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n o s . i n p a r e n t h e s e s
ARTICLES
The Practicum in TESOL 9
Jack C. Richards and Graham Crookes
Initiating ESL Students Into the
Academic Discourse Community:
How Far Should We Go? 29
Ruth Spack
The Present Progressive in Discourse:
Grammar Versus Usage Revisited 53
Susan Kesner Bland
Professors Reactions to the Academic
Writing of Nonnative-Speaking Students 69
Terry Santos
Computer-Assisted Instruction in Pronunciation for
Chinese Speakers of American English 91
Garry Molholt
Lets See: Contrasting Conversations About Teaching 113
John F. Fanselow
(10-28)
(30-52)
(54-69)
(70-91)
(92-112)
(114-131)
REVIEWS
Exploring Through Writing:
A Process Approach to ESL Composition 131
Ann Raimes
Reviewed by Melanie Schneider
Sounds and Rhythm: Focus on Vowels 135
William D. Sheeler and R.W. Markley
Speak Up!
Cheryl Pavlik
Reviewed by Ann C. Cessaris
BRIEF REPORTS AND SUMMARIES
Do We Need to Teach Spelling?
The Relationship Between Spelling and Voluntary
Reading Among Community College ESL Students 141
Jeanne Polak and Stephen Krashen
The Effect of ESL Students Perceptions of
Their Cognitive Strategies on Reading Achievement 146
Yolanda N. Padron and Hersholt C. Waxman
THE FORUM
20 Years of the TESOL Quarterly 151
John Swales
English Language Proficiency and Academic Performance
of Undergraduate International Students 164
Patricia Johnson
Information for Contributors 169
Editorial Policy
General Information for Authors
Publications Received 173
Publications Available From the TESOL Central Office 175
TESOL Membership Application 192
2 TESOL QUARTERLY
TESOL QUARTERLY
A Journal for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages
and of Standard English as a Second Dialect
Editor
STEPHEN J. GAIES, University of Northern Iowa
Review Editor
POLLY ULICHNY, University of Massachusetts at Boston
Brief Reports and Summaries Editor
D. SCOTT ENRIGHT, Georgia State University
Assistant Editor
CHERYL SMITH, University of Northern Iowa
Editorial Assistants
MARY A. MOODY, JULIA PALESTRINA, University of Northern Iowa
Editorial Advisory Board
William R. Acton
University of Houston
Elsa Auerbach
University of Massachusetts at Boston
James D. Brown
University of Hawaii at Manoa
Patricia L. Carrell
Southern Illinois University
Marianne Celce-Murcia
University of California, Los Angeles
Carol Chapelle
Iowa State University
Ulla Connor
Indiana University, Indianapolis
Wayne B. Dickerson
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Patricia A. Dunkel
The Pennsylvania State University
Donna M. Johnson
University of Arizona
Elliot L. Judd
University of Illinois at Chicago
Ilona Leki
University of Tennessee
Mary McGroarty
University of California, Los Angeles
Bernard A. Mohan
University of British Columbia
Ruth Spack
Tufts University and Boston University
Charles Stansfield
Center for Applied Linguistics
Vance Stevens
Sultan Qaboos University, Oman
Michael Strong
University of California, San Francisco
Leo van Lier
Monterey Institute of International Studies
Vivian Zamel
Additional Readers
Margie S. Berns, Craig Chaudron, Graham Crookes, Chuck Friedman, Fred Genesee, Liz Hamp-
Lyons, Elaine K. Horwitz, Ann M. Johns, Karl J. Krahnke, Don Loritz, Joy M. Reid, Cheryl A.
Roberts, Charlene M. Sato, Linda Schinke-Llano, John K. Smith, Polly Ulichny, Margaret
Walworth, Lise Winer
Credits
Advertising arranged by Aaron Berman, TESOL Development and Promotions, San Francisco,
California
Typesetting, printing, and binding by Pantagraph Printing, Bloomington, Illinois
Design by Chuck Thayer Advertising, San Francisco, California
TESOL QUARTERLY 3
TESOL QUARTERLY
Editor's Note
Readers of the TESOL Quarterly may notice that this and the next two
issues are somewhat smaller than previous issues. Whereas the Quarterly
has averaged slightly over 200 pages per issue for the last 3 years, the first
three issues of Volume 22 will be some 20 pages shorter. This restriction in
length is the result of budgetary action taken by the TESOL Executive
Board last September. I fully expect that, this restriction in length
notwithstanding, Volume 22 will offer readers the full variety of insights
and perspectives that the Quarterly aims to present.
For some time, we have wished to expand our coverage of recent
publications of ESOL text and reference materials. Accordingly, we plan
to publish in each issue, in addition to the comprehensive reviews that have
been a mainstay of the Quarterly, a number of book notices. I am pleased
to announce that book noticesshort reviews of approximately 350
wordswill become a regular part of the Quarterly, beginning with the
December 1988 issue. Complete specifications for the preparation of book
notices will appear in the June 1988 issue and in all subsequent issues.
Readers interested in contributing book notices may wish to contact Polly
Ulichny, Review Editor, for further information.
I n This I ssue
This issue of the TESOL Quarterly features contributions on a variety
of topicsincluding the Quarterly itselfin teaching English to speakers
of other languages and in ESOL teacher development. The teaching of
writing for academic purposes, of pronunciation, of grammar, and of
spelling and reading are all dealt with by one or more contributions, while
other discussions focus on the predictive value of English language
proficiency testing for undergraduate-level international students, the role
of the practicum in ESOL teacher preparation programs, perspectives on
teacher supervision and observation in general, and selected aspects of the
growth and development of the Quarterly.
5
Jack Richards and Graham Crookes report the findings of their
questionnaire survey of the nature and role of the teaching practicum
in graduate TESOL programs in the United States. Almost 60
respondents described the objectives of the practicum course in their
programs; the setting in which student teaching experiences take place;
the logistics of the practicum (whether the practicum is compulsory for
all students, regardless of previous teaching experience, and at what
point in their degree program students typically take the practicum);
the practicum curriculum; and the nature of supervised classroom
teaching experience. Richards and Crookes found that although the
practicum has come to be acknowledged as an important part of the
ESL teachers professional preparation in many TESOL programs,
there is a wide variety of options for designing and implementing the
practicum. The article concludes with a number of recommendations,
central among which is a call for research on the effectiveness of
current practicum practices.
Ruth Spack discusses problems in initiating students into the academic
discourse community, a task that in her view is confounded by our
imprecise knowledge of what academic writing is and by the gap
between what students bring to the academic community and what
the academic community expects of them. Spack examines a recent
trend, which has been influenced by the Writing Across the Curriculum
approach and by the English for specific purposes movement, to have
English teachers teach students to write for disciplines other than
English. Such expectations, the author argues, place unreasonable
demands on composition teachers. According to Spack, the English
composition course is and should be a humanities course, in which
the best we can accomplish is to create programs in which students
can learn general inquiry strategies, rhetorical principles, and tasks that
can transfer to other course work. This has been our traditional role.
and it is a worthy one. The article includes a discussion of how
academic writing can be incorporated into a composition course
without linking the course to any particular subject-area program.
Susan Bland examines the increasing frequency of so-called stative
verbs in the progressive aspectas illustrated by a sentence like He is
resembling his brother more and more every dayin order to
elucidate the progressive from a discourse perspective. Bland argues
that the occurrence of progressive formsprogressive statives
includedarises from the speakers wish to focus on a change (or
changes) of state. Recent linguistic and applied linguistic accounts of
the progressive emphasize that this form is used to focus on the internal
structure of events and that virtually any verb can be used for this
purpose. Progressive statives reflect a speakers desire to emphasize the
dynamic features of what is normally perceived as an unchanging state
or situation. In addition to adding expressive strength to a predication,
progressive forms of stative verbs fulfill a variety of other
communicative functions. The author claims that a discourse
6 TESOL QUARTERLY
perspective on the progressive can help explain the nature of ESL
speakers errors and can complement conventional treatments of the
progressive in ESL textbooks.
Terry Santos reports the results of a study that investigated the
reactions of university professors to compositions written by a Chinese
and a Korean student. A total of 178 professors representing different
academic disciplines participated in the study, which elicited
judgments about the content and language of the compositions. In
general, the results suggested that the professors are willing to look
beyond the deficiencies of language to the content in the writing of
these [ESL] students. According to Santos, her data indicate that
although they regarded errors as linguistically unacceptable, the
professors still judged content and language independently, to the
extent that this was possible. The author points out, however, that it is
not at all clear whether this apparent effort to separate judgments of
content and language is a measure of tolerance or reflects the view that
it is futile to demand linguistic correctness of nonnative writers.
Garry Molholt describes how visual displays of ESL learners speech
patterns can be used to help students overcome pronunciation
problems. Molholt shows how a computer-generated visual display of
pronunciation provides students with objective information about the
location, extent, type and significance of [an] error, as well as the
progress made in correcting the error. The technique described in the
article has distinct advantages over both traditional classroom work in
pronunciation, in which teachers make subjective evaluations of and
then discuss students pronunciation errors, and language-laboratory
work, in which learners must compare their performance with the
pronunciation of the speaker on a master tape. Although the article
focuses on the features of American English pronunciation that present
special challenges for speakers of Mandarin Chinese, the use of visual
displays of speech to improve pronunciation at the phonemic, word,
and sentence levels would appear to be valuable for speakers of other
languages as well. The article concludes with recommendations for
integrating the procedures described with class work in spoken
English.
John Fanselow argues for a different perspective on the use of
observation and supervision of teaching. Fanselow argues that despite
their differences, the various models of supervision in use all aim to
provide help; the alternative goal he proposes is self-exploration-
seeing ones own teaching differently. He points out that observing
others or ourselves to see teaching differently is not the same as being
told what to do by others. Observing to explore is a process; observing
to help or to evaluate is providing a product. Pre- and inservice
programs that choose to encourage efforts by teachers to investigate
their own teaching might include activities involving the collection and
grouping of data, the development of multiple interpretations of a
IN THIS ISSUE 7
classroom event, and self-observation practices. The goal of such
activities is to foster a sense of the value of process . . . the
construction of our own knowledge, not the acceptance of the
knowledge of others in some type of package, as a product.
Also in this issue:
Reviews: Melanie Schneider reviews Ann Raimess Exploring Through
Writing: A Process Approach to ESL Composition; Ann Cessaris
reviews Sounds and Rhythm: Focus on Vowels and Speak Up!, two
pronunciation texts.
Brief Reports and Summaries: Jeanne Polak and Stephen Krashen
report the findings of three studies of the relationship between spelling
competence and voluntary reading for ESL students at the community
college level, and Yolanda Padron and Hersholt Waxman report on a
study that examined whether third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade Hispanic
ESL students perceptions of the cognitive strategies that they used in
reading were related to their reading achievement.
The Forum: John Swales describes the growth and development of the
TESOL Quarterly, as reflected by a citational analysis of 192 main
articles published during the Quarterlys first 20 years; Patricia Johnson
reports the findings of a study that examined the English language
proficiency and academic performance of undergraduate international
students at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.
Stephen J. Gaies
TESOL QUARTERLY
8
TESOL QUARTERLY, Vol. 22, No. 1, March 1988
The Practicum in TESOL
JACK C. RICHARDS and GRAHAM CROOKES
University of Hawaii at Manoa
This article reports the results of a questionnaire survey of how the
teaching practicum is conducted in U.S. graduate TESOL
programs. Information was sought on the objectives of the
practicum, the kinds of training experiences and activities
employed, and how the practicum is implemented. The results are
discussed with reference to key issues in the field of practice
teaching in TESOL.
The Directory of Professional Preparation Programs in TESOL in
the United States (Frank-McNeil, 1986) lists 120 institutions that
have programs leading to a masters degree. These programs
typically offer a wide range of courses serving a diverse student
population. Some lead to certification so that graduates may teach
in public schools; other programs have a particular specialization,
such as bilingual education, adult education, or teaching English
overseas. Most attempt to achieve their goals through offering a
balanced curriculum emphasizing both theory and practice.
However, theory sometimes wins out over practice.
In a survey of American MA TESOL graduates working in Japan
(Richards & Hino, 1983), the most frequently studied courses in
MA TESOL programs were phonology, transformational grammar,
structural linguistics, second language acquisition, first language
acquisition, and contrastive analysis. In the same survey respon-
dents reported that the courses they found to be most useful in view
of the professional demands made on them as practicing language
teachers were practice teaching, classroom management, second
language acquisition, materials writing and adaptation, method
analysis, and phonology.
In most MA TESOL programs, the practice teaching course, or
practicum, is the major opportunity for the student teacher to
acquire the practical skills and knowledge needed to function as an
effective language teacher. Yet there is little research or literature in
9
the field of ESOL concerning the nature of the teaching practicum.
l
Our goal was to identify the objectives of the teaching practicum,
the different possibilities for designing and implementing a
practicum course, and the kinds of training experiences and
activities employed in American MA TESOL programs and their
effectiveness. This article addresses these questions by reporting on
a survey of practicum courses in MA TESOL programs and by
examining key issues in the field of practice teaching.
The data reported here were obtained from a questionnaire that
was mailed to the 120 programs in the United States listed in Frank-
McNeil (1986) as having courses leading to a masters degree. It
should be noted that not all of these programs lead to a degree in
ESL or TESOL; 60 of these institutions provide a degree that is not
in ESL or any of its equivalent acronyms, not in applied linguistics,
and not even an education degree specifically in some form of ESL.
They claim only concentrations, specializations, or endorsements in
ESL, as subordinate to, for example, elementary education or
linguistics.
The questionnaire was addressed to the supervisor or instructor in
charge of the teaching practicum course in such programs and
contained questions concerning the goals, organization, and content
of the practicum. A total of 78 responses were received, a response
rate of 65% Of these, 19 were null responses, from programs
without a practicum. For each major section of the survey
objectives of the practicum course, the context or setting for the
practicum, logistics of the practicum, the curriculum, and
supervised classroom teachingthis article first presents the results
of the survey, followed by a discussion of the issues raised.
Recommendations for the objectives, setting, logistics, curriculum,
and supervision of the practicum are then presented.
OBJECTIVES OF THE PRACTICUM COURSE
The Survey
Respondents were asked to rank 8 objectives for a practicum
1 The situation is little better in mainstream education. Zeichner (1980) states that
research on field-based experiences. . . generally has failed to provide us with very
reliable information about what does or does not occur during informal training. Fuller
and Bowns (1975) assessment of what is needed in teacher education research in general
seems equally applicable to our current state of knowledge about field-based
experiences. . . . The appropriate question at this state of knowledge is not are we
right? but only what is out there? (p. 47)
See Alatis, Strevens, and Stern (1983) and Gebhard, Gaitan, and Oprandy (1987) for the
current ESL perspective.
10 TESOL QUARTERLY
course in order of importance. The results were as follows:
1 To provide practical experience in classroom teaching
2 To apply instruction from theory courses
3 To provide opportunities to observe master teachers
4.5 To give feedback on teaching techniques
4.5 To develop increased awareness of personal teaching style
6 To develop lesson-planning skills
7 To develop ability to select/adapt materials
8 To become familiar with specific methods (e.g., the Silent Way)
Respondents were also asked to identify the most important skills
that students were expected to learn from the practicum. No
consistent pattern of answers emerged from this open-ended
question. A wide variety of skills were mentioned, such as
classroom management, ability to individualize lessons, time
management skills, lesson planning, awareness of teaching style,
and ability to interact with students. In studies of practicums in the
field of general teacher education, a similar diversity and vagueness
of purposes have been reported (Beyer, 1984; Erdman, 1983;
Ginsburg & Newman, 1985; Goodman, 1983, 1985; Tabachnick &
Zeichner, 1984; Zeichner & Teitelbaum, 1982).
Discussion
The objectives stated for a practicum course reflect how the
nature of teaching is viewed as well as how teacher development is
thought to occur. Thus, they reflect the approach or philosophy
implicit in the program. Teaching may be viewed as an art, as a
craft, as a technology, or as a science, and each of these viewpoints
makes different assumptions about the role of the teacher educator
and the student teacher as well as about how teacher development
occurs. A program directed toward the acquisition of specific skills
or competencies, for example, may have different objectives from
one that seeks to develop certain qualities in teachers (Richards,
1987).
These differences in program philosophy are reflected in
differences in terminology: A program may be described in terms
of teacher training, or teacher preparation, on the one hand, or in
terms of teacher development, or teacher education, on the other.
Despite its current prominence, this dichotomy is not recent but
dates back at least to Deweys influence on education at the turn of
the century (Haberman, 1983). Larsen-Freeman (1983) suggests that
THE PRACTICUM IN TESOL 11
teacher training involves a situation-oriented approach, character-
ized by finite objectives, in which trainees master a particular
model of teaching. Teacher education, on the other hand, involves
an individual-oriented approach with a focus on developing
decision-making and hypothesis-generating skills. The emphasis is
on the process rather than on a specific method or model of
teaching. The absence of a uniform set of objectives for the
practicum course may reflect philosophical differences of this kind.
THE CONTEXT OR SETTING FOR THE PRACTICUM
The Survey
Respondents were asked to identify where the student teaching
experiences occur. The most frequent settings were (a) in an ESL
program on campus (46%), (b) in a high school or elementary school
(36%), (c) in a community college or adult program (29%), and (d) in
a private ESL program off campus (21%). (Since more than one
answer was possible, these percentages do not total 100. )
Discussion
Teaching experiences can be characterized as either campus
based or field based. Campus-based experiences, such as working
in a university English language institute program for foreign
students, offer a very different kind of experience from the situation
a teacher might encounter in a public school or teaching English
abroad. Campus-based experiences may consequently differ so
radically from ESL or bilingual programs in elementary and high
schools or from private language schools abroad that they do not
offer realistic teaching experiences. On the other hand, campus-
based programs may be endowed with good facilities, well-trained
staff, and superior support systems, providing the student teacher
with experiences superior to those available off campus.
LOGISTICS OF THE PRACTICUM
The Survey
For most programs (85%) represented in the survey, the practicum
course was compulsory, and in about half of these (48%), there were
no grounds for exemption. In the remainder, students were usually
exempted only on the grounds of previous teaching experience, but
the length and required conditions varied considerably among
programs. Conditions mentioned included whether or not previous
12 TESOL QUARTERLY
teaching was supervised, whether or not ESL instruction was
involved, and what sort of documentation was required.
Most respondents referred to the length of their practicum in
credit hours. For these, the average number of credits carried by the
practicum was 3.3. The mode was 3 credits. In terms of the
academic year this suggests that most practicums take place over
the course of a single semester.
In most of the sample (89%), students took the practicum near or
at the end of their degree program. The majority of respondents
(79%) indicated that the practicum had prerequisites. If the
practicum was intended to be taken at the beginning of the
program, prerequisites usually consisted of one to three introduc-
tory courses (usually including one methods course). If the
practicum was to be taken at the end, formal or informal
prerequisites could consist of up to nine courses.
Discussion
The stringent requirements for exemption from the practicum
perhaps reflect the increasing professionalization of the field of
TESOL. Merely having taught before is no longer accepted as a
guarantee that adequate teaching skills have been developed.
Practice does not necessarily make perfect: What is needed is good
practice.
With regard to the length of the practicum, given the overall time
constraints of an MA program, it is perhaps not surprising to find a
great deal of agreement about practicum duration. The only
notable exceptions to the one-semester generalization were
programs in which it was possible to have a 6-credit, two-semester
practicum, one semester at the beginning of the program and one at
the end.
As the results indicate, practicum placement was split, though a
rationale for placement did not emerge. It seems likely that if
students generally have little teaching experience, the practicum
would be placed early in the program, and if students are mainly
experienced, the practicum would be placed at the end (though a
case for the converse can also be made).
THE CURRICULUM
The Survey
Two questions sought information on the kinds of experiences
and activities provided during the practicum. These questions
specified a number of alternatives, but provision was made for
respondents to write in any activities not mentioned. In response to
a question on the content of the practicum, the following activities
were cited (ranked by frequency of mention across all programs):
1.5 Observation of experienced teachers
1.5 Regular classroom teaching (supervised)
3 Individual conferences with supervisor/master teacher
4 Regular classroom teaching (unsupervised)
5.5 Observation of peers
5.5 Seminars
7.5 Viewing of videotapes of participant trainees teaching
7.5 Microteaching of peers
9.5 Microteaching of ESL students
9.5 Workshops
11 Viewing of sample lessons
Respondents were also asked to indicate which of the activities they
listed they had spent the most time on. The following ranking was
obtained:
1 Regular classroom teaching (supervised)
2 Regular classroom teaching (unsupervised)
3 Observation of experienced teachers
4.5 Individual conferences with supervisor/master teacher
4.5 Seminars
6.5 Viewing of videotapes of participants teaching
6.5 Microteaching of ESL students
8.5 Viewing of videotapes of example teaching
10.5 Workshops
10.5 Viewing of sample lessons
In addition, respondents reported on facilities utilized in
practicums. In terms of availability the following facilities were
cited: video-recording facilities, audio-recording facilities, trained
audiovisual staff, and observation rooms. The majority of
respondents, however, reported that available facilities were rarely
used. (These were absolute majorities, except in the case of
videotape use, for which respondents were split: rarely used was
selected by 46%, sometimes used by 27%, and often used by 27%.)
14
TESOL QUARTERLY
Discussion
The experiences provided for the novice teacher during a
practicum can be classified according to whether they are direct, or
first-hand, or whether they are indirect, or second-/third-hand
(Cruickshank & Armaline, 1986). Direct experiences involve the
student teacher either in real teaching experiences in a real
classroom or in teaching in a contrived situation, such as teaching
peers or teaching a class specially constituted to serve as a vehicle
for practice teaching. Indirect experiences involve watching
someone else teach. The observation may be either of a real class or
of a specially constituted class. Activities cited in the survey indicate
the practicum typically includes a mix of both direct and indirect
teaching experiences.
Direct teaching experiences cited in the survey included
supervised and unsupervised classroom teaching as well as
microteaching. Indirect experiences included observation of
experienced teachers and peers. Unsupervised teaching, micro-
teaching, and observation are discussed in this section. Since a
separate question in the survey addressed the issue of supervision,
this topic is discussed in the next section.
Direct experiences. Although the practicum in many programs
involved only supervised teaching experiences, in some programs
students completed a portion of their degree program on campus
and then completed their practicum requirement in the field. For
example, a student might work as a full-time ESL teacher in an ESL
program abroad, enabling him or her to complete part of the degree
requirement while in full-time employment. The student would
then be immersed in the full-time job of being a teacher with only
occasional (if any) contact with the program in the form of a site
visit by a faculty member.
The use of unsupervised regular classroom teaching as a
component of teacher preparation reflects a long-held view that
many skills of teaching can only be acquired through actual
classroom teaching (Conant, 1963; Merril, 1967). Skills that might be
developed in this way include handling the routines of the
classroom, developing student-teacher rapport, and learning
classroom management strategies. In addition, the student is
expected to put theory into practice through confronting the
practical realities of the classroom and the school. It may be
assumed that the learning processes involved are largely self-
directed. At its best, such an experience is coupled with or follows
training in self-awareness of teaching. Support is also provided to
assist the student teacher in this process, through the use of
assessment schedules or reports (see Dewey, 1904).
Some question an overdependence on unsupervised classroom
teaching, pointing out that such experiences provide few
opportunities for diagnosis or evaluation of teacher performance
and that the behavior of student teachers cannot be described
except in terms of their own recollections. As Smith (1972)
observed, an experience of this kind
rests on the gratuitous assumption that first hand experience and student
teaching are [italics added] training. At best, student teaching is a reality
from which the trainee learns by trial and error and a minimum of
feedback. The situations that arise in his teaching are fleeting in tenure
and can be discussed only in retrospect. He cannot work through the
situations again to correct his behavior because classroom work moves
rapidly from situation to situation and no situation can be reinstated for
the practice of technique. (p. 232)
Hence, there is a need for data on how such practical experience
can best be organized. As Haberman (1983) notes,
there has been and remains no greater need than to systematically gather
data to support or refute this contention that certain kinds of practice
teaching lead to technicians and other forms of student teaching lead to
students of teaching. (p. 104)
Alternatives to unsupervised field experiences include supervised
field experiences and more focused training experiences, such as
microteachinga procedure that captures the essence of the
training approach. From the perspective of training, teaching is
approached in terms of specific skills and strategies that can be
acquired through direct training. According to Joyce (1980), the
major components of training are as follows:
1. presentation of theory
2. modelling or demonstration of skills or models
3. practice in simulated and classroom settings
4. structured feedback
5. open-ended feedback
6. coaching for application. (p. 34)
Similar to the training approach is the clinical approach (Nutter,
1986), in which student teachers
systematically observe, simulate, and actually perform the activities of
teachers in a controlled environment, under close supervision, and with
feedback on their performance and opportunity to relearn, in
conjunction with their studies of theory and research in pedagogy and
foundation disciplines. (p. 59)
16 TESOL QUARTERLY
Examples of clinical activities cited by Nutter are simulations,
controlled practice activities such as microteaching and peer
teaching, and case studies such as video presentations. Microteach-
ing is one such activity reported in the present survey. (Although the
ranking of microteaching appears to be relatively low, this is partly
attributable to the fact that the responses are divided across two
categoriesmicroteaching of ESL students and microteaching of
peers.)
Microteaching was originally based on the idea that teaching is a
complex set of behaviors that can be broken down into different
skills that can be isolated and practiced individually. Usually, the
teacher trainee teaches a short minilesson, either to real students or
peers, which is video-recorded and later discussed in individual or
group tutorials (Cripwell & Geddes, 1979; Cruickshank, 1985).
Microteaching is used as a complement to other training activities in
a teacher preparation program. A number of different schools of
microteaching have evolved, varying according to the use of peers
or real students as pupils and the kind of feedback provided
(Brown, 1975; Garvey, 1978). Microteaching is said to provide for
more focused practice than real teaching. However, critics argue
that it is often an artificial activity, removed from the reality of the
regular classroom.
Politzer (1969) was the first to apply microteaching to the
preparation of foreign language teachers. At the time of its first
applications in language teacher education, audiolingualism was the
favored language teaching method. It was hence relatively easy to
identify skills that were appropriate for practice through
microteaching, for example, drilling, correcting errors, presenting a
new grammatical structure, or teaching an aspect of pronunciation.
Model teacher behaviors could thus be identified and practiced.
Although audiolingualism has since been replaced as the dominant
methodology in ESOL and the need for this kind of skill training is
no longer widely acknowledged, there are still aspects of classroom
methodology that can be practiced in a microteaching format, such
as setting up group activities, conducting a role play, or using
different kinds of classroom tasks, for example, information gap
activities, pair work, and so forth. (For positive reports of the
relevance of microteaching in British programs, see Cripwell &
Geddes, 1979; Phillips, 1975; Stoddard, 1981; see also E1-Naggar &
Heasley, 1987, for a study of the use of microteaching in an EFL
teacher training program.)
Indirect experiences. In the practicum, indirect experiences can
involve observation of the master teacher, observation of sample
lessons, and observation of peers. The following activities were
cited in the survey, ranked by frequency of use:
1 Observation of experienced teachers
2 Viewing of videotapes of sample lessons
3.5 Viewing of videotapes of peers
It is not surprising that observation should absorb such a large
section of time in practicums, since it constitutes the most basic
component of any form of training that can be used to learn a
complex skill. It is a basic element of the oldest model of teacher
traininglearning through apprenticeship. What needs to be
explored is how effective it is and whether its effectiveness justifies
its large share of the practicum. In the present context, a distinction
can be made between long-term observation of a cooperating
teacher and the observation of individual examples of teaching. The
latter may be live sample lessons taught by either the cooperating
teacher or supervisor or, alternatively, videotaped lessons, possibly
professionally developed.
Although the survey did not probe exactly how observation takes
place, it has been noted elsewhere that
although student teachers have always observed prior to taking over a
class, they typically observe as they grade papers, help pupils with
seatwork, and perform other clerical tasks for supervising teachers, or,
they sit quietly and look without training in the skills of observation.
(Mills, 1980, p. 5)
The need for a more focused approach to observation has therefore
been stressed. This position is taken by Mills, who advocates
training student teachers in clinical observation (as opposed to
Nutters clinical approach).
Mills (1980) defines clinical observation as the structured,
intense, systematic viewing and recording of significant information
about classroom environments and events (p. 5). She points out
that the student teacher needs to acquire information concerning a
classrooms schedule of activities, character of instruction,
organization, management, norms, and rituals. Not all the
information that could be provided to the student teacher is
provided, and there may be mismatches between the expectations
engendered by other parts of the training program and the reality of
the ESL classroom. Developing an observation system that provides
for a detailed breakdown of classroom experience at successively
finer levels of analysis under these headings allows supervisors of
student teachers to
18 TESOL QUARTERLY
(a) identify and question discrepancies between things learned on
campus and events in the classroom; (b) use observational data as a basis
for improving communication; (c) clarify any misconceptions student
teachers might have about what they observed; and (d) supply
information that is conspicuously absent from student teachers
observational data. (Mills, 1980, p. 6)
The allocation of more time to the observation of live examples of
teaching than to the viewing of videotaped examples of teaching
noted in the survey is supported in a recent investigation into the
effectiveness of demonstration lessons (in a mainstream, K-12
education program). Putnam (1985) compared a variety of
demonstration formats, including both live and videotaped lessons,
and found that live demonstrations of connected lessons were
perceived to be most beneficial.
SUPERVISED CLASSROOM TEACHING
Of all practicum experiences, supervised classroom teaching
ranked highest for time allocation in TESOL practicum programs.
This experience normally involves practice teaching in a regular
classroom under the direction of a cooperating teacher and under
the overall supervision of the supervisor of the practicum course.
Since the survey suggests that the practicum is largely dependent on
supervised practice teaching, the choice of cooperating teacher and
the kind of supervision provided are clearly key factors in
determining the success of the practicum course. Several questions
in the survey addressed the choice of the master teacher and the
kind of supervision provided.
The Survey
The results indicated that the selection of cooperating teachers
was done on a case-by-case basis. Although no clear pattern
emerged, factors cited included the proximity of the participating
school to the campus, the familiarity of the cooperating teacher to
the course supervisor, the fact that the cooperating teacher
graduated from the same university program, nomination of the
cooperating teacher by students in the program, person-al contact
with the cooperating teacher, and reputation of the cooperating
teacher. At best, cooperating teachers were selected because of
their known skills as teachers; at worst, by availability.
The survey indicated that in about half the programs surveyed,
responsibility for the practice teaching experience was shared by
the master teacher and the supervisor, whereas in other programs
the supervisor assumed the main responsibility for the practice
teaching.
Feedback on student performance during practice teaching
originated most often from the supervisor. Students rarely gave
each other feedback on their practice teaching. The forms of
feedback in order of frequency of use were as follows:
1 Conferences with supervisor/cooperating teacher
2 Observation of videotapes of a lesson
3 Peer feedback
4.5 Written reports
4.5 Use of audiotapes of a lesson
Most respondents (87%) reported the use of a checklist or
observation form as a standardized procedure for giving written
feedback.
Discussion
The concept of teaching practice reflects an apprenticeship view
of the process of teacher education. The novice teacher is
apprenticed to a master teacher and is expected to learn some
of the master teachers skills through observing, working with, and,
in many cases, getting feedback from the master teacher. The
standard pattern of organization is one in which the ESL
department or program enlists the cooperation of schools or
teachers who agree to offer classrooms for teaching practice. The
practice teaching typically begins with observation of the
cooperating teacher, with the student gradually taking over
responsibility for teaching part of a lesson, under the supervision of
the cooperating teacher. Supervision by the coordinator of the
practicum course may take the form of occasional or regular visits
by the supervisor, reports to the supervisor from the cooperating
teacher or the student, peer feedback, or conferences with the
supervisor.
The kinds of experiences students encounter in their practice
teaching are to some extent dependent on chance, since master
teachers may make different kinds of demands on student teachers.
