部落格同儕互評對台灣高職生之英文寫作能力與學習態度之效益研究

Abstract

Blog是近年來新興的個人交流、知識管理、和網路發表意見的工具，且逐漸被應用於教育和語言學習上。本研究旨在探討應用Blog進行英文寫作結合同儕互評對於高職生英文寫作能力與寫作態度之影響。研究時間為5個月，參與對象為台中市某高職二年級的兩班學生。兩班分別為Blog寫作組(實驗組)和傳統紙筆寫作組(對照組)，共44位學生。Blog寫作組 ( 20人 )和傳統紙筆寫作組 ( 24人 )在20次作文課中在寫作前測和後測之間，寫了3篇英文作文。 Blog寫作組3篇文章皆發表在blog上， 同儕互評給予意見，加以修改後，再由老師給意見,做第二次修改後才由老師評分。而傳統紙筆寫作組則是每篇文章寫在紙上，老師給意見，加以修改後由老師評分。所有參與活動的學生在活動前後各撰寫一篇英文作文作為前後測。 為了更客觀的評量學生作文能力的進步情形，此研究用the grammar checker program (http://140.122.83.189:8080/wgrammar/default.asp)以及the Vocabprofiler (http://www.lextutor.ca/vp/eng/) 兩軟體來研究學生的句子平均長度全文長度、type-token ratio、及lexical density，以了解學生寫作內容和用字差異; 並且用前後測文中T-Unit數、每句T-Unit長度來比較兩組學生文法結構的複雜度進步情形。在寫作態度方面，作文前測時兩組同時填寫一份寫作態度量表；寫作文後測時，再填寫同樣的寫作態度量表。Blog寫作組則另外寫一份Blog評量問卷以了解實驗組對此活動的看法與建議。本研究採用單因子共變數分析 (ANCOVA) 及單一樣本T考驗 (One sample T-test) 探討蒐集的資料。

本研究之重要研究發現如下： 1.Blog 寫作互評組比起傳統紙筆寫作組在全文長度、Type-token ratio、lexical density及T-Units數上較有進步, 但並無顯著差異。 2.英文學習態度的問卷分析顯示，Blog寫作互評組的學生較傳統紙筆寫作組的學生對英文學習興趣較高，較能減輕焦慮，也更肯定寫作的有效性，但兩組學習態度統計結果皆無顯著差異。 3.Blog寫作互評組對於Blog寫作及Blog同儕評改持肯定態度。多數認為寫作結合Blog和同儕互評有益於英文寫作也認為創新有趣，不過仍有一些建議。 例如，獎勵制度和公開示範好的同儕互評意見及部落格，可以作為讓學生更用心的誘因。而更嚴謹設計的規範、 老師更多的介入、及更多上課時間用於訓練同儕互評寫作修改等等，都是不可或缺的。而且每小組只有2~3人對增加意見和回饋似乎略嫌少了些。

最後研究者根據研究結果，針對blog結合同儕寫作及英文寫作教學提供建議與看法。

ABSTRACT Blogs have been used as a convenient tool for personal interaction, knowledge management, and expression of online opinions with wide popularity in recent years, and they are increasingly being applied to education and language learning. The current study investigated the effectiveness of blog-integrated peer feedback revision on the writing performance and attitude of vocational high school students in Taiwan. The duration of the experiment lasted for approximately five months, and the participants were students of two classes in a vocational high school in Taichung City. The participants were divided into two groups: one class was the experimental group (the blog-integrated group) and the other was the control group (the traditional paper-and-pen writing group), with a total of 44 students. The experimental group (the blog-integrated group) consisted of 20 students while the control group (the traditional paper-and pen writing group) was composed of 24 students. Both groups wrote three in-class essays besides the writing pre-test and writing post-test in the 20-week composition courses. The experimental group (the blog-integrated group) wrote all the three essays, gave peer feedback, and revised their first draft on the blogs. After the revision, they handed in their second draft for teacher feedback. The third draft, revised according to teacher feedback, was scored by the teacher afterwards. However, the control group wrote essays on paper for teacher feedback. Their revised second drafts were graded by the teacher. Every participant in the present study wrote one writing pre-test and post-test. To assess students’ improvement in writing performance more objectively, the researcher adopted the grammar checker program (http://140.122.83.189:8080/ wgrammar/ default.asp ) and the Vocabprofiler system (http://www.lextutor.ca/vp/eng/) to examine students’ text length (i.e. content length& sentence length) and lexical richness (i.e. type-token ratio and lexical density) to have a better understanding of variances in writing content and diction. Moreover, the syntactic complexity, including T-Units and T-Unit length, were also examined to gain more insight into participants’ improvement in grammar structure. With regard to their writing attitude, both groups responded to the writing attitude questionnaire simultaneously when taking the writing pre-test, and took the same questionnaire in the writing post-test. The blog-integrated group filled out another blog-evaluation questionnaire to elicit students’ perceptions and recommendations with regard to the experimental design. The analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) and one sample T-test were employed in the study for data analysis. The major findings in the current study were summarized as follows: 1. There were no significant differences in their overall writing performance between the experimental group and the traditional group. However, the experimental group made slightly more progress in terms of content length, type-token ratio, lexical density, and T-Units, although this was not statistically significant. 2. There were no significant differences in the writing attitudes between the two groups. Further comparison revealed that students in the experimental group showed greater interest and motivation, felt less anxious and had an increased realization of the usefulness of English writing. 3. The experimental group generally held a positive attitude toward writing on blogs, and blog-integrated peer feedback. The great majority of students perceived that the combination of blogs and peer feedback as beneficial to their English writing and agreed with the novelty and attraction of the design. Nevertheless, they also offered some practical suggestions. For example, the reward system or modeling of quality peer feedback and good blogs were recommended to be adopted as incentives to encourage students to devote themselves to the design. They also suggested that more rigidly structured guidelines, more intervention from teachers, and more class time in training, writing, and revision. Further, one or two members in a group may not be enough to provide diverse perspectives.

Finally, the researcher provides practical pedagogical implications and suggestions concerning blog-integrated peer feedback and English writing instruction.