Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a
Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
Abstract
Teaching writing as a process has been the dominant approach used in
Libya. Investigating the impact of feedback on students’ sentence-level
grammar in their composition has been the focus of this research. Results
show that the teachers’ feedback is an important way to address the need of
L2 writers to increase vocabulary and learn the syntax of the language they
learn.
Introduction
No doubt that writing skill considered to be one of the most difficult
skills to learn for EFL students. With its complexity, writing process can
demotivate students, and may lead to frustration. As a result, it is necessary
for teachers to provide a supportive environment and to be passionate and
patient about the process. In the Arab world, particularly in Libya; process
approach has been and still is widely used by most lectures where the focus
tends to be more on activities to promote the language use rather than
helping students with their word usage and sentence structure in their
writing. A certain number of Libyanlecturers in the faculty of educationTripoliuse feedback process with their students just to improve the piece of
work by providing them with the accurate vocabulary and punctuation.
Those lecturesunfortunately may not value the importance of feedback or
may not know the main objective of reformulationprocess which is to
promote learning by providing students contextual opportunities to repeat
the correct use of the language in terms of selecting the suitable
vocabularies and correct grammatical structures. This researchis to
investigate the importance of feedback process on students writing. This
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
research was conducted after the researcher started teaching writing skills
and noticed the feedback process was not given the attention by most of
lectures in the faculty of education. This was known after informal
meetings with some lectures in the faculty of education to know the
methods used and the level of students. A quick review of the literature was
conducted to understand how feedback could be more important to improve
the level of students’ writing. During my literature review, I found an
article by Sharon Myers (1997) who discussed sentence level grammar and
investigated the writing process and sentence –level syntax on ESL
students. Myers’ research was a main guide to do this research. Therefore,
this research will describethe procedures for using reformulation as a
composition feedback to improve sentence-level grammar of students of the
English Language Department. The results of survey responses of two
groups of first-semester students in the faculty of education, Tripoli
University are presented. This research has been accepted and presented in
IETEFL(International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign
Language)conference in the UK in April 2014 but it has not been published
yet.
Process, Product Approaches
In the faculty of education; most teachers use process approach in their
teaching. This reflects the normal trend in moving away from the older
traditional method that focuses on correctness. In process approach,
teachers have to incorporate invention techniques, as pre-writing exercises
to address a common problem in second language writing courses as to
activate any previous knowledge students haveabout the topic ‘schemata
knowledge’. A major problem for L2 learners in writing is ‘what to say’
that may lead them to produce boring texts, and hence, generating any
previous knowledge on certain topics is a technique teachers use to get
62
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
understandable texts according to their demand. With process approach,
teachers ask their students to write assignments in freewriting and personal
narration organized with the demands of error correction or formal register;
this may lead students to produce richer texts close to their voices but still
did not enable them to producea well-structured academic piece of writing
that their teachers expected to get(Horowitz, 1986). In the Faculty of
Education, before being involved in writing, students are introduced to a
topic to be discussed to help them discover all aspects and ideas they might
need to write about.Peer feedback and discussion on students’ first draft are
techniques used in my classes. So rewriting and revision of students’ drafts
are very integral in their work. During this process, the researcher was
involved in an ongoing process of peer feedback and discussion. This
involvement and the implementation of such techniques (invention
techniques, drafting and revision) do lead to more thoughtful work by L2
writers.
Traditional Grammar Feedback
Being teachers, we all want our students to write and produce error-free
paragraphs and to develop the grammar rules at a subconscious level, but
how? Krashen (1984) argues that pointing out what went wrong in
students’ composition by proofreading symbols, feedback or underlining
would not correspond at all to the process of producing a flow of writing,
nor does this feedback seem to promote the “acquisition” of correct
grammar. The symbols (e.g., frag, agr, / )students get on their papers from
their teachers are sometimes unclear and hence, teachers should teach their
students all symbols they use in their feedback techniques and the meaning
behind each one. So, students should know how to interpret what those
symbols mean, and try to correct what they seem to point to. However,
such difficult procedures may lead students away from their text into ever
63
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
more abstract, unrelated operations. Giving corrections in a straightforward
manner as feedback for sentence level errors may not be effective, either.
