The Influence Of Time-on-task And L2 Proficiency On The Effectiveness Of "Writing To Learn"

Second language acquisition(SLA)and second language writing were usually considered to be two parallel and independent fields as writing was generally regarded as the result of acquisition and thus often used as a tool for testing L2 proficiency while input and oral interaction predominated in traditional SLA and the role of writing in L2 acquisition was virtually neglected.However,around the beginning of this century,writing as a means of or a site for foreign language learning or the language learning potential(LLP)of L2 writing came to be recognized.Since then,“writing to learn(language)” has drawn much attention from both the SLA and the L2 writing community,though the study in this vein is still in its infancy.Against this background,the present study attempts to explore the effects of time-on-task and L2 proficiency on the efficacy of writing in foreign language learning in the non-target language context,with a view to finding ways to bring the LLP of writing into full play.In this study,an experiment with the “pretest-treatment-immediate posttestdelayed posttest” design was conducted.Before the experiment,an English proficiency test was administered to select the thirty subjects from two intact classes,who were then evenly divided into three groups,each consisting of 5 high-proficiency and 5 low-proficiency students and a pilot test was also made to decide on the time on the task for each group,with 25,40 and 55 minutes being the final choices.In addition,all the subjects were asked to write a journal after every writing treatment,and some of them were interviewed so as to help understand the language learning mechanism of writing from both cognitive and sociocultural perspectives and the possible influence of time-on-task and L2 proficiency on the effectiveness of “writing to learn”.The questions addressed in this study are as follows: 1)In general,can L2 writing improve the grammatical accuracy and syntactic complexity of second language? 2)Does time-on-task have an impact on the effect of writing on foreignlanguage learning? If so,how much time on writing task is most facilitative to improving learners’ grammatical accuracy and syntactic complexity? 3)Does L2 proficiency have an impact on the effect of writing on foreign language learning? 4)Do time-on-task and L2 proficiency interact in promoting L2 development through writing?The results show that: 1)after 9 consecutive weeks of writing treatment,the grammatical accuracy and the syntactic complexity of the three groups of subjects improved significantly in the two posttests,and only declined slightly in the delayed posttest compared with those in the immediate posttest,indicating that in general,L2 writing can improve the grammatical accuracy and syntactic complexity of second language,which means writing does have the potential to promote L2 development,and its language learning effect may be well retained;2)in the two posttests,the accuracy and complexity of the 40-minute group were higher than those of the25-minute group and the 55-minute group,suggesting that time-on-task exerts influence on the effectiveness of writing to learn language and tasks with time neither insufficient nor indefinite may yield the most gratifying results;3)in the pretest,the immediate and the delayed posttest,the accuracy and complexity of the high-proficiency learners were greater than those of the low-proficiency learners with the former making more remarkable progress than the latter after 9 consecutive weeks of writing treatment,implying that L2 proficiency has an impact on the effect of writing on foreign language learning and learners with high proficiency may profit more from writing;and 4)time-on-task and L2 proficiency did not interact in promoting L2 development through writing.This study,on the one hand,provides empirical support for the LLP of L2 writing and,on the other hand,may contribute to improving the effectiveness of foreign language teaching in China by proposing “writing to learn” so as to bring in changes in the popular input-driven and oral-interaction-dominated teaching mode.Besides,it may also offer some ideas on how to devise effective “writing-to-learn”tasks,especially when time-on-task is concerned.