languages, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran

²Assistant Professor, Department of Foreign Languages, Shiraz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shiraz, Iran

³Assistant Professor, Department of English Language, Abadeh Branch, Islamic Azad University, Abadeh, Iran

چکیده

Discourse markers improve both the quality and comprehension of a written text. This study aimed at investigating the effect of explicit and implicit instruction of formal meta-discourse markers on writ- ing skills. The quantitative data were collected from 90 upper-intermediate students at Shiraz Univer- sity Language Center. Two experimental groups went through an instruction, while the control group did not receive any instruction on formal meta-discourse markers. A pretest-posttest method of as- sessment was employed. After an eight-session treatment, a posttest was administered to compare the participants‟ performances. The results revealed that the instruction of formal meta-discourse markers had a positive effect on the learners‟ writing skills. Moreover, the results showed that learners who received explicit instruction of meta-discourse markers could perform better in writing than learners who received implicit instruction. The findings can have pedagogical implications for EFL educators and materials developers to enhance learners‟ writing skill. Furthermore, the findings provide impor- tant insight into the impact of teaching discourse markers and raising learners‟ awareness through ex- plicit instruction in order to make pupils produce more cohesive and coherent written texts. Besides, it sheds light on the effect of different types of instruction on learning metadiscourse markers and its application in writing skills.

کلیدواژه‌ها

Explicit instruction؛ Implicit instruction؛ Meta-discourse markers؛ Writing skill

مراجع

Blakemore, D. (2002). Relevance and linguis- tic meaning: The semantics and prag- matics of discourse markers. England: Cambridge university press.

Chow, T. V. F. (2007). The effects of the process-genre approach to writing in- struction on the expository essays of ESL students in a Malaysian second- ary school. Unpublished Ph.D. diss., Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia.

Crismore, A. (1989). Talking with readers: Meta-discourse as rhetorical act. New York: Peter Lang Pub Incorporated.

Crismore, A., Markkanen, R., & Steffensen, M. S. (1993). Meta-discourse in per- suasive writing: A study of texts writ- ten by American and Finnish universi- ty students. Written communica- tion, 10(1), 39-71.

Dastjerdi, V., & Shirzad, M. (2010). The Im- pact of Explicit Instruction of Meta- discourse Markers on EFL Learners' Writing Performance. Journal of Teaching Language Skills, 29(2), 155- 174.

De Graaff, R. (1997). Effects of Explicit In- struction on Second Language. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 19(2), 249-276.

DeKeyser, R. M. (1995). Learning second lan- guage grammar rules: An experiment with a miniature linguistic system. Studies in second language acquisi- tion, 17(3), 379-410.

DeKeyser, R. (2008). Implicit and explicit learning. The handbook of second lan- guage acquisition, 27, 313.

Dergisi, A. (2010). Discourse markers in Eng- lish writing. The Journal of Interna- tional Social Research, 3, 299-305.

Ellis, N. C. (2002). Frequency effects in lan- guage processing: A review with im- plications for theories of implicit and explicit language acquisition. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 24(2), 143-188.

Eslami, R. Z., & Eslami, R. A. (2007). Dis- course markers in academic lectures. Asian EFL Journal, 9(1), 22-38.

Frodesen, J. (2001). Grammar in writing.

Teaching English as a Second or For-

eign Language, 3, 233-248.
Fung, L., & Carter, R. (2007). Discourse markers and spoken English: Native and learner use in pedagogic settings.

Applied linguistics, 28(3), 410-439. Henry, F., & Tator, C. (2002). Discourses of domination: Racial bias in the Cana- dian English-language press.Toronto:

University of Toronto Press.
Hinkel, E. (2001). Matters of cohesion in L2 academic texts. Applied language

learning, 12(2), 111-132.
Hyland, K. (1998). Persuasion and context:

The pragmatics of academic meta- discourse. Journal of pragmatics, 30(4), 437-455.

Hyland, K. (2004). Disciplinary interactions: Meta-discourse in L2 postgraduate writing. Journal of Second Language Writing, 13(2), 133-151.

Hyland, K. (2005). Representing readers in writing: Student and expert practices. Linguistics and Education, 16(4), 363- 377.

Innajih, A. (2007). The impact of textual cohe- sive conjunctions on the reading com- prehension of 4th-year English major students in Libyan universities, Publi- shedDoctoral dissertation, Newcastle University.

Jalilifar, A., & Alipour, M. (2007). How expli- cit instruction makes a difference: Me- ta-discourse markers and EFL learn- ers' reading comprehension skill. Journal of College Reading and Learning, 38(1), 35-52.

Jeon, E. H. & Kaya, T. (2006). Effects of L2 instruction on interlanguage pragmatic development. In J. M. Norris (Ed.), Synthesizing Research on Language Learning and Teaching (pp. 165- 211). Philadelphia, PA, USA: John Benjamins Publishing Company.