| 2.3
GRAMMAR KNOWLEDGE |
| Students'
knowledge of discrete points of grammar (as demonstrated in an error
identification test) was compared with the incidence of vivid and
descriptive language in their writing. A positive correlation was
identified between student knowledge of discrete points of grammar
(correct identification of function of noun, verb, adjective) and
the use of vivid and descriptive language in their writing. At Year
8 level the relationship between knowledge of these discrete points
of grammar and vivid language use was statistically significant (r
= .39, p < .001) compared with Year 4 where r =.20 so was not significant.
A positive correlation was also identified between students' use of
descriptive language in their writing and their overall writing performance
at both Year 4 (r= .57, p <. 0001) and at Year 8 Level (r = .77, p
< .0001). |
|
|
| 2.4
STUDENT SELF ASSESSMENT |
| Information
on student attitudes, gathered by way of a student survey, revealed
a decreasing sense of enjoyment of writing as students advance through
the school years. This fall-off in enthusiasm was common to both male
and female students, though it was more marked among male students.
|
| |
Table
5: Frequency Distribution of Student Self-Assessment of Enjoyment
of Writing at School by Gender and Year Group |
| |
| Student
Self-Assessment |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
| “I enjoy
writing at school…” |
M |
F |
M |
F |
| 'Heaps” |
30% |
48% |
16% |
19% |
| “Mostly” |
36% |
29% |
42% |
39% |
| “Some” |
33% |
19% |
29% |
32% |
| “Not at
all” |
0% |
3% |
13% |
10% |
|
| Year
4 students had a more positive sense of themselves as writers than
Year 8 students, and they also showed a more positive attitude to
writing than their older counterparts. Whereas at Year 4, 36% of male
students and 50% of female students considered themselves to be very
good at writing, by Year 8 this had fallen dramatically to just 12%
of males and 9% of females considering themselves to be good at writing.
This decline in students' sense of themselves as writers was found
to be highly statistically significant (t = -4, DF = 125, p <.0001).
|
| |
Table
6: Frequency Distribution of Student Self-Assessment of their Own
Ability in Writing by Gender and Year Group |
| |
| Student
Self-Assessment |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
| “I think
I am ... at writing" |
M |
F |
M |
F |
| 'Excellent” |
36% |
50% |
13% |
9% |
| “Very Good” |
45% |
47% |
58% |
61% |
| “Alright” |
12% |
3% |
26% |
21% |
| “No good” |
6% |
0% |
3% |
1% |
|
| Year
4 students also appeared more positive than Year 8 students when gauging
their classroom teacher's opinion of their writing. Whereas at Year
4, 39% of male students and 55% of female students judged their teacher
thought their writing was very good, at Year 8 level only 23% of males
and 24% of females believed this to be the case. Again this result
was statistically significant (t = -2.7, DF = 125, p < .01). |
| |
Table
7: Frequency Distribution of Student Assessment of their Teacher's
Attitude to their Writing by Year Group and Gender. |
| |
| Student
Self-Assessment |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
| “My teacher
thinks my writing is ..." |
M |
F |
M |
F |
| 'Excellent” |
39% |
55% |
23% |
24% |
| “Very Good” |
39% |
45% |
57% |
51.5% |
| “Alright” |
9% |
0% |
20% |
21% |
| “No good” |
3% |
0% |
0% |
3% |
|
| Across
both age groups, students believed that their mum or dad rated their
writing ahead of their teacher. At Year 4, 55% of males and 84% of
females considered their mother or father rated their writing very
highly, while at Year 8 this had fallen to just 39% of males and 45%
of females. Year 4 students held consistently more positive attitudes
than Year 8 about their writing, and this was statistically significant
(t= -27, DF = 126, p< .01). |
| |
Table
8: Frequency Distribution of Student Assessment of Parent's Attitude
to their Writing by Year Group and Gender. |
| |
| Student
Self-Assessment |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
| “My parent
thinks my writing is..." |
M |
F |
M |
F |
| 'Excellent” |
55% |
84% |
39% |
45% |
| “Very Good” |
33% |
13% |
42% |
42% |
| “Alright” |
9% |
3% |
19% |
9% |
| “No good” |
3% |
0% |
0% |
3% |
|
| Further
data analysis found that students' self assessments were generally
inconsistent with students' overall writing scores. At Year 4 there
was a weak, non-significant relationship between attitude to writing
and writing ability as assessed in this study. At Year 8 there was
no statistical relationship between student attitude and assessed
writing ability. This result raises questions about both students'
accuracy in self-assessment and indirectly about the nature of the
feedback students receive about their writing. What is most striking
overall about these finding is how great the falling away of enthusiasm
about writing is over this four-year period across both gender groups,
though particularly among Year 8 males. |
| |
| 2.5
WRITTEN AND ORAL LANGUAGE PERFORMANCE COMPARED |
Overall,
few qualitative differences were found across student overall spoken
and written language performances, suggesting that development across
these two domains is importantly intertwined. Males and females
in both year groups performed in largely parallel ways and correlation
between overall written and overall oral performances was found
at both year levels. This correlation was found to be statistically
significant at Year 4 (r = .309, p < .05) and was found to be even
more significant at Year 8 (r = .419, p < .001). The frequency distributions
of student scores for both oral and written language tasks were
also clustered in largely similar ways, indicating that for the
great majority of students in this study, oral and written language
expertise is indeed inter-related.
