Investigating L2 Teacher-Student Writing Conferences in aCollege ESL Composition Classroom

 

• This study investigated features of L2 classroom-based teacher-student writing conference and student subsequent revision from the perspective of languaging. 
• discourse topics (language use vs. content/rhetoric), and configuration of negotiation and scaffolding. Discourse topics were found to interact with task types as more issues about content and rhetoric were addressed for critical review. Configurations of negotiation and scaffolding were found to be similar in both tasks. Scaffolding was dominant in language use talks while negotiation and scaffolding were balanced in content/rhetoric talks. As for making meaning and student revision, the quality of negotiation was more critical than the quantity. Non-extensive scaffolding also led to successful revision along with students’ background knowledge and classroom instruction. The findings demonstrate dynamics of writing tasks, conferences, and student revision.
• This case study in an intact ESL composition class investigated how L2 classroombased writing conferences about two different tasks are characterized and interact with solving student problems in writing from the perspectives of languaging. The interactional features of writing conferences were found to interact with the writing tasks in terms of topic distribution. In the task of writing critical review, the issues about content and rhetoric were more discussed than those of language use. The analysis of MSL showed more extensive exchanges about the topics of content and rhetoric than those about the topics of language use. On the other hand, the writing tasks did not interact with the configuration of negotiation and scaffolding in the conference interactions. In both tasks, scaffolding was dominant in the topics of language use while it was balanced with negotiation in the topics of content and rhetoric. The most frequently observed feature of negotiation was comprehension/confirmation check, the moves of which were much more actively initiated by the students than in scaffolding. The teacher predominantly used the strategies of demonstrating an idealized version and marking critical features for scaffolding. The qualitative analyses of conference interactions in terms of making meaning and subsequent revisions revealed that non-negotiated scaffolding interactions led to making meaning as successfully as extensive interactions of negotiation-scaffolding interface did. It was also found that even very extensive negotiations cannot succeed making meaning to resolve student problems. The significance of these findings is twofold. 
• The concept of languaging materializes the role of language in language learning by focusing on solving the problems about language, so that your language means “what you want it to mean”.

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L2 Techer-studet writing conferences in a college ESL composition classroom.pdf

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