Computer-Supported Contrasting Models to Develop ESL Students' Writing Abilities

ABSTRACT

English as a Second Language (ESL) students tend to pay too much attention to lower-order problems at the expense of higher-level aspects of writing such as organizing ideas, which results in poor writing quality. Two studies explored ways of designing writing instruction to raise ESL students’ awareness about the higher-order tasks in the writing process beyond their dominant concerns with grammar. Study 1 found that instructional methods using writing models, the Contrasting Models (CM) approach and the Good Model Only approach (GO) were more effective in improving students’ revision skills than a traditional approach without models. The CM approach utilizes the comparison of a stronger with a weaker model, which triggers students’ further information processes of the concepts under study. The GO approach provides good examples of a certain kind. Study 2 was designed as an online self-study instruction using the CM approach and was compared its effectiveness with that of the GO approach. Evidently, the CM students outperformed GO students in identifying important writing features, using more cohesive devices, participating actively in online discussions, and exploring better learning strategies. An instructional framework is proposed to help students develop extensive knowledge and grow themselves as adaptive learners.