As a consequence, a substantial portion of the content of the
practicum is probably beyond the control of the practicum
supervisor, since there is often little or no control over the
interaction between the master teacher and the trainee. As
Cruickshank and Armaline (1986) put it:
20 TESOL QUARTERLY
One field-based teacher educator might . . . ask the [student] to spend
considerable time observing, then practicing according to a local
standard. Another . . . might demand the student define his or her role
as a teacher, act on it, and consider its consequences and outcomes.
(p. 37)
The success of the practice teaching experience depends
therefore on the kinds of liaison and communication established
between supervisor and master teacher. The responsibilities of the
cooperating teacher and the purpose of visits from the supervisor
need to be clearly established. At the same time, student teachers
need to be made aware of what is expected of them. Zimpher,
deVoss, and Nott (1980), in one of the few studies of the
relationship between supervision and teacher trainees, attest to the
crucial role of the supervisor:
First, at least four of the findings suggest that if the university supervisor
were not directly involved in the student teaching experience, there
would have been no direction set for requirements, evaluation, or
assessment of the student teachers experience in the school site. Second,
informational communication between participants appeared to be
enhanced because of the presence of the university supervisor. Students
and teachers (and the principal) appeared unable to deal with each other
very directly and needed an interlocutors assistancein this case the
university supervisor. Third, even though the university supervisor in
our study appeared to be frustrated by a lack of direct influence on the
teaching style of the student teachers, the supervisor seemed to be the
only one making any critical contributions to the student teachers
progress. (p. 14)
RECOMMENDATIONS
In the last 20 years, the practicum has come to be acknowledged
as an important part of the ESL teachers professional preparation
in many TESOL programs. However, this survey of practicum
courses revealed a wide variety of options for designing and
implementing the practicum. Central issues that emerged concern
objectives for the practicum course, settings used, logistics, the
curriculum, and supervision. Comments and recommendations for
each of these areas are offered for consideration by practicum
supervisors and ESL faculty.
Objectives
The objectives for the practicum currently reflect the uncertain
status of classroom teaching and practical experience in TESOL
programs. Programs differ in the extent to which they emphasize
the practical aspects of classroom teaching and classroom-based
research.
The purpose and value of classroom teaching experiences should
be reexamined by faculty involved in ESOL teacher preparation,
and the importance of these experiences relative to other compo-
nents of professional training should be evaluated. Objectives for
such experiences should be established and agreed upon by all those
involved in each particular programsupervisors, students, and
cooperating teachersand procedures for validating objectives
should be developed.
The Setting
Research on field experiences in teacher education reports that
they involve a complicated set of both positive and negative
consequences that are often subtle in nature (Zeichner, 1980, p. 46).
On the one hand, field experiences are often claimed to be the only
indisputably essential element in professional education (Conant,
1963, p. 142). On the other hand, off-campus experiences are
reported to induct the trainee into the old conservative patterns and
norms of school practices (Hooper & Johnston, 1973).
In ESOL teacher preparation we know of no studies that have
examined exactly what takes place during field experiences and the
interaction between such experiences and the campus program.
Such information is essential in determining the contribution of field
experiences to the student teachers professional development. As
we noted earlier, exclusive reliance on campus-based experiences
provides a limited exposure to the real world of TESOL.
We recommend that a balance of both campus-based and field-
based experiences should be provided but that careful considera~
tion should be given as to precisely what students are expected to
learn (and how) from both kinds of experiences.
Logistics
The central issues here center on whether the practicum can be
exempted, the length of the practicum, and its positioning within
the program. This is one area in which practicum supervisors can
exercise little control, but one in which decisions taken have a major
impact on the kind of professional training a student gets in a
TESOL program.
22 TESOL QUARTERLY
A students previous teaching experience should not be accepted
as grounds for exemption from a practicum unless there is evidence
that this teaching was carried out under the supervision and
direction of a qualified and experienced teacher. The relative
weighting of the practicum course and its positioning within a
TESOL program should be subjected to critical scrutiny to ensure
that an optimum integration of theoretical and practical compo-
nents has been achieved, according to the goals of the program.
The Curriculum
In view of the lack of agreement on objectives for a practicum in
TESOL, it is not surprising that there is also a wide range of options
in use concerning the kinds of experiences students will encounter
during their practicum. In the absence of any substantial data on the
value of particular kinds of experiences, a mix of both direct and
indirect activities would seem to be the safest strategy.
Thus, we recommend that the practicum curriculum reflect both
direct and indirect teaching experiences, with careful consideration
given to what students are expected to learn from each kind of
experience and the relationship of each kind of experience to the
total curriculum. In addition, a research base concerning the effect
of the various components of the practicum on the trainees
performance as a teacher should be developed.
Supervision
We question the value of unsupervised field experiences in
teacher preparation and support the emphasis on supervised
teaching experiences as constituting the core of the practicum.
However, the nature of the supervision provided is crucial in
determining the quality and value of such experiences. A consistent
finding of research on supervision is that the role of the cooperating
teacher has been poorly defined and that classroom teachers are
usually not well prepared for the task of supervising a student
teacher (Grimmett & Ratzlaff, 1986). There may consequently be
conflicting expectations on the part of the student teacher, the
cooperating teacher, and the program supervisor.
Programs should examine the procedures by which cooperating
teachers are chosen and clarify the expectations they have for such
teachers. Provision should be made to ensure that the relationship
between the cooperating teacher, the student teacher, and the
supervisor is a cooperative one and that master teachers are
adequately prepared and rewarded for the demands made on them.
CONCLUSION
Our goal in this article has been to determine current practices
and to identify key issues and problems in the practicum in order to
establish priorities for needed research. This survey has confirmed
that a variety of different approaches are currently in use in
implementing the practicum requirement in ESOL teacher
preparation programs and that the importance of the experience
provided in a practicum is increasingly recognized. However, we
still possess little information on the effectiveness of current
practicum practices. As Stern (1983) remarked,
there is little research, systematic experimentation, or attested
knowledge which would demonstrate that these different procedures [in
teacher preparation] actually contribute to the learning experiences of
prospective language teachers. (pp. 353-354)
The field of TESOL is not alone in having neglected this aspect of
teacher preparation, since the same observations have been made in
mainstream education. In the latter case, however, the reasons for
neglect have been identified (Haberman, 1983), and an agenda for
research and evaluation has been initiated (Katz & Raths, 1985;
Ornstein, 1985). It is now time for professionals in ESOL teacher
education to apply the same concerns for knowledge and
effectiveness that we have with regard to second language teaching
to the training and education of second language teachers.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This article is a revised version of a paper presented at the 21st Annual TESOL
Convention in Miami Beach, April 1987.
THE AUTHORS
Jack C. Richards is a professor in the Department of ESL at the University of
Hawaii, where he teaches courses in methodology, curriculum development,
teacher training, and materials development. A frequent speaker at international
conferences, he is the co-author (with T. Rodgers) of Approaches and Methods in
Language Teaching (Cambridge University Press, 1986) and co-editor (with J.
Platt and H. Weber) of the Longman Dictionary of Applied Linguistics (Longman,
1985).
24 TESOL QUARTERLY
Graham Crookes is Assistant Director of the Center for Second Language
Classroom Research at the University of Hawaii and also trains second language
teachers for the Department of ESL. His research interests, besides teacher
training, concern interlanguage variation, task-based syllabuses, and the role of
cognitive strategies in second language learning.
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I nitiating ESL Students I nto the
Academic Discourse Community:
How Far Should We Go?
RUTH SPACK
Tufts University and Boston University
In the interest of finding ways to help their students succeed in
university studies, college-level L2 writing researchers and
teachers have endeavored for years to define the nature of
academic writing tasks. The effort to determine what academic
writing is and what ESL students need to know in order to
produce it has led to the development of a number of different
approaches to the teaching of writing. Most recently, this effort
has led to a problematic trend toward having teachers of English,
including teachers of freshman composition, teach students to
write in other disciplines. This trend has emerged in response to
criticism of previous writing programs, analyses of surveys of
academic writing tasks, and movements such as Writing Across the
Curriculum and English for specific purposes. This article reviews
studies of L1 writing programs in which students learn to write in
various disciplines, discusses the implications of the researchers
findings, and argues that (a) the teaching of writing in the
disciplines should be left to the teachers of those disciplines and
(b) L2 English composition teachers should focus on general
principles of inquiry and rhetoric, with emphasis on writing from
sources.
Within the last decade, numerous approaches to the teaching of
writing in programs for ESL college students have been tried, and
much discussion has focused on the most appropriate approach to
adopt (see the TESOL Quarterly Forum contributions of Horowitz,
1986c/Liebman-Kleine, 1986/Horowitz, 1986b/Hamp-Lyons, 1986/
Horowitz, 1986a; Reid, 1984b/Spack, 1985a/Reid, 1985; Reid,
1984a/Zamel, 1984). Though a misleading process/product, or
process-centered/content-based, dichotomy has characterized the
debate, ESL writing researchers and teachers have generally agreed
that the goal of college-level L2 writing programs is to prepare
students to become better academic writers.
29
However, the achievement of this goal is complicated by at least
two major factors. One is that we have not yet satisfactorily
determined, despite numerous surveys, what academic writing is,
an issue that this article examines. The other is that there is most
often a large gap between what students bring to the academic
community and what the academic community expects of them.
In the case of native English-speaking basic writersacademi-
cally disadvantaged students who have achieved only very modest
standards of high school literacy Bizzell (1982) points out that the
students social situation and previous training may hamper their
ability to succeed in the academy. In other words, their problems
with academic writing may not lie in a lack of innate ability but
rather in the social and cultural factors that influence composing.
The gap is even wider for ESL students who can be classified as
basic writers, for it includes L2 linguistic and cultural deficiencies.
Even for ESL students who are highly literate in their native
language, a similar gap exists: The students lack of L2 linguistic and
cultural knowledge can stand in the way of academic success.
It is clearly the obligation of the ESL college-level writing
teacher, whether teaching basic writers or highly literate students,
to find a way to narrow the gap. As Bizzell (1982) suggests, we must
help students master the language and culture of the university; the
role of the university writing teacher is to initiate students into the
academic discourse community. The issue of concern in this article
is the means through which we should fulfill our role.
My concern stems from what I perceive to be a disturbing trend
in L2 writing instruction, a trend that has been influenced both by
the Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) movement in L1 writing
instruction and the English for specific purposes (ESP) movement
in L2 instruction. This trend toward having teachers of English,
including teachers of freshman composition, teach students to write
in disciplines other than English may lead many in the composition
field to assign papers that they are ill-equipped to handle. The
purpose of this article is to remind teachers of English that we are
justified in teaching general academic writing and to argue that we
should leave the teaching of writing in the disciplines to the teachers
of those disciplines.
DEFINING ACADEMIC WRITING
Determining what academic writing is and what ESL students
need to know in order to produce it has not been an easy task for
researchers and teachers. In fact, a number of L2 writing
instructors, including this author, have tried several different
30 TESOL QUARTERLY
approaches, faithfully following textbook guidelines. Early ESL
writing textbooks were largely workbooks that fostered controlled
composition and that did not satisfy students need to learn how to
produce their own body of work for their other university courses.
Later efforts to have students create their own academic texts often
resulted in absurd assignments that students could not logically
fulfill. For example, one textbook (Bander, 1978) suggested that
science students begin with a topic sentence such as The
importance of oxygen to mankind cannot be overstated and that
humanities students show how the revolutions that took place in
France, the United States, and Russia resulted in major changes in
those countries (p. 30). (This, according to the book, could be done
in one paragraph!)
ESL writing textbooks began at this time to be modeled after
textbooks for native speakers (NSs) of English, which emphasized
the rhetorical patterns researchers claimed were commonly found
in American academic prose. These books ask students to write
whole pieces of discourse by imitating models (which are,
paradoxically, often excerpts rather than whole pieces of discourse)
and to describe, compare, classify, define, and determine the cause
and effect of everything from religion to Chinese food.
Though still popular with many teachers, this approach has been
called into question in both L2 and L1 fields because starting from
given patterns and asking students to find topics and produce essays
to fit them is a reversal of the normal writing process (Shih, 1986,
p. 622) and turns attention away from the meaningful act of
communication in a social context (Connors, 1981). Furthermore, a
recent (though admittedly limited) survey of actual writing
assignment handouts given to university students by teachers in
courses other than writing (Horowitz, 1986d) reveals that these
assignments do not ask students to start from patterns and produce
essays to fit them. If further research bears this out, it will be safe to
say that this pattern-centered approach is not suitable for a program
that emphasizes academic writing.
In response to some of this criticism, and again following the
model of NS writing textbooks, the ESL field has begun to publish
textbooks that emphasize the cognitive process of writing. This
approach is based on the research of composition specialists who
have drawn on the theories of cognitive psychologists and
psycholinguists to explore the mental procedures writers use to
communicate ideas (see, for example, the L1 research of Flower &
Hayes, 1977, 1981; the L2 research of Lay, 1982; Raimes, 1985;
Zamel, 1982, 1983). The thrust of these ESL textbooks (see, for
example, Hartfiel, Hughey, Warmuth, & Jacobs, 1985) is to teach
THE ACADEMIC DISCOURSE COMMUNITY 31
students systematic thinking and writing skills so that they can use
their own composing strategies effectively to explore ideas.
Emphasis is on self-generated topics, with thematically organized
readings usually, but not always, acting as springboards for ideas.
Yet the writing produced in such courses has not been universally
accepted as academic, even though it takes place in the academy.
Much of the writing is based solely on students personal
experiences or interests. Although this provides students with a
drive to learn to write by focusing on what really matters to them,
it has its drawbacks. As Bazerman (1980) points out, in emphasizing
the writers independent self, teachers ignore the fact that writing is
not contained entirely in the envelope of experience, native
thought, and personal motivation to communicate (p. 657).
I would argue that since the personal essay as a genre informs the
discipline known as English literature, this kind of writing can be
considered academic. It also serves as a vehicle for reflection and
self-expression for specialists in many other fields, including science
(e.g., Cole, 1985), medicine (e.g., Thomas, 1983), and engineering
(e.g., Petroski, 1986). And the personal essay plays a role in students
future academic success: When they apply for transfer, for
scholarships, or to graduate school, they are asked to write on
personal topics in order to sell themselves and presumably to
display their writing skills. Still, there is no evidence that the skills
learned in this kind of writing adequately provide students with the
tools they need to produce the academic writing required in other
courses.
Although the cognitive process approach is admired because of
its emphasis on writing as a learning process and its development of
useful, teachable skills, MacDonald (1987) reveals its limitations: Its
L1 research (e.g., Flower& Hayes, 1977, 1981) is based on only one
kind of writing, which MacDonald describes as composing with an
undefined problem, with the writer forced to create a problem for
him- or herself . . . a kind of composing traditionally associated
with English departmentswhether interpretations of literature or
personal essays (p. 328). Other kinds of writing, such as scientific
or social science writing, which have different demands and
constraints, are ignored. Raimess (1985) L2 research, based on
students personal experience essays, has been challenged on similar
grounds (Horowitz, 1986c).
A further criticism of a process approach that promotes student-
generated meaning and form is that it does not acknowledge that
most writing for academic classes is in response to a specific
assignment or prompt (Johns, 1986, p. 253). Shaughnessy (1977),
Bizzell (1982), and Rose (1985) therefore claim that it does not
32 TESOL QUARTERLY
prepare students to grapple with the challenges of academic life but
rather postpones their confrontation with the complex linguistic
and rhetorical expectations of the academy (Rose, 1985, p. 357).
Bizzell (1982) argues that to succeed in their university studies,
students need critical training and recommends a social-contextual
approach that demystifies the institutional structure of
knowledge (p. 196). Researchers and textbook writers, Bizzell
contends, need to focus on the conventions of academic discourse,
emphasizing the relationship between discourse, community, and
knowledge. In finding ways to demystify academic discourse,
ESP researchers have been at the forefront of genre analysis,
identifying and analyzing key genres, such as Case Studies in
Business, Legislative documents in Law, lab reports in Science,
disease-descriptions in Medicine and Agriculture (Swales, 1986,
p. 18).
L1 and L2 researchers have conducted a number of surveys to
determine what writing tasks are actually assigned across academic
disciplines. Horowitz (1986d) has found fault with some of the
studies (Bridgeman & Carlson, 1984; Johns, 1981, 1985; Kroll, 1979;
Ostler, 1980), which, he points out, beg the question of what the
tasks are: Instead of trying to discover and classify university
writing tasksa logical prior endeavorthey began with a set of
preconceived classifications, forcing on the respondents the
particular scheme used in each survey (p. 448). The surveys of
Behrens (1980), Rose (1983), and Horowitz (1986d) take a more
ethnographic view, creating classifications after examining the data.
Nevertheless, the Horowitz survey has been criticized on the
grounds that it is a limited study (only 38 of the 750 faculty
members who were contacted responded; only 54 writing
assignments were collected) (Raimes, 1987) and that it ignores the
context in which the tasks were assigned (Zamel, 1987).
Until we collect more assignments, interview the teachers to learn
the purposes of the assigned tasks, observe the courses in which the
tasks are assigned, examine the resulting student essays, and analyze
the teacher responses to and evaluations of these papers, we cannot
truly understand the nature of the academic writing students are
asked to produce. Furthermore, we should not forget that it is
important to take a critical look at these assignments. Having seen
numerous examples of writing assignments for other courses, I
suspect that one reason so few faculty members responded to
Horowitz is that they may have been reluctant to show English
teachers their own poorly written or poorly designed texts. The fact
that papers assigned by teachers in other disciplines are different
from those assigned in freshman composition classesthe finding
of several surveysdoes not necessarily mean that the former are
superior.
Still, it is impossible and perhaps foolish to ignore the
implications of the surveys: The writing students do in courses other
than English composition is rarely dependent solely on their own
general knowledge base. Rather, students will be confronted with
either academic or professional writing tasks that surface in relation
to texts of various kinds (literary, historical, psychological, legal,
managerial) or data (computer, laboratory-testing, statistical,
chemical) (Scheiber, 1987, p. 15). These assignments are viewed as
a means of promoting understanding of the content presented in
subject-matter courses (Shih, 1986). Furthermore, writing academic
papers involves the recursive processes of drafting, revising, and
editing (Shih, 1986). Therefore, writing teachers can comfortably
design process-centered courses around text-based or data-based
tasks in which written language acts as a medium for learning
something else. What that something else should be is the focus of
this article.
TEACHING WRITING IN THE DISCIPLINES
Until fairly recently, students wrote the various kinds of papers
listed above only in classes other than English, with the obvious
exception of essays related to literary texts. But there has been a
growing tendency in both L1 and L2 composition instruction to add
the responsibility of teaching writing in other disciplines to the other
responsibilities of English department writing programs. It is
beyond the scope of this article to examine all the reasons for this
trend; only two of the influences are touched on in this section:
Writing Across the Curriculum, an L1 movement, and English for
specific or academic purposes, an L2 movement.
Writing Across the Curriculum
For a number of years, faculty have complained about
weaknesses in students ability to produce papers of high quality in
subject-area coursesweaknesses attributed in part to a loosening
of standards in the academy and in part to the change in the student
population in the 1960s and 1970s from a somewhat elitist,
homogeneous group to an academically underprepared group
representing diverse cultures and educational backgrounds. Partly
in response to this concern, a movement known as Writing Across
the Curriculum, modeled on a British program, took hold in
colleges and universities in the 1970s, its purpose to restore writing
34 TESOL QUARTERLY
to its central place in the curricula of institutions of learning
(Maimon, 1984). Though there have been several WAC models,
they have shared the goal of encouraging instructors in all
disciplines to make writing an inevitable part of the teaching and
learning process in their courses. In faculty development seminars
teachers of English have collaborated with subject-area instructors
so that the latter can learn more about writing.
But WAC programs have not always met with success (Russell,
1987). Obstacles such as increased teaching loads, large classes,
administrative responsibilities, lack of collegial support, pressures
to research, publish, write grants and the like (Fulwiler, 1984,
p. 119) on teachers in other disciplines have caused some to refuse
the extra burden of introducing the writing process into their
courses. Furthermore, the lack of understanding on the part of
English department faculty of the processes involved in writing
essays that are neither personal nor interpretive has led to counter-
productive faculty workshops (Applebee, 1986; Fulwiler, 1984).
Collaborative faculty workshops have only recently begun to focus
on the processes and strategies involved in scientific, technical, and
social science writing, perhaps because researchers have only
recently begun studying the writing processes of scientists (see
Gilbert & Mulkay, 1984; Myers, 1985; and, for a discussion of these
and other studies, Swales, 1987), engineers (Selzer, 1983), and social
scientists (Becker, 1986).
Faculty development seminars now bring teachers of English
together with subject-area instructors not only so that the latter can
learn more about writing, but also so that the former can learn more
about the subject area (Dick & Esch, 1985). In writing and planning
linked courses with colleagues, the English composition teachers
general goal of strengthening students writing skills is becoming the
more specific goal of training students to handle the tasks of the
other disciplines. This goal has led today to the creation of
programs such as that at Beaver College (described in Maimon,
Belcher, Hearn, Nodine, & OConnor, 1981), which are built on the
foundation of a cross-disciplinary, required freshman composition
course. L1 textbooks designed for use in such English composition
courses include instructions for writing in other disciplinescase
studies in the social sciences, laboratory reports in the natural
sciences, and so on (e.g., Bazerman, 1985; Maimon et al., 1981).
English for Specific Purposes/English for Academic Purposes
At approximately the same time the WAC movement was gaining
prominence in L1 writing instruction, the ESP movement had taken
hold in the field of L2 acquisition. ESP programs arose as a
practical alternative to the general orientation of language
teaching: cultural and literary emphases, education for life (Maher,
1986, p. 113). Taking as its focus science and technologythe fields
with the heaviest concentrations of international studentsESP
creates courses, taught by English language teachers, whose aim is
generally to fulfill the practical needs of L2 learners and specifically
to produce technicians and technocrats who are proficient in
English (Coffey, 1984). Collaboration, or team teaching, between
the language instructor and the instructor in the other discipline is
the preferred method of instruction but is possible only where
there is a high level of goodwill and mutual interest and
understanding (Coffey, 1984, p. 9).
When the students needs consist of the quick and economical
use of the English language to pursue a course of academic study
(Coffey, 1984, p. 3), English for academic purposes (EAP) is
offered. The incorporation of writing into the EAP curriculum,
however, necessitates collaboration with the instructor in the other
discipline, following what Shih (1986) calls the adjunct model of
many university composition programs for native students. But the
development of such programs for ESL students has been slow, and
Shih recommends that we learn from existing programs:
The potential contributions and possible limitations of the adjunct-
course approach for ESL programs in general, and for preparing ESL
students to handle university writing tasks in particular, remain to be
evaluated. What is needed, minimally, is cooperation from subject-area
instructors and ESL faculty willingness to step into subject-area
classrooms and keep up with class events. For ESL instructors seeking to
set up adjunct courses, the experiences of composition adjunct programs
already in place for native students are a rich source of information.
(p. 640)
The next section of this article examines studies of these NS
programs and discusses the implications of the researchers findings.
STUDIES OF WRITING PROGRAMS IN THE DISCIPLINES
AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS
Several L1 programs have been instituted to introduce students to
the methods of inquiry in various disciplines. In typical programs,
English teachers have collaborated with teachers in other
disciplines, such as biology (Wilkinson, 1985), psychology (Faigley
& Hansen, 1985), and sociology (Faigley & Hansen, 1985), linking
the compositions to subject matter in the other course. Investiga-
tions of these programs reveal some obvious advantages: Students
36 TESOL QUARTERLY
learn new forms of writing which as professionals they might need;
they have more time to write, since there is less reading due to the
fact that one subject matter is employed for two courses; and their
discussions of student papers are more informative, since
knowledge is shared among class members.
However, the disadvantages of such a program are equally, if not
more, significant, as Wilkinson (1985) and others show, and should
be of great concern to the English teacher. First of all, it is difficult
for a writing course to have a carefully planned pedagogical or
rhetorical rationale when it is dependent on another content course;
furthermore, the timing of assignments is not always optimal.
Second, the program can raise false expectations among the faculty
as well as among the students. English faculty, even when they
collaborate with content teachers, find they have little basis for
dealing with the content. They therefore find themselves in the
uncomfortable position of being less knowledgeable than their
students. Students likewise can resent finding themselves in a
situation in which their instructor cannot fully explain or answer
questions about the subject matter. Faigley and Hansen (1985)
observed collaborative courses in which completely different
criteria for evaluation were applied to students papers by the two
teachers because the English teacher did not recognize when a
student failed to demonstrate adequate knowledge of a discipline or
showed a good grasp of new knowledge.
The same phenomenon can hold true in L2 writing instruction.
Pearson (1983) finds that the instructor cannot always conveniently
divorce the teaching of form from the understanding of content
(PP. 390-397). This drawback is often mentioned only in passing in
articles recommending that English teachers use technical and
scientific materials they are not familiar with (see Hill, Soppelsa, &
West, 1982). But the lack of control over content on the part of
English teachers who teach in the other disciplines is a serious
problem. This concern is reflected in a state-of-the-art article on
English for medical purposes (EMP):
A sense of insecurity and uncertainty can sometimes be observed
amongst EMP teachers regarding their effective roles as lay persons
teaching medical English among medical professionals. . . .
Occasionally, the specialist informant, who is co-opted on to a
teaching programme, harbours suspicions about the language teachers
motives. Consider the view of the DUODECIM [Finnish Medical
Society] team of doctors: We believe that it is essential to have teachers
entirely at home in medicine and English and who have some experience
in writing and lecturing (Collan, 1974:629), and Too few teachers
combine enough experience in the use of the English language in general
and knowledge of the speciality in particular (Lock et al., 1975: cover).
Is the teacher trying to teach my subject? What if s/he gets the medical
bits wrong and misleads the learners? (Maher, 1986, p. 138)
In spite of these drawbacks, some investigators claim that it is
possible for an English teacher to conduct a course that focuses on
writing in a particular discipline if the teacher learns how a
discipline creates and transmits knowledge. This is accomplished
by examining the kinds of issues a discipline considers important,
why certain methods of inquiry and not others are sanctioned, how
the conventions of a discipline shape text in that discipline, how
individual writers represent themselves in a text, how texts are read
and disseminated within the discipline, and how one text influences
subsequent texts (Faigley & Hansen, 1985; Herrington, 1985).
This exploration, of course, would involve a great deal of
commitment, as anyone who has studied a particular field or
discipline knows. Specialists in second language instruction, for
example, have spent years acquiring the knowledge and under-
standing that enable them to recognize the issues that dominate
discussion in the field (e.g., communicative competence), the
methods of inquiry employed (e. g., ethnography), the structure of
manuscripts focusing on those issues (e.g., the TESOL Quarterly
format), the names associated with various issues (e.g., Krashen/
Input Hypothesis; Carrell/schema theory; Zamel/writing process),
and the impact a given article might have on thinking and research
in the field.
It seems that only the rare individual teacher can learn another
discipline, for each discipline offers a different system for
examining experience, a different angle for looking at subject
matter, a different kind of thinking (Maimon et al., 1981).
Furthermore, whereas the transmission of a discipline within
content courses primarily requires that students comprehend, recall,
and display information in examinations, writing in the disciplines
requires a complete, active, struggling engagement with the facts and
principles of a discipline, an encounter with the disciplines texts and the
incorporation of them into ones own work, the framing of ones
knowledge within the myriad conventions that help define a discipline,
the persuading of other investigators that ones knowledge is legitimate.
(Rose, 1985, p. 359)
The teaching of writing in a discipline, then, involves even more
specialized knowledge and skills than does the teaching of the
subject matter itself.
The difficulty of teaching writing in another discipline is
compounded when we realize that within each discipline, such as
38 TESOL QUARTERLY
the social sciences, there are subdiscipline, each with its own set of
conventions. Reflection on personal events, for example, is
considered legitimate evidence in sociology and anthropology, but
not in behavioral psychology (Rose, 1983). Even within subdisci-
pline, such as anthropology, there are other subdiscipline with
their own sets of conventions. The articles of physical anthropolo-
gists, for example, resemble those of natural scientists, whereas
those of cultural anthropologists sometimes resemble those of
literary scholars (Faigley & Hansen, 1985).
To further complicate matters, no discipline is static. In virtually
all academic disciplines there is controversy concerning the validity
of approaches, controversy that nonspecialists are usually unaware
of until it is covered in the popular media (see, for example, Silk,
1987, for a discussion of the recent debate between political and
anthropological historians). In addition, the principles of reasoning
in a discipline may change over time, even in science, which is
affected by the emergence of new mathematical techniques, new
items of apparatus, and even new philosophical precepts (Yearley,
1981). Formal scientific papers, then, though often considered final
statements of facts, are primarily contributions to scientific debate
(Yearley, 1981).
And although we may be able to read and study texts from other
disciplines, analyze genres, and thereby learn writing styles and
conventions to teach our students, we should also be aware of any
critical stance in relation to the texts. For example, Woodford
(1967), editor of a scholarly scientific research journal, has mocked
the state of scientific writing:
The articles in our journalseven the journals with the highest
standardsare, by and large, poorly written. Some of the worst are
produced by the kind of author who consciously pretends to a scientific
scholarly style. He takes what should be lively, inspiring, and beautiful
and, in an attempt to make it seem dignified, chokes it to death with
stately abstract nouns; next, in the name of scientific impartiality, he fits
it with a complete set of passive constructions to drain away any
remaining lifes blood or excitement; then he embalms the remains in
molasses of polysyllable, wraps the corpse in an impenetrable veil of
vogue words, and buries the stiff old mummy with much pomp and
circumstance in the most distinguished journal that will take it. (p. 743)
Woodford argues that this kind of writing is damaging to the
students who read it. In his experience as a teacher of graduate
students of science, he has found that it adversely affects students
ability to read, write, and think well. (English teachers, who
traditionally have seen themselves as purveyors of effective prose,
might do well to wonder why they should present such poorly
written texts to their students.)
Even studying a finished productwhether well written or not
cannot prepare English teachers to teach students how writers in
other disciplines write. A written product such as a scientific report
is merely a representation of a research process, which is finally
summarized for peers; it is not a representation of a writing process.
To teach writing, writing teachers should teach the writing process;
and to teach the writing process, they should know how to write.
But English teachers are not necessarily equipped to write in other
disciplines. Testimony to this truth appears in the ESP literature:
In the authors experience, every attempt to write a passage, however
satisfactory it seemed on pedagogic grounds, was promptly vetoed by
the Projects scientific adviser because a technical solecism of some kind
had been committed. The ESP writer, however experienced, simply
does not know when a mistake of this kind is being committed. (Coffey,
1984, p. 8)
To learn to write in any discipline, students must become
immersed in the subject matter; this is accomplished through
reading, lectures, seminars, and so on. They learn by participating
in the field, by doing, by sharing, and by talking about it with those
who know more. They can also learn by observing the process
through which professional academic writers produce texts or, if
that is not possible, by studying that process in the type of program
recommended by Swales (1987) for teaching the research paper to
nonnative-speaking graduate students. They will learn most
efficiently from teachers who have a solid grounding in the subject
matter and who have been through the process themselves.
I do not deny that programs that instruct students to write in other
disciplines can work. But a review of the L1 literature (e.g.,
Herrington, 1985) and the L2 literature (e.g., Swales, 1987) on
successful programs reveals that the teachers are themselves
immersed in the discipline. For example, Herringtons (1985) study
is an observation of senior-level engineering courses taught by
engineering faculty. And Swaless list of publications reveals a
background in scientific discourse dating back at least to 1970.
ACADEMIC WRITING TASKS FOR
ESL COLLEGE STUDENTS
English teachers cannot and should not be held responsible for
teaching writing in the disciplines. The best we can accomplish is to
create programs in which students can learn general inquiry
40 TESOL QUARTERLY
strategies, rhetorical principles, and tasks that can transfer to other
course work. This has been our traditional role, and it is a worthy
one. The materials we use should be those we can fully understand.
The writing projects we assign and evaluate should be those we are
capable of doing ourselves. The remainder of this article is devoted
to practical suggestions for incorporating academic writing into an
English composition course designed for ESL undergraduates,
without the need for linking the course with another subject-area
program.
