peer-review

Peer-review as an Important Way to Improve the Teaching of English Writing in Senior High School Wang Jinhong 1. Introduction Writing is an essential part of English study in senior high school which takes up 20 percent in the NMET. The new curriculum standards stipulate that we have to regard it as the general goal in the English teaching cultivating students’ capacity of utilizing language comprehensively. However, how to make the English writing teaching more effective has been puzzling many English teachers for many years. And correcting errors in writing is an indispensable component of writing teaching process. Traditionally, it was believed that correcting the students' writing is the teacher's tasks, but it often resulted in the low quality in writing teaching. Therefore, it's of great significance to explore the effective correction method to improve the teaching quality in writing. This paper is on the basis of the theory of "Cooperative Learning" and Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development and process teaching approach. Based on those , and according to the previous researches , the author designed a writing teaching model suitable for the senior high school students -- peer review to help the student to evaluate and revise their articles. As is known to all, the teaching of writing focuses on the formal accuracy of the language, such as grammar, syntax, and words. Usually, the linear process of teaching writing is like the following: the teacher assigning the writing topic, students writing, the teacher correcting the formal errors such as words spelling, sentence structure, etc. The students’ writing is an individual and isolated process. Besides that, teachers work their heart out of marking students’ homework underlining and correcting errors one by one, however, students turn blind eyes to exercise books and still make the same mistakes next time. It’s a pity that teachers spend a large quantity of time checking and evaluating homework earnestly in return of failure and ignorance. Peer review is a writing activity in which students form pairs or groups to read each other's composition and make suggestions for revision (Mangelsdorf, 1992). It is also termed peer feedback, peer response, peer revision, peer critiquing, peer evaluation, peer editing, etc. In the teaching of English composition , peer review refers to the practice of letting students review and correct the compositions f or each other . Studies have shown t hat students do not learn well when they are isolated , silent “receivers” of knowledge ( Ellis, 1985) . Indeed , learning is most effective when students overcome both isolation and silence . Peer review exercises succeed in writing class because they give students the opportunity to become actively involved in t he activities with their peers . Although peer review enjoys strong theoretical support and has become a regular feature of writing instructions abroad, it remains a rare scene in the teaching of English writing in China. Mangelsdorf (1992:117) said this is because peer review is a common activity of the process approach, whereas writing instruction in China is dominated by the product approach, in which only teachers respond to student writing. In recent years, however, more and more Chinese teachers have become interested in the process approach. Ferris points out that as peer review is highly recommended by process proponents, it's very likely that Chinese teachers will try this activity when they adopt the process approach. This study intends to investigate three questions: (1) How do senior high students of China react to peer review and teacher comments? (2) What effect does peer review have on student revision? (3) What kind of problems exist during the application of peer review in senior high schools? How to avoid or solve these problems? This study has great significance in China as nowadays in China, big classes that characterize the teaching of English load the teachers greatly. Usually a teacher has to teach 100 students or so, and the number is going on continuously due to the increase of enrollment in recent years. That means, besides preparing and giving lessons, the teacher has to mark 100 compositions for each writing assignment. Due to the limited time permitted being spent in giving feedback, teachers either decrease the assignment or reduce the corrections and comments. However, neither of the choices does any good to the improvement of students’ writing ability. Under such circumstance, peer review can liberate teachers from stacks of papers and ensure students much practice on writing. In addition, it can make students more responsible for their own learning so as to develop more learner autonomy. Therefore, it is necessary for the present study to explore the possibility of adopting peer review in EFL writing classroom. 