Abstract:
AbstractWriting and speaking are the productive skills of a language and share similar components. However, there has been little attempt to investigate the impact of writing practice on the speaking proficiency of the learners. The present study using a pretest-posttest controlled group design in a quasi-experimental approach investigated the effect of guided writing practice on the speaking proficiency of Iranian EFL students. Two elementary intact classes which were classified based on the institute’s placement test were selected for the study. The homogeneity of the learners was checked through Key English Test (2007) as the pretest of the study, and the classes were randomly assigned into the experimental group (n=26) and the comparison group (n=26). The experimental group was provided with 10 guided writing worksheets in the last 15 to 20 minutes of the class, whereas the comparison group went through the procedure of a typical institute class in which they worked on workbook exercises during the mentioned time. The quantitative analysis of the posttest using an independent samples t-test indicated that not only writing proficiency, but also the speaking proficiency of the experimental group had significantly improved. Moreover, an end of the term a semi-structured interview sought the experimental group learners’ attitudes toward the role of writing practice in improving their speaking skill. The content analysis of the interview transcripts revealed that the learners held positive attitudes toward the guided writing worksheets at the end of the term, though they did not have the same attitude at the beginning.
Machine summary:
The present study using a pretest-posttest controlled group design in a quasi-experimental approach investigated the effect of guided writing practice on the speaking proficiency of Iranian EFL students.
El-Koumy (1998) conducted a study investigating the effect of dialogue journal writing on EFL students’ speaking proficiency, in which the results indicated the significant performance of the experimental group.
Overall, theoretically it is believed that there is a significant relationship between writing and speaking skill (Brown, 2001; Bygate, 1987; Luoma, 2004; Nation & Newton, 2009; Newton, 1995; Rivers, 1981; Zhu, 2007) but experimentally the only and the most relevant study is the one conducted by El-Koumy (1998), in which he considered the effect of dialogue journal writing on the speaking proficiency of the learners.
To carry out the qualitative part of the study, after the post-test at the end of the term, students of the experimental group were interviewed to see whether they held positive or negative attitudes toward writing practice and their influence on speaking proficiency.
But since the effect of guided writing on writing proficiency is proved in other studies (Gibson, 2008; Lan, Hung & Hsu, 2011; Oczkus, 2007) and hence it was not a new point of research, it was only considered as a pre-requisite of the main study, i.
Although many researchers believe in the difference between spoken and written language theoretically, this study as a practical one revealed that writing can be helpful for the improvement of both writing and speaking proficiency.