Working With Data
According to a number of surveys discussed earlier, students are
often asked to work with data, either as observers or as participants.
These experiences can become a part of the writing class
instruction. In the L1 literature, Hillocks (1984, 1986) recommends
that we engage students in a process of examining various kinds of
dataeither objects such as shells or photographs, or sets of
information such as arguments. Students can be led to formulate
and test explanatory generalizations, observe and report significant
details, and generate criteria for contrasting similar phenomena.
Such programs have been shown to work in L2 writing classes.
Zamel (1984) has reported on a class project in which students read
published interviews with workers, then conducted and wrote up
their own interviews, and later compared the data. Likewise,
students have become amateur ethnographers, observing and
evaluating the language in their communities (Zamel, 1986). Such
tasks can produce writing that is rich and original (Zamel, 1984,
p. 202).
But since composing in a second language is an enormously
complex undertaking and because it seems that this complexity has
more to do with the constraints imposed by the writing task itself
than with linguistic difficulties (Zamel, 1984, p. 198), students need
consistent teacher input in the observation and interviewing
processes. They also need regular in-class collaborative workshops
so that they can comment on and raise questions about each others
writing.
Writing From Other Texts
Though training in observation and interviewing can undoubt-
edly be useful in students academic career, perhaps the most
important skill English teachers can engage students in is the
complex ability to write from other texts, a major part of their
academic writing experience. Students intellectual socialization
may be accomplished not only by interacting with people, but also
by encountering the writing of others (Bizzell, 1986, p. 65). As
Bazerman (1980) says, we must cultivate various techniques of
absorbing, reformulating, commenting on, and using reading if we
want to prepare our students to enter the written exchanges of their
chosen disciplines and the various discussions of personal and
public interest (p. 658).
L1 and L2 research shows the interdependent relationship
between reading and writing processes (see Krashen, 1984;
Petrosky, 1982; Salvatori, 1983; Spack, 1985b): Both processes focus
on the making of meaning; they share the act of constructing
meaning from words, text, prior knowledge, and feelings
(Petrosky, 1982, p. 22). To become better writers, then, students
need to become better readers.
Intelligent response to reading, Bazerman (1980) reminds us,
begins with an accurate understanding of a textnot just the facts
and ideas, but also what the author is trying to achieve. But this is
not easy for second language readers. Even advanced, highly
literate students struggle in a way that their NS counterparts do not.
First, there are linguistic difficulties. Overcoming them is not
simply a matter of learning specialists language because often the
more general use of language causes the greatest problem, as one of
my freshman students pointed out in a working journal (mechanical
errors corrected):
During the last few days I had to read several (about 150) pages for my
psychology exam. I had great difficulties in understanding the material.
There are dozens, maybe hundreds of words Im unfamiliar with. Its not
the actual scientific terms (such as repression, schizophrenia
psychosis, or neurosis) that make the reading so hard, but it's
descriptive and elaborating terms (e.g., to coax, gnawing
discomfort, remnants, fervent appeal), instead. To understand the
text fully, it often takes more than an hour to read just ten pages. And
even then I still didnt look up all the words I didnt understand. It is a
very frustrating thing to read these kinds of texts, because one feels
incredibly ignorant and stupid.
And there are cultural barriers, best expressed by another student
(mechanical errors corrected):
My last essay was about bowing in the Japanese culture. After discussing
my first draft with my classmates, Ramy and Luis, I felt I could get
about half of the message across. But I found it interesting that both of
them were stuck at the part where I mentioned Buddhism. I was
interested because I saw a similarity with my own experience; i.e., I am
always stuck when any essay mentions Christianity. I am not Buddhist or
42 TESOL QUARTERLY
Shintoist, but Japanese culture is so much influenced by those religions
that it is almost impossible to talk about Japan without them. The
problem is that many concepts associated with these religions are
nonexistent in Christian-influenced society (Western society). I do not
know how to explain something which does not exist in the English-
speaking world in the English language. And I do not know how to
understand something that never existed in my frame of reference. To
me it is almost as hard as solving complicated math problems.
Given the complexity of reading in a second language, it is
necessary for L2 writing teachers to become familiar with theories
and techniques of L2 reading instruction (see, for example, Dubin,
Eskey, & Grabe, 1986) if they are to guide their students to become
better academic writers.
Some of those techniques are already part of L1 and L2
composition instruction. Marginal notes, note taking, working
journals (see Spack & Sadow, 1983), and response statements
(Petrosky, 1982) can train students to discover and record their own
reactions to a text. Exercises that focus on the processes of
summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting can encourage precise
understanding of an authors style and purpose. But these
techniques should not be ends unto themselves. Rather, paraphrase,
summary, and quotation become part of students texts as they
incorporate key ideas and relevant facts from their reading into
their own writing. In this way, students can develop informed views
on the issues they pursue, building on what has already been
written.
Readings can be content based, grouped by themes, and can be
expressive or literary as well as informative. They can be drawn
from a specific field, if the area of study is one that the instructor is
well versed in, or from several fields, if the articles are written by
professionals for a general audience. Although these articles may
not be considered academic since they were not written for
academic/professional audiences, they can give students an
understanding of how writers from different disciplines approach
the same subject. Most important, they allow instructors to avoid
placing themselves in the awkward position of presenting materials
they do not fully understand. But whatever readings are chosen,
teachers of ESL students should always consider the background
knowledge that readers are expected to bring to written texts (e.g.,
knowledge of American history, recognition of the publications in
which the texts originally appeared, discernment of organizational
formats, etc. ) and help their students establish a frame of reference
that will facilitate comprehension (Dubin et al., 1986).
Writing tasks should build upon knowledge students already
possess but should also be designed to allow new learning to occur.
Students can initially write about their own experiences or views,
then read, discuss, and respond informally in writing to the assigned
readings. They can next be assigned the task of evaluating, testing
the truth of, or otherwise illuminating the texts. Students can be
directed to compare the ideas discussed in one or more of the
readings with their own experiences, or they can be asked to agree
or disagree or take a mixed position toward one of the readings.
Making specific references to the readings, they can develop ideas
by giving examples, citing experiences, and/or providing evidence
from other texts on the subject.
By sequencing assignments, the teacher can move the students
away from a primarily personal approach to a more critical
approach to the readings. The goal should not be regurgitation of
others ideas, but the development of an independent viewpoint.
Students can develop the ability to acknowledge the points of view
of others but still question and critique established authorities in a
field of knowledge (Coles & Wall, 1987, p. 299). This is a
particularly important skill for foreign students, many of whom are
products of educational systems where unquestioning acceptance
of books and teachers as the ultimate authority is the norm
(Horowitz & McKee, 1984, p. 5).
Yet other assignments, such as research projects utilizing the
library and perhaps data from interviews and/or observations, can
ask students to evaluate and synthesize material from a number of
sources in order to establish a perspective on a given subject or area
of controversy. Like the assignments discussed above, this type of
assignment allows for demonstration of knowledge and prompts
the independent thinking, researching, and learning (Shih, 1986,
p. 621) often required when students write for their other university
courses. Such an assignment also builds on skills students have
already practiced: reading, note taking, summarizing, paraphrasing,
quoting, evaluating, comparing, agreeing/disagreeing, and so on.
These skills are transferable to many writing tasks that students
will be required to perform in other courses when they write for
academic audiences. The content will vary from course to course,
and the format will vary from discipline to discipline and within
disciplines, depending on the particular constraints of individual
assignments and the particular concerns of individual teachers. But
students should have a fairly good sense of how to focus on a
subject, provide evidence to support a point or discovery, and
examine the implications of the material discussed.
44 TESOL QUARTERLY
The Process of Academic Writing
Although it might appear at first glance that asking students to
write from other textsa common writing assignment before
research on the composing process gained prominenceis a
throwback to traditional teaching methods, that is far from the case.
The kinds of writing assignments described above take place within
the context of a process-centered approach, with students
employing appropriate inquiry strategies, planning, drafting,
consulting, revising, and editing.
The students papers become teaching tools of the course. An
assigned paper is not a test of their ability to follow prescribed rules
of writing, but a chance to examine and organize, and then
reexamine and reorganize, their thinking. Because more than one
draft is read, it is not a matter of better luck next time, but try
again until you have communicated your ideas clearly. Students
can be trained to respond productively to each others work-in-
progress; thus, they can learn how collaboration among scholars
evolves. These experiences in collaborative learning help students
become socialized into the academic community (Maimon, 1983,
p. 122).
Student-teacher interaction is almost always necessary, at least
initially, for learning to take place. Over time, students internalize
various routines and procedures and take greater responsibility for
controlling the progress of an assigned task (Applebee, 1986,
p. 110). But first, teacher feedback on drafts guides students toward
producing a more tightly organized, well-focused paper that fulfills
the assignment. The final product of this effort shows them what
effective writing should look like. Their own good work becomes a
model for future academic papers, including essay examinations.
The writing classroom is the place where students are given the time
to learn how to write.
With each assignment, learning can be structured so that students
are provided with useful strategies for fulfilling the task at hand.
Assignments can be given in such a way that students understand
from the beginning what the task requires and what its evaluative
criteria will be (Herrington, 1981). Students can be helped to
deconstruct the assignment prompt (Johns, 1986, p. 247). After
they have done some informal writing, including invention
techniques (Spack, 1984), they can be given a variety of suggestions
on how to organize an academic paper that makes reference to
another authors work. For example, they can be told what might go
in the beginning (a summary of the authors article and an
identification of the particular issue the student will respond to),
middle (ideas and examples presented in logical order, never
wandering from the central issue and frequently referring back to
the reading), and ending (discussion of the implications of what has
just been written).
The constraints of the form are meant to benefit, not hamper, the
students writing. Knowledge of what usually comes at the
beginning, in the middle, and at the end of such discourse can give
students another writing strategy or cognitive framework.
However, rigid adherence to specific formulas is counterproduc-
tive. Students, especially those who were trained in a different
culture and who are now enriched by a second culture, can create
texts that may not follow explicit guidelines but that are still
effective.
Indeed, Lus (1987) discussion of her experience in writing is an
example of this phenomenon. Caught between the rigid, imitative
forms required at school in China and the inner-directed approach
of the at-home English instruction given by her Westernized
parents, she wrote a book report that was not acceptable to either
her school instructors (because she sentimentally focused on the
internal conflict of a character) or her at-home instructors (because
she praised a Revolutionary book). Yet the essay was a highly
original text.
As Coe (1987) points out, an understanding of the purpose of
formto enable writers to communicate accurately and effectively
to readerscan empower students to understand, use, and even
invent new forms for new purposes (p. 26). So, respect for form is
encouragedand necessary if students are to succeed in certain
other coursesbut flexibility is built into the course to encourage
students to respect the composing process as well.
CONCLUSION
It is ironic that the pressure on ESL/English teachers to teach the
writing of other disciplines is manifesting itself at precisely the time
when influential technological institutes such as the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology are funding programs to increase student
exposure to the humanities in an effort to produce more well-
rounded, open-minded students. The English composition course is
and should be a humanities course: a place where students are
provided the enrichment of reading and writing that provoke
thought and foster their intellectual and ethical development.
This approach includes exploratory writing tasks that deal with
making sense of thoughts and experiences. As Rose (1983) reminds
us, making meaning for the self, ordering experience, establishing
46 TESOL QUARTERLY
ones own relation to it is what informs any serious writing (p. 118).
It also includes expository writing tasks that direct students to take
an evaluative and analytical stance toward what they read. Each of
these processes makes a crucial contribution to the whole of
intellectual activity (Zeiger, 1985, p. 457).
Students will mature as writers as they receive invaluable input
from numerous classroom experiences and from teachers who are
conversant in other disciplines. To initiate students into the
academic discourse community, we do not have to change our
orientation completely, assign tasks we ourselves cannot master, or
limit our assignments to prescribed, rule-governed tasks. We can
instead draw on our own knowledge and abilities as we strengthen
and expand the knowledge and abilities of our students.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is a revised version of a paper presented at the 21st Annual TESOL
Convention in Miami Beach, April 1987. The author would like to thank Catherine
Sadow and three anonymous TESOL Quarterly reviewers for their valuable
suggestions on earlier drafts.
THE AUTHOR
Ruth Spack is Adjunct Lecturer/Special Instructor for Foreign Students in the
English Department at Tufts University and Lecturer in the English Department at
Boston University. She has published several articles on the teaching of writing,
serves as a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the TESOL Quarterly, and
is currently at work on a writing textbook for students.
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THE ACADEMIC DISCOURSE COMMUNITY
51
The Present Progressive in Discourse:
Grammar Versus Usage Revisited
SUSAN KESNER BLAND
Cornell University
Certain uses of the present progressive in informal spoken English
discourse remain difficult for even the most advanced ESL
learners. This article focuses on the increasing frequency of the so-
called stative verbs found in the progressive aspect. It is proposed
that the use of stative verbs in the progressive is not necessarily
exceptional or contrary to standard accounts of the English
present progressive; rather, it is a predictable consequence of the
meaning of the present progressive and the particular discourse
contexts in which progressive statives are found. A consideration
of the progressive from a discourse perspective provides a
principled account of the discrepancy between grammar book
and usage and offers a number of implications for ESL pedagogy.
The English present progressive offers an interesting challenge to
ESL teachers and students. Although preliminary knowledge of the
progressive is acquired early (see Krashen, 1981, and the studies
cited therein), the progressive often remains a problem for even the
most advanced ESL learner. This article presents a simple
generalization about the meaning of the English progressive, which
is intended to provide a principled explanation of its usage in
discourse. It is argued that the progressive must be considered from
a discourse perspective to be better understood.
The generalization about the progressive is stated as follows: The
progressive focuses on a change (or changes) of state. The two key
notions, which will be developed in detail, are focus and change.
This generalization accounts not only for standard uses of the pro-
gressive, but also for occurrences of progressive statives like that in
Example 1.
1
1 Examples without a source specified were constructed by the author. Those labeled
attested are based on actual collected data. The remaining examples were taken from
written sources (e.g., ESL textbooks, journal articles, etc.) as indicated.
53
1. Dan is resembling his father more and more every day.
The goal of this article is to explain how such sentences exemplify
the contribution of progressive meaning in English. This research
strategy is based on the premise, described in Smith (1983), that by
looking at some of the more innovative uses of the progressive, we
can gain insight into how the progressive is perceived and used in
discourse.
A natural question at this point concerns the place of such
sentences in an ESL curriculum. Let us defer this issue for the
moment, for once we look at all of the data, it will become apparent
that at least some of the progressive statives are quite common. But
regardless of whether these sentences should be taught to students,
the important point is that such sentences are a tool for teachers to
gain insight into the progressive.
The first part of this article provides a brief overview of
treatments of the progressive in ESL texts and in the recent
literature in linguistics and applied linguistics. This is followed by
an analysis of the progressive that attempts to synthesize relevant
features of the literature in linguistics and applied linguistics. In
support of this analysis, certain innovative progressive sentences,
namely, progressive statives, are discussed. ESL data that reflect
some of the proposals made here are then briefly examined.
PREVIOUS TREATMENTS OF THE PROGRESSIVE
An examination of ESL texts and the recent literature in linguistics
(both theoretical and applied) reveals fundamental differences in
the approaches taken.
ESL Texts
ESL texts tend to concentrate on the straightforward action in
progress meaning of the progressive, contrasting it to the simple
present. For example, intermediate and advanced ESL texts such as
Azar (1981, 1985), Dart (1978), Praninskas (1975), Frank (1972), and
Davis (1977) typically provide sentences such as those in Examples
2 and 3, which portray the action in progress at the moment of
speaking or at a particular time, not necessarily the present moment.
2. Im speaking now.
3. Hes writing a book this year.
The contrast between the notion of progressive events and
nonprogressive states is usually only briefly mentioned. Typically, a
54 TESOL QUARTERLY
list of statives (often called nonaction verbs) is given. Table 1 is
similar to the list of statives found in Azar (1981) and other ESL
texts. Generally, ESL texts state that these verbs and others like
them (the list, of course, is far from complete) resist the progressive.
However, the inadequacy of such an approach becomes apparent
when one considers the varying tendencies among stative verbs to
occur in the progressive and the fact that some verbs are clearly
more stative than others. (See Sag, 1973, for further details on this
point about statives, and Bland, 1988, for a discussion of a hierarchy
of the progressivizability of various stative verbs according to
their contexts.)
TABLE 1
Nonaction Verbs
A few ESL texts do list progressive statives as exceptions to a pro-
gressive rule. Dart (1978) provides the following examples:
4a. Youre being foolish.
b. This operation is costing a lot.
c. I am loving these moments with you. (p. 77)
For the most part, however, such sentences are not included in ESL
texts.
Finally, ESL texts typically do not pay explicit attention to the
different effect that the progressive has on different types of verbs,
a point that is taken up shortly.
Linguistic and Applied Linguistic Accounts of the Progressive
Linguistic accounts of the progressive provide interesting
discussions of the notion of events versus states (see Comrie, 1976;
Leech, 1971; Sag, 1973; Smith, 1983) and of aspect as a discourse
THE PRESENT PROGRESSIVE 55
notion (see especially Smith, 1983). The literature in linguistics also
tends to focus on the different effects of the progressive on
different types of event verbs (see Leech, 1971; Vlach, 1981).
Goldsmith and Woisetschlager (1982) present a revealing analysis of
the simple present versus the present progressive.
In the recent literature in applied linguistics, Richards (1981) and
Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman (1983) also provide interesting
discussions of the event/state contrast and the effect of the progres-
sive on different types of verbs. These accounts tend to focus on the
notion of incompleteness and its manifestations as the semantic
contribution of the progressive. The analysis presented here, though
compatible with those by Richards and by Celce-Murcia and
Larsen-Freeman in several respects, especially with regard to the
semantics of aspect from a discourse perspective, emphasizes
instead the notion of change.
AN ANALYSIS OF THE PROGRESSIVE
The following analysis, which synthesizes discussions in the
recent literature in linguistics and applied linguistics, presents a
more complete picture of the progressive than that usually given in
ESL texts. (A more detailed review of both recent and traditional
treatments of the progressive can be found in Bland, 1985.) The
analysis includes a discussion of events and states.
Events
The notion of event is important because virtually all verbs
referring to events can be put into the progressive. Basically, an
event is an occurrence of some kind, a situation in which something
happens, that is, some sort of change takes place. Although event
has been chosen here as a technical term that contrasts with state,
the terms occurrence or dynamic situation might be considered
more descriptive. This is because certain preconceived notions
about the word event in English sometimes make it difficult for us
to conceive of certain situations as events. For example, the
following situations are not typically thought of as events, though
theoretically they are:
5a. Shes blinking her eyes.
b. Hes coughing his head off.
The importance of events in this discussion of the progressive is that
they involve change and that therefore they have what Comrie
56 TESOL QUARTERLY
(1976) calls internal temporal structure (p. 24). They have
beginnings and endings and something, no matter how brief, going
on in between.
Figure la below is meant to depict an event. The vertical lines
represent the temporal boundaries, and the wavy lines represent the
changes going on during the event. Following Comrie (1976), we
can say that the progressive makes explicit reference to the internal
structure of dynamic situations. That is, the reason for using the pro-
gressive is typically to refer to the changes in between the
boundaries in Figure la.
FIGURE 1
Representations of Events and States
Dynamic situations can be analyzed into distinct phases due to
the fact that they involve change. Thus, the generalization proposed
earlier is really a simplification of the following characterization of
the progressive based on Comrie (1976): The progressive focuses on
the unfolding of the event, which is made up of distinct individual
phases.
Depending on the type of verb put into the progressive, different
types of change or distinct phases are focused upon. In Example 6
below, the focus is on the iterative motion of these progressive
activities. Figure lb depicts the iterative motion of the events
running on the beach and nodding his head.
6a. Jan is running on the beach.
b. Joe is nodding his head.
With the verbs in Example 7, the progressive focuses on progress
toward an end. Figure lC illustrates the distinct progressive stages
involved in these events.
7a. Tom is painting a picture.
b. The ship is arriving.
Comrie (1976) proposes that this dynamic view of the progressive
may account for the meaning of temporariness also conveyed by
the progressive. For example, a dynamic view of Example 8a below
is that it focuses on the situation as a phase or a stage, suggesting
change from the more permanent circumstance in Example 8b.
8a. Im living in New York.
b. I live in New York.
Similarly, Example 9 presents the situation as a phase, not as a
permanent situation or as a characteristic of the speaker.
9. Im wearing a jacket.
Notice, however, that internal change does not appropriately
characterize the situations in Examples 8a and 9. That is, neither
Figures la, lb, nor lC woul d appropri atel y depi ct them.
Nevertheless, the notions of boundaries and change are implicit.
According to Smith (1983), the progressive sets up the expectation
for change, and in this sense it conveys the notion of temporariness.
The last important point about the internal structure of events is
that it gives us insight into why certain event verbs either resist the
progressive or occur infrequently in the progressive. These are
basically event verbs that entail instantaneous change, such as the
verb phrases in Example 10.
10. recognize the woman
realize his mistake
discover the truth
The difficulty in putting these verb phrases into the progressive
appears to be due to the difficulty in stretching out or looking
inside of what is really an instantaneous occurrence. If they are put
into the progressive, as in Example 11 below, they tend to mean
inception of the event, for example, Joe is beginning to recognize
the woman. By signaling inception, they show change.
11. Joe is
58
recognizing the woman.
realizing his mistake.
discovering the truth.
TESOL QUARTERLY
Certain other verbs that entail instantaneous change can be put
into the progressive with the following results. In Example 12, the
progressive focuses on a process which, if continued in the same
characteristic way, will lead to the respective end points die and
win. (Vlach, 1981, presents an in-depth analysis of these verbs in the
progressive.)
12a. Tom is dying.
b. Mark is winning.
The progressive in Example 13 focuses on the preparatory
procedures leading to the end point, that is, the moments just
preceding the end point. Example 13a, therefore, might focus on
the entry of the ship into the harbor, and Example 13b might focus
on the reduction in altitude and the lowering of the landing gear.
13a. The ship is arriving.
b. The plane is landing.
States
In contrast to the picture of events that has been described, states
can be depicted as a straight line, which represents the fact that all
parts of a state are the same, that is, the first moment of a state is the
same as any other. According to Smith (1983), states are homogene-
ous, stable situations that lack internal structure (p. 490). States lack
shift or variation; they are without activity and successive stages. In
other words, states consist of undifferentiated moments (p. 490).
Neither beginnings nor endings are integral to states, even though we
may speak of such boundaries (e.g., I knew the answer; I dont know
it any more). Once a change takes place, a new state is said to come
into existence. In contrast, a number of changes typically make up
the same event (see Figures la, lb, and lc).
This discussion of states suggests why stative verbs typically resist
the progressive. Since there is no relevant internal structure to states
(i.e., no stages progressing toward an end that can be focused
upon), there would seem to be no need for progressive statives.
Why, then, do they occur in discourse? The remainder of this article
deals with this question.
PROGRESSIVE STATIVES
The main reason that statives can combine with the progressive is
due to the aspectual nature of the progressive. The progressive
presents a situation from a certain perspective. This is where the
notion of focus comes in. Let us consider aspect as a spotlight on a
stage, which focuses on different parts of the temporal contour of a
situation (R. Hendricks, personal communication, November 4,
1980). As we have seen in Example 8, the same situation (i.e., the
same objective reality) can be viewed from two different
perspectives.
What really happens in the case of progressive statives is that
speakers endow certain states with features of event verbs. By
choosing the progressive as opposed to the more usual simple
present form, the speaker can convey slight differences in the
meaning and function of stative verbs. The progressive makes the
stative verbs act as if they were nonstates by imposing some sort of
dynamics (i.e., change) on the stative situations. This notion of
change is conveyed by progressive statives in several different
ways. For ease of discussion, therefore, I have divided the progres-
sive statives into several groups. (Although there may be some
overlap in these divisions, this should not detract from the main
objectives of this discussion. )
Let us consider the first group:
14a. Im hating this weather. (attested)
b. Im actually liking this play. (Smith, 1983, p. 497)
c. Im loving these moments with you. (Dart, 1978, p. 77)
d. The whole family is wanting to go to the Bahamas for Easter.
(King, 1983, p. 131)
The sentences above represent the most common type of progres-
sive statives. They are frequent in conversation, and they do appear
in some ESL texts as exceptions to the progressive (e. g., Example
14c). These examples are mainly verbs of emotion, desire, and
attitude. The states to which they refer are presented as events in
the sense that their progressive forms convey the dynamism of
actions or processes. Most important, they convey change by
suggesting that something is going on.
Why are they used? First of all, the immediate quality of the pro-
gressive gives more strength to the predication. These sentences are
therefore more intense, emotional, and vivid than their simple
present counterparts. (Most standard grammar book accounts of
the progressive make some reference to the emotional or vivid
overtones of the progressive; see, for example, Curme, 1931;
Jespersen, 1931; Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech, & Svartvik, 1985;
Zandvoort, 1962.) Thus, with emotions like love, hate, and so on, the
60 TESOL QUARTERLY
progressive expresses the strength and force of these states. Such
progressive statives are often found with various kinds of modifiers
to further emphasize the immediacy and intensity of the situation
(see Examples 14e and 14g), and many of these sentences are also
likely to have emphatic intonation. Finally, it should be added that
as expressions of emotion, desire, and attitude, it is probably no
coincidence that almost all of the sentences in Example 14 are in the
first person. The first person is, after all, most conducive to
expressing feelings.
The effect of vividness, however, is not necessarily limited to this
class of verbs, as Example 15 demonstrates.
15. A photograph of Grandma and Grandpa is sitting on the
mantelpiece, as it has been for 30 years. (Goldsmith & Woiset-
schlager, 1982, p. 85)
We could say that in this sentence the progressive has the effect of
putting us in the room with the picture. This use of the progressive
with all types of verbs is often found as a literary device that sets
the stage at the beginning of a story.
The sentences in Example 16 represent additional instances of
emphasis or intensity with other types of verbs.
16a. This operation is costing a lot. (Dart, 1978, p. 77)
b. This operation is reaIly costing us a lot.
c. Herbert is always hearing noises. (Celce-Murcia & Larsen-
Freeman, 1983, p. 72)
d. Jane is constantly working on her book. (attested)
e. [Speaker pricks herself with a needle while sewing.] Damn it! Im
always doing this. (attested)
The progressive stative in Example 16a conveys a more immediate
quality in the sense that it is more personal than the simple present
alternative This operation costs a lot. In fact, the feeling in Example
16a is probably more naturally expressed in the sentence in
Example 16b, since the progressive appears to attach a more
personal or emotional value or perspective to the sentence.
Examples 16c, 16d, and 16e also demonstrate this attachment of an
emotional value to progressive sentences. Notice that Example 16c
is a stative verb but that Examples 16d and 16e are event verbs.
Examples 16c, 16d, and 16e show a common use of the progres-
sive to convey a somewhat negative emotional comment (Celce-
Murcia & Larsen-Freeman, 1983) about an action that is often
habitual. Such sentences, which express varying degrees of
negativism, have also been called examples of colloquial hyperbole,
irritation, and mild or amused disparagement or reproof (see, for
example, Goldsmith & Woisetschlager, 1982; Leech, 1971). They are
likely to be accompanied by certain marked intonation patterns. To
sum up, let us say that the focus on behavior by the progressive may
convey some sort of comment or opinion by the speaker about that
behavior.
The sentences in Example 17 below illustrate more progressive
statives. These sentences convey temporariness or limited
duration, two meanings of the progressive discussed above.
b. Today my uncle is being Napoleon. (Leech, 1971, p. 25)
c. The car is being difficult. (Leech, 1971, p. 25)
d. Peter is believing in ghosts these days. (Smith, 1983, p. 493)
e. The river is smelling particularly bad today. (Smith, 1983, p. 493)
f. . . . its looking like rain. (King, 1983, p. 142)
g. In general, shes looking fine. (Cathcart-Strong, 1986, p. 2 of
handout)
h. They seem to be knowing it and thenpoofthey dont. (King,
1983, p. 142)
The sentences in Example 17 may be divided into two types, the
first of which (Examples 17a-c) exhibits the following structural
pattern: NP be + ing ADJ. In the second type (Examples 17d-h),
the expression of temporariness depends more strongly on an
explicit or implicit time adverbial that limits the time duration. Let
us turn first to Examples 17a-c.
The sentences in Example 17a are very common in conversation.
The progressive conveys temporary behavior by focusing on the
behavior as a change from the status quo. (Once again, note the
importance of the notion of change.) This is similar to the
explanation for Examples 8a and 9 discussed above. The sentences
in Example 17a express an observation about the present, about
present behavior. They do not characterize the behavior the way
the simple present does. Compare, for example, the sentences
Youre rude and Youre being rude. Only certain adjectives,
however, are appropriate in this sentence patternadjectives that
typically describe a situation that the subject can control (i.e.,
change) or at least pretend to control. Thus, the sentence in
Example 18 is ungrammatical (indicated by an asterisk).
18. *Youre being white as a ghost.
The verbs in Examples 17b and 17c can be paraphrased as
pretend or act: Hes acting/pretending to be like Napoleon.
Example 17c is particularly interesting because it also conveys
62 TESOL QUARTERLY
personification of the car. The novelty of this sentence lies in its
implicit reference to agency via the progressive: A verb in the pro-
gressive typically refers to an event, and an event typically has an
animate subject that controls or causes the change.
The second type of progressive statives expressing temporariness
are those in Examples 17d-h. The importance of the explicit or
implied time adverbial is due to the fact that states do not include
change. Therefore, an explicit time adverbial in Examples 17d and
17e satisfies a condition for the use of the progressive by
introducing the limited duration that implies change. Notice that in
some cases, such as Example 17d, the lack of a time adverbial
would make the sentence less grammatical. Thus, the sentence Peter
is believing in ghosts is less acceptable without the adverb. In other
cases, such as Examples 17f and 17g, the use of the progressive itself
conveys a focus on the present moment. Example 17h may be said
to express limited time duration by virtue of its meaning, with seem
and the progressive supporting this conveyed notion of temporari-
ness.
The third group of progressive statives is probably the most
interesting because it provides more examples of stative verbs like
know and resemble, which are generally much more resistant to the
progressive than the other stative verbs discussed. Because of these
differences among stative verbs, it is an overgeneralization to tell
ESL students that stative verbs do not occur in the progressive.
Ideally, a listing of stative verbs should be expressed in terms of
more and less stative.
Let us now consider the data:
19a. John is knowing the answer more and more often this semester.
(Smith, 1983, p. 498)
b. Young kids are knowing more and more about sex and violence
these days. (attested)
c. The babys resembling his father more and more every day. (Sag,
1973, p. 88)
d. These examples are gradually seeming less and less unacceptable
to me. (Smith, 1983, p. 498)
e. Im understanding more and more about quantum mechanics as
each day goes by. (Comrie, 1976, p. 36)
f. . . . its looking worse and worse. (King, 1983, p. 142)
g. John is resembling his great-uncle these days. (Smith, 1983, p. 483)
Smith (1983) describes the so-called states in these examples as
being viewed dynamically on a continuum of intensity or
frequency. They involve change over time and act somewhat like
events in these sentences. The progressive introduces change in
these states by focusing on the differences in degree among classes
of related states. This is illustrated in Example 20 and schematically
in Figure ld.
20. [The baby resembles his father]1, [The baby resembles his father
(more)]2, [The baby resembles his father (even more)]3 . . .
Figure ld suggests that the progressive acts as a quantifier over
the state, in the sense that it creates a number of related states
([
] 1 , [ ]2, etc.) showing degrees of change (S.
McConnell-Ginet, personal communication, April 12, 1985). Note
that this does not imply that we think of states as dynamic events
with a lot going on inside them, as seen in Figure la.
2
Rather, it
suggests that we think of groups of related states. The differences
between the groups of related states shown in Example 20 and in
Figure ld, for example, imply change over time; in this sense, they
can be viewed as a succession of stages. The adverbial phrases more
and more, less and less, and worse and worse are obviously quite
important in imposing the progressive meaning just described.