Thus, Teachers should try to apply process approach not only in writing,
but also to the process of acquiring syntax and vocabulary. Basically
pointing to what is wrong in service level grammar, whether through other
aspects of the language “grammar, proofreading symbols, or underlining” is
not enough for students to acquire syntax and vocabulary, but may lead to
produce more effective writing. Gatbonton and Seglowitz (1988) have
argued that traditional teaching methods have failed to make correct
grammar because they have been aimed, not at particular utterances, but at
structures. Gatbonnton and Seglowitz (ibid) feel that repetition of
utterances would work better to produce correct spoken language; and this
may be probably true for writing as well. It is important to refer to students’
need for efficiency in language processing, including vocabulary retrieval.
This would lead us to argue that this need is not addressed in isolated work
focusing on grammar and vocabulary but rather that speed of language
processing only develops through extensive and repeated acts of language
processing in the service of writing (1994, p. 98).Looking at how repetition
works, and based on some of the researcher’s teaching experience
withuniversity students in the faculty of education- Tripoli University,the
researcher has started to apply some classroom procedures and a method of
marking composition ‘reformulation’ that was used by Myers (1997).
Reconstruction and Reformulation
Reconstruction refers to the native equivalent for a certain utterance of
L2 learner of the language with a certain meaning in a certain context. For
example; if a second language learner utterance was “Ali go to cinema”, the
reconstruction would be: “Ali went to the cinema”. Levenston (1987)
argues that it is not only the grammaticalness that should be taken into
64
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
account to improve the composition but also other rhetorical factors should
be considered to make the composition near native-like. Cohen (1989, p.4)
also explains that the formulator should “rewrite the paper so as to preserve
as many of the writers’ ideas as possible, while expressing them in his/her
own words so as to make the piece sound more native-like”.Clearly,
correcting every single mistake students commit in their writing
wouldbetime-consuming and not practical particularly with the huge
number of students in big classes such as the classes in the Faculty of
education.
The marking scheme has been adoptedfrom Mayer (1997) and it is very
simple. The rest of this research will be a description of this method and of
student response to its use throughout the first semester in Writing 1
required of allnew students.It is not the central focus of the writing class,
but it is incorporated to address L2 students' need for help with vocabulary,
word usage, and grammar. The sample of this research was 43 students
whose first language was Arabic.
Classroom Procedure and Writing Assignments
All students were in the English department. Those were specialized in
English in high school, and are interested in learning English. Those
students have to write and reflect on their weeklygiven topics and they need
to write in a unified coherent style. Their writing tasks were based on their
readings from their textbook (fundamentals of academic writing, by Linda
Butler). Stating the obvious, their reading and instructions were based on a
specific task studied in each unit and then asked to reflect on those specific
techniques studied in that specific unit in a class assignment. The writing
assignments were not structured beyond asking them to respond to those
readings in no more than 250 words. To avoid any difficultiesin
understanding the texts in the main text book, the researcher has to explain
those texts to avoid any burden students may face in understanding every
65
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
single word in the text. Furthermore, to save time,the researcher asked them
to work in pairs and to discuss what they have understood from the text.
And then, students will be given an assignment to write and reflect on their
own experience of the same topic or reflect on what they have understood
from reading the text. Usually they produce one response each week,
fulfilling the objectives of each unit. This procedure has been used in
Mayer’s (1997) study proved to be successful in terms of fulfilling the
objectives of such research.
Composition Marking
The main scheme of reformulation is to make a composition free from
errors in syntax. It offers the students the vocabulary they are looking for.
The vocabulary provided would be more contextually suitable in the flow
of the students' texts, bearing in mind the main idea of writing should not
be affected by the new vocabularies provided by the researcher. The
markings below are adopted from Mayer (1997) and used to correct the
original text. The markings are simple and can be learnedby students
immediately and they have been given to every student on a piece of paper:
correction code
^
(
)
>
?
|
Meaning
"add"
"omit"
(put in)
(take out)
"indent" (go in 5 spaces to the right)
"mystery" (I can't interpretthis. Rewrite
or leave out)
"separate" (leave a space between these
items)
SP
“spelling mistake”
WO
Wrong word order
66
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
A
Article error
WP
Wrong Punctuation
X
Word not Necessary
WT
Wrong Tense
Note: The last three symbols are added to the original; Mayer 1997.