Several other
positive correlations across oral and written performance were identified
in the analysis. At both Year 4 and Year 8 a positive correlation
was identified between students' oral pronunciation and their overall
writing performance. At Year 4 this was statistically significant
(r = .27, p < .05). An even stronger correlation was identified
at Year 8 (r = 335, p < .001). This suggests that good articulation
in speech is increasingly strongly associated with good overall
performance in writing. |
| |
Table
9: Mean Scores for Different Aspects of the Oral and Writing Tasks
by Year Group |
| |
Oral
Language |
Written
Language |
| |
Variables: |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
Variables: |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
Deeper
Features |
Impact/Purpose |
| Fluency |
2.1 |
2.1 |
Impact |
2.9 |
2.5* |
| Attitude |
2.2 |
2.2 |
Personal
Voice |
2.0 |
1.8 |
Content/Ideas |
| Content |
2.4 |
2.3 |
Content |
1.5 |
1.4 |
| Justification |
2.3 |
2.1 |
Justification |
2.1 |
1.7** |
Structure/Organisation |
| Utterance
Construction |
2.6 |
2.5 |
Sentence
Construction |
2.7 |
2.3*** |
| Complexity |
2.5 |
2.5 |
Overall
Shape |
2.6 |
2.2*** |
Language |
| Vividness |
2.7 |
2.7 |
Vividness |
2.7 |
2.3**** |
| Adjective
count |
3.5 |
3.4 |
Use of
adjectives |
3.0 |
2.4*** |
Surface
Features |
Presentation |
| Speech
Habits |
1.8 |
2.3** |
Punctuation |
2.3 |
2.1 |
| Pronunciation |
2.0 |
2.2 |
Syntax |
1.7 |
1.8 |
| Non-Verbal
Cues |
2.0* |
2.4 |
Handwriting |
2.2 |
2.1 |
| Dysfluencies |
2.4 |
2.7 |
|
| Clarity |
2.5 |
2.1** |
| Breathing |
1.7 |
1.6 |
| Posture |
1.9 |
1.6 |
*p
< .05 **p<.01 ***p<.001 ****p<.0001 ^ For these items there
were only three categories on the coding sheet |
|
| |
Table
10: Year 4 Mean Scores for Aspects of Oral and Writing Performance
by Gender |
| |
Oral
Performance |
Writing
Performance |
| Aspects |
Male |
Female |
Aspects |
Male |
Female |
| Fluency |
2.1 |
2.0 |
Impact |
2.9 |
2.8 |
| Purpose |
2.2 |
2.1 |
Personal
Voice |
2.0 |
1.9 |
| Justification |
2.5 |
2.2 |
Overall
Shape |
2.6 |
2.7 |
| Syntax |
2.5 |
2.5 |
Adjectives |
3.0 |
2.9 |
| Pronunciation |
1.9 |
2.0 |
Syntax |
1.6 |
1.8 |
| Non-Verbal |
2.1 |
1.9 |
Handwriting |
2.3 |
2.1 |
| Clarity |
2.5 |
2.3 |
Punctuation |
2.3 |
2.3 |
NOTE:
Aspects = Selected categories from original coding sheet
No significant differences in performance across gender was
found for any of these variables. |
|
| |
Table
11: Year 8 Mean Scores for Aspects of Oral and Writing Performance
by Gender |
| |
Oral
Performance |
Writing
Performance |
| Aspects |
Male |
Female |
Aspects |
Male |
Female |
| Fluency |
2.6 |
2.3 |
Impact |
2.6 |
1.8 |
| Purpose |
1.7 |
1.8 |
Personal
Voice |
1.7 |
1.8 |
| Justification |
1.7 |
1.7 |
Overall
Shape |
2.3 |
2.1 |
| Syntax |
2.5 |
2.4 |
Adjectives |
2.3 |
2.4 |
| Pronunciation |
2.3 |
1.9 |
Syntax |
1.8 |
1.7 |
| Non-Verbal |
2.4 |
1.9* |
Handwriting |
2.3 |
2.0 |
| Clarity |
2.8 |
2.0* |
Punctuation |
2.3 |
2.0 |
NOTE:
Aspects = Selected categories from original coding sheet
*p<.05 |
|
| |
Table
12: Mean Scores for Aspects of Overall Oral and Overall Writing
Performance by Year Group |
| |
| |
Oral
Performance |
Writing
Performance |
| Aspects |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
Year
4 |
Year
8 |
| Purpose |
4.3 |
4.3 |
4.9 |
4.3 |
| Ideas |
10.1 |
9.4 |
3.4 |
3.7 |
| Structure |
6.5 |
6.2 |
7.1 |
6.3 |
| Language |
6.2 |
6.1 |
5.8 |
4.8 |
| Presentation |
14.4 |
15.0 |
4.4 |
4.7 |
|
| |
Table
13: Correlation Matrix Showing Correlations between Pairs of Aspects
in Oral and Written Language for Year 4, Year 8. |
| |
| |
Year
4 |
Year
4 Year 8 Writing |
| Purpose |
.22 |
.44*** |
| Ideas |
.29* |
.04 |
| Structure |
.13 |
.35** |
| Language |
.15 |
.39** |
| Presentation |
.13 |
.18 |
*p
< .05 **p < .01 ***P<.001 |
|
| |
