Writing Apprehension

The purpose of the present study was to compare writing high achievers and low achievers TEFL (teaching English as foreign language) learners’ writing self-beliefs. Subjects, based on their officially recorded scores on the writing course, were assigned in two 22-member groups of high and low achievers. The adapted English version of Mills’ and Péron’s (2008) questionnaire and the Foreign Language Writing Self-Beliefs Instrument which assesses writing self-efficacy in the areas of organization, expression, content and grammar as well as writing self-concept, writing anxiety, perceived value of writing, and self-efficacy for self-regulation in writing were administered to evaluate each group’s writing self beliefs. The results of the two-way ANOVAs suggested that high achievers’ writing self beliefs were significantly higher than low achievers. Implications for researchers and educators are discussed.

Dynamic assessment (DA) is an innovative way of assessing students’ knowledge. Given the importance of knowing how to reduce writing apprehension and improve writing self-efficacy in language learning, this study investigated the effects of models of DA including Buddoff’s Learning Potential Measurement Approach (LPMA), Carlson and Wiedl’s Testing-the-Limits Approach (TLA), and Intensive Mediated Learning Experience (IMLE) on L2 writing apprehension and self-efficacy. The participants were 302 students in four groups. All groups were given the writing apprehension and writing self-efficacy questionnaires as pretests, followed by 20 sessions of treatment. The same questionnaires were given in the last session as posttests. The collected data were analyzed using one-way Analysis of Covariance. The results showed a significant difference among the four groups’ writing apprehension and writing self-efficacy mean scores on the posttests. The findings also revealed that the IMLE group outperformed the other two groups. Based on the results, it was concluded that employing DA models can be conducive to reducing writing apprehension and improving writing self-efficacy among EFL learners. The findings of the present study can have useful implications for teachers, students, material designers, and language assessors.