The feedback given is not just the symbols written on any error the
students have in their writing. In addition to that, expressing an alternative
for that word, punctuation or even a sentence is provided. For example, if
there is a letter, word, or phrase enclosed within the parentheses, it means
the student must take out what is wrong and put in what is providedin the
parentheses. Sometimes circling some words and drawing an arrow from it
to another location in the text, to be changed completely.
In this way, the text is corrected. It is not corrected by an underline,
which simply draws attention to "wrongness," or by a symbol naming the
error. It is, rather, simply corrected by supplying the right word or material.
Once the text has been marked, I ask the students to rewrite the text in their
notebook as a clean copy in which all corrections have been incorporated.
All students must bring the corrections as the researcher has made it clear
that the final assessment (mark) would be on the final version. Students,
sometimes, are allowed to take their work home and given at least two days
to bring the final assignment back. This means that students have enough
time to think about this individual feedback and try to incorporate the
correction and to keep their intended meaning in their writing. Those clean
copies must follow the standard format of writing paragraphs. After the
corrected papers are handed in, students are grouped in pairs and given
their papers to peer editing. After 15 minutes and after the papers have been
67
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
discussed in pairs, the whole class inters a group discussion. And therefore,
everyone has something to say even if he or she hasn't commented on every
paper. During 15 minutes of discussion, students are very interested to read
each other's work and to look at the quality as well as the meaning of each
other’s work. Consequently, students would have more chance to discuss
and learn about writing from the feedback they got on their assignments.
Data Analysis and Discussion
All feedback on students work is done by hand and given back to
students and asked whether to rewrite it in the class or take it home and
bring it back next meeting. The attached pieces are an example of the
students work and this has been computerized just for the sake of
publishing.
Example of one student’s original paragraph:
.Friend.
“I have a best friend, she is like tall and graceful, she have a strong
personality Ex: she didn’t like feeling by the something is name
(“gloomy”) because she want to be optimistic girl to much in her life study
and she is in her relation ship, Because she have a sweet feeling and she’s
lovely , even if she was so sad from inside she make herself feeling like
fineor ok , and she is social with the people if she know thim or not, and
she is organized in her like , she dont like the time spend the time in
nothing that is important note . in the conclusion she still right now my best
my friend.”
The corrected version:
My Friend Sara
“Sara is my best friend. She is tall and graceful. She has a strong
personality. She is always friendly and optimistic. She is very sweet and
lovely. She is very sociable with all people; she does not show her bad
68
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
feeling to other people. Sara likes her study, and she is very organized
person. She does not like spending her time doingnothing,she is always
busy in something useful. Finally, Sara is the best friend I have ever
known.”
In addition to the class assignments, students had one entry-per-week
into their journal on self-selected topics. Students were told that the journal
assignment would not be marked for grammar errors, but would only
receive the reader response. The journal assignment was meant to be
exploratory in nature, and to develop speed and fluency. Nevertheless, once
students began getting their reformulated compositions back, many of them
requested that their journal text be reformulated, too. It would have been far
too time-consuming to have done all the journals in addition to the other
texts even if it hadn't violated the purpose of the assignment, but their
interest showed that they valued the feedback. The coursethat they are
registered in includes some other modules like grammar, reading
comprehension that would work together to help them in their writing as
they may reflect on what they have been taught in their classes; new
grammar rules, and new vocabulary.
Overall, sentence-level accuracy in the response papers improved over
the semester (see the example above), though it varied considerably across
individuals. Comparison of paragraphs written at the end of the semester, in
which students had very little time to revise or edit, showed noticeable
improvement in the use of articles, verb tenses and punctuation for most of
the students. This has been supported by the quantitative data where the
results have clearly showed that most of the students think that this
technique has helped them “more than a little” or “very much” in the areas
mentioned above (see appendix one).