Example 19g, however, differs from the others, since it does not
have one of these adverbial phrases. Instead, it has the time
adverbial these days, which suggests change from before. The
change is conveyed by a possible inceptive interpretation: John is
beginning to resemble his great uncle.
Let us now turn to the final group of examples:
21a. Are you liking it here? (attested)
b. Is she liking her new car? (King, 1983, p. 142)
c. Im hoping youll give us some advice. (Leech, 1971, p. 24)
d. Were wondering if you have any suggestions. (Leech, 1971, p. 24)
e. Im guessing that youre French. (King, 1983, p. 142)
f. She is thinking that she wants to go home. (Smith, 1983, p. 493)
g. No, Im thinking that Id like a bit of a higher heel anyway.
(attested)
h. I am remembering now. (Smith, 1983, p. 498)
i. Im not doubting your word, but . . . (Smith, 1983, p. 493)
These sentences can be divided into two major groups (a-e and f-i),
the first of which is typical in informal conversation and very
frequent in questions. Example 21a was spoken by a person at an
informal party given in honor of a new neighbor. In this context,
Are you liking it here? was actually much more polite than Do you
like it here? The latter would have been more director abrupt. My
impression in observing this conversation was that the indirectness
2 Smith (1983) argues that these examples are not progressive statives at all, but rather
dynamic situations (i.e., events) because of the change over time. However, Smith appears
to ignore the stative meaning of these verbs, which I have tried to illustrate in Example 20
and in Figure ld.
64 TESOL QUARTERLY
of the progressive question allowed for more hedging or a more
descriptive and anecdotal answer. In other words, it took the
respondent off the hook by requiring less of a value judgment on
her part.
The use of the progressive for politeness is probably more typical
in British English and more frequent in some idiolects and dialects
than others. Why does the progressive convey politeness? Let us say
that the progressive is the weaker, more indirect form in certain
situations because it does not assert (or question) general truths; it
merely comments about more immediate behavior or situations. It
is therefore less formal or binding and more temporary or
contingent in its description. In this sense it is weak and non-
characterizing as compared with the simple present (see Goldsmith
& Woisetschlager, 1982).
This discussion of the progressive for politeness appears to
present a contradiction: In Example 14 the progressive was said to
have a strengthening effect, whereas in Examples 21a-e it has a
weakening effect on many of the same verbs. Notice, however, that
the sentences in Example 14 and Examples 21a-e serve different
functions in discourse: The former represent statements, whereas
the latter represent questions or sentences that function as questions.
The conclusion that we can draw here is that not only does the pro-
gressive have different effects on different types of verbs, but it also
has different effects on different speech acts.
Examples 21 f-i also show evidence of the weakening effect of the
progressive. Unlike the sentences in Examples 21a-e, however,
these sentences do not function as questions. They represent
statements in which verbs of mental activity and attitude take on an
inceptive quality, for example, Im starting to think . . ., Im
starting to remember . . . The progressive appears to weaken what
could otherwise be a more definitive expression of opinion or
attitude. The sentence in Example 21g, for instance, served as a
polite response to a somewhat aggressive shoe salesman. Here the
use of the progressive allowed the speaker to hedge, since she had
not really made up her mind yet about buying the shoes.
ESL ERRORS
Let us now turn to some conversational errors that are related to
the progressive analysis presented in this article. Examples 22 and
23 are from a German speaker, Example 24 is from a French
speaker, and Example 25 is from a Hebrew speaker.
22. A: Do you know Sapsucker Woods?
B: *Yes, my wife is often going there with the children. (attested)
23. *He is a character who is scaring everyone. (attested)
24. *Look! She doesnt wear a sweater [= shes not wearing a sweater].
(attested)
25. *Hes a man who is known for being innovative and imaginative in
the terrorism they are doing [= acts of terrorism they commit].
(attested)
Examples 22, 23, and 25 are instances of overuse of the progressive.
This appears to be the main problem with advanced speakers. The
reasons for such overuse of the progressive need to be investigated
further. It appears, however, that such errors may indeed derive
from inadequate knowledge of the meaning and functional range of
both the progressive and the simple present. Example 22 represents
a problem with adverbs. It is quite possible that this sentence was
produced by analogy to a sentence like Shes always going there,
which is a grammatical sentence with a possible negative
connotation like Examples 16c-e. Thus, in addition to the incorrect
combination of adverb and present progressive, the possible
negative connotation or emotional comment conveyed by this type
of sentence is not supported by the context.
The grammatical use of always with the progressive brings up a
related point concerning the use of adverbs with progressive
sentences, namely, that adverbs are not always optional. Consider
the following:
26. Why doesnt Ed have any money?
a. Hes buying designer clothes (these days).
b. Hes (always) buying designer clothes.
Examples 26a and 26b are much less acceptable without the
adverbs in parentheses. The fine line between acceptability and
unacceptability may confuse students unless they understand the
role of adverbs in progressive sentences and unless they are
required to use them. As another illustration of this point, consider
the fact that Example 23 would have been considerably better with
always: He is a character who is always scaring everyone.
It is also interesting that Example 23 becomes more acceptable
when it is not an introductory sentence with the indefinite article a,
but rather a sentence whose subject has already been referred to in
discourse, as the definite article the suggests in He is the character
who is scaring everyone. This provides more evidence for the use of
the simple present for characterizing in general versus the use of the
present progressive for describing something more immediate or
specific. Examples 24 and 25 represent similar problems with the
notion of characterizing something, in contrast to merely
commenting on a particular situation or a particular behavior.
66 TESOL QUARTERLY
CONCLUSION
The innovative uses of the progressive discussed in this article are
important to ESL teachers, curriculum developers, and materials
writers for several reasons: (a) They tell us a great deal about
speakers perceptions of the meaning, range, and scope of the pro-
gressive; (b) they complement a communicative approach to ESL
by focusing on the function of the progressive in discourse, for
example, its use in complaining, requesting, questioning, hedging,
and so onuses that are not currently stressed in ESL texts; and (c)
they force us to reassess constantly the relationship between the
grammar book and the language students are apt to encounter.
This discussion of the innovative uses of the progressive also
suggests a number of directions for further research. For example,
it would be useful for ESL teachers, materials writers, and
curriculum developers to have access to empirical data on the actual
frequency of these innovative uses of the progressive in natural
spoken discourse as compared with uses of the simple present and
the more standard uses of the progressive. Furthermore, as
suggested earlier, studies of the acquisition of the English progres-
sive by nonnative speakers of various L1 backgrounds could
empirically test various aspects of the analysis presented here, as
well as provide insight into the apparent overuse of the progressive
by ESL learners.
In conclusion, the points raised in this study clearly illustrate a
comment made by Leech (1971) about the progressive in colloquial
English: This is an area of usage which is unstable at the present
time, and is probably undergoing continuing change (p. 26).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Earlier versions of this article have been presented at NYS TESOL, Syracuse, NY,
1985; TESOL 86, Anaheim, CA; and Harvard University Summer ESL Staff
Seminars, 1986. For their advice and encouragement, I gratefully acknowledge
Deborah Campbell, Chris Feak, Susan Lanzano, Anne Dow, and Karen Price. A
special debt of gratitude goes to Sally McComell-Ginet, for the hours of discussion
on the progressive, during which many of these ideas began to take shape. And
finally, I would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their constructive
comments.
THE AUTHOR
Susan Kesner Bland, Acting Assistant Professor at Cornell University, is currently
involved in teacher training and computer-assisted language learning research. She
has taught university and adult education ESL/EFL in the United States and
abroad, and linguistics and applied linguistics at Cornell University. Her research
interests include pedagogic grammar, discourse analysis, and the lexicon.
REFERENCES
Azar, B.S. (1981). Understanding and using English grammar. Englewood
Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Azar, B.S. (1985). Fundamentals of English grammar. Englewood Cliffs,
NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Bland, S.K. (1985). The action nominal in English. Unpublished doctoral
dissertation, Cornell University.
Bland, S.K. (1988). On the progressivizability of so-called stative verbs.
Unpublished manuscript, Cornell University.
Cathcart-Strong, R. (1986, March). Quantitative discourse analysis and
ESL. Paper presented at the 20th Annual TESOL Convention, Anaheim,
CA.
Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (1983). The grammar book: An
ESL/EFL teachers course. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Comrie, B. (1976). Aspect. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Curme, G. (1931). A grammar of the English language (Vol. 3). Boston:
Heath.
Dart, A.K. (1978). ESL grammar workbook 1. Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall.
Davis, P. (1977). English structure in focus. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Frank, M. (1972). Modern English. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Goldsmith, J., & Woisetschlager, E. (1982). The logic of the English pro-
gressive. Linguistic Inquiry, 13, 79-89.
Jespersen, O. (1931). A modern English grammar, Part IV (Vol. 3).
London: Allen and Unwin.
King, L.D. (1983). Tense, orientation, and aspect. Lingua, 59, 101-154.
Krashen, S.D. (1981). Second language acquisition and second language
learning. Cambridge: Pergamon Press.
Leech, G.N. (1971). Meaning and the English verb. London: Longman.
Praninskas, J. (1975). Rapid review of English grammar (2nd ed.).
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G., & Svartvik, J. (1985). A
comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman.
Richards, J.C. (1981). Introducing the progressive. TESOL Quarterly, 15,
391-402.
Sag, I. (1973). On the state of progress on progressives and statives. In C.J.-
N. Bailey&R. Shuy (Eds.), New ways of analyzing variation in English
(pp. 83-95). Washington, DC: Georgetown university Press.
Smith, C.S. (1983). A theory of aspectual choice. Language, 59, 479-501.
Vlach, F. (1981). The semantics of the progressive. In P. Tedeschi & A.
Zaenen (Eds.), Tense and aspect (pp. 271-292). New York: Academic
Press.
Zandvoort, R.W. (1962). A handbook of English grammar (2nd ed.).
London: Longman.
68 TESOL QUARTERLY
Professors Reactions to the
Academic Writing of
Nonnative-Speaking Students
TERRY SANTOS
California State University, Los Angeles
The study reported in this article investigated the reactions of 178
professors to two 400-word compositions, one written by a
Chinese student and the other by a Korean student. The
professors, 96 of whom were in the humanities/social sciences and
82 of whom were in the physical sciences, were each asked to rate
one of the two compositions on six 10-point scales, three of which
focused on content (holistic impression, development, and
sophistication) and three of which focused on language
(comprehensibility, acceptability, and irritation). The results were
as follows: (a) Content received lower ratings than language; (b)
professors found the errors highly comprehensible, generally
unirritating, but academically unacceptable, with lexical errors
rated as the most serious;(c) professors in the humanities/social
sciences were more lenient in their judgments than professors in
the physical sciences; (d) older professors were less irritated by
errors than younger professors, and nonnative-speaking professors
were more severe in their judgments than native speakers. The
results suggest the need for greater emphasis on vocabulary
improvement and lexical selection.
Within the past several years, a previously unexamined aspect of
error evaluation has begun to generate interestthat of professors
judgments of, and subjective reactions to, errors in the writing of
nonnative-speaking (NNS) students. As this segment of the student
population in the United States has grown, the demands on ESL
writing programs and instructors have also increased. Conse-
quently, there is a need to establish firmer instructional priorities in
the teaching of composition. One way to do this is to investigate the
reactions of the audience to whom the writing of NNS students is
directed: their professors (Santos, 1984; Secord, 1978; Sheorey &
Ward, 1984; Vann & Meyer, 1984; Vann, Meyer, & Lorenz, 1984).
69
The purpose of the study reported here was to investigate
professors reactions to the academic writing of NNS students. The
following questions were posed: (a) What is the difference between
professors ratings of the content of an essay written by a NNS
student and their ratings of the language? (b) What is the rank
ordering of comprehensibility, acceptability, and irritation for
errors in the writing of those students, as judged by professors in the
physical sciences and the humanities/social sciences? (c) Do
professors in the physical sciences and the humanities/social
sciences exhibit similar patterns in their judgments? (d) What
factors are significant in professors ratings? For example, are the
judgments of professors who are themselves NNSs similar to those
who are native speakers (NSS)?
Error evaluation has been broadly defined as NSs reactions to
NNSs errors. Various types of reactions are encompassed under
this umbrella notion. Comprehensibility is the degree to which the
interlocutor understands what is said or written. Comprehensibility
has been tested both through objective and subjective measures, for
example, repetition, restatement, and Likert-scale rankings (Bansal,
1969; Dimitrijevic & Djordjevic, 1971; Guntermann, 1978; Olsson,
1973).
Irritation has been defined as the result of the form of the
message intruding upon the interlocutors perception of the
communication. . . . The irritation continuum ranges from un-
concerned, undistracted awareness of a communicative error to a
conscious preoccupation with form (Ludwig, 1982, p. 275). Some
researchers (Johansson, 1978; Ludwig, 1982) consider comprehensi-
bility and irritation inextricably linked, equating lower comprehen-
sibility with higher irritation, and vice versa, whereas others
(Santos, 1984; Vann & Meyer, 1984; Vann et al., 1984) separate the
two, regarding irritation more as a function of the expectations and
characteristics of interlocutors, who may become irritated by errors
even when the message is comprehensible to them.
Acceptability is the degree to which the interlocutor regards the
speech or writing of the NNS as approximating the target language
norms. Acceptability thus appeals to judgments about language,
whereas irritation appeals to subjective reactions (the bother
factor), which, however, may also include notions of acceptability.
METHODOLOGY
This study employed a split-plot design (Pedhazur, 1982, p. 562)
to answer the research questions. Two compositions written by
70 TESOL QUARTERLY
NNS students (one a speaker of Chinese, the other of Korean) were
selected for evaluation; two sets of ratings were elicited (one for
overall content and language, the other for individual errors); and
two types of professors were consulted (those in the physical
sciences and those in the humanities/social sciences). In addition, all
of the professors were asked to complete a questionnaire designed
to determine which independent variables (sex, age, native
language, etc.) might be significant in their ratings.
Subjects
A total of 178 professors at the University of California, Los
Angeles (UCLA), participated in the study. They were selected on
the basis of their availability at the time of data collection and their
willingness to participate in the study. They ranged in age from 27
to 77, with a median age of 45.6 years. Of the 178, 156 were males,
22 females; 144 were NSs of English, 34 were not; 96 represented
departments in the humanities/social sciences, and 82 represented
schools/departments in the physical sciences.
The participants were divided into four groups on the basis of
availability and representation in either the humanities/social
sciences or the physical sciences. Every effort was made to maintain
a balance in each group between the disciplines. Group 1 consisted
of 10 professors who read, rated, and corrected the composition
written by the Chinese student. Group 2 consisted of 10 professors
who performed the same tasks on the composition written by the
Korean student. The 80 professors in Group 3 read and rated a
partially corrected version of the Chinese students composition,
and the 78 professors in Group 4 performed the same tasks on the
Korean students composition.
Materials
Subjects were asked to complete a questionnaire that requested
the following information: department; sex; age; native language;
proficiency in speaking other languages; the approximate
percentage of NNS students in the professors classes; whether these
students tended to be undergraduates or graduates; whether the
professor had a policy in dealing with the writing of NNS students;
and which of the following statements most closely corresponded to
the way the professor generally dealt with the writing of NNS
students: (a) does not correct errors and does not downgrade them,
PROFESSORS REACTIONS TO WRITING 71
(b) does not correct and does downgrade them, (c) corrects but
does not downgrade, (d) corrects and downgrades.
The two compositions were selected from among more than 100
written by NNSs referred to the ESL section of the English
Department at UCLA. To fulfill their composition requirement,
such students must successfully complete either English 36,
Intermediate Composition for ESL Students, or English 106J,
Advanced Composition for ESL Students. Students are placed in
either English 36 or 106J on the basis of a 350- to 500-word
composition they write on a set topic in a 75-minute period. The
compositions are read and rated by two ESL writing instructors
and, in cases in which there is a difference of opinion, by a tie-
breaking third reader. (Instructions to the students and the
composition topic are given in Appendix A.)
The selection of the two compositions to be used in the study was
made on the basis of a number of criteria. First, since the vast
majority of ESL students fulfill the composition requirement by
passing English 36 (Intermediate Composition), representative
compositions at that level were chosen. Second, essays were sought
that contained a variety of representative errors, both local and
global, made by ESL students. A composite of the findings of
Tomiyama (1980), Vann and Meyer (1984), and Sheorey and Ward
(1984), who consulted the literature of error analysis and conducted
surveys of ESL instructors to determine which types of errors are
most common among ESL students, was used to compile the
following list (no ranking implied), which served as a reference
guide: articles, lexical choice, logical connectors (e.g., relative
pronouns, conjunctions), possessives, prepositions, singular/plural,
subject-verb agreement, tense, and word form.
A third consideration was that the compositions represent two
linguistic and cultural backgrounds found in large number at
UCLA. Finally, it was thought that for greater generalizability the
essays should be equal in length and employ the standard five-
paragraph system of organization and development, namely,
introduction, body (three paragraphs), and conclusion. Indeed, the
instructions to the students regarding the composition topic clearly,
though implicitly, suggest such a structure (see Appendix A).
Given the criteria for selection, the two compositions (see
Appendixes B and C) that were chosen were not radically different
from one another, although at the same time they did exhibit certain
idiosyncratic characteristics. Both conformed to the five-paragraph
structure and contained almost the same number of words (392 for
the Chinese student, 388 for the Korean). The Chinese students
72 TESOL QUARTERLY
composition consisted of 19 sentences (including one fragment), 26
T-units (a single independent clause together with all of its
modifying subordinate clauses), and 12 instances of embedding.
The Korean students composition consisted of 23 sentences, 27 T-
units, and 13 instances of embedding.
Table 1 shows how the errors in the compositions were classified.
Following Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman (1983), all grammat-
ical errors were classified as being the result of omission, a wrong
form, or a superfluous word or form. The general category of verbs
was further divided into the subcategories of agreement, auxiliary,
and so on.
TABLE 1
Classification of Errors in the Two Uncorrected Compositions
PROFESSORS REACTIONS TO WRITING
73
It should be noted that at times the classifying of errors becomes
a matter of individual interpretation and judgment. For example,
how to classify the inappropriateness of the concluding sentence of
the Chinese students composition (I should say example of first two
points I mentioned is commonly found) is problematic. The
primary problem here is not at the grammatical level but rather at
the discourse level. Therefore, the entire sentence was classified
under the error category of discourse cohesion, and the individual
grammatical errors were also counted and classified, for example,
articles and singular/plural. Furthermore, in cases when it was
difficult to determine which of two error categories was involved,
the error was entered twice. For example, the United State might
have been a spelling error or an error with singular/plural. Since
there was no way to be certain, it was classified under both
categories.
Procedures
The study consisted of two phases. In the first phase, 20
professors (10 for each composition) were presented with a typed
copy of one of the two compositions in its original, uncorrected
form and were asked to read and rate it on six 10-point scales. Three
of the scales were for content (holistic impression, development,
and sophistication) and three for language (comprehensibility,
acceptability, and irritation). The professors were then instructed to
go back over the composition and correct everything that seemed
incorrect to them. Finally, they were asked to list at the end the
problems they regarded as the most serious in the composition. No
time limit was set for the completion of these tasks.
The purpose of this first phase was to determine which of the
many errors in the two compositions appeared most salient to the
professors who read and corrected them. Of the studies of error
gravity and error evaluation in composition, only McGirts (1984)
started with natural, unaltered samples. The other studies used
either textbook passages with inserted errors (Tomiyama, 1980;
Vann & Meyer, 1984; Vann et al., 1984) or partially to extensively
corrected, revised, and manipulated paragraphs or compositions
written by NNSs (Johansson, 1978; Santos, 1984). Artificially
prepared passages allow for maximum control of the variables by
the researcher, but they also sacrifice the natural quality of
unaltered connected discourse. Furthermore, they do not allow the
NS judges to decide for themselves which errors are the most
glaring. Finally, selectively inserted errors give equal weight to each
error type by representing them only once each, an unrealistic
74 TESOL QUARTERLY
condition that ignores the frequent recurrence of certain error types
and the relatively infrequent occurrence of others. For these
reasons, authentic, unaltered compositions were used in this first
phase.
In Phase 2, the compositions were corrected for all but the most
salient errors (see Appendixes D and E), as identified by the
professors in Phase 1. The most salient errors were regarded as
those that either all 10 professors or 9 of the 10 corrected. For the
Chinese students composition, these numbered 17, and for the
Korean students, 12. Table 2 presents a list of the error types
represented in this phase.
TABLE 2
Classification of Errors in the Two Partially Corrected Compositions
Copies of the partially corrected compositions were typed, and
the same 10-point scales for content and language given in Phase 1
were used in Phase 2. In addition, the sentences containing the most
salient errors were typed separately and the errors underlined.
Following each sentence were three 10-point scales for ratings of
comprehensibility, acceptability, and irritation.
All of the professors who participated in the study were seen
personally by this researcher and were told that they should
consider the composition they were being asked to read and rate as
a piece of academic writing produced under the conditions
described in the instructions to the students. They were also told
how the terms comprehensibility, acceptability, and irritation were
meant to be interpreted.
The results reported in the following section are based on the
responses of the 158 professors (Groups 3 and 4) who participated
in Phase 2.
RESULTS
Ratings of Content Versus Language
The first research question asked whether there was a significant
difference on a 10-point scale between professors ratings of the
overall content and the language of an essay written by a NNS. The
means and standard deviations of the ratings of content and
language given by the 158 professors in Phase 2 were computed and
Duncans Multiple Range Test run, using the general linear model of
the SAS program. The results were the same for both compositions:
The content was rated significantly lower than the language. In
other words, the professors made a statistically significant
distinction between the content of the composition they read and its
language; they judged the content more severely than the language
(see Tables 3 and 4).
Order of Language Variables
The second research question asked about the order of
comprehensibility, acceptability, and irritation for the errors in the
compositions. The means and standard deviations for the ratings of
each error in the two compositions were computed and Duncans
Test run to determine if there was a significant difference among
the three language variables. The same statistically significant order
was found in both compositions. Comprehensibility received the
highest rating (7.5 for the Chinese students composition, 7.9 for the
Korean students), irritation the second highest (5.8 for the Chinese
student, 5.6 for the Korean), and acceptability the lowest (3.7 for the
Chinese student, 3.9 for the Korean). That is, the professors found
the sentences with errors highly comprehensible, reasonably
unirritating, but linguistically unacceptable. This same order also
obtained for the ratings of the overall language of the composition.
The individual errors were also rank ordered by means in four
ways: for each language variable (comprehensibility, acceptability,
irritation) and for overall means of the three (obtained by averaging
the ratings of the three variables). Table 5 gives the rank order of
errors in the Chinese students composition. The errors are
presented in order of seriousness, from most serious to least,
76 TESOL QUARTERLY
TABLE 4
Duncans Multiple Range Test for Comparison of Ratings for Overall Content and Language
TABLE 5
Rank Order of Errors in Chinese Students Composition
M
according to the overall means. The rank order of each error for
each language variable is also indicated in parentheses below the
mean ratings. The pattern that emerged shows that lexical errors in
the composition were judged to be the most serious error type. Of
the five most serious errors, four were lexical errors and one was the
single article error. No other discernible pattern of order by error
type was found. Of the seven verb errors, for example, two were
rated toward the negative end of the scale, three toward the middle,
and two toward the positive end.
Table 6 shows the rank order of errors in the Korean students
composition. Again, the lexical errors were considered the most
serious, followed by one of the three article errors. It is also
interesting to note that the double negative error (They wouldnt get
nowhere unless they used a translator) ranked as the least
acceptable and most irritating error, even though highly compre-
hensible (8.77 on the 10-point scale).
Comparison of Ratings by Professorial Field
The third research question asked whether or not professors in
the physical sciences and humanities/social sciences exhibited the
same or similar patterns in their judgments of the compositions.
This question was answered by means of several multiple regression
analyses performed with the SAS program. The first analysis
examined the overall ratings of content (holistic impression,
development, sophistication) and language (comprehensibility,
acceptability, irritation) by professors in the physical sciences and
humanities/social sciences. The one significant difference among
the six variables was language acceptability. Professors in the
physical sciences rated the acceptability of the language of the
compositions significantly lower than did those in the humanities/
social sciences.
The second and third analyses examined the ratings of the
individual errors in the two compositions for significant differences
between the two groups of professors. In the Chinese students
composition, a clearly delineated pattern appeared. Of the 51
variables (17 sentences with errors and three 10-point scales for
each), 12 showed a significant difference, all in the same direction:
Professors in the physical sciences rated the 12 significantly lower
than did those in the humanities/social sciences. Of the 12, 10 were
for irritation and 2 for comprehensibility.
The results for the ratings of errors in the Korean students
composition were less clear-cut. Of the 36 variables (12 sentences
with errors and three 10-point scales for each), 11 showed a
80 TESOL QUARTERLY
significant difference for the two groups of professors. Five
variables, all for language acceptability, were rated lower by the
humanities/social science professors, despite the fact that these
were the same professors who had rated the overall language of the
compositions significantly higher for acceptability than had the
physical science professors. On the other hand, 6 variables, 5 for
comprehensibility and 1 for irritation, were rated significantly
lower by the physical science professors.
Based on these results, two generalizations might be made. First,
only professors in the physical sciences were irritated by certain
errors. Second, the humanities/social science professors exhibited a
remarkable degree of tolerance in their ratings. Of the 93 variables
(6 for overall content and language, 51 for the errors in the Chinese
students composition, and 36 in the Korean students), they rated
only 5 errors significantly lowerless acceptablethan did their
colleagues in the physical sciences.
Signiflcant Factors in Professors Ratings
The fourth research question asked what factors might account
for the professors ratings. This question was answered by
performing a stepwise multiple regression analysis; the ratings for
overall content and language of the compositions were regressed on
the items on the questionnaire that the professors completed. Two
items proved to be significant: age and native language. The age of
the professors was a significant factor in the ratings of one variable:
the degree of irritation aroused by the language of the composi-
tions. The older professors displayed a lower degree of irritation in
their ratings than did the younger professors. For native language,
the 32 NNS professors rated the acceptability of the language of the
compositions significantly lower than did the 126 NS professors.
DISCUSSION
In brief, this study yielded the following results: The language of
the essays written by the two NNS students was rated higher than
the content; the rank order of errors in the compositions, according
to the professors ratings, was (from highest to lowest) comprehen-
sibility, irritation, and acceptability; the error type considered most
serious was the lexical error; humanities/social science professors
tended to be more lenient in their judgments than did physical
science professors; and two variablesage and native language
were significant in the professors ratings of some aspect of the
language, but not of the content. The older professors rated
TABLE 6
Rank Order of Errors in Korean Students Composition
M
the language less irritating than did the younger professors, and
those who were themselves NNSs gave lower ratings to the
acceptability of the language.
The findings for several of the research questions seem to lead to
the conclusion that professors are willing to look beyond the
deficiencies of language to the content in the writing of these NNS
students. This conclusion would account for the fact that the
content of the essays was rated significantly lower than the
language. That the professors considered the errors in the essays
linguistically unacceptable but nonetheless gave significantly higher
ratings to the language than to the content also suggests they were
both willing and able to make a distinction between the content and
language of the writing of these NNS students. Put another way, it
is a mark of their tolerance that although they regarded errors as
linguistically unacceptable, the professors still judged content and
language independently, to the extent that this was possible.
However, this seems not to have been possible with the error type
considered the most serious: the lexical error. It is precisely with this
type of error that language impinges directly on content; when the
wrong word is used, the meaning is very likely to be obscured.
It is also worth noting that although the physical science
professors rated the overall language of the essays significantly
lower than did the humanities/social science professors and were
more irritated by certain errors, they did not rate the content of the
essays lower than did the humanities/social science professors. This,
too, seems to support the position that professors make a distinction
between content and language, regardless of their attitude toward
errors in the language.
The fact that these professors tried to separate their judgments of
content and language may be a measure of their tolerance;
however, another interpretation is also possible. Professors are
realists and have come to accept, if not appreciate, the fact that the
writing of NNS studentsand, all too often, NS studentswill
contain numerous errors of language and that it would only be
punitive, and probably futile, to downgrade heavily for them.
The fact that the double negative error (They wouldnt get
nowhere unless they used a translator) ranked as both the least
acceptable and most irritating error in the Korean students
composition, despite its being completely comprehensible,
deserves special mention. lt seems clear that the reaction here is a
social rather than a strictly linguistic one and is undoubtedly a
transfer from attitudes toward less educated native speakers as well
as attitudes ingrained after years of prescriptive education.
84 TESOL QUARTERLY
When considering the implications of the two factors that proved
to be significant in the professors ratings of two of the three
language variables, the one that seems less amenable to explanation
is age. It seems counterintuitive that the older professors were less
irritated by the language of the essays than were the younger
professors. Yet a similar result was found by Vann and Meyer (1984)
in their second study of professors ratings of errors in verb form,
articles, and spelling. The older professors gave higher ratings to
those errors than did the younger professors. One can only
speculate why this might be so; for example, perhaps professors, as
they become older, become more realistic in their expectations of
students performance and thus more tolerant.
There seems to be a readily available explanation, however, for
why the NNS professors rated the language of the essays as less
acceptable than did the NS professors: NNS professors have
attained an extremely high level of proficiency in English and,
because of their investment of effort in the language, judge the
errors of other NNSs more severely than do NS professors.
PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS
Two findings in particularthat professors seem to make a
distinction between content and language and that lexical errors are
considered the most serioushave pedagogical implications. The
first supports the current approach to teaching writing as a process
of planning, composing, revising, and editing. NNS students need
to improve their skills in the areas that most directly affect content,
such as organizing, developing, and supporting their ideas and
arguments, and these are the areas that are given the most attention
by the process approach.
In addition, however, units on vocabulary building and lexical
selection should be incorporated into an ESL writing course.
Vocabulary has tended to be the neglected component in academic
ESL courses, but the results of this study indicate that this area
deserves closer attention. This could be done in several ways:
through the use of vocabulary exercises, such as cloze and word-
form exercises; through requiring students to keep a vocabulary
notebook based on their readings and lectures; and through
emphasis on the importance of lexical selection and the elicitation or
presentation of synonymous forms of expression. Moreover,
textbooks that deal with vocabulary for academic purposes would
be valuable supplements to texts on academic writing.
This study has attempted to incorporate the major aspects of
error evaluation in generalthat is, the notions of comprehensibil-
ity, acceptability, and irritation, and ratings of errors at sentence
and discourse levelwhile at the same time examining issues
specific to the academic settingthat is, the content/language
distinction and significant factors in professors ratings. Such
research offers many benefits to both applied linguists and ESL
instructors by adding to our understanding of the types of errors in
writing that are considered the most serious by professors who read
the writing of NNS students.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is an expanded version of a paper presented at the 20th Annual TESOL
Convention in Anaheim, March 1986. I would like to thank Marianne Celce-
Murcia, Mary McGroarty, and Leigh Burstein of UCLA for their comments on the
original manuscript.
THE AUTHOR
Terry Santos is an assistant professor in the English Department at California State
University, Los Angeles.
REFERENCES
Bansal, R.K. (1969). The intelligibility of Indian English. Hyderabad,
India: Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages.
Celce-Murcia, M., & Larsen-Freeman, D. (1983). The grammar book.
Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Dimitrijevic, N. R., & Djordjevic, D. (1971). The reliability of the
subjective assessment of the pupils pronunciation of EFL. International
Review of Applied Linguistics, 9, 245-265.
Guntermann, G. (1978). A study of the frequency and communicative
effects of errors in Spanish. Modern Language Journal, 62, 249-253.
Johansson, S. (1978). Native reactions to errors produced by Swedish
learners of English (Gothenburg Studies in English 44). Gteborg,
Sweden: Acts Universitatis Gothoburgensis.
Ludwig, J. (1982). Native-speaker judgments of second-language learners
efforts at communication: A review. Modern Language Journal, 66, 274-
283.
McGirt, D. (1984). The effect of morphological and syntactic errors on the
holistic scores of native and non-native compositions. Unpublished
masters thesis, University of California, Los Angeles.
