writingavalidandexpressiveformtoreflect本科学位论文

1、Writing: A Valid and Expressive Form to reflect【Abstract 】Asa main language skill like listening, speakingor reading,writingisavalidand expressiveform toreflect howwella studentofEnglish,especially a studentwho learns Englishas aforeig nIan guage(EFL), hasmastered thatIan guage This paperwillexplore

2、 the natureof writingas comparedwith theother threebasiclanguageskills,particularlyspeaking, discuss thepurpose ofteachi ng writinginthe EFL con text, and in troduce requireme nts of EFL writing for Chines e college stude nts.requirementsKey words writing;language ability; EFL writing1 Nature of wri

3、ting: compared with speakingIt iswidely recognizedthat thereare fourmain modesinwhich aIanguage is used Thefourmodes,gen erallyreferred toasthe fourbasic language skillsinlanguageteachi ng,are listening,speaking,readi ng and writing, passive or receptive productive skills.Of skillslistening areIt go

4、es without sayingies more on the activethem, reading andandspeaking and writing，thecalled theactive orthatthe dem on stration ofIan guageability re Iproductive skills like speakingand writinsincewrite. It does notmean, however, that speaking reflectsones Iang. As for the two active or productive ski

5、lls, speaking is of cours e primary to languagehuman beings speak before they learn toguage ability better than writing. In fact, many people, especially t eachers, think otherwise. We can understand why writing is at least an equally, if not more, valid and expressive means to display ones Ianguage

6、 ability of writing.by answering the question of what is the natureAs R. Neufeld said,ItWriting is thought tran stormed into a visual form. In other words, writ ing is a visualexpressi on of ideas. .Writ ing is the process of taking anidea from insideof ones head and putting itina code so that it ca

7、nbe shared with others (Neufeld:4).So, writing coversspeaking in thatit is more than speakingby pentosome one not present. In other words, then ature of writing istwo-fold:the expression of ideas by means of a writtencode that calls for more careful and more exact dem on strati on of the mastery of

8、vocabulary, grammar and even phonetic knowledge of the Ianguage in which one is writing.Another reason that to display ones hing other than purewriting is a more valid language abilityjs thatand more expressive form writing can reyon notIan guage itselfto express one，s meanings.Speahand, can takekin

9、g, on the otherexpressions, gestures and, most of all, tones for communication.advantage of the speakersfacialEmpirical facts also show the close relati on ship betwee n writing skill and Ian guage ability (Yang Huizhong & C. Weir: 148), and that is why many important tests adopt writing as a means

10、of judging learner s. Take CET for example. If the score for the writing part is 0, then a can didate will fail no matter how high his total score is. No such penalty exists for other parts like listening or reading.2. Purpose of teaching writing in the EFL contextConsiderable literature has been pr

11、oduced concerning the purpose of EF L writing. One of the most concise but comprehensive discussions is given by Jeremy Harmer in his book How to Teach English. According to Harmer, the reasonsfor teachi ngwriting to college students ofEnglish as a foreign Ianguage are not only that writing is a bas

12、ic Ianguage skill but also that writing can 1) reinforce acquired Iangua ge ability, 2) develop Ianguage ability further, 3) help to learn st yle, and finally 4) serve as an authentic means of communication. (H armer:79)Reinforcement of acquired Ianguage abilityHarmer puts Reinforcement of acquired

13、Ianguage ability first becaus e he believes that people can acquire their mother tongues in a purely oral / aural way, but students of a foreign Ianguage in collegetendthe seeinto rely more on the Ian guageMost collegethe languagewritte nwrittenformto have astudents saythat theydown by themselves as

14、sound command ofben efit more fromwell as by others. The visual dem on strati on of la nguage con structi on is in valuable forboth understanding how itall fits together andas an aid to committing the new language to write sentences using newmemory. Stude nts ofte n Ian guage shortly afterfindit use

15、ful totheyhave studiedit. (Harmer:79)Further language developmentIt seems, though Harmer himself cannot be for sure, that the actual process of writing (rather like theprocess of speaking) helps us to learn as we go along. The mental activity that we have to go through inorder to con structproper wr

