2/19. Critique to Noreen's chapter



For this post I am going a little different and I'll focus on the draft from Noreen Lape (Chapter 4). Based on my previous readings in the field of SLA, I will critique and give some specific feedback to the author of this chapter. Essentially I express my reactions, and I point out things I didn't understand or that confused me in the chapter.  

1)
I get very confused with the wide variety of terms used in pages 1-6:
English native speakers, English language learners (ELL), non-native speakers, second language writers, foreign language writers, non-English FL writing, EFL writers, ESL writers, English-medium/native language writing.
This seems a lot to me, and then later you end up focusing on SLA strategies while talking about “FL writers. I would suggest to be consistent with the terms and use only L1 and L2 writers, L1 and L2 instructors, etc. I would avoid the terms “native” and “non-native”, because sometimes they can become controversial. Specifically, the terms native and non-native divide learners in two totally different groups that may not necessarily exist (e.g. are L2 heritage and bilingual speakers natives or non-natives?). More importantly, it creates a dichotomy that is highly hierarchized, since the native-like language becomes the referent for the non-natives. This ideal of “nativeness”, however, may not necessarily work in the L2 learning context (and issues related to identity may come into play here).
Overall, I would say that SLA research uses the terms “natives” and “non-natives” when there two very controlled groups of participants, L1s and L2s, and when the topic being researched is directly related to the issue of being a native speaker or non-native speaker.
  
2)
When citing the responses from the tutors, it would be nice to specify where that data is coming from. Maybe just say something like “extracted from Interview data” or “extracted from tutors’ journals”.  

3)
I am not very sure who is supposed to be the audience of this chapter, but as someone in the field of SLA I felt somewhat offended in the second half of page 3 and first paragraph of page 4. There are pretty strong statements such as:
-        “FL writing tutors do not have strong set of foundational principles upon to build a pedagogy”
-        “its scholars [in FL research] have not always conversed with their counterparts”
-         “FL writing scholar do not even converse with each other”
I feel these statements are not completely true, and I am not sure how much they add to the chapter. First, I am not sure there is a significant difference between SLA and FL writing when it comes to L2 research. Second, the statements seem to be supported by only one reference (Reichelt et al.). It would be more reliable to include references from other peer-reviewed articles . Third, I am not sure why you are problematizing not having a common framework across all languages. There is a common framework in SLA: It’s common to examine the same issues across the different languages and evaluate the extent to which these issues are generalizable to all languages. Overall, I think I would try to re-orientate this part from a more positive perspective, for instance talking about the need for more research in L2 tutoring, or talking about the added difficulty of writing in an L2, which involves mastery of both the language itself and the L2 writing conventions.  

4)
In page 5, the models “writing-to-learn” and “learning-to-write” are definitely very commonly used in L2 research. Are these models the same as the pedagogies pointed above in (a) and (b) respectively? If that’s the case, I think I would make it more clear, since the 3 pedagogies may not sound as familiar to everyone.
  
5)
On page 6, I would revise the sentence “some FL writing truncate the writing process into two steps (composing and editing) […]”. Again, that sounds a little strong and vague. Are we talking about courses? students? researchers? I think any L2 scholar would agree that the L2 writing process goes beyond just 2 or 3 steps.

6)
From pages 7 to 12, I think I am missing a section that encompasses or helps us understanding why you are discussing the “Output Hypothesis” and the “Interaction Hypothesis”.  These two hypotheses, together with the “Input Hypothesis” (Krashen, 1982) and the Noticing Hypothesis (Schmidt, 1995) are all processing-related theories. They all focus on the “processes” and use cognitive concepts to explain how interaction and learning are linked. I think I would like to see a broader picture before you actually start focusing on Output and Interaction Hypothesis. It could be a small section, but by including it you would be setting the readers’ mindset into a Cognitive-based approach.

Also, for the processing-related hypothesis, my understanding is that these cognitive processes happen in the head of the learners. So I understand that “instructors can prompt students to employ SLA techniques [processes?]”. However, I am not so sure about the ‘techniques’ [processes] being “essential tools for a FL writing tutor” (p.7). When you started mentioning the hypothesis I thought we were talking about cognitive processes that should happen in the mind of the learner writers. But then when you go and apply it to the mind and the conversations of the tutors, it feels a little forced. I think I would try to at least make it smoother. Maybe give the real definitions first, and then make the transition to how you apply it to tutors? For instance, “hypothesis testing” occurs when learners test their knowledge (hypothesis) and discover that their utterances are not being understood. It would be nice if you could give a solid and extended definition first (based on learners’ cognition) before you actually say “FL writing tutor feedback can initiate hypothesis testing”.






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