86 TESOL QUARTERLY
Olsson, M. (1973). The effects of different types of errors in the
communication situation. In J. Svartvik (Ed.), Errata: Papers in error
analysis (pp. 153-160). Lund, Sweden: Gleerup.
Pedhazur, E. (1982). Multiple regression in behavioral research. New York:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Santos, T. (1984). Markedness theory and error evaluation: An
experimental study. Unpublished manuscript, University of California,
Los Angeles.
Secord, M. (1978). A categorization of transitional expressions in English.
Unpublished masters thesis, University of California, Los Angeles.
Sheorey, R., & Ward, M.A. (1984, March). Using non-ESL teachers
perceptions of error gravity in correcting ESL compositions. Paper
presented at the 18th Annual TESOL Convention, Houston.
Tomiyama, M. (1980). Grammatical errors and communication break-
down. TESOL Quarterly, 14, 71-79.
Vann, R.J., & Meyer, D.E. (1984, March). Error gravity: A study of faculty
opinion of ESL errors, phase 2. Paper presented at the 18th Annual
TESOL Convention, Houston.
Vann, R.J., Meyer, D. E., & Lorenz, F.0, (1984). Error gravity: A study of
faculty opinion of ESL errors. TESOL Quarterly, 18, 427-440.
APPENDIX A
Instructions to the Students and Composition Topic
Write a 350-to 500-word composition on the topic below. You will have
75 minutes in which to plan and write the essay. You should pay particular
attention to the content, organization, and grammar. Vocabulary and
punctuation should also be taken into account.
Composition Topic
There are things which are unique to each culture and which an
outsider finds difficult to understand. This lack of understanding may
lead to frustration, conflict, or a lack of appreciation of the values of the
culture. Find three things about your culture which you believe most other
people might not understand and which cause them to get a distorted
impression. Write a unified essay in which you explain these aspects of
your culture to outsiders, so that they will not misinterpret what they see
and may avoid conflicts.
APPENDIX B
Composition Written by Chinese Student (Phase 1)
Generally Chinese culture is not well understood by Western people
they think that Chineses standard of value and relation with people are
relatively hard to understand and strange. There was a large number of
Chinese migrated to the coast area of America three decades ago. Today,
in Los Angeles, Chinese form a small community in down town, called
China Town. Althought, Chinese in the United State is increased; still most
American do not understood Chinese well.
Personally I found the Chineses attitude towards others is not the same
as most Western people. When Chinese finds that there are something
wrong with their friend or they do not like the attitude of their friend, they
would not mention or compliant about it unless it is disgusting. Sometimes,
even if they really cannot take it, they would rather avoid that friend than
make a compliant.
Besides the above point, there some other cultural practices that is hard
to understand by outsiders. For example, when someone appreciate a
persons outlook belonging or thoughtfulness and tell the person what he
feels, the person may reply it is not good at all or No, not really, it is just
fine, if the person is Chinese. This may be rude to some people by dening
others opinion; but this is Chineses way of being polite by denying their
belongs is good or appreciable, and it does not mean to reject others.
Finally, Chinese is very closely related to the relative and surrounding
people comparing to other races. For instance, once one of my American
friend ask me why would not the main character in a Chinese story ran
away from home when his family tring to force him to marry a girl he does
not like or never meet. This is because in Chinese society elder is highly
respected, and one must obey the elder. And if he runs away and marry the
girl he loves, he may not accept by the society. He has lost his root, and
root is something acient Chinese would change their life for.
Modern Chinese is not so strongly related to the others in respect to the
acient Chinese. Especially those Chinese who did not born in China.
However Chinese still have that the cultural background to a certain level.
I should say example of first two points I mentioned is commonly found.
APPENDIX C
Composition Written by Korean Student (Phase 1)
There are three unique things in the Korean culture that a stranger from
outer region or other country may not understand and may lead them to a
frustration. These three things are the language, food, and the beliefs or
religions which are unique to the Korean culture.
First of all, the Korean language have been originated more than 5,000
years. Language itself may represent the whole culture. Outsiders or
foreigners who are visiting Korea may find him/her-self in frustration or in
conflict because of language that they cant understand. They wouldnt get
nowhere unless they call the translator. As they hear more and more of
Korean language they may think Koreans are speaking in all same tone
which is true. Soon after a stranger may find that the Korean culture is like
the language itself. He/she will see that the same tone which flown in the
language flow thru the culture.
88 TESOL QUARTERLY
The Korean foods are mostly made up of the vegetables, A foreigner or
visitor may find a nothing but a hot and chilly taste of vegetables. It doesnt
mean that all of the Korean are vegetarians. It is a history which explains
how come eating a meat become our least need. The Koreans use to
believe the buddhism which was the national religion. In Buddhism killing
or eating an animal was a crime. These thoughts handed down more than
a 5,000 years. In these days many Koreans does not follow it anymore but
still a forigner will not see any meat on the dining table except vegetables.
The third and last of all, religion or belief in Korea are various but are
belief which most of the Koreans still believes is a pledge that they give to
their ancestors. They (Koreans) pick one day from a yearand they
prepare very carefully for that day. They believe that when they prepare
all foods and drinks and pray, all of their ancestor who died will come eat
and drink and enjoy. These belief may be strange and unpleasant to an
outsiders but it is a very important to most Koreans.
These three kinds of culture, language, foods, and beliefs are the unique
and very important to many Koreans. A stranger or an outsider would
understand very easily if he/her tried to understand it from beginning.
APPENDIX D
Partially Corrected Version of
Chinese Students Composition (Phase 2)
Generally, the Chinese culture is not well understood by Western
people; they think that the Chineses standards, values, and relations with
people are strange and relatively hard to understand. There was a large
number of Chinese who immigrated to the West Coast of America three
decades ago. Today in Los Angeles the Chinese form a small community
in the downtown area called Chinatown. Although the Chinese population
in the United States is increased, most Americans still do not understand
the Chinese well.
Personally, I have found that the Chinese attitude towards others is not
the same as that of most Western people. When a Chinese person finds that
there are something wrong with his friend, or he does not like the attitude
of his friend, he would not mention it or complain about it unless it was
disgusting. Sometimes, if he really cannot take it, he would rather avoid
that friend than complain.
Besides the above point, there are some other cultural practices that are
hard for outsiders to understand. For example, when someone appreciate
a Chinese persons outlook belonging or thoughtfulness and tells the person
how he feels, the person may reply, It is not good at all, or No, not
really, it is just fine. This may seem rude to some people, but it is the
Chinese way of being politeby denying that their belongs are good or
appreciable. It is not meant to reject others.
Finally, the Chinese are very closely related to the relative and
surrounding people compared to other races. For instance, one of my
American friends once ask me why the main character in a Chinese story
would not ran away from home when his family try to force him to marry
a girl he does not like or never meet. This is because in Chinese society the
elders are highly respected, and one must obey them. If he ran away and
married the girl he loved, he may not accept by the society. He has lost his
root and root is something the Chinese would never change.
The modern Chinese are not as strongly bound to tradition in respect to
the ancient Chinese. This is especially true of those who did not born in
China. However, even these Chinese still have that the cultural
background to a certain degree. I should say the examples of the first two
points I mentioned are commonly found.
APPENDIX E
Partially Corrected Version of
Korean Students Composition (Phase 2)
There are three unique things in the Korean culture that a stranger from
an outer region or another country may not understand and may lead him
or her to a frustration. These three things are the language, the food, and
the religious beliefs, which are all unique to the Korean culture.
First, the Korean language have been originated more than five
thousand years. The language itself may represent the whole culture.
Visitors to Korea may find themselves frustrated or confused because they
cant understand the language. They wouldnt get nowhere unless they
used a translator. As they hear more and more of the language, they may
think all Koreans are speaking in the same tone, which is true. Soon,
strangers may find that the Korean culture is like the language itself. They
will see that the same tone which flown in the language also flows through
the culture.
Second, Korean food is mostly made up of vegetables. Foreigners may
find a nothing but a hot and chilly taste of vegetables. This does not mean
that all Koreans are vegetarians. Our history explains why eating meat is
unnecessary for us. Koreans used to believe in Buddhism, which was once
the national religion. In Buddhism, killing or eating an animal was a crime.
These thoughts handed down more than five thousand years. Today, many
Koreans does not follow Buddhism anymore, but foreigners still will not
see any meat on the table, only vegetables.
Third and last, religious beliefs in Korea are various, but are belief which
most Koreans still believe in is a pledge that they give to their ancestors.
The Koreans pick one day each year to honor their ancestors and prepare
very carefully for that day. They believe that when they prepare food and
drinks, and then pray, all of their ancestors will come to eat, drink, and
enjoy themselves. This belief may sound strange to outsiders, but it is very
important to most Koreans.
These three aspects of Korean culturelanguage, food, and religious
beliefsare the unique and very important to most Koreans. A stranger
would not be frustrated or confused if he/her understood these things
from the beginning.
90 TESOL QUARTERLY
Computer-Assisted I nstruction in
Pronunciation for Chinese Speakers
of American English
GARRY MOLHOLT
West Chester University
This article represents a synthesis of concepts from contrastive
phonology, speech processing, TESOL, and computer-assisted
instruction for the purpose of improving the communication skills
of international teaching assistants in U.S. colleges and universi-
ties. Although the focus is on speakers of Chinese, most of the
concepts are equally applicable to speakers of other East Asian
languages. Methods of interpreting and utilizing visual displays of
speech patterns are presented throughout, with examples of both
segmental and suprasegmental phonology.
Recent research in electrical engineering to produce voice-
activated machinery has resulted in the production of many
efficient and low-cost machines for analyzing pronunciation. This
article presents the results of 4 years of research at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute in the application of such machines to
language education. The research was prompted by the need to
improve the communication skills of international teaching
assistants.
In the face of the large and growing proportion of international
students and the limitations on ESL programs, effective teaching of
pronunciation is emerging as an important goal for the needs of
these students as well as those of academic institutions. Because we
still have no widely standardized entrance examination of
pronunciation, many high-quality international students with
reasonable vocabularies and grammar are admitted to universities,
even though their pronunciation of English makes them difficult to
understand.
Though the focus in this article is on the needs of Chinese
students, most of the concepts are equally applicable to speakers of
other East Asian languages, especially Japanese and Korean.
Mandarin Chinese was chosen as the L1 because of its strong
91
contrast to English and because of the large number of Chinese
students in the United States.
Methods of interpreting and using visual displays of speech
patterns in order to help international students overcome
pronunciation problems are explained throughout this article. The
examples and explanations included focus on the immediate needs
of students who must quickly improve their communication skills in
order to survive in a highly competitive environment. Though the
equipment is also useful for precise analysis of differences among
native speakers idiolects, that level of sophistication is beyond the
scope of this article.
THE ADVANTAGES OF COMPUTER DISPLAYS
OF PRONUNCIATION
Traditional methods of communicating with students about
pronunciation rely heavily on subjective evaluations or, even in the
best of language labs, on student recognition of the differences
between their pronunciation and that on the master tape. Many
errors go unchanged. In these settings it is easy to imagine the
following exchange reported to me by an ESL teacher working on
the aspiration of initial /p/.
Teacher: OK, I will hold a lit match in front of your mouth so that when
you say the word pat, you will blow out the match.
Student: Bat.
Teacher: No. /p
h
/. pHat.
Student: Bat.
Teacher: Hurry up. You will burn my fingers.
Student: Bat.
Teacher: OK. This time I will appeal to your self-interest. You hold the
match.
Student: Bathhh. See it went out.
With a computer display of pronunciation comparing a native
speakers model with attempts to match it, we can instantly show
students objective information about the location, extent, type, and
significance of the error, as well as the progress made in correcting
the error.
In Figure 1, made on a Speech Spectrographic Display (SSD)
8800, which provides instant displays of speech signals, we can see
why the teacher thought the student was saying bat. The distance
between points 1 and 2 in Figure la is much greater than the
distance between points 1 and 2 in Figure lb. This is because /p/in
92 TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 1
SSD Displays
Figure la is aspirated. Aspiration comes between the initial
explosion of the /p/ (la, point 1) and the beginning of the vowel
sound (la, point 2). This is the feature the teacher in the story
attempted to emphasize by having the student blow out the match.
In Figure lC there is also a short distance between the initial
expIosion (of the /b/, at point 2) and the following vowel (point 3).
Americans seem to interpret the short distance between points 1 and
2 of Figure lb (unaspirated /p/) as an attempt at the voiced stop
/b/ rather than an attempt at an aspirated voiceless stop /p/. This
is why Indians saying pat, time, or coat are often perceived as
saying bat, dime, and goat.
Figure 1 dispIays the spectral frequencies of the speech signals.
The vertical axis is the frequency from O to 5,000 Hz. The horizontal
axis is duration. The third dimension, amplitude, is indicated by the
gray scale, which shows the strength of the signal. Note that the
aspiration of /p/ in Figure la between points 1 and 2 is lighter than
the bands indicating the following vowel. This means that the vowel
has greater amplitude (or energy). The three dimensions of
frequency, duration, and amplitude are sufficient for displaying all
aspects of American English pronunciation, including both
segmental and suprasegmental features.
Figure 2, made on a Visi-Pitch 6095, which also provides instant
displays of speech signals, is a simpler display providing
information only about the strength and pitch of the lowest
frequency range (0-400 Hz) of the signal. The lower bar
corresponds to voicing, the upper to the relative strengths of all the
sounds. So the distance from the beginning of /p/ to the vowel //
CAI IN PRONUNCIATION 93
is indicated by the top curve starting farther to the left than the
bottom line. The cursor has been placed at the onset of the vowel to
show this clearly. Figure 2b shows the incorrect version
corresponding to Figure lb. The onset of the vowel is too close to
the beginning of the word, so listeners will think the word is bat
rather than pat.
FIGURE 2
Visi-Pitch Displays
FEATURES OF AMERICAN ENGLISH PRONUNCIATION
THAT CHINESE NEED TO CONTROL
The features emphasized in this article have been divided into
three levels: phoneme, word, and sentence. No attempt is made to
promote the importance of segmental phonology over supraseg-
mental phonology, or vice versa. Both are necessary and easy to
teach with instant displays of speech signals. In the authors
experience, the techniques described work well even with people
who have been in the United States for 25 years and exhibit all the
signs of so-called fossilized pronunciation.
Phoneme Level
It is possible to listen to a good speaker of Chinese for an hour
without hearing one clear phoneme that is also found in American
English. Some phonemes are similar, such as lightly aspirated
voiceless stops or lightly pronounced nasals. In general, the energy
94 TESOL QUARTERLY
concentration of Chinese consonants has a higher frequency than
American consonants. The differences in the duration of American
/I/ and /i/ or of /v/ and /b/ are new to Chinese speakers. They try
to make /I/as long as /i/ and /v/as short as /b/. This section on the
phoneme level is divided into three parts: frequency (including
voicing), aspiration, and duration.
Frequency. Telephone systems usually operate in a frequency range
of 503,500 Hz. This captures the essential characteristics of speech
and provides a signal of reasonable quality. Some of our sounds,
such as /s/, have very high frequency, 3,000 Hz and above. Others,
such as /u/, are very low. Many have a combination of high and low
components, such as /z/, which combines an /s/-like high-
frequency component with voicing, which is low.
Since Chinese has no voiced stops and only one voiced fricative,
the language in general has a higher frequency range than English.
Therefore, it is important at the beginning of pronunciation lessons
for Chinese students to start building more sensitivity to sounds in
the low-frequency range. One way to do this is to help them learn
how to control frequency. For example, by pronouncing /s/ with
the tongue very near the teeth, we have a very high-frequency
sound. As the tongue is gradually moved back along the alveolar
ridge and onto the palate, the frequency lowers. Figure 3a shows
how the frequency lowers, and Figure 3b
amplitude rises.
FIGURE 3
Frequency Control Practice
shows clearly how the
Chinese uses parts of the range of Figure 3 for some of its sounds;
English uses other parts. Figure 4 shows the parts of the range we
can find the proper levels of frequency. Then they learn, by
practice, to associate the display with the feeling of producing the
sound. The final goal is for students to associate the feeling with the
sound.
FIGURE 4
For a good many students, the intermediary step of seeing a
visual display greatly accelerates their acquisition of this final step.
This is because the visual display provides an objective measure
that helps students focus their attention on the exact features that
need to be changed. Because the communication is in the visual
mode, students do not need to learn the linguistic vocabulary
associated with phonological analysis.
Figure 5, which presents visual displays for the word shaped,
shows the difference between vowel frequencies. The second band
from the bottom of Figure 5a, points 2 and 3, is lower for /e/ and
higher for /I/. We can clearly see the change in the diphthong from
/e/ to /I/. The relationship between the second band and the
bottom band is different for each vowel, and each vowel should be
demonstrated by the teacher.
Students need the chance to practice these sounds, with
supervision, at the beginning of the term. It helps them both to learn
to control the frequency and to interpret the graphics. They
96 TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 5
Correct shaped
especially need help with //, as in the initial sound of apple, which
which often sounds like late.
Though there are sounds in Chinese similar to /aI/, /eI/, and
them in the appropriate places. They need practice in producing the
sounds correctly in isolation and in individual words before using
them in connected speech. This type of pattern recognition helps
students with both pronunciation and listening comprehension.
To show Chinese students a simple way to produce /r/ and /l/,
the teacher can give them a clear explanation of tongue placement
followed by reinforcement from the graphics. One way that works
touching the teeth. Students can use this broad tongue to push
against the back of the upper teeth while they say the /l/ of line.
With the broad tongue pushing against the teeth, they produce a
sound that we recognize easily as /l/, even though it is not produced
in exactly the conventional way. Then the teacher can explain that
with /r/, the tongue does not touch anywhere. After the students
understand tongue position, minimal pairs can be demonstrated,
such as red and led in Figure 6.
Figure 6a, between points 1 and 2, shows that at the onset of /r/,
the second band slants upward to the right, but for /l/, in Figure 6c,
between points 1 and 2, the second band is parallel to the bottom
band. It may be very difficult for students to hear the difference at
first, but they definitely can feel it and see it on the screen. By
making it feel right, they can make themselves better understood
FIGURE 6
red and led
even before they can hear the difference clearly. Gradually they
learn to associate the feelings with the sounds, so that they make the
sounds naturally in continuous speech after 4-6 weeks of class, 1
hour per week.
Initial /y/ is often spoken by students with a glottal stop, so that
the year sounds like the ear (Figure 7). It is easy to show that in
ordinary speech, there is a smooth transition from the to year
(Figure 7a, point 3), so that there is no break in the sound. The year
has a vertical gap between the words (Figure 7b, point 3).
98 TESOL QUARTERLY
Initial /w/ is often mispronounced as /u/, so wood sounds like
/ud/. Students need an explanation of lip movement so they can
practice matching the pattern in Figure 8a, between points 1 and 2,
where the second band slants upward to the right. If they
pronounce /ud/, the second band is parallel to the bottom band as
in Figure 8b, between points 1 and 2.
In addition to the exercise exemplified in Figures 3 and 4, another
good exercise is starting with a voiceless fricative or sibilant and
alternating with its voiced counterpart, as shown in Figure 9. This
Students need a lot of help to realize that unvoiced fricatives and
sibilants have voiced counterparts that have similar places of
articulation. They usually are able to produce the voiceless sounds
reasonably well, but the low frequency of the voiced sounds is
generally difficult. This is also true for affricates. Students often
useful to work on a list of words such as mayor, major, mesher, and
measure, as in Figure 10.
If a student is trying to say measure, then examples similar to
Figures 10b, point 4, or 10f (at the cursor) are incorrect because
there is a break in the word resulting from the pressure used to
Then by adding voicing in Figures 10d, point 3, and 10h, we get the
the same as Figure 10b without the voicing pattern at point 4. It is
corrected by maintaining the pressure of the affricate and adding
voicing.
Chinese students usually use voiceless unaspirated stops (Figure
11, point 1) when precise American English requires voiced stops.
Thus, for a word such as big, the only voicing occurs during the
vowel (Figure 11, point 2).
In precise American English we have prevoicing of voiced stops.
This means that there is vibration of the vocal cords before the air
pressure of the stop is released. Figure 12 shows the correct
American English pronunciation of big. The dark horizontal band at
the bottom of Figure 12a, point 1, represents voicing; the entire
word is voiced. The voicing for both the /b/ (Figure 12a, point 1)
and the /g/ (Figure 12a, point 4) begins before the vertical bars
indicating the release of the air pressure for /b/ and /g/ (points 3
and 5). In Figure 12b voicing is indicated by the horizontal line
beneath the curve. The area to the left of the cursor in Figure 12b
represents the /b/ of big.
FIGURE 7
Correct and Incorrect Pronunciation of Initial /y/
FIGURE 9
Practice With a Voiceless and Voiced Sibilant
100 TESOL QUARTERLY
CAI IN PRONUNCIATION
101
There is a very large difference in the timing of voicing in Figures
11 and 12. This is significant for listening comprehension, especially
if it is accompanied by problems in stress. Fortunately, it is not
difficult to solve using homorganic nasals. By pronouncing a light
when the stops are in word-initial position, students start to sound
very American in their pronunciation. At first, students may make
the prevoicing too long and separate from the rest of the word, as
in /b/ of big in Figure 13, point 1. Note that the student did not
attempt to prevoice the /g/ (point 4).
This is not a bad beginning. With practice, the student should be
able to make the prevoicing the appropriate length and connect it to
FIGURE 11
Incorrect big
FIGURE 12
Correct big
102 TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 13
An Attempt at Prevoicing: Incorrect big
the vertical bar. Chinese has the light nasal sounds required, so it is
not difficult to use these sounds in this way. If students have trouble
sound for the word yellow in Chinese.
Aspiration. Though Chinese has three lightly aspirated, unvoiced
stops similar to /p,t,k/, students frequently omit the aspiration of
/p,t,k/ in English. As explained earlier, this may cause Americans to
perceive these sounds as attempts to produce /b,d,g/ because of the
shorter time span between the release of the air pressure and the
onset of the following vowel. This is especially important for word-
initial stops and word-medial stops before a stressed vowel. Word-
final stops are usually not as strong, though in formal speech, they
do retain all the features.
To help Chinese students with aspiration, the teacher can remind
them that they have three sounds in their phonetic alphabet that are
lightly aspirated voiceless stops. The teacher should explain that
Americans use more air in English /p,t,k/, so that if an American
tries to speak Chinese, certain words sound too heavy. For example,
the word wife sounds like tie-tie in Americanized Chinese. When
students hear such heavy aspiration, they understand the difference.
When they see the difference on the screen, it does not take long for
them to match the shape of the teachers pattern.
It is reasonable to expect that students will take some time to
master both voicing and aspiration. The concepts should be
reinforced often, especially during the first few weeks of the term.
It is desirable to move back and forth from pronunciation exercises
to conversations and presentations, so that students are encouraged
to transfer their new skills to natural situations. It is also a good idea
to encourage students to listen more closely to English speakers in
order to make better use of the potential reinforcement of the
environment. They will ask why some people speak in less clear
ways, and this provides a good opportunity to discuss differences
between formal and informal speech.
Voicing and aspiration are two features that often change very
little, no matter how long Chinese people stay in the United States.
The visual channel of communication is very powerful for helping
them focus their attention on the location, size, type, and
significance of their errors. Bowens Patterns of English Pronuncia-
tion (1975) contains very helpful exercises for students attempting
to master these contrasts in the context of sentences. Because
students are able to see their progress, they learn the new style of
pronunciation quickly. Thus, there is little need to worry that by
working on these contrasts, they will not be able to appreciate
suprasegmental features such as sentence stress or intonation.
Duration. It is both necessary and common to work on the duration
of vowels such as /I/ and /i/. It is less common but also necessary
to work on the difference in duration between stops, which are
short, and fricatives and sibilants, which are longer. If students try
to pronounce a fricative or sibilant in the same short amount of time
that it takes to produce a stop, then they do not give themselves a
chance to pronounce the fricative correctly. One explanation they
grasp quickly is that a stop is more like a punch, whereas a fricative
is more like a scratch.
The duration of vowels, fricatives, and sibilants can be discussed
easily by using visual displays, such as those in Figures 14 and 15. In
Figure 14a, between points 1 and 2, we see that /d/ is missing both
between points 1 and 2. The contrast is shown in Figure 15 in a
different way. To the left of the cursors, /d/in Figure 15a has lower
amplitude in Figure 15b corresponds to the turbulence between
points 1 and 2 of Figure 14b.
It is helpful to have students fill the screen with the pattern of a
long fricative by pronouncing it once for more than 2 seconds; then
they can see that they have real control of the sound. After they
have the correct pattern, the teacher can explain that they only need
to use a small portion of it to pronounce the word correctly. Again,
for voiced fricatives, it is a good idea to start with the unvoiced
counterparts and then add voicing, as in Figure 9.
104 TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 14
Incorrect and Correct that
FIGURE 15
Incorrect and Correct that
Word Level
End of the word. A typical word in Chinese consists of a consonant
followed by a vowel. Mandarin does not have words that end in
stops, sibilants, fricatives, or affricates. The only consonants
possible at the ends of words are nasals. Even if students know how
to pronounce the sounds correctly, they often omit them when they
occur in word- or syllable-final position. This creates a very
significant problem in communication. Compare the incorrect /g/
in Figure 11, point 3, with the correct form in Figure 12a, point 5.
One way to explain the significance of consonants at the end of a
word is to start with an idea about the Chinese language. When an
American tries to learn Chinese, mastering the four tones is a
difficult but crucial task. The Chinese word for ask has a falling
tone. If by mistake the falling tone has a slight rising tone at the end,
it means kiss. So the intended sentence Ask your friend could easily
be misunderstood as Kiss your friend. It can be explained that
consonants at the ends of words in English serve a similar function
as the tone system in Chinese. We must pronounce them clearly so
we can tell the difference between words such as map, mat, mad,
math, mass, and mash Students should also know that final
consonants are important because we listen very carefully to the
ends of words to pick up grammatical signals such as -ed, -s, -ing,
-ly, and -est.
It takes time, patience, and reinforcement to help students
appreciate the significance of pronouncing consonants at the ends
of words and syllables clearly. Once they start receiving positive
feedback from outside the classroom regarding their improvement,
their progress usually accelerates.
Computer displays for syllable- and word-final consonants look
different from those for initial consonants. In general, initial
consonants are bigger. In formal speech, final consonants, though
smaller, still retain all of their features such as voicing and aspiration
(see Figures 1,2,5,6,8,12,14, 15). Because of the sensitivity of the
equipment, the teacher is free to decide which level of usage is
appropriate to emphasize. Broadcast speech differs from
informal conversation in many ways, including rules regarding
assimilation of consonants at word and syllable boundaries. Since
students bring their own concepts of assimilation from their native
language, it is important to stabilize these concepts at a more formal
level before concentrating on various shortcuts employed in
informal speech.
Some of the time spent on specific consonants can also be
devoted to general work on consonant clusters as errors occur in
students speech. The word-final consonant cluster in Figure 5
provides a clear example. Both sounds should be represented, but
they are not as fully developed as, for example, the initial /p/ in
Figures la and 2a.
Word stress. Short, unstressed vowel syllables such as the /I/ in
president are often missing, even when students have learned the
proper frequency and duration of such syllables. Figure 16 shows
the correct and incorrect pronunciation of president. Note that in
the correct versions, the /1/ (Figure 16a, point 5; 16c, cursor) is
106 TESOL QUARTERLY
Sentence Level
That kind of a boy is ambiguous. In the sentence I didnt know he
was that kind of a boy, the word kind could mean such a nice boy
or a certain type of boy, depending on the placement of stress.
Stress on kind in Figure 17a, point 2, emphasizes kindness. Stress on
108
TESOL QUARTERLY
that and boy in Figure 17b, points 1 and 5, emphasizes a type of
boy. We can easily see the differences in stress by the different size
of the stressed parts. Stressed parts have more energy, so the
amplitude is greater, resulting in a larger and darker display. The
greater duration results in a longer display on the horizontal axis.
Rhythm is indicated by the relative length of syllables, words, and
spaces.
Figure 18 is a Visi-Pitch display of three wordswho shaped
Americas taken from a complex sentence. The word shaped,
which appears between the vertical cursors, was discussed earlier
(see Figure 5). The horizontal line at the bottom of Figure 18
represents voicing. It is broken in three places, corresponding to the
sound in Americas. Note that the final /t/ of shaped is connected to
the initial vowel of Americas.
FIGURE 18
who shaped Americas
In addition to showing voicing, the lower line shows intonation.
Sentence intonation shows up better on the Visi-Pitch display
because students can see a rising, stable, or falling line correspond-
ing to the intonation. The tone goes down for who and up for
shaped. For Americas the tone starts going down, goes up for the
second syllable, and then goes down again. Rising intonation
corresponds to increased stress. Looking at the intonation peaks and
their duration, we have an objective way to determine that the
primary stress of these words is on the second syllable of Americas.
PEDAGOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS
The techniques described in this article may be integrated into a
traditional spoken English class as a special laboratory section
meeting 1 hour per week with 7-10 students and an instructor. This
is sufficient time for the instructor to provide orientation to students
regarding the use of the equipment for a particular lesson and for
students to take turns individually to master the patterns. Students
learn from each other in this process and often help each other, so
small-group work is more efficient than individual lessons. As
capabilities develop for networking, in which several student work-
stations are connected to a host computer, it will be possible to have
larger classes with lower cost per student. Some students prefer a
simpler display such as the Visi-Pitch. As an instructor, I prefer to
use the SSD-type of display because it provides more information.
It is possible to start a program at the sentence level and work on
specific sounds only when needed, an approach that might be best
for more advanced students. Instruction at the sentence level can
also be integrated into a more traditional approach starting with
individual sounds. Students usually need help with all levels.
Segmental phonology, working with sounds in isolation, can be
covered in a sufficiently short time so that any fluency that has
already been developed will not be seriously damaged.
To enhance the transfer of clear pronunciation from lessons to
professional communication, the teacher can include a variety of
supervised activities in the lessons. In addition to drills and
exercises, students should prepare and deliver presentations and
engage in conversations. During these activities it sometimes helps
to ask students to discuss their possible errors before pointing them
out. The use of the equipment should gradually decrease
throughout the semester until it is used only on an as-needed basis
for review.
For those planning to use computer equipment, the following
suggestions could be helpful:
1. Allow a few weeks for students to get used to the equipment
before using it as a regular part of a class.
2. Keep the microphone close to your mouth when speaking in
order for all the pronunciation features to be reflected in the
visual display.
3. If a student sounds correct but the display looks wrong, check
the location of the microphone.
110 TESOL QUARTERLY
4. Learn to distinguish the natural difference in the display,
resulting from womens voices being higher than mens, from
significant differences.
5. Ask students if they are familiar with spectral displays. Those in
science and engineering may understand the principles of the
machines very well, and if so, they can explain some of the
technical details to other students.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author wishes to thank Laurie Fischer of the Kay Elemetrics Corporation for
her encouragement and support, and the referees for their thoughtful comments. A
special thank you goes to Jui-Lan Lou for the photography.
THE AUTHOR
Garry Molholt, Assistant Professor of Linguistics and ESL and Coordinator of
Computer-Assisted Instruction in the English Department of West Chester
University, has been active in research in the applications of speech-processing
computers to teaching pronunciation for 4 years. He has found computers to be
quite helpful in communicating with students regarding their errors and their
progress in correcting errors.
REFERENCE
Bowen, J. D. (1975). Patterns of English pronunciation. Rowley, MA:
Newbury House.
TESOL QUARTERLY, Vol. 22, No. l, March 1988
Lets See: Contrasting
Conversations About Teaching
JOHN F. FANSELOW
Teachers College, Columbia University
Two common aims of supervision and observation are to evaluate
and to help. Supervisors and observers with these aims provide
products to those they visit: helpful prescriptions for
improvement or a rating of the observed performances. The aims
of supervision and observation presented in this article are to
explore, to see teaching differently, not to evaluate or help; the
emphasis is on a processvisited and visiting teachers sharing
ways of looking to discover self. This process includes taping and
transcribing excerpts from classes, grouping parts of the excerpts,
arriving at a common language to discuss them, and making
multiple interpretations about them, based not only on precon-
ceived notions but also on a range of contrasting beliefs and goals.
