A study of EFL students' argumentative writing skills through online collaborative writing activities
(in progress)
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.62819/jel.2024.658Keywords:
argumentative writing, online collaborative writing, writing activitiesAbstract
This study explored the impact of online collaborative writing on EFL learners’ argumentative writing abilities and learners’ attitudes toward using this method to enhance writing skills. The participants consisted of twenty undergraduate learners from a writing classroom, selected through purposive sampling. The twenty learners were categorized into three proficiency levels: advanced, intermediate, and novice learners. The selected participants were then divided into five heterogeneous groups to collaboratively compose argumentative paragraph writings. This study employs a quantitative technique. The instruments consisted of six lesson plans, pre-test and post-test, four argumentative writing assignments, and a questionnaire. The study evaluated an online collaborative writing activity to determine how proficiency levels affected both group and individual writing performance. The results of the learners’ argumentative writing post-test were higher than pre-test scores across all proficiency levels. The highest scores in learners' argumentative writing were found in the group performance, followed by the individual post-test scores, respectively. This approach enhances learners’ analysis, evaluation, and content-creation skills, leading to more effective group work. Additionally, online collaborative writing simplifies tasks like gathering information and using various functions, making the writing process more efficient.
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