We should notice that this good change in their grammar and therefore
their writing could not be claimed to be as a direct result of the composition
69
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
feedback method. This noticeable change needs more careful investigation
to measure the effect of other environment factors (e.g., grammar and
reading comprehension subjects). But this, according to the qualitative data,
it is very clear that the bulk of the students very much liked the method and
felt that they were learning from it. In general, this method of feedback and
its use is not used by other teachers and even if it is used, they are quite
suspicious about itsbenefits. This would be because of the response
assignments, students are simply given the words they need; they don't
have to ‘work’ for them. But why not just give them the words? Why not
giving the words needed as soon as possible so that the writers can
incorporate them in their writing? The object of the reformulation feedback
is not to teach the students editing, which is another part of the course, but
to promote learning by providing students contextual opportunities to
repeat the correct use of structures through repeated tokens of written
expression. In fact, the repeated reformulations raised their awareness to
grammar and the ability to revise and edit their work. This is in agreement
with the observation of Gatbonton and Seglowitz (1988) that many
traditional teaching methods have not promoted the automatic use of
correct grammar because they have been aimed at abstract structures rather
than at particular utterances.
Conclusion
On the whole, students seem to focus less on grammar when they write,
but when they revise/edit their writing; their awareness become more
noticeable. Added to that, they became more conscious about the syntax
and vocabulary of the new language as a basic to their ability to write. The
feedback method used in this research is one way to address the need of our
students to increase vocabulary and learn the syntax of English as they
learn to write. Therefore, learning sentence-level syntax is as much a
70
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
process as writing is a process. In the faculty of Education, professors
should pay more attention to the feedback process and to the sentence-level
syntax and look to the writing process as a complete process; syntax,
vocabulary, ideas and organization.
References
Cohen, A. D. (1989). Reformulation: A technique for providing
advanced feedback in writing. Guidelines, 11 (2), 1-9.
Flower, L. S., and Hayes, J. R. (1981).A cognitive process theory of
writing. CCC, 32 , 365-387.
Horowitz, D. (1986) . What professors actually require: Academic tasks
for the ESL classroom. TESOL Quarterly, 20 , (3), 445-462.
Krashen,
S.
D.
(1984). Writing:
Research,
theory
and
applications .Language Teaching Methodology Series. Oxford: Pergamon
Press.
Levenston, E. A. (1978). Error analysis of free composition: The theory
and the practice. Indian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 4 , (1), 1-11.
Myers, S. (1997). Teaching Writing as a Process and Teaching
Sentence-Level Syntax: Reformulation as ESL Composition Feedback.
TESL-EJ 2 (4).
Rose, M. (1989). Lives on the boundary: The struggles and
achievements of America's underprepared . New York: Free Press.
Gatbonton, E. and Seglowitz, N. (1988). Creative automatization:
Principles
for
promoting
fluency
within
a
communicative
framework. TESOL Quarterly, 22 , (3), 473-492.
Dear Students,
During last semester you have written paragraphs and some journal
entries which were reformulated by your lecturer. (Reformulation refers to
the techniques of correcting your work by directly providing words,
spelling, punctuation, or by providing a phrase or sentence). These were
71
Teaching Sentence-level Syntax through Reformulation as a Composition feedback
Dr. Jalal Ali Belshekh
then returned to you and you were then asked to produce a clean copy of
your text (one which incorporated every correction) by the following class
period.
To gather information about this technique, it would be helpful if you
would respond to the following questions.
1-
This technique helped my grammar.
Not at all
2-
3-
More than a little
34 %
47.8 %
Very much
17.3%
This technique helped to improve my grammar.
Not at all
A little
More than a little
4.3 %
21.7 %
56.5 %
Very much
17.3 %
This technique helped me learn word usage.
Not at all
4-
A little
A little
More than a little
21.7 %
34.7 %
Very much
43.4 %
This technique helped my mechanics (spelling, punctuation,
formatting)
5-
Not at all
A little
More than a little
4.3 %
30.4 %
26 %
Very much
39 %
For learning to write in general, this technique was
Not
Slightly
Moderately useful
72
Very
‫م‬5102 ‫ سبتمبر‬، ‫ العدد الثاني عشر‬، ‫كلية اللغات‬
useful
useful
useful
39 %
6-
39.1 %
21.7 %
In general, I …………………….using this technique.
liked
disliked
Felt indifferent about
82.6 %
17.3 %
0%
73