In short, this article tries to provide ways of looking so each of us
can see our own teaching differently through observing others,
reminding us all that we are capable of acting on the world, and
that these actions can transform the world (Mehan, 1979, p. 207).
AIMS OF SUPERVISION AND OBSERVATION
When I used to ask teachers to write down comments they
recalled from conversations with supervisors or fellow teachers who
had visited their classes or had watched videotapes of their
teaching, the comments and exchanges between different
supervisors/observing teachers and the observed teachers seemed
very different from each other. Others have found this too.
Gebhard (1984), in a review of different models of supervision
different ways of making comments or of having conversations
about lessons between supervisors and teachersuses these labels:
directive, alternative, collaborative, nondirective, creative.
Although the conversations I asked teachers to recall often
indicated an overall tendency to be, say, more collaborative than
directive, or more directive than nondirective, I consistently saw
113
elements of many distinct models in the same sets of comments or
conversations. I also began to notice that all the distinct models had
the same aim: to provide a means for a more experienced person to
help or evaluate a less experienced person. Two articles on
supervision in second language teaching use the following words
and phrases to characterize the purposes of the supervision models
they describe: functions as an arbitrator, commenting, evaluating,
helping, provides (Freeman, 1982, p. 21); to direct or guide, to offer
suggestions, to model teaching, to advise teachers, to evaluate
(Gebhard, 1984, p, 501). All of these words indicate that the person
doing the visiting, no matter whether that person is following a
collaborative model, creative model, or any other, is there mainly to
help or evaluate the practice teacher, fellow teacher, or inservice
teacher in training.
On first thinking about it, what could be more reasonable than
designing models of supervision that provide ways for experienced
people to help or evaluate inexperienced people? But thinking
about the idea of help in other contexts provides a different
perspective. Havent you heard children shout to parents or teachers
words like Let me do itdont show me, or Dont give me the
answer? When referring to the need of children to be allowed to do
things on their own, Montessori (1967, p. 309) made the plea, Let
them fill their own buckets. As Alinsky (1971) reminded us:
It is a human characteristic that someone who asks for help and gets it
reacts not only with gratitude but with a subconscious hostility toward
the one who helped him. lt is a sort of psychic original sin because he
feels that the one who helped him is always aware that if it hadnt been
for his help, he would still be a defeated nothing. (p. 93)
The type of resentment Alinsky mentions is not necessarily
universal. Some people seem to like to be helped and expect to be
told what to do as well. For them, evaluations containing
prescriptions of what to do are welcome. In discussing the
appropriateness of different models for teachers at various stages,
Freeman (1982) highlights the value of help and evaluation by
pointing out that beginning teachers, for example, seem to prefer
models and direction to collaboration. But even while pleading for
help from the cooperating teacher or supervisor, many practice
teachers assert, The most valuable part of practice teaching was
seeing other teachers teach! Seeing other teachers teach is not the
same as being told what to do by an evaluator, nor is it being helped
by someone.
As a result of this keen interest that practice teachers and many
inservice teachers have in seeing others teach, my fear that helping
114 TESOL QUARTERLY
people can lead to resentment toward the one providing the help,
and the fact that prescriptions from supervisors evaluations can be
demeaning and decrease the teachers authority and responsibility,
I see the need for an aim of supervision and observation different
from the ones frequently practiced and described in the literature.
Whereas the usual aim of observation and supervision is to help or
evaluate the person being seen, the aim I propose is self-
explorationseeing ones own teaching differently. Observing
others or ourselves to see teaching differently is not the same as
being told what to do by others. Observing to explore is a process;
observing to help or to evaluate is providing a product.
Besides leading to resentment, help can also lead to learned
helplessness (Abramson, Seligman, & Teasdale, 1978). Helpful
prescriptions can stop exploration, since the receiver, as someone in
an inferior position being given orders by someone in a superior
position, may easily develop the ours is not to wonder why
syndrome.
A conversation reflecting the aims of the usual models might go
like this: Here I am with my lens to look at you and your actions
and tell you or discover with you what is right and what is wrong
and needs to be improved; I will then prescribe better activities or
collaborate so we or you alone can discover better activities. A
conversation reflecting the aim of observation I am suggesting
might go like this: Here I am with my lens to look at you and your
actions. But as I look at you with my lens, I consider you a mirror;
I hope to see myself in you and through your teaching. When I see
myself, I find it hard to get distance from my teaching. I hear my
voice, I see my face and clothes and fail to see my teaching. Seeing
you allows me to see myself differently and to explore variables we
both use. Although supervisors may consider their roles so set that
empowering teachers to make decisions seems impossible, such
redefinition is possible in any field. The role of managers in
relationship to workers, for example, is presently undergoing
change in many companies.
Although observing others does not automatically lead to seeing
oneself differently, mainly because the aim of seeing others to help
them is so usual, over time an increase occurs in comments like
these: That teacher said Ok, now to mark changes in activity just
as I do; How little each of us walks around; That teacher spoke
to students at eye level some of the time; I do so only during
breaks.
The model I am describing grows out of a range of sources, not
only my examination of many transcripts of teacher-supervisor
conferences. For example, Jarvis (1972) argued that in order for
CONTRASTING CONVERSATIONS ABOUT TEACHING 115
teacher preparation programs to be truly responsive, they need to
shift the responsibility for the decision-making to the classroom
teacher. . . . It is perhaps time to train the teacher to analyze his
situation and make his own decision for his situation (p. 201 ). As
Freire (1970) points out, learning consists of acts of cognition, not
transferals of information (p. 67). Each of us needs to construct,
reconstruct, and revise our own teaching. He reminds us that for
learning to take place we need to resolve the teacher-student
contradiction (p. 67).
When we observe others to gain self-knowledge and self-insight
and when we generate our own alternatives based on what we see
others do, we construct our own knowledge and engage in the type
of learning Freire has advocated. In a discussion of education, Abbs
(1986) has this to say: Authentic education is to be found in that act
of intelligent exploration . . . the first priority of teachers should be
to secure the necessary condition for the autonomy of teaching and
for the freedom to learn (p. 21). Using the word supervisor a
person with super visionhardly supports our autonomy. When I
observe and when I invite others to observe me, I refer to all of us
as visiting teachers to avoid the use of the word supervisor.
PRACTICES
I and others have used various combinations of the following
practices in pre- and inservice MA and adult education programs.
Anyone genuinely interested in exploring, in seeing teaching
differently, and anyone who believes that we can learn about our
own teaching by seeing others can use the practices.
In my experience, trying to observe and supervise with the aim of
exploring practices and of gaining insight into ones own teaching
does not in itself enable us to stop treating observation and
supervision as a means of helping and evaluating others. For people
to begin to learn that they can see their own teaching differently by
observing others, I and others have found the following practices
for collecting, describing, and interpreting observations useful:
1. Short amounts of time have to be set aside for observation and
discussion.
2. Segments from observed lessons need to be collected by note
taking, taping, or transcribing.
3. The exchanges and activities in the segments need to be grouped
in a range of ways.
116 TESOL QUARTERLY
4. Finally, what was done, as reflected in notes, tapes, and
transcripts, needs to be related to notions, beliefs, and goals.
Coupling this data collection and analysis with discussions of
freedom and the need for each of us to construct our own
knowledge helps many visiting teachers to decrease their
suggestions to others, to increase their descriptive and analytical
comments about the lessons observed, and to relate their insights
to their own lessons.
Although allowing time for discussions of observations as part of
a teachers load is a policy I advocate, this policy is rare. Even in
teacher preparation programs, there are not always long periods of
time for discussions. Rather than putting off observations and
discussions until sufficient time is available, thereby virtually
ensuring that they will never take place, I recommend limiting
observations and discussions to as little as 5 minutes.
Obviously, seeing 5 minutes of a lesson prevents us from seeing
lesson development. But look how much we notice in l-minute
commercials. In many classes, 30 questions are asked in a minute
(Hoetker, 1968). A dozen instances of feedbackboth the
treatment of errors and communications made after acceptable
student movescan be seen in a minute as well (Fanselow, 1977). In
a 30-minute period, hundreds of communications are made, each in
split seconds (Jackson, 1968).
Though short segments provide much data, short discussions
force a limit to the number of communications that can be
considered and the number of alternatives that can be generated.
Since one or two communications often affect what is done and
since many of our communications are unconscious, we can only
hope to see and later try out one or two alternative communications
per class period. Short time segments do not of themselves lead to
fewer evaluative or helping comments or more exploration,
however, and that is why the following activities are used.
Collecting and Describing Data
Transcribing and note taking. The first step in our observations, no
matter how long, is to capture as many of the specific communica-
tions as possible by audio- or videotaping, by taking notes, and by
drawing sketches or even taking photographs as communications
are observed. Later, tapes can be transcribed to reveal details
missed in notes and sketches.
Observers can take notes, sketch, and transcribe as they wish.
Many put exchanges in dialogue form in their notes. But now and
then, one will put teacher communications in the left-hand column
of a page and student communications in the right-hand column to
highlight them. Many write one line and pause, forgetting that the
purpose of looking is to collect data, not to judge the teacher or
think of ways to help the teacher. Some prefer sketches to notes,
noting the position of teachers and students, their location, or
expressions on faces of teacher or students. Others note what is
done rather than what is saidmovements, objects used, writing on
the board.
Except for the instruction that observers are to write down only
what happens, not comments about what happens, no directions are
given about what observers are to note. Different observers often
note different communications, reflecting differences in the values
of the observers. Some observers write down things they are
interested in seeing in their own classes that they cannot see while
they are teaching. Though two observers are likely to capture some
of the same spoken exchanges, they are not likely to have the same
account of how the exchanges were said or what other communica-
tions were made. Discussing what took place and listening to tapes
will make clear a central lesson of observation: What we see is not
what takes place but what we value as important to see; observing
is selecting.
While transcribing exchanges, drawing sketches, or otherwise
noting or capturing specific communications, we cannot write
comments such as these: To make the class lively, this teacher
needs more activities; This teacher should follow the responses
with clearer feedback. When not taking notes or transcribing, we
tend to revert to our usual pattern of thinking of ways to help or
evaluate another. This is a sure way to miss seeing anything
differently, a sure way to limit our observations by trying to relate
them to our preconceived notions of good and bad teaching.
Grouping activities. As data are collected, the observers, and in
many cases the teacher observed, begin to group the communica-
tions. For example, if the teacher asks the students to give synonyms
for some words and to draw sketches to show the meanings of other
words, the two types of tasks are grouped. One possible grouping
that emerges has to do with the fact that one task requires the
students to speak and the other one requires drawing and silence.
A range of groupings of tasks and activities, rather than just one,
is aimed for. Looking at the same exchanges again, we can group
the questions on the basis of who was asked the question. Were
students sitting in particular rows asked to perform some tasks more
often than students in other rows? Were males asked to perform
118 TESOL QUARTERLY
more of some types of tasks than females? How many tasks did
students perform because the teacher requested them to, either by
using names or pointing, and how many did they volunteer for?
The purpose of the questions and the grouping is not to imply
that, for example, using names is better than pointing or getting
volunteers. The questions are asked so that the same tasks or
activities can be grouped and categorized on the basis of a range of
characteristics. When we look at, say, a dessert menu, we see many
characteristics. We have categories such as high calorie or low
calorie, sweet or semisweet, high or low cholesterol, easy or
difficult to prepare, for children or adults, and so on. By seeing that
there are many ways to group the same communications, we
basically are developing a checklist of options and the multiple
characteristics of each.
As such lists and groupings expand, ways to vary our teaching
use different optionsbecome more and more evident. Each
activity, and the groups it fits in, provides at least one more
variable, with a distinct range of characteristics, that we can
manipulate in our own teaching. Each grouping also reminds us that
communications have multiple dimensions, a fact that is hidden by
one-dimensional terms often used to judge teaching, such as great
pace, nice grammar work, or fine communications.
Data are also grouped by making lists. For example, one teacher
may give the answer to a question after a student cannot answer,
and another may give a clue rather than the entire answer. Thus, we
have two specific items on a list of feedback possibilities. Clues,
too, may be given in various ways. A teacher may sometimes say,
The word starts with a g. Another time the teacher may say, It
has two syllables or It is a noun. One of the insights that come as
lists are developed of what is observed in distinct areas of teaching
such as feedback, group work, and so on is that the range of
activities observed in any one class is often small, but across many
teachers the range becomes great.
Using technical language. If transcribed communications are merely
listed without being grouped or categorized, the list can become
very long, of course. By grouping different communications on the
basis of inferences we make about them, the value of category
labelstechnical languagebecomes apparent. Thus, from the
descriptive statement Students gave synonyms, an observer and
teacher might infer that memory was required but that no motor
control was, as in the case of drawing sketches to show the meaning
of words. Then, looking at communications from our own or other
classes and seeing other activities that require memory alone or
memory plus motor control, subsequent communications can be
compared with the first ones in the category. The feedback
activities listed, such as the distinct clues given, can also be
compared and grouped. Clues given with spoken words versus
clues given with symbols on the blackboard would constitute one
way to distinguish clues, for example.
After a few discussions between observers (visiting teachers) and
the teachers observed (visited teachers), the following general
categories inevitably arise: questions that require students to share
previous knowledge versus those that require information just
presented; tasks done individually or in groups; answers for which
the teacher is interested in the form of what is said versus the
meaning; questions teachers know the answers to and those they do
not know the answers to; communications containing experiences of
students and those using language for its own sake; student-to-
student communication and teacher-to-student or student-to-
teacher communication. Observers are reminded to develop
categories that refer to at least two dimensions of any item in order
to keep in mind the aim of seeing multiple dimensions of any
communication.
The categories for the lists made and the groupings can cover
whatever areas that observers and teachers want, as long as the
focus is on the data: transcripts, sketches, photographs, notes, and
actual recordings as well, when possible. This concentration on the
collection and grouping of data makes it difficult to think of helping
or evaluating anyone.
Lortie (1975), among others, has said that one of the critical
problems that teachers face is that they do not have a language to
discuss what they do: What students [practice teachers] learn
about teaching, then, is intuitive and imitative rather than explicit
and analytical (p. 62). Lortie (p. 73) maintains that the absence of
a common technical vocabulary limits the ability to analyze as well
as the acuity of the observations that teachers make.
Giving category names to the groups of communications and lists
of activities provides a technical language, since those noting the
similarities and differences between communications and activities
constantly have to go back and forth between data and names
applied to distinct types of data until they agree on a fit between the
terms and the data. Once teachers and observers have developed
some technical terms, coding systems developed by others can be
introduced. The one I introduce most frequently is my own, called
FOCUS (Fanselow, 1987). COLT (Allen, Frhlich, & Spada, 1984),
TALOS (Ullmann & Geva, 1982), or any other coding system can
also be used (Long, 1980).
120 TESOL QUARTERLY
Starting discussions with a published coding system can make the
idea of categories clear earlier, but there are some disadvantages to
their early introduction. If teachers and observers are unaware of
the problem coding systems were designed to deal with, they may
use the systems in a mechanical way. Starting with published
systems can also imply that the observers and teachers working
jointly may not be up to the development of categories. On the
other hand, going through the steps of gathering data and grouping
data often shows the value of a technical language. It is also more
likely that somebody elses categories can be made our own if we
develop some of our own along the way. When those doing the
observing develop the categories, knowledge is being created,
rather than buckets being filled (Montessori, 1967) or information
being transferred (Freire, 1970, p. 67).
Interpreting Data
Once a range of communications is captured in the form of data
and once activities are listed, grouped, or categorized, interpreta-
tions can be made. It must be remembered, of course, that
collecting data and listing and grouping them according to jointly
developed categories or published ones are not activities free of
interpretation. In initial discussions, as in initial collection and
grouping of data, most participants interpret data in light of
preconceived notions of good teaching. But at this stage, attention is
given to showing how the data and lists of categories already reflect
values, notions, or theories of teaching and learning. If the data
indicate, for example, that the teacher smiled constantly, one
participant may point out that a person noted smiles rather than
frowns or shaking of the head. As the observer who noted the smiles
equates smiles with friendliness, he or she realizes how a belief
affected what was observed.
Since it is very common for us all to see, list, and group, as well
as interpret, what we see in light of our preconceived notions about
teaching, there is no way to prevent such filtered data collecting,
grouping, or interpreting. But this effect can be counterbalanced.
After one observer or teacher says that the teachers smile showed
that the teacher was friendly, other possible interpretations of a
smile can be sought. Alternative interpretations emerge from asking
what smiles have meant in our classes or by asking for possible
negative meanings of smiles. Usually, a comment such as Well, I
often smile when nervous comes forth. Or one will hear, I smile
sometimes when I want students to like me. Different data from
the segment being discussed might also be noted: The smile was
fixed as I recall; I frowned a lot toolook at the sketch you made
of me.
To encourage interpretations that are quite different from the
normal ones that people with similar preconceived notions offer,
participants are taught to ask each other to provide at least one
interpretation that is seemingly outlandish or different in intent
from the ones given. If all the interpretations are positive, possible
negative interpretations can be sought. And if all are negative,
positive interpretations can be sought. In the case of the smile, a
negative interpretation might be that smiling can be used to keep
control. Arguments about the superiority of a particular interpreta-
tion are not allowed in the beginning. Rather, the goal is simply to
try to remind the participants that each event we see can be
interpreted in ways different from our usual ways of doing it
because we are each limited by the ideas of reality we have.
Another central lesson that emerges from multiple interpretations
of the same event is that each event has more than one cause and
that these causes need to be specified precisely. A replay of the
videotape or a review of the notes or sketches may reveal some of
the exchanges that took place before the smile, exchanges that were
not seen because they seemed unimportant: the realization that the
smile was perhaps the result of a number of small events that had
happened immediately beforehand. By searching for different
interpretations, observers and teachers are thrown back to the data,
lists, and categories, not to seek support for what they thought when
they started, but to seek support for the seemingly outlandish new
interpretations. Seeing our own teaching differently is not going to
happen if we are simply looking at other lessons and interpreting
them in the same way we have been looking at lessons and
interpreting them all of our lives.
Data and categories can also be interpreted in relationship to
beliefs about teaching the participants have heard about. For
example, participants can search for communications that are
congruent or incongruent with Smith's (1971) admonition that
information about an error and aid in performing a task correctly
are more helpful than discouraging comments about an inadequate
performance (p. 229). If a teacher is heard saying Why cant you
ever do it right? the participants might respond at first by saying
that the communication seems incongruent. Seems is used because
Why cant you do it right? if said humorously and with a smile,
could be congruent with Smiths advice. Such tentativeness among
the participants is possible because of a self-developed realization
based on engaging in the process of collecting data, listing specific
communications and activities, and relating them to ideas over and
over again in short segments of time.
122 TESOL QUARTERLY
Isolating beliefs about language teaching that can be related to
data and categories is not difficult. Most articles and books are
written to further beliefs or theories. By relating beliefs from the
literature to what is actually done and observed in specific detail,
participants clarify beliefs and see ways to translate the beliefs into
practice. To translate Krashens notion of comprehensible input
(see Dulay, Burt, & Krashen, 1982) into action, teachers and
observers can first examine exchanges in a range of lessons and then
group those that seem comprehensible and those that seem not to
be. Barness (1976) ideas about exploratory talk and finished
talk, about school knowledge versus action knowledge, can be
understood, seen, and translated into action only when related to
data gathered from lessons.
In addition to relating data and categories to beliefs about
learning, we can relate them to goals. If our goal is to ensure that
students can obtain literal and implied meaning from what they
hear and read but we never ask any inference questions of them,
then our practices are not congruent with our goal.
Relating data to notions in articles and books brings us to another
activity that can be used in the observations and discussions of
teaching: reading. Just as one goal of working in pairs and groups is
to provide multiple perspectives, so reading is used to provide
different angles. When our partners give us a different view of a
lesson, we have to take our usual lenses off, for a few seconds at
least, to try to see what they have seen. Published notions, both of
ways of looking at teaching (Bateson, 1972; Mehan, 1979) and ways
of teaching (Haskell, 1987), show us different maps of similar
territory that require us to try on a range of different lenses.
Self-Observation and the Notion of Opposites
Transcribing, listing activities, grouping communications,
categorizing and relating these activities to our notions, beliefs, and
goalsall show the great number of different ways of seeing
variables, relationships between them, and consequences, if these
activities can be done in pairs or groups. However, often we cannot
find even one person to observe us or to be observed.
The basis for getting multiple perspectives when we are in a
group is simply to juxtapose different individuals perceptions. This
same idea of juxtaposing, of using opposites, can also be used to
provide different perceptions when we are alone. If in our own
classes we see the students always sitting in chairs during speaking
lessons, we can ask ourselves to juxtaposeto give an opposite
posture. In this case two opposites come immediately to mind.
Students and teacher alike can sit on the floor, if the room is
carpeted, or everyone can stand. Though much conversation
outside of the classroom takes place when we are standing, the
point of juxtaposing or contrasting opposite situations is to see
situations not seen before, not to argue about the absolute
superiority of a particular format. And although some may object to
standing or to sitting on the floor, by precluding alternatives based
on what people might think, we close off inquiry and tend to limit
what occurs to our preconceived notions of good and bad teaching.
In addition to generating alternatives by looking at aspects of the
classroom, we can compare the communications in a class with
those we see outside of a teaching setting. Using our chair example,
we can compare where we sit in a teaching setting with where we
sit in a nonteaching setting, such as a dormitory room, living room,
or park. Finding opposites to what we normally do in a teaching
setting or comparing what we do in teaching and nonteaching
settings can be extremely valuable in providing the alternative
perspectives a partner would supply in pair or group work.
The idea of opposites can also help to broaden the range of
interpretations. If the first and only interpretation of a teachers
smile is that the teacher is happy and no other interpretations come
up in a discussion, an opposite interpretation can be offered: I have
interpreted the smile as a good communication; now let me
consider a smile a bad communication. Then what could it mean?
What are some disadvantages of smiling?
In second language acquisition research, learner errors were first
attributed to the first language of the learners. Then, some began to
explain the errors on the basis of developmental stages. Different
types of errors were later considered to be caused by different
types of tasks used to elicit the sentences that contained the errors
(Ellis, 1985). What are these but opposite interpretations of the same
data? Most fields are enriched by multiple interpretations of the
same data, and these multiple interpretations can be generated by
considering opposite interpretations to those usually provided.
Even with the concept of opposites to provide different
perspectives, self-observation is limited. It prevents us from getting
distance from our teaching and seeing our teaching through others.
Though transcribing our own teaching gives us some distance from
what we do, since the written record removes our voice, the
transcriptions often remain too much a part of ourselves.
124 TESOL QUARTERLY
MEANINGS
Given the aim I advocate for conversations about teaching, labels
often used to classify conversations about teaching, as well as the
words in the conversations, take on new meanings. Ask questions
more rapidly is not necessarily a prescription or an offer of help in
a conversation in which exploration and seeing teaching differently
are the goals. The meaning need not be, Do this because I who
visited your class know more than you do and you need help.
Rather, the meaning can be, Try this to see how it alters what has
been happening. I am going to ask questions more rapidly too;
perhaps different reasons to ask questions both slowly and rapidly
will become apparent. We can compare tapes when we have some
descriptions of both quick and slow questions. On the other hand,
when a visitor in the role of a person in charge says, You might try
a slower pace, though the modal might is used, the meaning can be
a helpful prescription. The message can mean, I know, and I
want you to do what I say. Exploration can be inhibited or
completely stopped because the underlying intention of the words
can be to show who is in charge.
Even a comment such as The quick questions were great can be
seen as a description rather than as a judgment if the aim is
exploratory. In such a context, the great could refer to the execution
of the direction rather than to the technique itself.
Words in our conversations, to be judgments, must imply that the
speaker or hearer is attributing good or bad, superiority or
inferiority, to a practice. If good lesson is said or heard to imply
that you or a teacher you visited did what was prescribedwhat the
speaker or hearer considers to be the right way to do itthen a
judgment is probably being made in our communication. The
words must be heard in relationship to the aim of our conversation
and the role of those having the conversation. In the conversations
I advocate, judgments are avoided because they tend to close off
exploration. They tend to end, rather than continue, a process.
Some label an emphasis on data and description objective. We
avoid both the terms objective and subjective. The meaning of a lot
in You asked a lot of questions is not subjective because of a lot.
Nor are 42 and 2 objective in You asked 42 questions in 2 minutes.
Both statements can be judgments or descriptions, depending
greatly on what the speakers and hearers aim is and the role each
is assuming. Again, if the words are used to see differently, as a
means to exploresuggesting the importance of comparing the
asking of 42 questions in 2 minutes with 22 in 2 minutes or a few
with a lotthen, they are both simply descriptive. If the words are
used because the speaker or listenerthe visited or visiting
CONTRASTING CONVERSATIONS ABOUT TEACHING 12.5
teacheris against frequent questions or feels that asking a lot of
questions is not the thing to do, both groups of words are likely to
be judgments. Both can be implied helpful prescriptions to use
fewer questions if you want to do the right thing and be a good
teacher, given the preconceived notion of good teaching held by the
visiting teacher or visited teacher.
There is a reason that explanations or proof to support categories
or interpretations has not been mentioned. Observers do not request
explanations like Why did you smile? And teachers do not give
such explanations: I smiled because I thought at that moment the
class needed reassurance. These exchanges tend to lead to
arguments and can be seen as veiled attempts to support or
strengthen the authority of one of the participants. In the model
presented here, explanations are replaced by what a person did;
what the characteristics were of what was done; how these related
to beliefs, theories, or goals; and multiple interpretations of the data
and groupings and the relationships among these.
Trying to see how the same words that for so long meant one
thing can begin to mean something else is, of course, not something
accomplished only by going through a series of steps. Nor indeed is
seeing differentlyexplorationa point to reach, but rather a
tendency, a movement toward.
This tendency, this movement toward, as well as the tendency
back toward the usual conversations, is noted by recording the
discussions among teachers and observersvisited and visiting
teachers. The exchanges in the discussions are dealt within the same
way as exchanges from classes: Short transcriptions are made,
communications are grouped and coded, and multiple interpreta-
tions are made. They are related to the beliefs upon which this
model reststhe trust that can come from joint effort without
external evaluation; exploration; multiple perspectives; multiple
causation; the idea that much of what we do in classes, just as
outside the classroom, is beyond our awareness; and the notion that
helping another from a superior position can lead to resentment and
dependence.
The discussions of the observations often show confusion,
struggles to group and categorize data. They also contain examples
of simple causation (The repetition of the sentence made them
learn it), prescriptions (You should never put the directions up on
the board when they are in their books), and all the other normal
types of conversations we usually have about teaching. But now and
then the teaching act is discussed in a way that is congruent with the
beliefs of this model.
126 TESOL QUARTERLY
CONCLUSION
Judgments and predictable prescriptions are not limited to
conversations about teaching. In a critique of Canbys movie
reviews, Carney (1986) reminds us that using words like charming,
sincere, buoyant, funny, and clever to review films amounts to an
alarming aesthetic (p. 30). He goes on:
One is accustomed to seeing invocations of charms, etc., as measures of
value . . . in ads for Calvin Klein, Christian Dior, Clinique, and Club
Med. But these are hardly the supreme values that one would expect in
a serious reflection on art. . . . They are, indeed, precisely the values
such a reflection should question. (p. 30)
If we discuss teaching with words implying judgments like exciting,
boring, flowed smoothlyall variations of good and badwe limit
our perceptions in the same way that such one-dimensional,
uncritical words limit our perceptions of film and other forms of art.
The usual conversations, full of prescriptive clichs designed to
help or evaluate, no doubt provide more certainty than conversa-
tions whose purpose is to see our own and others teaching
differently and to explore reality. In fact, Canbys buoyant, funny,
and clever might be welcome in many conversations about
teaching. Conversations between Socrates and others in the Socratic
dialogues could not be described in this way! These characters
reflect more complexity in their conversationsmovement from
strongly held opinion to floundering uncertainty to a confused not
knowing. Similar stages occur in conversations aimed at seeing
teaching differentlyexploring. An authentic quest for learning and
meaning requires that these stages take place. Neat, pat answers to
complex problems were not a part of the Socratic dialogues, nor are
they a part of conversations exploring teaching. As Abbs (1986)
reminds us in a discussion of Socrates:
To adopt the Socratic view of education would be to reaffirm that
education in our culture is primarily concerned with critical reflection
. . . with sustained inquiry into the various forms of meaning, with the
lifelong process . . . that goes well beyond the enclosing pressures of the
ego and the ephemeral clamorings of party politics. (p. 21)
To observe others and ourselves with the purpose of helping
implies not only that we know that one set of practices is
consistently superior to another, but that we know what needs to be
done in each distinct setting. It also implies that there is a simple
cause-effect relationship between a communication and a result:
Smile and the class will be relaxed; Speak slowly and the class
will understand. To help another or ourselves means we know
what should be done and what practices produce what results. If
experience in classes has taught us nothing else, we have learned
that each day we and our students are different as a result of
ongoing experiences and that practices that seemed to have
particular consequences one day have different ones another day.
To help means we have something to give another, a product to
sell. The whole thrust of the point of view and activities presented
in this article is toward the value of process, not product, and
toward the construction of our own knowledge, not the acceptance
of the knowledge of others in some type of package, as a product.
Freires (1970, p. 59) use of banking as a metaphor for education
that stresses product highlights the aim of many conversations about
lessons we observe: the passing of information from one person to
another. As Mehan (1979) says:
In sum, providing people with prearranged packages of information is
oppressive, for it fails to treat people as responsible for their own lives.
Furthermore, these imposed programs often have little to do with the
participants own preoccupations and practical circumstances.
Providing people with ways of looking, on the other hand, reminds the
participants that they are capable of acting on the world, and that these
actions can transform the world. (pp. 206-207)
The model for visiting teachers presented here, like the ideas of
Mehan and Freire, all come together in Bronowskis (1956)
discussion of the purposes of art and science. For the words science
and works of art in the following quotation, one might consider
substituting the words observation and lessons and conversations
about lessons, respectively.
The discoveries of science, the works of art are explorationsmore, are
explosionsof a hidden likeness. . . . When a simile takes us aback and
persuades us together, when we find a juxtaposition in a picture both
odd and intriguing, when a theory is at once fresh and convincing, we do
not merely nod over someone elses work. We re-enact the creative act,
and we ourselves make the discovery again. At bottom, there is no
unifying likeness there until we have seized it, we too have made it for
ourselves. (p. 19)
When we collect and interpret data from observations and
reconstruct our teaching, we are, of course, reinventing the wheel.
But why not? Why deny others or ourselves this pleasure? By
providing pat prescriptions to help, we not only deny others or
ourselves the excitement of constructing knowledge, we also imply
that we ourselves or those we work with cannot construct
knowledge. Moreover, helping can stop exploration. Again,
Bronowskis (1956) comments are appropriate. To him, the process
128 TESOL QUARTERLY
of exploration is the habit of truth: In science and in art and in
self-knowledge we explore and move constantly by turning to the
world of sense to ask, Is this so? This is the habit of truth, always
minute yet always urgent (p. 43).
THE AUTHOR
John F. Fanselow first got involved in the field of teacher preparation in 1961 as a
Peace Corps volunteer at Government Teachers College in Uyo, Nigeria. From
that time to his subsequent involvement in teacher preparation at Teachers
College, Columbia University, in New York, he has been raveling and unraveling
issues in teacher preparation.
REFERENCES
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Abramson, L. V., Seligman, M. E. P., & Teasdale, J.D. (1978). Learned
helplessness in humans: Critique and reformulation. Journal of
Abnormal Psychology, 87, 49-74.
Alinsky, S.D. (1971). Rules for radicalsA practical primer for realistic
radicals. New York: Random House.
Allen, P., Frohlich, M., & Spada, N. (1984). The communicative
orientation of language teaching: An observation scheme. In J.
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Barnes, D. (1976). From communication to curriculum. Harmondsworth,
England: Penguin.
Bateson, G. (1972). Steps to an ecology of mind. New York: Ballantine.