2. Literature Review 2.1 Theoretical foundation Keh (1990: 34 ) said Feedback is a fundamental element of a process approach to writing. In the process approach, reviewing is a greatly enhanced by “having more than one person working on it, and the generation of ideas is frequently more lively with two or more people involved than it is when writers work on their own”(Hammer, 2003). As several ESL composition researchers have noted, the peer review has the potential to be a powerful learning tool. Mittan (1989) wrote that peer reviews achieve the following: provide students with an authentic audience: increase students’motivation for writing; enable students to receive different views on their writing; help students learn to read critically their own writing; and assist students in gaining confidence in their writing etc. Cooperative learning (Johnson and Johnson, 1986: 3) is “ the instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each others’leaning”. The research clearly indicates that Cooperation compared with competitive and individualistic efforts typically results in (a) higher achievement and greater productivity, (b) more caring, supportive, and committed relationships, and (c) greater psychological health, social competence, and self-esteem. Cooperative learning also resulted in more higher-level reasoning, more frequent generation of new ideas and solutions, and greater transfer of what is learned from one situation to another than did competitive or individualistic learning. Specifically, cooperative learning experiences promote positive effectiveness in the following areas: Student achievement, critical thinking competencies, positive attitudes toward subject area, time on task, interpersonal attraction and cohesion, social support, importance of peer relationships, accuracy of perspective taking, group interaction and social skills, self-esteem and mutual respect (Johnson & Johnson, 1999: 67). Vygotsky holds that social interaction plays an important role in the development of cognitive ability and learning is not an individual but a cognitive activity that happens through social interaction. He determined at least two developmental levels in order to discover the actual relations of the developmental process to learning capabilities. The first level can be called the actual developmental level and the other the potential level. He defines the zone of proximal development as “the distance between the actual development level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peer.” According to Vygotsky (1978), students are capable of performing at higher intellectual levels when asked to work in collaborative situations than when asked to work individually. Group diversity in terms of knowledge and experience contributes positively to the learning process. According to his theory, peer review will provide the students an instructional environment in which students both as readers and writers to interact and thus can contribute to the development of writing abilities. 2.2 Definitions of “peer review” Peer review, also known as peer response, peer revision, peer editing, peer tutoring, peer critique, peer comment, or peer feedback, Mangelsdorf said (1992), is a common activity in a process-oriented writing class during which students read each other’s drafts and make suggestions for revision after the first draft of the paper is completed in the writing process. Peers read the first draft and provide the writer with their comments or suggestions, helping writers to evaluate and to improve the content, clarity, and organization of their papers. Through such peer reviewing activities, student writers get feedback from their peer readers, which helps them revise their papers to be more effective. For beginning ESL students, informal peer-review sessions usually consist of a group of three or four students reading or listening to a peer’s draft and commenting on what they want to know more about, where they were confused, and so on. The writers then use these responses to decide how to revise their writings. At more advanced levels of instruction, students can use worksheets to answer questions concerning the draft’s thesis, unity, development, focus and so on Peer review has different modes: 1) oral: peers read the paper and then give suggestions orally; 2) written: peers read the paper and write comments and give them back to the writer; 3) oral plus written: peers read the paper, write comments and then discuss the comments with the writer; 4) computer-mediated: peers read papers on line and offer feedback on line through delayed-time or real-time mode (Badger, 2000). 2.3 Previous studies of “ peer review” Nowadays, peer review is common in the process of EFL writing classes, and research has begun to address the effectiveness of peer feedback for EFL writing instruction. By using peer feedback in the EFL writing classes, many researchers find that it brings a genuine sense of audience into classroom, helps develop students’critical reading and analysis skills, and encourages students to focus on their intended meaning by discussing alternative points of view that can lead to the development of those ideas. By now, many different aspects of peer feedback have been investigated through a variety of both qualitative and quantitative methods: (a) the impact of peer feedback on subsequent drafts; (b) the effects of training on peer feedback; (c) the quality of peer feedback; (d) the students’ ability to identify areas in need of revision; (e) the student toward peers’ texts; (f) the analysis of talk during peer response session from task, social and cultural points of view; (g) the affective advantages of peer feedback; and the students’ perception of effectiveness of peer feedback (Li, 2000: 77). In the early studies about peer response on the effectiveness of ESL writing groups, Moore (1986) stressed that peer response was useful in teaching students important skills that were critical to effective writing and that it was necessary to train students to become peer responders and gave an explanation of what peer response was and the following four-part pep talk: 1) you’re capable of critiquing each other’s essays; 2) it is your responsibility to give and take criticism well, remembering that