16、itten textse ongoinglearning experience.For college studentsis all partof thof Englishas aforeign Ianguage, writingis an especially effective way ofeveloping their languageability since itis such an activefurther d(comparedwith reading, which is receptive) and direct (compared with multiple choice e

17、xercises, which are in direct) form of language practice.Lear ning stylequick atpickingupIan guagejustrgues that formostof thecollegeAlthough he admits itis possibleit may take a littlelonger.for a fewstudents tobe fairlyby looki ngand listening,Harmer astude ntsof a foreignIan guage,To be more exac

18、t and toshow greatereleganee in communication, they have to learn how to write.Writing as an authentic means of communicationOne of the most important reasons for teaching writing, in Harmers opinion, is that it is an authenticmeans of communication. College students of a foreign language need to kn

19、ow how to write letters,how to put written reportstogether, how toreply to advertisementsand, increasingly,how to write using electronicmedia in the foreign Ianguage thatthey are learning. They needto know some of writings special conventions (punctuation, paragraph construction, etc.) ju st as they

20、 need to knowWriting as a good source of feedback informationThe research of writingtest experts also helps us to understand thepurpose of EFL writing from a d if fere nt an gle. Fred Gen esee and Jo hn A. Upshur, i n their bookuageEducati on,and J. B.Heaton,in hisbook WritingEnglish Language Tests,

21、 allmention writingasa goodsourceof feedback information ofteachi ngand learningresultsTheteacher,forexample, can 1earnfrom students 1compositionshow wellthey havebeen progressingwiththeirstudy of theforeig nton gueby assigningthem writingtasks in or after class. Whether spelling, vocabulary, struct

22、ure, gramm ar, or even phonetics (since theClassroom-based Evaluationin Second Langcorrect choices of a or an beforea noun, and / - s/ or /-z/ suffixed to a verbdepend on the knowledge of speech sound), nearly every aspect of Ianguage ability can be checked through writing. By this almost all-aro un

23、d feedback inf or matio n from actual writing, both teachers and stude nts of a foreign Ian guage can get to learn how well teachi ng and lear ning have been going and what can be done accordingly in future instruction.To sum up, the purpose of teachi ng writing in the EFL context is n ot only forst

24、udents toreinforceandfurtherdevelop their languageability and learn how tocommunicate by means of writing,but alsofor teachersand students to use asa goodsource of feedback informati on for the improveme nt of teachi ng and lear ning.3. Requirements of EFL writing for Chinese studentsJust asknowing

25、the purposesof EFLwritingin structi onat collegeis essentialto the understandingofthe imports nee of EFL writingevaluation,learningthe presentEnglishwritingrequireme ntsfor collegestude ntsin China is alsocriticalto the improvementof writingin structi onand practice.Acco rd i ngto College EnglishCur

26、riculumRequirements (ForTrialImplementation),which was put intoeffectin Chinese collegesand universities in June 2004, the writing requirements for un dergraduate college English teachi ng are set at three levels:basic requirements, intermediate requirements and higher requirements. All non-English

27、majors, acco rding to their level of English upon entering college, are required to attain to one of the three levels of requirements after studyingand practicing English at school. The writing parts of the requirem ents are quoted as follows:For basic requirementsStudents should be able to complete

28、 writingtasks for general purposes, e.g., describing personal experiences,impressions, feelings, or events, and to undertake practical writing.They should be able to write within 30 minutes a short composition of 120 words on a general topic or an outline. The compositi on should be basically comple

29、te in content, appropriate in dicti on and cohere nt in discourse. Students are expected to be able to have a command of basic writing strategi es.For in termediate requireme ntscomposeEnglishabstractsof thesesin their specialization,andwrite shortEnglishpapers ontopics oftheirspecialty.Theyshouldbeable todescribechartsand graphs,andto completewithin30minutes a short compositionof160 words.Thecompositionshouldbebasically complete incontent,appropriateindiction andcohere ntindisStudents should be abletoexpress personalviews on generaltop