Bronowski, J. (1956). Science and human values. New York: Harper &
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Carney, R. (1986, June 30). A critic in the dark. The New Republic, pp. 25-
33.
Dulay, H., Burt, M., & Krashen, S. (1982). Language two. New York:
Oxford University Press.
Ellis, R. (1985). Understanding second language acquisition. Oxford:
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Fanselow, J.F. (1977). The treatment of error in oral work. Foreign
Language Annals, 10; 583-593.
Fanselow, J.F. (1987). Breaking rulesGenerating and exploring
alternatives in language teaching. White Plains, NY: Longman.
Freeman, D. (1982). Observing teachers: Three approaches to in-service
training and development. TESOL Quarterly, 16, 21-28.
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Seabury.
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Haskell, J. (1987). A bare-bones bibliography bookshelf. TESOL
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130 TESOL QUARTERLY
REVIEWS
The TESOL Quarterly welcomes evaluative reviews of publications of relevance
to TESOL professionals. In addition to textbooks and reference materials, these
include computer and video software, testing instruments, and other forms of
nonprint materials.
Edited by POLLY ULICHNY
Expl ori ng through Wri ti ng:
A Process Approach to ESL Composition
Ann Raimes. New York: St. Martins Press, 1987. Students Book, pp.
xiii + 318; Instructors Manual (in Instructors Edition), pp. 42.
I Few ESL teachers choose to teach writing without a text of any
kind, so that selecting a textbook, although no guarantee of a
successful class, often goes a long way in directing the activities and
assignments of a composition class. This past year I had the
occasion to use Ann Raimess latest book, Exploring Through
Writing, with ESL students in a pre-university composition class.
The review that follows offers both a users and a reviewers
perspective on the book.
Beginning with her textbook Focus on Composition (1978),
Raimes has consistently used visual and graphic material, in
addition to readings, as stimuli for writing. Many ESL teachers,
myself included, owe our introduction to Magrittes Portrait (1935),
an unforgettable still life with an eye staring out from a slice of ham,
to that book. In Techniques in Writing (1983), a text for teachers,
Raimes devoted a chapter to the use of pictures, in addition to
providing a solid grounding in other teaching techniques at all
stages of the writing process. In her most recent book, Exploring
Through Writing, Raimes again incorporates both pictures and
readings into the text, this time gearing the level to more advanced
students than she did in her 1978 book.
Like Focus on Composition, Exploring Through Writing i s
nontraditional in content and organization. It contains three parts:
Part I, Processes; Part II, Grammar: Twenty-One Troublespots; and
Part 111, Materials: Pictures and Readings. On the surface, these
components appear to be discrete and separate units. But upon
131
careful reading, that impression dissolves, since the different parts
of the book are intended to be recycled throughout the course. Part
I involves students in activities that move them through all stages of
the writing process. Part II offers guidelines on problem areas of
grammar and short exercises, and Part III provides the content for
writing through pictures and readings. The intention is for students
to choose one of five general topic areas in Part III (places,
possessions, work, family, or men and women) and work through
the recursive stages of writing: motivation, idea generation,
drafting, reformulation, editing, and publication (delivery to
readers) as described by Coe (1986). In subsequent papers, or
writing cycles, students choose other topic areas and generally
move through the writing process at a faster pace.
The Instructors Manual, which is included in the instructors
edition, is mandatory reading for anyone new to the writing
process. It provides a brief rationale for the approach, suggesting
teaching plans for a 15- and 8-week course and discussing how to
use groups in the classroom. What follows is a short sketch of each
of the three parts of the book.
Part I (Processes) drives the whole text and is noteworthy for the
variety and depth of its writing activities at all stages of writing.
Raimes divides the writing process into four components: getting
started, finding ways in, writing and rewriting, and editing. Each
component is further subdivided into strategies, resulting, for
example, in five ways of finding ways in: listing and brainstorming,
freewriting, asking questions, exploring new viewpoints, and telling
a story. Teachers newly acquainted with teaching writing as a
process may be tempted to walk students through all five strategies
before they produce a first drafton the theory that if one
invention technique is good, five must be better. I have found it
more productive to try one or two of the strategies with each paper
so that students develop a repertoire of invention techniques by the
end of the course.
Also noteworthy in the editing component of Part I are the
sections on improving style and using a dictionary. To go beyond
editing for correctness, ESL writers must consider features of style,
such as sentence length and complexity, types of cohesive links,
word choice, and tone. Stylistic concerns are rarely treated in ESL
composition texts, although they are a common feature of freshman
English texts for native English speakers. Though limited in focus to
sentence types (short and choppy versus long and convoluted) and
types of cohesive links, the section on improving style represents a
step in the right direction. The section on using dictionaries is basic
for all ESL teachers and a welcome addition to the book, since too
132 TESOL QUARTERLY
many ESL teachers ignore or assume knowledge of dictionary skills.
The 21 grammar troublespots described in Part II reflect the
choice of a seasoned teacher of writing but are by no means
exhaustive. They fall into three general categories: sentence
construction (types of sentences, sentence boundaries, sentence
combining); grammar and syntax (parts of speech, word forms,
word order); and mechanics (punctuation, forms of quoting and
citing). They are not arranged in any explicit order, but rather
reflect frequency of occurrence and, to some degree, level of
difficulty. For example, basic grammar problems, such as those
related to sentence boundaries and agreement, are listed before
more advanced grammar structures, such as -ing versus -ed
participles, articles, relative clauses, and conditionals.
The grammar troublespots contain general rules rather than
complete descriptions of usage. But as Raimes herself points out in
the Instructors Manual, the troublespots are not intended to
explicate fully or to provide comprehensive practice with problem
structures. Instead, they are meant to be used as an editing tool for
a student to pinpoint a problem, to understand general rules about
it, and to apply them in writing. The troublespots contain
explanations, examples, and flowcharts as well as practice exercises.
Raimes suggests that the teacher go through one or more of the
troublespots with the members of the class so that they become
familiar with their intended use and format. Students can then more
profitably refer to the troublespots on their own or as recom-
mended by the teacher. Students who desire a more complete
discussion of rules, including exceptions, should be referred to a
grammar reference text or style manual. Because the exercises
included in the grammar troublespots are short, teachers will need
to supplement them to provide adequate practice in problem areas
for some students.
Part III (Materials) provides the content for Part I (Processes). As
mentioned earlier, the pictures and readings in Part III are
thematically organized into five units: places, possessions, work,
family, and men and women. Each unit contains a series of black-
and-white reproductions of paintings or photographs, sometimes
excerpted from advertisements. Although the pictures themselves
are chosen for high interest, unfortunately the poor quality of some
reproductions detracts from that intention. Without knowing
something about Gandhi, a reader would find it difficult to identify
several objects in the photograph of his worldly possessions (Unit 2
7
Possessions, p. 203), including a pair of sandals in the foreground.
The same is true for a reproduction of Edward Hoppers painting
Gas (1940) in the Places unit (p. 181). My students had difficulty
REVIEWS 133
determining whether the light cast from the gas station was due to
the sun or light bulbs. Although the cost of color reproductions may
be prohibitive, sharper photographs would undoubtedly contribute
to students ability to describe these artworks, which deserve better
presentation.
In each of the five units, the series of pictures is preceded by
preview questions and accompanied by brief questions that guide
students in their reactions to the pictures. These questions are
designed to elicit ideas that go beyond the picture itself, crucial for
writers searching for connections to their own lives. Similar
questions accompany each reading.
The quality and careful selection of the readings compensate in
many ways for the problems with the pictures. Like the pictures
that precede them, the readings are of high interest. Lively and
engaging, they range in topic from a selection from the diary of
Anne Frank to a description of job satisfaction and productivity,
complete with tables. The readings are unedited and come with
glosses of low-frequency words and colloquialisms in the margins.
A fundamental issue about Exploring Through Writing concerns
its ongoing usefulness. Working through the book provides a classic
exercise in self-learning. Once students go through two or three
writing cycles, referring to Part I (Processes), Part II (Grammar),
and Part III (Materials), they have no more use for the text. That is,
by internalizing the various steps in the writing process and
acquiring strategies for implementing them, students need only
refer to the text for problem areas in grammar or to the pictures and
readings for ideas. However, a grammar reference text and teacher-
made materials would accomplish the same purpose. Does this
mean that Part I, covering the first 77 pages, is the only essential part
of the book? Yes and no. For the teacher new to the writing process
and/or new to teaching writing, the book makes it possible to put
theories about the composing process into practice. The pictures
and readings, with their accompanying questions, offer basic
materials that teachers can then expand or substitute on their own.
The grammar troublespots, though not a complete grammar
reference, provide enough information for most students to get
back on track in their writing.
A problem some students and teachers may have with this text is
that there is very little to take home after the course is over: no set
rules about writing, no complete grammar reference, no style
manual. For the most part, the learning with this book takes place in
the doing. But if students have accomplished the goal, that is, made
strides in their writing, is the text somehow lacking? If, in fact,
students work themselves out of the need for a writing text, this
134 TESOL QUARTERLY
should be cause for praise, not criticism. Learning how to write
should not be equated simply with learning how to control
grammar, mechanics, and the conventions of academic writing.
Throughout the book, Raimes demonstrates that since writing
cannot really be taught, students learn most from doing more
themselveswriting and discussing their work with each other and
with the teacher. As such, Exploring Through Writing should be
commended for delivering what its subtitle claims: A Process
Approach to ESL Composition.
REFERENCES
Coe, R. (1986). Teaching writing: The process approach, humanism, and
the context of crisis. In S. de Castell, A. Luke, & K. Egan (Eds.),
Literacy, society, and schooling: A reader (pp. 270-312). Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Raimes, A. (1978). Focus on composition. New York: Oxford University
Press.
Raimes, A. (1983). Techniques in writing. New York: Oxford University
Press,
MELANIE SCHNEIDER
Ohio University
Sounds and Rhythm: Focus on Vowel s
William D. Sheeler and R.W. Markley. New York: Regents, 1986.
Pp. vi+ 201.
Speak Up!
Cheryl Pavlik. Rowley, MA: Newbury House, 1986. Pp. v + 96.
I Bennington and Richards (1986) put forth a list of general
recommendations regarding the teaching of pronunciation and its
place in second language learning. Their recommendations include
helping the learner focus on longer term goals; bringing learners
gradually from controlled, cognitively based performance to
automatic, skill-based performance; and highlighting the interde-
pendence of pronunciation with other aspects of language use.
Sounds and Rhythm takes some admirable steps in implementing
these recommendations.
Designed for a wide range of ability levels, Sounds and Rhythm
begins with an overview of English pronunciation. When I used this
REVIEWS 135
text with a variety of adult learners from the newly arrived to long-
time, quite fluent residents, I found that all appreciated the overall
orientation very much. Word stress is introduced with nonlinguistic
syllables, which in practice proved to be an excellent aid to those
having difficulty hearing such differences. The orientation section
also includes units on phrases and sentences, vowels, rhythm, and
the sound of English. The latter unit includes an exercise in which
sentences spoken by a native speaker are contrasted with the same
sentences spoken by a foreign speaker. This is followed by an
exercise in which the student must decide if the speaker of each
sentence is native or nonnative.
Part 2 contains 13 units on basic stress, rhythm, and intonation.
Each chapter tries to bring the learner from a controlled to an
automatic performance by following a specific buildup pattern. In
the chapter on falling intonation, for example, the lesson begins
with a simple explanation of the use of final falling intonation,
followed by a listen-and-repeat exercise, moves on to audition
exercises, then to asking question-word questions and making
statements about pictures, and finally to having the learners
interview each other. As in most pronunciation texts, unfortunately,
word stress is treated as an essentially random matter with no
attempt to alert students to the control of stress by word endings
such as -tion, -it, and -ity. The unit on compound-noun stress is
similarly oversimplified, dwelling only on initially stressed
compounds (BASEball, CANdy store, etc.) while neglecting finally
stressed compounds such as afterNOON or New YORK.
Part 3 presents vowels in 35 separate units. In this section the text
really shines in its creative communicative exercises. It begins with
an overview of all vowels and then introduces learners to the three
influences on the length of vowels. This is an excellent chapter with
one exception: In my experience, the closing consonant influence
needs a great deal more practice than afforded here.
The chapters on individual vowels begin with the low central
vowel /a/. In each of these chapters, learners move from words and
phrases, to producing sentences and answering questions, to such
communicative activities as telling a short story using targeted
Chapter 21, where learners answer questions using the past tense of
feel? (well), S: I felt well (p. 51). Previously introduced vowels are
contrasted and summarized periodically. Unfortunately, the
importance of the schwa sound is lost by introducing it at the very
end of these 35 units. A more appropriate place might have been in
connection with word stress, as was done by Gilbert (1984).
136 TESOL QUARTERLY
Part 4 focuses on grammar words and sentence rhythm. Many of
the chapters deal with reduced forms, and this material is handled
well with the exception of having students attempt to learn to
produce // before vowels and before consonants. Bowen (1975)
has pointed out that this rule was developed from observations of
formal speech and does not hold true for the pronunciation of
informal speech toward which this book is directed.
In spite of the above mentioned faults, Sounds and Rhythm is a
sound book (no pun intended) from which many students should
benefit, especially high-beginning and intermediate-level speakers.
Another new text, Speak Up!, makes a similar attempt to
integrate pronunciation into the language syllabus. It is designed to
be used with the series Beginnings, though it can be used alone, as
it was for this evaluation. This text is rich in variety and as
comprehensive as most beginning pronunciation texts on the
market, though it has serious errors.
Speak Up! is divided into 40 convenient two-page units, each
starting with a comprehension dialogue from which the consonant
or vowel pronunciation focus is drawn. The traditional word list
with discrimination exercise is followed by a cloze exercise. Section
C addresses suprasegmentals and reduced forms, and Section D is
a listening exercise designed to give students practice in listening to
reduced forms in context.
This text has many well-thought-out exercises. The dialogues on
the set of four accompanying tapes, which are integral to the use of
the text, are interesting and well performed; their natural speed and
intonation present a realistic challenge. In the articulation focus
section, the contrasting sounds presented cover the greatest needs
of Asian and Spanish speakers, who form the largest portion of most
pronunciation classes, at least in the San Francisco Bay area.
Answers to almost all exercises are provided in the appendixes,
though a few that were needed were omitted.
There are, however, some glaring errors. Using the traditional
grammar-based approach to intonation, the text introduces students
to the difference in tunes between yes/no questions and wh-
questions. The illustration shows wh- questions ending with a rising
intonation, rather than the more common falling intonation, a
serious fault. The wh- questions in the recording of the listen-and-
repeat exercise that immediately follows, however, are given final
falling-intonation contours.
The author maintains that only the vowels in stressed syllables are
spoken clearly, or with full vowels. In fact, English abounds with
words that have full vowels in syllables that do not carry the
primary word stress, such as transportation, secretary, and so on.
REVIEWS 137
Furthermore, some pairs of words are distinguished only by the
production of a full or an unclear vowel in an unstressed syllable,
such as in estimate as a noun and estimate as a verb.
Speak Up! also fails to explain why the rule that statements have
final falling intonation and yes/no questions have final rising
intonation, as well as the examples illustrating the rule, is
contradicted by the dialogues on the tapes. In the very same lesson
in the following dialogue, the male speaker on the tape makes the
statement I want to report an accident with a final rising intonation.
Surely, he did not mean an uninvested question signaled by rising
intonation (Do I want to report an accident?). As if to underscore
this point, further on in the same dialogue, the female speaker asks
a yes/no questlon with final fall-rise intonation, rather than
expected rising one. These are not isolated examples as is
evidenced by the fact that the very next unit begins with another
yes/no question delivered with final falling intonation by the
speaker. The dialogues sound natural so the problem is not in the
speakers but in the rules, though these rules are the most commonly
taught.
Though initially I was intrigued by the organization of this book
and by its variety, I have since concluded that the frequent errors in
theory as well as in answers to drills are sufficiently grave that this
text should only be in the hands of teachers knowledgeable enough
in the area of pronunciation to provide correct information for
students. In addition, there is a preponderance of listening material
and too little production work, especially of communicative speech.
Although both of these texts offer some new ideas and
presentation methods, we need to continue to think about
improvements in the teaching of pronunciation. Most pressing is the
need for a more valid presentation of the subject of intonation. As
one can observe often on the tapes accompanying Speak Up!, the
use of natural intonation in realistic situations does not substantiate
the rules presented.
Brazil, Coulthard, and Johns, in Discourse Intonation and
Language Teaching (1980), detail the argument against teaching the
grammar-based intonation patterns used in the two texts reviewed
here and in most current texts. Noting the problems with teaching
intonation patterns as expressions of specific emotions (surprise,
anger, excitement, etc.), they come to the conclusion that we need
to think in terms of the role of speakers in relationship to each other
and of intonation as a function of discourse with implications for
context and for moment by moment assessment of the communi-
cative value of each part of each utterance (p. 128). As a further
complication, it has been found (see de Bot, 1981) that it is very
138 TESOL QUARTERLY
difficulteven for teachers with considerable experience in
pronunciation teachingto judge intonation consistently, leading to
the conclusion that without doubt the fact that most teachers are
unable to judge intonation in the speech of their pupils consistently
constitutes one of the major problems of intonation teaching
(p. 36).
Recent publications should prove helpful in stimulating thought
on how to present intonation more effectively. Bolinger (1986), for
example, has posited three basic intonation profiles that are smaller
than whole contours and has made some very useful generalizations
on how and why they are used. Bolingers work as well as that of
Gumperz (1982) and others should help us in understanding
intonation as a factor in the roles played by speakers in discourse.
These books are theoretically oriented, however, and much work
lies ahead to transform new concepts into even better teaching
methods and materials.
REFERENCES
Bolinger, D. (1986). Intonation and its
University Press.
de Bot, C. (1981). Intonation teaching
parts. Stanford, CA: Stanford
and pitch control. Review of
Applied Linguistics, 52, 31-42.
- -
Bowen, J.D. (1975). Patterns of English pronunciation. Rowley, MA:
Newbury House.
Brazil, D., Coulthard, M., & Johns, C. (1980). Discourse intonation and
language teaching. London: Longman.
Gilbert, J. (1984). Clear speech. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gumperz, J. (1982). Discourse strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Pennington, M. C., & Richards, J.C. (1986). Pronunciation revisited.
ANN C. CESSARIS
Key Communication, Menlo Park, CA
REVIEWS 139
BRIEF REPORTS AND SUMMARIES
The TESOL Quarterly invites readers to submit short reports and updates on their
work. These summaries may address any areas of interest to Quarterly readers.
Authors addresses are printed with
contact the authors for more details.
Edited by D. SCOTT ENRIGHT
Georgia State University
these reports to enable interested readers to
Do We Need to Teach Spelling? The Relationship
Between Spel l i ng and Vol untary Readi ng
Among Community College ESL Students
JEANNE POLAK
Los Angeles Valley College
STEPHEN KRASHEN
University of Southern California
I It has been suggested that reading contributes to spelling competence
(Ehri, 1986; Krashen, 1985; Smith, 1982b; see also Goodman, Smith,
Meredith, & Goodman, 1987). Experimental studies indicate that readers
can improve their spelling by exposure to words in texts (Gilbert, 1934,
1935). In addition, consistent correlations have been found between
performance on tests of reading comprehension and tests of spelling
ability (Hammill & McNutt, 1980). Although this relationship can be
interpreted as showing the relevance of spelling ability to reading, it is also
consistent with the hypothesis that reading experience causes improve-
ment in both reading and spelling ability.
The three studies described here were an attempt to determine whether
a relationship exists between spelling competence and voluntary reading
for ESL students at the community college level. If such a relationship
could be demonstrated, it would provide additional support for the
hypothesis that reading contributes to spelling ability.
METHOD
Three separate studies were conducted. The second study was done to
see whether the results of the first study would hold for different test
words. The third was done to determine whether first language had an
effect. The subjects were students enrolled in intermediate-level ESL
classes at Valley College in Los Angeles. (lntermediate is defined here as
advanced enough to enroll in regular subject-matter classes taught in
English.) Students qualified for this level by passing the previous level or
141
by scoring between 30 and 37 on the Comprehensive English Language
Test (Harris & Palmer, 1970), a test of listening comprehension, structure,
and vocabulary that does not measure spelling proficiency. Students in this
level do not receive formal spelling instruction, but they are penalized for
misspelled words on their written work, and occasional spelling lessons are
provided by some instructors. Subjects in the first two studies were
members of intact classes (N = 30 and 15, respectively). Two additional
intact classes were combined for the third study (N = 78); a larger sample
was considered desirable so that a sufficient number of different first
languages could be included.
In all three studies, subjects were first given a dictation and were then
asked to fill out a questionnaire probing their voluntary reading. The
dictation used in Studies 1 and 3 consisted of 103 words and was taken
from Learning American English (Taylor, 1956, p. 87). In Study 2, an 85-
word passage from Whaddaya Say? Guided Practice in Relaxed English
(Weinstein, 1982, p. 13) was used. The passage was read twice, and
students simply recorded what they heard. They were given time to check
their work after the passage was read. Students scores were simply the
number of words misspelled. If the same word was used and misspelled
more than once, it was counted as only one spelling error. Students were
aware that spelling accuracy was the focus of the activity.
After doing the dictation, subjects filled out a questionnaire developed
by the first author to probe their current voluntary reading (see Figure 1).
They were given one point for each item checked. The same questionnaire
was used in all three studies.
RESULTS
In all three studies a significant negative correlation was found between
questionnaire results and spelling errors: Those who reported more free
reading tended to make fewer errors (see Table 1). All three correlations
were statistically significant, but not significantly different from each other
(for Studies 1 and 2, z = .245; for Studies 2 and 3, z = .442; for Studies 1
and 3, z = .232).
Oller and Ziahosseiny (1971) reported that college ESL students who
spoke languages with Roman scripts made slightly more errors in English
spelling on a dictation test than did students who were speakers of
languages with non-Roman scripts. Differences were significant, but small.
To determine the possible influence of first language, in Study 3 we kept
a record of students first language. The following first languages were
represented: Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Hebrew,
Farsi, Armenian, Arabic, French, German, and Slovak. For statistical
analysis, languages written with Roman alphabets were coded as 1,
whereas languages with non-Roman alphabets were coded as O. No
difference was found in spelling performance between speakers of
languages with Roman alphabets and speakers of languages with non-
Roman alphabets (r= .097, n.s.).
142 TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 1
Spelling Questionnaire
The combined effect of reading and first language was analyzed using
multiple regression (see Table 2), which reveals the effect of each of the
independent variables when the other is held constant. The regression
coefficient (b) for reading is significantly different from zero (t = 3.055,
p < .01), but the coefficient for first language is not (t= 0.1494, n.s.).
Inspection of the betas (standardized regression coefficients) shows that
reported voluntary reading has a much larger effect on spelling than does
first language. In addition, incorporating first language into the analysis
does very little for our ability to predict spelling scores. Alone, current
reading habits account for 11.83% of the variance in spelling in Study 3 (R
2
,
or .344
2
). Adding first language allows us to account for about 11.86% of
the variance in spelling (R
2
in Table 2), less than 0.03% more.
A separate analysis of Spanish-speaking subjects in Study 3 resulted in a
very similar relationship between reading and spelling (r = .323, p < .05;
n = 30), confirming that the effect of reading is independent of any effect
of first language.
BRIEF REPORTS AND SUMMARIES 143
TABLE 1
The Relationship Between Reported Free Reading
and Spelling Performance
TABLE 2
Regression Coefficients for Spelling Achievement
DISCUSSION
Correlations do not imply causality. Our results might mean that reading
experience is responsible for spelling ability or that spelling ability
underlies reading ability, which in turn results in more free reading. They
could also mean that reading and spelling influence each other.
The hypothesis that spelling competence aids and thus encourages
reading runs into trouble in the face of Smith's (1982a) arguments that
spelling has only a minimal role in reading (p. 143). Smith presents
evidence that word identification does not require previous letter
identification and that knowledge of the features necessary for word
identification and the identification of meaning from texts is built up by
meaningful reading.
If free reading causes improvement in spelling ability, we must explain
why the correlations found here are so modest; current reading habits
account for only 22.4% of the variance in spelling in the study yielding the
highest correlation, Study 2. One possible explanation, consistent with the
hypothesis that reading causes improvement in spelling ability, is that our
measures were not sufficiently sensitive. The reading questionnaire
probed only current voluntary reading, not previous reading in the first or
second language, and may not have given enough weight to certain kinds
144 TESOL QUARTERLY
of reading. Also, the dictation test may not have probed a wide enough
variety of words.
Of course, it is possible that other variables play an important role.
Candidates include level of literacy in the primary language, perceptual/
memory factors, degree of concern with proper spelling, and amount and
kind of spelling instruction (for strong arguments against the view that
spelling competence comes primarily from writing, see Smith, 1981).
The fact that the measures used were so crude, yet our results so
consistent, makes our results, in our view, all the more interesting. A more
extensive test of spelling and a measure of reading that takes into account
students past history of voluntary reading might produce stronger results.
Our results suggest that voluntary reading will help spelling and lead to
what is at worst a harmless implication: Students should be encouraged to
do pleasure reading on their own. Besides spelling, there is good evidence
that voluntary reading leads to improvement in many areas of language,
including reading ability, vocabulary, grammar, and writing style
(Krashen, 1985; Smith, 1982a, 1982b).
However, even if improved spelling ability results from reading, this
does not imply that extensive reading will result in perfect spelling. If
Goodman (1982) and Smith (1982a) are correct, fluent readers do not need
to pay attention to every bit of visual information, but only need enough
to confirm their predictions. Thus, even excellent readers may have some
gaps. (Most readers of this article, we predict, are good, but perhaps not
perfect, spellers.) A spelling dictionary or spelling-checker program may
be the best way of dealing with occasional demons.
1
REFERENCES
Ehri, L. (1986). Sources of difficulty in learning to spell and read. In M. Wolraich
& D. Routh (Eds.), Advances in developmental and behavioral pediatrics (pp.
121-196). Greenwich, CT: Jai Press.
Gilbert, L. (1934). Effect of reading on spelling in the ninth grade. School Review,
42, 197-204.
Gilbert, L. (1935). A study of the effect of reading on spelling. Journal Of
Educational Research, 28, 570-576.
Goodman, K. (1982), Language and literacy: The selected writings of Kenneth S.
Goodman (F. Gollasch, Ed.). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Goodman, K., Smith, E. B., Meredith, R., & Goodman, Y. (1987). Language and
thinking in school: A whole-language curriculum (3rd ed.). New York: Richard
C. Owen.
Hammill, D., & McNutt, G. (1980). Language abilities and reading: A review of the
literature of their relationship. The Elementay School ]ournal, 80, 269-277.
Harris, D. P., & Palmer, L.A. (1970). CELT/A comprehensive English language test
for speakers of English as a second language. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Krashen, S. (1985). Inquiries and insights. Hayward, CA: Alemany Press.
Oller, J. W., Jr., & Ziahosseiny, S. (1971). The contrastive analysis hypothesis and
spelling errors. Language Learning, 20, 183-189.
1 We thank Douglas Biber and Theresa Roberts for valuable discussion and comments,
Smith, F. (1981). Reading: What is basic? In M. Douglas (Ed.), Claremont Reading
Conference, 45th yearbook (pp. 1-20). Claremont, CA: Claremont Graduate
School of Education.
Smith, F. (1982a). Understanding reading (3rd ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
Erbaum.
Smith, F. (1982b). Writing and the writer. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Taylor, G. (1956). Learning American English. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Weinstein, N. (1982). Whaddaya say? Guided practice in relaxed English. Culver
City, CA: ELS Publications.
Authors Addresses: Jeanne Polak, Department of English, Los Angeles Valley
College, 5800 Fulton Avenue, Van Nuys, CA 91401-4096;
Stephen Krashen, Department of Linguistics, University of
Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90007
The Effect of ESL Students Percepti ons of
Thei r Cogni ti ve Strategi es on Readi ng Achi evement
YOLANDA N. PADRON
University of HoustonClear Lake
HERSHOLT C. WAXMAN
University of Houston University Park
Although a few studies have investigated the cognitive reading
strategies used by Hispanic ESL students (Block, 1986; Knight, Padron, &
Waxman, 1985), the effect of these students use of strategies on reading
achievement has not been specifically examined. Furthermore, most of
these studies have used think-aloud procedures and verbal reports to
identify reading strategies, a methodology that has been questioned
because students sometimes have difficulty assessing metacognitive
processes (Afflerbach & Johnston, 1984; Ericsson& Simon, 1984).
On the other hand, a few studies have successfully used self-report
instruments to identify the cognitive reading strategies used by students
(Hahn, 1984; Paris & Myers, 1981). These instruments, however, have not
been used with Hispanic ESL students, nor have they specifically
examined the relationship between students reported use of cognitive
reading strategies and performance on measures of reading comprehen-
sion.
METHOD
The sample in the present study consisted of 82 students who were
randomly selected from the population of Hispanic ESL students in the
third, fourth, and fifth grades of a public elementary school in a small
146 TESOL QUARTERLY
industrial town located near a major southwestern city. The reading
comprehension section of the Stanford Diagnostic Reading Test (Karlesen,
Madden, & Gardner, 1966) was administered in January and again in April
to determine the relationship between the strategies cited by students and
gains in reading comprehension. Immediately after completing the
posttest, students were administered the Reading Strategy Questionnaire
(RSQ) (Waxman & Padron, 1987), which was adapted from Hahn (1984)
and Paris and Myers (1981). The survey administrators read the RSQ items
aloud to the students so that reading proficiency would not interfere with
the students ability to respond to the items.
The RSQ is a 14-item, Likert-type questionnaire on which students
indicate the extent to which they use the described strategy by responding
either (a) Always, (b) Sometimes, or (c) Never. A mean score of 3 indicates
that the student perceived using the strategy all of the time, whereas a
score of 1 indicates that the student perceived using the strategy none of
the time.
The following seven strategies included on the RSQ have been found to
be negatively related to students reading achievement: (a) thinking about
something else while reading, (b) writing down every word, (c) skipping
the parts you dont understand in the story, (d) reading as fast as you can,
(e) saying every word over and over again, (f) looking up words in the
dictionary, and (g) saying the main idea over and over (Hahn, 1984;
Padron, 1985). The following seven strategies on the RSQ have been found
to be positively related to students achievement: (a) summarizing in
writing, (b) underlining important parts of the story, (c) self-generated
questions, (d) checking through the story to see if you remember all of it,
(e) asking questions about the parts of the story you dont understand,
(f) taking notes, and (g) imaging or picturing the story in your mind (Hahn,
1984; Padron, 1985).
RESULTS
Table 1 reports the means and standard deviations on the 14 RSQ items.
The results indicate that the most frequently cited strategies were
(a) asking questions about the parts of the story you dont understand,
(b) checking through the story to see if you remember all of it, (c) imaging
or picturing the story in your mind, and (d) looking up words in the
dictionary. The least cited strategies were (a) reading as fast as you can,
(b) thinking about something else while reading, (c) writing down every
word, and (d) skipping the parts you dont understand in the story. The
mean scores of the strategies are generally low, and most are close to 2,
indicating that students reported using these strategies only some of the
time. On the other hand, the standard deviations of all the items are quite
large, indicating a great deal of variance in the way students responded to
each item. This finding reveals that there were large differences in the
ways students reported using strategies.
ABLE 1
Means and Standard Deviations of ESL Students Strategies
Stepwise multiple regression was used to examine which reading
strategies significantly predict (p < .05) students posttest achievement,
after statistically controlling for students pretest achievement (see Table
2). Pretest achievement and the 14 RSQ items were included as the
independent variables in the regression analysis. Then variables that were
found to predict significantly posttest achievement were extracted from
the overall equation in the stepwise procedure and entered in the final
regression model. As expected, pretest achievement entered the regression
model first and accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in
students achievement scores (R
2
= .66, b = .80, p < .001).
