چکیده:
The purpose of the present study was to develop appropriate scoring scales for each
of the defined stages of the writing process, and also to determine to what extent
these scoring scales can reliably and validly assess the performances of EFL
learners in an academic writing task. Two hundred and two students’ writing
samples were collected after a step-by-step process oriented essay writing
instruction. Four stages of writing process – generating ideas (brainstorming),
outlining (structuring), drafting, and editing – were operationally defined. Each
collected writing sample included student writers’ scripts produced in each stage of
the writing process. Through a detailed analysis of the collected writing samples by
three raters, the features which highlighted the strong or weak points in the student
writers’ samples were identified, and then the student writers’ scripts were
categorized into four levels of performance. Then, descriptive statements were
made for each identified feature to represent the specified level of performance.
These descriptive statements, or descriptors, formed rating scales for each stage of
the writing process. Finally, four rating sub-scales, namely brainstorming,
outlining, drafting, and editing were designed for the corresponding stages of the
writing process. Subsequently, the designed rating scales were used by the three
raters to rate the 202 collected writing samples
The scores thus obtained were put to statistical analyses. The high inter-rater
reliability estimate (0.895) indicated that the rating scales could produce consistent
results. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) indicated that there was no significant
difference among the ratings created by the three raters. Factor analysis suggested
that at least three constructs, –language knowledge, planning ability, and idea
creation ability – could possibly underlie the variables measured by the rating
scale.
خلاصه ماشینی:
"Writing fluency: the ability of students to produce a continuous piece of Drafting 0 1 2 3 4 writing without causing difficulty or breakdown of communication Having a clear central idea; the extent to which the draft presents a central 0 1 2 3 4 idea to be communicated to the audience Relevance (unity): the extent to which the draft provides relevant 0 1 2 3 4 information about the central idea of the prompt through supporting sentences Coherence: the extent to which the meaning of sentences are linked 0 1 2 3 4 logically by using the cohesive devices throughout the text Organization: the extent to which the draft can attract readers’ attention, 0 1 2 3 4 presents blueprints, has body paragraphs with topic sentences and supporters, and has a conclusion which is linked to the introductory paragraph and the thesis statement Grammatical accuracy: The extent to which the final draft contains Editing 0 1 2 3 4 structures with few noticeable grammatical errors or word order problems Appropriate use of vocabulary: The extent to which the final draft features 0 1 2 3 4 the precise and effective use of vocabulary Organization/ coherence revision: the extent to which the student has been 0 1 2 3 4 able to revise the organization and coherence problems in his/her draft Relevance/ adequacy of information: the extent to which the student has 0 1 2 3 4 been able to improve the relevance of information in his/her final draft Mechanics of writing (spelling and punctuation): The extent to which the 0 1 2 3 4 draft appears accurate in spelling and punctuation Inter-rater and intra-rater reliability estimations The second question of this study dealt with the extent to which the suggested rating scale can produce consistent results."