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The development and analysis of a corpus of student writing

This research project analyzes a corpus of British Academic Written English to identify characteristics, genres, and variations in student writing across disciplines and study levels.

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The development and analysis of a corpus of student writing

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  1. The development and analysis of a corpus of student writing AILA, Madison, Wisconsin, July 2005 Hilary Nesi BAWE Project CELTE, University of Warwick BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  2. A corpus of British Academic Written English • 3000+ examples of proficient student writing • Different genres • Different disciplines • Different levels BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  3. Research questions • What are the characteristics of proficient university student writing? • How can this writing be categorised in terms of genres? • What are the similarities and differences between genres produced in different disciplines? • What are the similarities and differences within and between genres produced at different stages of university study? BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  4. Four stages of corpus development: • categorizing • contextualizing • collecting • coding BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  5. Topic 1:Identifying categories of texts We are interested in: • the similarities and differences between genres of assessed writing produced in different disciplines • the similarities and differences between genres of assessed writing produced at different stages of university study BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  6. The 4-by-4 matrix • Four broad disciplinary groupings (life sciences, physical sciences, social sciences, humanities) • Four years of study (undergraduate and taught postgraduate) BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  7. The departmental grid BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  8. The sampling grid (= 3072): BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  9. Year of study? Categories: 1, 2, 3, 3*, 4, 4* • 3 = 3rd year, no intercalated year • 3*= 3rd year, intercalated year • 4* = 4th year undergraduate • 4 = "normal" postgraduate, e.g. Masters BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  10. Topic 2:Identifying contexts for the texts “the social context (place, time, participants) is arguably .. as significant as .. intrinsic linguistic features” Burnard 2004:8 BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  11. Perspectives from the discourse community a. Department documentation b. Tutor interviews & surveys c. Student submission forms BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  12. Sociology Assignment Types (from interview data) • Essays • Book reviews • Book reports • Projects • Urban Ethnography Assignments • Fieldwork Reports • Dissertations BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  13. Tradition vs. innovation “We’re quite a traditional department in that we still use mainly essays, we’re very conscious that we would like to, and perhaps need to, do something about that” Mike Neary, Director of Undergraduate Studies, Sociology, Warwick, 26/04/2005 BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  14. Language and educational background • Native vs. non-native English speakers • Submission form data: 1. first language 2. secondary education BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  15. Is it in or is it out? • Formative vs. summative • Foreign languages • Posters and PowerPoint • Creative writing / Fiction BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  16. Contexual Info as Metadata (1) Student (unique code) Sex M,F First Language Eng, Ger, Fre … UK Education UKA, OSA, UK1, UK2, .. Course BA English Studies, BSc Maths BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  17. Contextual Info as Metadata (2) • Assignment (unique code) • Title (text) • Date written (year-month) 2002-2, 2004-5, .. • Level (of student) 1,2,3,3*,4, 4* • Module title Critical Theory, … • Module code EN3001, … • Assignment Type Essay, Report, … • JACS Code A, E, D … • Disciplinary Grouping AH, LS, PS, SS • Grade M(erit), D(istinction) • Authors 1,2,3,… BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  18. checking Cohort emails Presentation in core lectures Students email texts to project (bawe@xxx.ac.uk) establish personal contacts (interview) Reply – accept texts, specify collection point Investigate: modules (course/department documentation) F2F Collection: St. forms checked. Money paid. Text and data handling Topic 3:Collecting the texts [Facilitate collection of texts to meet sampling policies, timeframe and budget.] BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  19. Issues arising from the pilot study • Establish contacts + promote project • Include a monetary incentive • Make collection process user friendly BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  20. The paper trail • Generate unique identifier for each student/text • Monitoring the submissions – expected and collected • The submission form – student data and ‘disclaimer’ (IP) • Transferring the student data – maintaining links BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  21. Topic 4: Coding the texts • Anthropology vs. English Studies assignment <front> <titlePage> <docTitle> <titlePart type="main">Case Study of the white-throated capuchin monkey (<hi rend="italic">Cebus capucinus</hi>)</titlePart> <titlePart>xxx</titlePart> </docTitle> <figure id="BAWE_3016a-pic1"/> </titlePage> </front> <body> <front> <docTitle> <titlePart type="main" rend="underline">Discuss the handling of the discourses of religion and the effects of religious and ethical change in the Victorian period</titlePart> </docTitle> </front> <body> BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  22. What goes into <front> vs. <body>? • Example of two first pages: BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  23. What to do about formulae? • equations (and all kinds of variations of =) • chemical formulae • arithmetic expressions • logical expressions • expressions following some other discipline-specific formalism (e.g. computer code, phonetic transcription etc.) • a part ("term") of any of these (if non-NL) BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  24. Insert empty <formula> tag • anything that has been inserted with the MS formula editor (appears as a "field"); • any complex formal expression, i.e. that cannot be represented as a simple sequence of characters (e.g. fraction, square root) 0 I(∆s) = Q • any formal expression separated typographically from running text (new paragraph) BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  25. Example ... The slope of the yield curve can be analysed by looking at the spread between the long-term and the one-period, short-term interest rate, denoted as Snt = Rnt – rt. If we manipulate equation 1, the yield spread, Snt, can be written as the expectation of a weighted average of future changes in short-term interest rates as follows: Snt = Et Snt* Snt* = (1/n) [(n-1)Δrt+1+ (n-2)Δrt+2+ …+ Δrt+(n-1)] [2] <p><s>...</s> <s>The slope of the yield curve can be analysed by looking at the spread between the long-term and the one-period, short-term interest rate, denoted as S<hi rend="italic"><hi rend="sup">n</hi><hi rend="sub">t</hi></hi> = R<hi rend="italic"><hi rend="sup">n</hi><hi rend="sub">t</hi></hi> – r<hi rend="italic"><hi rend="sub">t</hi></hi>.</s> <s>If we manipulate equation 1, the yield spread, S<hi rend="italic"><hi rend="sup">n</hi><hi rend="sub">t</hi></hi>, can be written as the expectation of a weighted average of future changes in short-term interest rates as follows:</s></p> <p><formula notation="" id="EC0001-form2"/></p> BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  26. Principles of mark-up • Keep the structure of the document as close to the original as possible • Mark up elements relevant to our research • Be cost effective BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  27. The final stage:Corpus analysis • Multidimensional analysis will tell us about the language of texts in our 4 x 4 grid. Broadly, a description of register. • SFL Genre analysis will tell us about the generic stages of texts. Broadly, a description of text organization and purpose, with reference to contextual and linguistic features. BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

  28. Goodbye Folks! • Thanks for your attention •  • Thanks also to: • Signe Ebeling, Richard Forsyth, Sheena Gardner, Alois Heuboeck, Dawn Hindle, Maria Leedham, Paul Thompson, Paul Wickens. BAWE/ Madison, Wisconsin / July 2005

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