Analyzing Second Language Written Summaries at University Level

Katarina Zamborova,Blanka Klimova

doi:10.28991/esj-2021-01322

Abstract

Objective: The objectives of the study are to identify and categorize non-native students´ errors in the written summaries, to see which research instruments – the mobile reading app (experimental group) or internet-based article (control group) are more effective, and to determine if language proficiency of students will improve. Methods: This study uses an analysis of linguistic-stylistic errors as a research method on the written performance of 29 EFL Slovak students in 29 written summaries. Findings: The findings indicate that the most problematic areas in writing summaries were grammatical (determiners), followed by stylistic (text coherence, slang words, and punctuation), lexical (word collocations), and lexico-stylistic errors (prepositions). Overall, students´ proficiency in both groups rose from B2 to C1 level by 38% of the students (11 students). Therefore, both methods – the reading app and internet-based articles are effective. Novelty: The novelty of the study consists in enriching the existing literature by pointing out errors of EFL Slovak students making in writing summaries by exploiting modern technology in the writing process. Doi: 10.28991/esj-2021-01322 Full Text: PDF

Highlights

One of the key requirements for English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) students, when they transfer from high school to higher education, is to produce formal texts
Not all students are prepared for this change or trained to produce formal academic writing that differs from the informal writing students use daily in their social media communication
The results of the study on writing summaries by EFL Slovak learners is valuable for read-to-write research, which has been growing as a model [26]

Summary

Introduction

One of the key requirements for English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) students, when they transfer from high school to higher education, is to produce formal texts. Not all students are prepared for this change or trained to produce formal academic writing that differs from the informal writing students use daily in their social media communication. What is more, they do not practice this type of writing at secondary schools in their mother tongue or in a foreign language [1,2,3,4]. Register includes formality, elaborate sentence structure, specialist terminology, and the avoidance of personal voice. Formality is depicted in the use of technical, elevated, or abstract vocabulary, complex sentence structures, and the avoidance of the personal voice (I, you).

Methods

Results

Conclusion