The strategy of thinking about something else while reading was
selected for entry into the regression model next and accounted for an
additional 6% of the variance in the dependent variable (R
2
change = .06,
p > .001). The b-weight for this independent variable was negative
(b = 3.62), indicating that the more students used this strategy, the lower
their achievement gain. The final variable that significantly predicted
students posttest achievement and was entered into the regression model
was the strategy of saying the main idea over and over. This variable
accounted for an additional 1% of the variance (R
2
change = .01, p < .05),
and the negative sign of the b-coefficient (b = 1 .87) also indicates that
this strategy had a negative effect on students posttest achievement. In
other words, the more students reported that they said the main ideas over
and over again, the lower their achievement gain.
148 TESOL QUARTERLY
TABLE 2
Regression of Posttest Achievement on Pretest Achievement and 14 Strategies
The overall regression model accounted for 73% of students posttest
reading achievement scores, which indicates that a great deal of the total
variance in the dependent variable was explained by pretest achievement
and the two significant reading strategies. It should also be pointed out that
the two reading strategies that were found to be significant negative
predictors of posttest reading achievement were also considered to be
negative or detrimental reading strategies on the questionnaire.
DISCUSSION
The results of this study indicate that students perceptions of the
cognitive strategies they use have predictive validity for their reading
comprehension. As expected, two of the negative strategies included on
the questionnaire were found to be negatively related to students gains in
reading comprehension. Thinking about something else while reading
obviously hinders students concentration and understanding of the story.
Similarly, when students say the main idea over and over, they may be
spending too much time rehearsing, in an effort to recall what the story is
generally about, while ignoring other important aspects of the story.
These findings support previous metacognitive research conducted with
monolingual, which has found that lower achieving students use less
sophisticated and inappropriate cognitive reading strategies during
reading (Brown, Armbruster, & Baker, 1983). The results of the present
study suggest that the use of inappropriate cognitive strategies may be an
additional reason why Hispanic ESL students generally score lower on
reading achievement tests than English monolingual students. That is, the
use of negative strategies by Hispanic students may be another factor other
than English proficiency that interferes with their reading comprehension
and thus negatively affects their reading achievement. Further
experimental research needs to be conducted to determine if decreasing
the use of negative reading strategies will result in increased achievement
by Hispanic ESL students.
The results of this study also lend support to the use of self-report
measures to assess students cognitive strategy use in reading. Self-report
instruments have tremendous advantages over verbal reports of strategy
use because they are easy and convenient to administer and do not require
students to articulate the strategies that they use. Furthermore, the
instrument used in this study can help students develop greater awareness
of the strategies they employ during reading (Padron, 1985). This
instrument may also be useful for classroom teachers because it provides
them with important information on students strategy use and thus allows
them to adapt instruction to the needs of individual students.
REFERENCES
Afflerbach, P., & Johnston, P. (1984). On the use of verbal reports in reading
research. Journal of Reading Behavior, 16, 307-322.
Block, E. (1986). The comprehension strategies of second language readers.
Brown, A., Armbruster, B., & Baker, L. (1983). The role of metacognition in
reading and studying. In J. Orsanu (Ed.), Reading comprehension: From
research to practice (pp. 49-75). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Ericsson, K., & Simon, H. (1984). Protocol analysis: Verbal reports as data.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Hahn, A.L. (1984). Assessing and extending comprehension: Monitoring strategies
in the classroom. Reading Horizons, 24, 231-237.
Karlesen, B., Madden, R., & Gardner, E.F. (1966). Stanford diagnostic reading test.
New York: Harcourt, Brace& World.
Knight, S. L., Padron, Y. N., & Waxman, H.C. (1985). The cognitive reading
strategies of ESL students. TESOL Quarterly, 19, 789-792.
Padron, Y.N. (1985). Utilizing cognitive reading strategies to improve English
reading comprehension of Spanish-speaking bilingual students. Unpublished
doctoral dissertation, University of Houston.
Paris, S. G., & Myers, M. (1981). Comprehension monitoring, memory, and study
strategies of good and poor readers. ]ournal of Reading Behavior, 13, 5-22.
Waxman, H. C., & Padron, Y.N. (1987, January). The effect of students
perceptions of cognitive strategies on reading achievement. Paper presented at
the annual meeting of the Southwest Educational Research Association, Dallas.
Authors Address: c/o Padron, School of Education, University of HoustonClear
Lake, 2700 Bay Area Blvd., Box 286, Houston, TX 77058
150 TESOL QUARTERLY
THE FORUM
The TESOL Quarterly invites commentary on current trends or practices in the
TESOL profession. It also welcomes responses or rebuttals to any articles or
remarks published here in The Forum or elsewhere in the Quarterly.
20 Y ear s of t he T ESO L Q uar t er l y
JOHN SWALES
University of Michigan
This article reports the results of a diachronic study of the
flagship publication of the TESOL organization, the TESOL
Quarterly (TQ). A flagship periodical in any field is worth more
than cursory interest because it self-evidently is something more
than a passive reflector of contemporary trends and issues. The
gatekeeping activities of editorsand of those called upon to serve
as reviewersset standards of scholarly and professional behavior
and establish areas of greater concern. Although a major periodical
is partly shaped by wider forces in the disciplinary culture, it also
shapes that disciplinary culture by the way it goes about its business.
One obvious way of studying the 20-year development of a
periodical is to construct a historical account. Here the investigator
would largely tell the story of the periodical from within: the
circumstances of its founding, its growth and development, its
internal crises and key points of transition-and such events set
against the wider background of the story of the rise and fall of
movements, enthusiasms, and research fronts (see Bowers, 1986). In
the pursuit of such a historical narrative, the historian is likely to
spend time in interviewing key figures and in examining archival
documents and will do so with the laudable and reasonable
ambition of relating cause and effect. In particular, the journal
historian, like his or her counterparts in the history of knowledge, is
likely to give special importance to attribution-wherein the TQs
pages did a particular concept first surface, and out of whos head?
As it happens, I have had neither the time nor the right kind of
experience to be able to construct such a narrative. My own
contacts with TESOL and the TQ are both short-lived and
peripheral in comparison with those of many others. On the other
hand, I have some familiarity with the procedures of citational
analysis (Small, 1982), and Swales (1986) was an attempt to apply
151
qualitative procedures to the English as a second language/English
for special purposes controversy surrounding Communicative
Syllabus Design (Munby, 1978). The present study is more
quantitative; in effect, this means that the approach is archaeologi-
cal rather than historical, for it examines, by stratified sampling, the
surviving textual record. It investigates the pictures on the wall of
the cave but has nothing to say as to why or how those artifacts
come to be there. Although there is little doubt that editors,
publishers, and prophets can all play critical roles, the approach I
have adopted may be able to discern certain broader trends,
perhaps divorceable from the influence of particular protagonists.
A direct inspiration for the present study was Bazermans (1984)
analysis of spectroscopic articles in the Physical Review, 1893-1980.
Following Bazerman, I examine the textual product in a broadbrush
kind of way, even if I do not report for the TQ on some of the things
that Bazerman investigated, such as syntactic, lexical, and rhetorical
changes over time, and even if I have extended Bazermans
procedures to include authorship characteristics and a comparison
of the TQ and its peer periodicals.
PROCEDURE
This analysis is based on a selection of main articles across the
history of the TQ. All other textual material, such as review articles,
reviews, brief reports, and The Forum, has been excluded. The
analysis starts with the main articles of Volume 2 (1968) in the
belief that after four issues the TQ would have found its feetand
then includes all the main articles at subsequent 4-year intervals
until 1984. I also examined in somewhat more detail the first three
issues of 1986 (1986, No. 4, contains an unusual composite on
Alternatives in Second Language Research, and that issue was
therefore excluded). The procedure produced a corpus of 192 main
articles, of which the following features were investigated:
1. Authorship characteristics in terms of gender, number, location,
and present occupation
2. Article length and the degree and type of macrostructuring into
sections
3. The use of set-off nonprose material under such headings as
Figure No. X or Table No. Y
4. The number of references per article and per 1,000 words of
main text and the types of references cited (books, articles,
chapters, etc.)
152 TESOL QUARTERLY
5. The provenance of the references in the first three issues of the
TQ, 1986
6. The citational status of the TQ (1977-1985) and its status in
comparison with other periodicals (1985 only)
MAIN RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Table 1 shows the percentage of single authors or first authors (of
two or more) who are female. As the table makes clear, the data
show a rise from 26% to 70% in the 18-year period, with a strong
increase in this decade. It looks as though before 1980 the majority
of single/first authors were men, but since then, the majority have
tended to be women. It would be nice to think that the greater
representation of women more closely reflects their preponderance
in the ESL profession.
Table 2 gives the percentage of articles that are single authored.
Single-authored main articles still constitute a majority, but the
percentage has moved downward from 92% in the early years to 62%
in 1986. The increase in multiple-authored articles is possibly due to
a partial shift from a humanities to a social science orientation as
witnessed by a rise in quantitative research (Henning, 1986). The
actual average number of authors has increased from 1.08 in 1968 to
1.48 in 1986 (Nos. 1-3), but the 1986 average still remains well below
the average of around three authors per article commonly reported
for the sciences.
TABLE 1
Percentage of Articles with a Female Sole or First Author
1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1986
26 42 39 33 64 70
TABLE 2
Percentage of Single-Authored Articles
1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1986
92 92 78 74 65 62
THE FORUM 153
An analysis of 19 two-authored articles published in the TQ, 1984-
1986, shows that in all but 2 articles at least one of the authors held
a professorial position. The other authors in these 17 professorially
authored articles were fairly equally distributed among instructors/
teachers (7), students or ex-students (5), and professors (5). This
pattern seems to suggest that diverse individuals perceive an
advantage in collaboration, irrespective of a contemporary trend to
downgrade co-authored articles in promotion/tenure decisions for
professorial appointments in the humanities.
The data for Figure 1, which gives the geographical location of
first/single authors, were derived from the biographical notes
accompanying articles and refer to the current location as described
in those notes. The figure shows the consistent preponderance of
North American locations (United States and Canada) and offers
little evidence of any diminution of U.S.-located domination of the
TQ. Canada is the only other country that gets on the graph at all.
Particular country locations outside North America occur only
occasionally. According to this sample, there is no country outside
North America that has a tradition or track record of having its ESL
specialists appear as authors of main articles in the TQ.
FIGURE 1
U.S. and Canadian Authors
154 TESOL QUARTERLY
Figure 2 summarizes the types of occupation of single or first
authors, who were placed into one of six categories:
1. University faculty (those with professorial posts in U.S. and U. S.-
based administrations, or lecturers and professors in U.K. and
U.K.-based administrations)
2. University staff (those with instructor or lecturer positions in
U.S. and U.S.-based systems; tutors in U.K. and U.K.-based
systems)
3. University students
4. School instructors, whether public or private
5. Professionals, such as inspectors, translators, or testers
6. Others, such as those retired or working in non-ESL-related areas
The last four categories produced relatively few first/single
authors, and as can be seen from Figure 2, the combined percentage
for the first two categories has increasingly predominated (from
around 75% to around 90% during the 1968-1986 period). The figure
also shows for the present decade some fall in faculty authorship
and some rise in staff authorship. This trend may be due to
increasing opportunities for staff to carry out the major studies that
we typically expect of TQ main articles; alternatively, it may reflect
the increasing difficulty that PhD holders have been experiencing in
obtaining tenure-track positions.
Overall, the authorship data suggest that a clear majority of TQ
main articles have, throughout the periodicals history, been written
by university-based North Americans. The TQ never was a journal
written by teachers for teachers. In addition, there is evidence of a
strong continuing trend toward female authorship and a weaker
trend toward multiple authorship.
Table 3 provides data on the average length of the main articles
during the 1968-1986 period. The figures are for the average length
of the main text and exclude abstracts, tables, references, and
appendixes. If we leave aside the 1968 average, there has apparently
not been such a strong trend toward increasing length of main text
as I suspect many readers of the TQ would have anticipated. There
has, however, been some standardization: For example, the 1972
peak is partly accounted for by the existence of two very long
articles (around 12,000 words). Certainly, the later articles look
longer because of the increasing numbers of tables, references, and
appendixes, but if length is defined in terms of the main prose text,
current averages are still under 6,000 words.
THE FORUM 155
FIGURE 2
Employment Status of Authors
During the life of the TQ there have been greater changes in
sectioning and in the use of set-off nonprose material. The
unsectioned main article was originally the norm (80%) but declined
sharply and by 1984 had disappeared. Since 1972, sectioned articles
have had a fairly steady average of about four top-level sections (as
currently represented by large capitals). The percentage of articles
without titled tables or figures has also declined (from 80% to 30%),
and the average number of such items per article has steadily risen
from under 1 to about 2.5. Numerical tables have consistently
provided the majority of the set-off items; thus, the TQ has not
evidenced the trend toward graphs that Bazerman (1984) noted for
the Physical Review.
During the TQs existence there have been interesting develop-
ments in reference patterns. First, unreferenced main articles were
156 TESOL QUARTERLY
always infrequent (a maximum of 24% in 1968) and have now
disappeared. Concomitantly, there has been strong growth in the
average number of references per main article, from 4 in 1968 to 34
in 1986 (see Table 4). A plateau can be seen in the 1972-1980 period,
largely brought about by variability in citation practice. For
example, of the 28 main articles published in 1976, half contained 10
or fewer references, 5 had between 11 and 20, 3 between 21 and 30,
5 between 31 and 50, and 1 with more than 50 references. Thus, in
1976, almost a quarter of the articles were highly referencedif we
accept that 30 or more references constitute a high degree of
referencing. The main change that had occurred by 1984 was the
virtual disappearance of main articles with 10 or fewer references,
rather than an increase in references at the upper end of the scale.
Because articles vary in length, a somewhat more adequate
indication of the upward trend can be achieved by examining the
number of references per 1,000 words of main text. Table 5 shows
a steepand acceleratingrise from 1.6 to 7.0 references per 1,000
words.
TABLE 4
References per Main Article
1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1986
4 17 16 17 30 34
TABLE 5
References per 1,000 Words of Main Article
1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1986
1.6 3.5 4.5 3.7 5.1 7.0
References in the corpus were classified according to the
following categories: (a) scholarly or teacher reference books, (b)
textbooks (for ESL students or others), (c) chapters in edited books,
(d) articles in journals and presentations, (e) technical reports and
monographs, (f) dissertations and theses, (g) tests, (h) audiovisual
materials such as tapes or films, (i) reviews, (j) literary works, and
(k) others. Only the first four categories were prominent. Figure 3
shows a slow decline in the percentage of references that are made
to scholarly or teacher reference books and the virtual elimination
THE FORUM 157
of references to textbooks. This latter trend would seem to suggest
that TQ main authors no longer consider ESL textbooks as primary
sources of information or authority.
FIGURE 3
Types of Reference to Longer Works
1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1986
Year
In contrast there has been a rise (see Figure 4) in the proportion
of references made to short scholarly or research pieces as typically
represented by articles and chapters. Indeed, the combined
percentages for Categories c and d have increased from 30% to
about 65% over the 1968-1986 period.
I also examined in some detail the main classes of references in
the main articles in the first three issues of 1986: references to
journal articles and references to scholarly/teacher reference books
or to chapters therein. In both cases I venture to suggest that the
findings are not without interest.
In the 1986 corpus as described, there are 290 references to
journal articles. These 290 references are spread around a
remarkable total of 96 different journals, which represents a very
low token-type ratio of 3:1. This wide spread may reflect either a
vibrant interdisciplinary eclecticism or the existence of isolated
authorial subgroups.
Two journals tower above the others: the TQ with 53 references
(the high self-citation rate in the TQ is taken up later) and Language
158
TESOL QUARTERLY
FIGURE 4
Types of Reference to Shorter Works
Learning with 43. The remaining 67% of the 290 references are
distributed among 94 journals. The leaders of the pack, as well as a
crude approximation of the constituencies they principally serve,
are presented below, in order of journals cited most frequently
(after the TQ and Language Learning):
Modern Language Journal foreign language teaching
International Review of Applied Linguistics applied linguistics
College Composition and Communication Ll writing
English Language Teaching Journal E S L
Syst em ESL
Language linguistics
There then follows a group of periodicals concerned with
educational research, educational psychology, and psychology.
Thus far we have apparently seen a predominance of citations to
journals that are concerned in varying proportions with language
learning. One would then expect that each of the areas represented
by these journals would have a large number of citations. However,
if we examine the total list of journals (minus 11 that contain 12
references and fall into the category of miscellaneous), this
expectation is not borne out. Indeed, the broader picture of which
THE FORUM 159
journals TQ authors in the sample cite shifts quite dramatically
even assuming that I may have sometimes erred in placing a
particular journal within a particular specialty. In the area of
linguistics there is a total of 9 references (5 journals); in foreign
language teaching, 23 references (6 journals); in English as an Ll, 26
references (12 journals); and in applied linguistics, 20 references (6
journals). Citationally, in 1986 the TQs strongest links appear to be
with educational and psychological research, for which there are 77
references (44 journals).
However, the most interesting finding relates to ESL journals
themselvesat first sight natural sources of references for articles
submitted to the TQ. There are, in fact, but 10 ESL journals cited
and a low total of 27 references (very similar figures for English as
a first language). How can we account for the phenomenon that the
authors in the sample find little citable in ESL journals other than
the TQ itself (and Language Learning in so far as it is concerned
with ESL)?
The most plausible answer seems to be that the TQ is considered
largely self-sufficient as a source of appropriate and relevant ESL
journal citations, and indeed the high TQ self-citation rate would
support such a speculation. Of course, this is not to imply that the
1986 authors consider the TQ as a self-sufficient source of ESL
citations in general because considerable reference is made to ESL
scholarly and teacher reference books (both edited and authored).
What it does suggest is that there is no strong interest in
incorporating findings from ESL journals that in some sense
represent other regions of the world, findings from the JALT
Journal and the RELC Journal for Asia, from System for continental
Europe, from the English Language Teaching Journal for Britain
and the Commonwealth, or from TESL Canada.
I also investigated the country of publication of books cited.
There were 240 such books, of which 181 were published in the
United States (75%) and 59 (25%) elsewhere, mostly Britain (39)
followed by Canada (8). There were only three outside North
America/Western Europe (Egypt, 2; Singapore, 1). Most striking is
the low visibility of publishers in Western Europe, especially in
Holland, where we know that several publishing houses are active
in linguistics and allied fields.
So far I have concentrated on the TQs internal practices. I would
now like to consider its role in the wider world. What is the TQs
record as a cited journal? For this we can look for enlightenment to
the final and seventh volume of the annual Social Science Citation
Index (SSCI). The figures for the 1977-1985 years, which are (as is
customary in the SSCl) based on all citations, not just those found in
160 TESOL QUARTERLY
main articles, are presented in Table 6. For example, the SSCI
survey found 55 citations to the TQ in 1977, 16 of which were made
in 1977 to previous articles in the TQ by TQ authors and 39 of which
were made in 1977 by authors of articles published in other journals.
TABLE 6
S.SCl Citations of the TQ ( 1977-1985 )
The previous section has illustrated that references in the TQ
have been steadily increasing; according to the SSCl count of all
references, these climbed from 451 in 1977 to 1,119 in 1985 (with a
big jump between 1982 and 1983). This represents an increase of
almost 150%, whereas total citations to the TQ have increased from
55 to 242, an increase of just under 350%. It therefore looks as though
the TQ is becoming a more influential periodical in absolute terms
(i.e., in terms of increasing citations) as well as in relative terms (i.e.,
the growth in citations to the TQ is increasing faster than the growth
in the TQ). However, such a straightforward account cannot be sus-
tained if we consider the figures in the last two columns in Table 6.
Clearly, references to the TQ within the TQ have been growing
faster than references to the TQ in other journals: The percentage
increase for the former is almost 700%, whereas for the latter it is
almost 200%. It therefore appears that the citational success of the
TQ is at least partly due to its own self-perpetuating tradition rather
than being simply ascribable to the periodicals increasing
significance for the authors who publish in a broader coterie of
periodicals.
Indeed, we can see some confirmation of this when we compare
the 1985 TQ figures with those for a number of comparable
journals. (The TQ- relevant fields are comparatively small. A
THE FORUM 161
powerful and prestigious journal like Language collected over 700
citations in 1985, and a giant in a giant field, The American
Economic Review, stacked up more than 5,000 citations to itself.)
Table 7 shows that the TQ belongs in the peer-group big four as
far as total 1985 citations are concerned. However, if we examine
citations to the TQ that are not self-citations, it can be seen that the
TQ evinces the greatest place drop of all 10 journalsfrom third to
sixth. It may be, of course, that the 1985 figures will turn out to be
anomalous when data for 1986 are available. Certainly, a possible
contributing factor to the TQs high self-citation rate is the
encouragement of interactive commentary such as Forum-type
replies and responses, which are bound to increase journal self-
citation.
TABLE 7
SSCI Citations of Selected Journals (1985)
EVALUATION
Finally, is there, in the light of this rather odd study, cause for
celebration after 20 years and 80 issues? I will look at this by trying
to answer four questions.
1. Is the TQ a major journal? In terms of peers in the applied
language arts and sciences, the answer is yes, even if the
affirmative is qualified by the abnormally high self-citation rate.
2. Is the TQ a journal of
clearly yes (see Gaies,
research issue).
162
research and scholarship? The answer is
1987, for an interesting discussion of the
TESOL QUARTERLY
3.
4.
Is the TQ an international journal? Given the fact that ESL is a
major global activity, the answer is no, at least in any geographic
sense of international.
Does the TQ represent the profession? In terms of demonstrat-
ing to a wider world that ESL is too serious a business to be left
to native-speaker amateurs, the answer is yes.
Certainly the rather dry facts that I have presented attest to
growth and development in all kinds of ways (except for
international aspects). Of course, as I mentioned at the outset, these
facts are limited to textual, biographical, and citational features. A
more complete study of the first 20 years of the TESOL Quarterly
would also involve at least an analysis of its content, but that
requires investigators with a greater courage in their categorical
convictions.
1
REFERENCES
Bazerman, C. (1984). Modern evolution of the experimental report in
physics: Spectroscopic articles in Physical Review, 1893-1980. Social
Studies of Science, 14, 163-196.
Bowers, R. (1986). English in the world: Aims and achievements in English
language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 20, 393-410.
Gaies, S.J. (1987). Research in TESOL: Romance, precision, and reality.
TESOL Newsletter, 21 (2), 21-23.
Henning, G. (1986). Quantitative methods in language acquisition
research. TESOL Quarterly, 20, 701-708.
Munby, J. (1978). Communicative syllabus design. Cambr i dge :
Cambridge University Press.
Small, H. (1982). Citation context analysis. In B. Dervin & M.J. Voight
(Eds.), Progress in communication sciences (Vol. 3, pp. 287-310).
Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Swales, J. (1986). Citation analysis and discourse analysis. Applied
Linguistics, 7, 39-56.
1 I would like to thank my assistants Jennifer Marwill, Shigeru Mori, Pan Fang Fu, and Carol
Tower for their help in analyzing the main data; Douglass Scott and Robert Blue for help
with the graphics; Dr. Henry Small of the Institute for Scientific Information, Philadelphia,
for important advice at a critical juncture; and an anonymous reviewer who wrote a
valuable, two-page commentary.
THE FORUM 163
English Language Proficiency and
Academic Performance of
Undergraduate I nternational Students
PATRICIA JOHNSON
University of Wisconsin-Green Bay
The study on English proficiency and academic performance of
graduate international students at the State University of New York
at Albany (SUNYA) reported in Richard Light, Ming Xu, and
Jonathan Mossops recent article in the TESOL Quarterly (Vol. 21,
No. 2, June 1987) is very interesting in its comprehensiveness and
the nature of its findings. Readers may be interested in comparing
a similar study that we recently undertook with undergraduates.
This more limited study yielded results remarkably similar to those
of Light, Xu, and Mossop; however, our interpretation of the data
was different because of the lower language proficiency of the
undergraduate students.
Our examination of the relationship between language profi-
ciency and academic success of undergraduate international
students was part of a self-study, following TESOL guidelines, of
the nonintensive, developmental ESL courses and international
student services at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay (UWGB).
We were interested in the consistency of the relationship between
the minimum TOEFL score of 500, required for undergraduate
admission, and academic success, as measured by grade point
average (GPA).
Unlike the SUNYA study, which included only first-semester
graduate students, our study included all international students
(N = 196) enrolled as undergraduates at UWGB during the spring
1986 semester. Transcripts and records in the office of International
Student Services provided TOEFL scores and GPAs, as well as
information on course load, number of credits earned, nationality,
and academic major. In addition, we conducted case studies of ESL
students at the lower end of the language proficiency range and in
their first semester of undergraduate study.
The mean TOEFL score for undergraduates admitted to UWGB
was 537 (SD = 51), which was much higher than the mean score of
the TOEFL reference group (M = 506, SD = 66) for students
applying for admission to undergraduate school (Educational
Testing Service, 1985). A similar difference in mean TOEFL scores
was found between graduate students at SUNYA and applicants for
164 TESOL QUARTERLY
graduate school in general. Both of these differences can be
explained by the fact that 48% of undergraduate schools require a
minimum score of 525-550 for admission, and 49% of graduate
schools require a score in the 540-570 range (Educational Testing
Service, 1985). As for academic achievement, the mean GPA of 3.00
(SD = 0.64) for international undergraduates was slightly above the
mean GPA of 2.80 (SD n.a. ) for all undergraduates at UWGB.
Although such results are institution-specific, descriptive statistics
for TOEFL and GPA, by academic major and language back-
ground, indicate that undergraduates at UWGB with TOEFL scores
below 500 tended to have lower GPAs than those with TOEFL
scores of 500 and above. However, there were exceptions to this
general tendency, as was also the case for graduate students at
SUNYA. UWGB undergraduates in business administration
(n = 76) had a relatively high mean TOEFL score (541), yet their
mean CPA (3.02) was lower than that for most other majors and
very close to the mean GPA (3.00) for all international undergradu-
ates. Japanese students (n = 12) had a low mean TOEFL score
(490), yet their mean GPA (3.02) was very close to that (3.06) of the
Malaysian students (n = 94), who had a high mean TOEFL score
(553).
The overall mean TOEFL score of 537 for undergraduates
correlated significantly with the mean GPA of 3.00 (r = .36,
p < .01). This moderately low correlation is higher than the one
between TOEFL and GPA for graduate students in the SUNYA
study. Furthermore, students (n = 68) with TOEFL scores below
500 earned significantly lower grades (z = 3.77, p < .01) than
students (n = 128) with TOEFL scores of 500 and above. This result
is in contrast to the SUNYA study, in which graduate students with
TOEFL scores below 550 did not earn significantly lower grades
than students with TOEFL scores above 550, the accepted level of
language proficiency for graduate study at SUNYA. These
differences in results for graduate and undergraduate students seem
to indicate that the lower the language proficiency, the more
important the role it plays in academic success.
According to the guidelines for interpretation of TOEFL scores
(Educational Testing Service, 1985), there may be no relationship
between TOEFL scores and academic performance when the
minimum TOEFL score required for admission is relatively high,
such that only those students with a high level of language
proficiency are admitted, as at SUNYA. With higher language
proficiency, prior exposure to subject matter, motivation, academic
aptitude/experience, development of study skills, cultural
adaptability, or financial security may become more important
THE FORUM 165
factors. In an institution in which the minimum TOEFL score
required for admission is low, TOEFL scores may correlate
strongly with academic performance, and nonnative speakers of
English may be unsuccessful because of an inadequate command of
English. Thus, in institutions like UWGB, in which the standard for
admission is neither high nor low, the correlation between TOEFL
scores and subsequent academic success may be moderately low.
GPA also correlated significantly with two TOEFL subscores
Structure and Written Expression (r = .43, p < .01) and Vocabulary
and Reading Comprehension (r = .36, p <.01 )but not with the
subscore for Listening Comprehension. Similar results for graduates
at SUNYA suggest that the listening skill does not play as important
a role in academic success, in either graduate or undergraduate
study, as might have been thought. However, this lack of
correlation may also result from the fact that the Listening
Comprehension subtest of the TOEFL is dependent on the skill of
being able to recognize phonetic aspects of spoken academic
language and thus may not reflect language proficiency. The
significant correlations of the other two substests could be a result
of both tests depending on reading comprehension, thus reflecting
language proficiency and also a skill important for academic
success.
Investigation of the relationship between language proficiency
and undergraduate credit hours earned indicated a significant
correlation (r = .80, p < .01), as was also the case for graduate
students at SUNYA. However, because the number of credit hours
earned and the amount of time in undergraduate school varied
among our subjects, we selected for case studies 27 students at the
lower end of the TOEFL range (450-525) who were enrolled in their
first semester of undergraduate study. This selection of students
was also based on the fact that students with lower TOEFL scores
have a greater probable gain in language proficiency over a fixed
period of time (Educational Testing Service, 1985).
We calculated by hand GPAs in courses in which these students
were competing with native English speakers, omitting ESL
courses. After consulting with instructors, we divided the courses
into two categories: Type A courses were heavy in outside reading
and/or writing assignments, depended heavily on lecture
comprehension, or were offered at an advanced academic level
(e.g., humanities, communication and the arts, biological and social
sciences), whereas Type B courses included mathematics,
laboratory/demonstration courses in science, or introductory
courses that did not make heavy demands on reading and writing.
Students were divided into two subgroups: those (n = 10) who
166 TESOL QUARTERLY
scored below 500 on the TOEFL, the accepted level for admission
to UWGB, and those (n = 17) who scored from 500-525 on the
TOEFL. The difference between means for the two types of
courses was greater for the students of lower language proficiency
than for the students of higher language proficiency. For the 10
students of lower language proficiency, GPAs were lower in Type
A courses (M = 1.63) than in Type B courses (M = 3.29). These
students were taking a lighter course load than was normal for
undergraduates12 credits (4 courses), including 6 credits in ESL
to improve reading and writing skills. In addition, these students
had been carefully guided in course selection and did not drop any
courses before the end of the semester.
For the 17 students admitted with TOEFL scores in the 500-525
range, the mean GPA was also lower in Type A courses (M = 2.26)
than in Type B courses (M = 3.04). These students, who had more
freedom of choice in selecting courses, were taking the normal
course load of 15 credits (5 courses), including 3 credits in ESL to
meet the undergraduate requirement in expository writing.
However, these students tended to lighten class loads by dropping
courses or taking incomplete, with a possible effect on overall
academic performance.
These results seem to indicate that these students at the lower end
of the TOEFL range (450-525) performed sufficiently; especially in
courses that did not require a high level of English language
proficiency, their performance was very solid. Similarly, in the
SUNYA study, academic performance in courses requiring fewer
verbal skills (i.e., science/mathematics/business) was also much
better than in courses requiring a higher level of verbal skills (i.e.,
humanities/fine arts/social sciences).
The 10 students admitted on academic criteria other than
language proficiency as indicated by TOEFL score seemed
satisfied with their grades and course work. As these students were
primarily in large introductory courses, their instructors tended to
report only their grades and whether or not the students had
requested help. However, the following comments, made by an
instructor in a computing course requiring a high level of verbal
ability, indicate the frustration of both students and instructors
when language proficiency is inadequate for academic success:
Both of these students are in my COBOL class. I am giving them Ds
rather than the Fs they have earned because of the unusual amount of
determination and effort displayed. They have had enormous difficulty
asking questions even in the relaxed setting of my office or the student
workroom. My assistant and I spent several hours tutoring them on the
THE FORUM 167
first evening of class. It was immediately obvious that their skills in
English were insufficient to allow them to complete the elementary self-
paced familiarization exercise required for that evening. Numerous
incidents of academic dishonesty involving these students have occurred
during the semester. They have obviously not been well rewarded for
the time, money, and effort they have invested in my class. I would
imagine that they have also endured a significant amount of emotional
stress, resentment, and frustration.
In conclusion, when English proficiency is relatively low, TOEFL
scores can predict academic performance. Even though basic
academic requirements for admission must be met, sufficient
language proficiency to undertake the academic program at the
institution should be given foremost consideration.
1
REFERENCE
Educational Testing Service. (1985). TOEFL test manual. Princeton, NJ:
Author.
1 I would like to thank Elizabeth Hocking and Nancy Long, International Student Services,
UWGB.
168 TESOL QUARTERLY

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