Developing the Writing Skills through Reading and Writing Workshop Strategy: The Case of First Year LMD Students at the University of Bejaia

Abstract

This study investigates the effectiveness of teaching writing through a reading/writing workshop approach to develop students’ writing abilities and skills. It is worth mentioning that for practical reasons, the researcher made an adjustement in the choice of the population under study. Thus, the participants are second year LMD students at the department of English, Faculty of Letters and Languages, University of Bejaia. To carry out the research, a quasi experimental design is adopted. For this purpose, two groups displaying similar performance in the writing proficiency pre-test were randomly assigned into an experimental group and a control groups. The experimental group (n=16) was taught writing through a reading/writing workshop approach while the control group (n=16) received no manipulation. The treatment phase took place during the first semester of the academic year: 2013-2014 and lasted 16 weeks. During this period, the experiment group was exposed to different types of texts for which a variety of activities was designed. At the end of the experiment, both groups were administered a writing proficiency post-test. Statistical analysis procedures were applied to the test scores of both groups. The results demonstrated that the treatment group achieved significant progress, which was reflected in post-test scores which were higher than both their pre-test scores and the pre- and post-test scores of the control group. Moreover, in order to test the validity of the obtained results, the researcher relied on a t test analysis which demonstrated that they are statistically significant. On the basis of this analysis, the two hypotheses have been confirmed, thus teaching writing through a reading/writing workshop approach can help students develop their writing abilities. Therefore, in the light of the obtained results, pedagogical implications have also been drawn. Finally, the present study concludes with a set of suggestions for further researches. ................................................................................................................................................... This study investigates the effectiveness of teaching writing through a reading/writing workshop approach to develop students’ writing abilities and skills. It is worth mentioning that for practical reasons, the researcher made an adjustement in the choice of the population under study. Thus, the participants are second year LMD students at the department of English, Faculty of Letters and Languages, University of Bejaia. To carry out the research, a quasi experimental design is adopted. For this purpose, two groups displaying similar performance in the writing proficiency pre-test were randomly assigned into an experimental group and a control groups. The experimental group (n=16) was taught writing through a reading/writing workshop approach while the control group (n=16) received no manipulation. The treatment phase took place during the first semester of the academic year: 2013-2014 and lasted 16 weeks. During this period, the experiment group was exposed to different types of texts for which a variety of activities was designed. At the end of the experiment, both groups were administered a writing proficiency post-test. Statistical analysis procedures were applied to the test scores of both groups. The results demonstrated that the treatment group achieved significant progress, which was reflected in post-test scores which were higher than both their pre-test scores and the pre- and post-test scores of the control group. Moreover, in order to test the validity of the obtained results, the researcher relied on a t test analysis which demonstrated that they are statistically significant. On the basis of this analysis, the two hypotheses have been confirmed, thus teaching writing through a reading/writing workshop approach can help students develop their writing abilities. Therefore, in the light of the obtained results, pedagogical implications have also been drawn. Finally, the present study concludes with a set of suggestions for further researches.