A Study On The Effects Of Iwrite Automatic Writing Evaluation System For Vocational School Students’ English Writing

English writing is Achilles’ heel among the four basic skills for secondary vocational school students.On the basis of teachers’ correction feedback,automatic writing evaluation system can make up for the shortage of classroom teaching time.Most previous studies of automatic writing evaluation system focused on college students,and few had applied automatic writing evaluation to secondary vocational school’s English teaching.This thesis asks the following three major research questions:(1)What is the effect of iWrite automatic writing evaluation system on secondary vocational school students’ writing scores in general?And what is the effect of the four dimensions(language,discourse structure,content and technical specification)of iWrite on students’ writing scores individually?(2)What are the different effects of iWrite on the scores of higher and lower score groups in secondary vocational school students?And what are the different effects of the four dimensions of iWrite on the scores of higher and lower score groups?(3)What is the effect of iWrite on secondary vocational school students’ writing attitude?Quantitative methods as well as qualitative methods are adopted in the study.The subjects of this research were 60 students in senior one in Gaoyou Lingtang.30 students were in Control Class(CC)and 30 students in Experiment Class(EC).The research lasted three months.The research instruments include writing tests,questionnaires and interviews.There are totally 5 writing tests in this research.In addition to the pretest and post-test writing tests,there are 3 writing tests in-between,Students’ scores in the pretest writing indicated that there was no significant difference between the EC and CC.For the middle three writing tests,students in CC revised their writing twice according to teacher feedback,while students in EC revised their writing twice according to teacher feedback and iWrite feedback,and then uploaded their revised version onto iWrite to get further suggestions.Students’ compositions in CC were evaluated by the author,and students’ compositions in EC were firstly evaluated by the author,then EC students uploaded their writing onto iWrite system and got their scores from iWrite.Students’ scores of each writing test in EC are averaged from teacher feedback and iWrite feedback.Based on students’ scores in EC in the pretest writing,the top ten students are classified as higher score group and the bottom ten students are made up of lower score group.There are pretest and post-test questionnaires in this study.The internal reliability of pretest questionnaire reaches.914,and reliability of post-test reaches.979.Questionnaires are given to 30 students in EC.Pretest questionnaire concerns the investigation of the present condition of secondary vocational school students’English writing.Compared to the pretest questionnaire,post-test questionnaire analyzes students’ attitude towards feedback from iWrite.At last,data from both questionnaires are analyzed via SPSS.Ten students in EC are chosen randomly after the experiment for an interview.Interviews of the ten students are conducted in Chinese and recorded.The author later transcribed the interview recordings into English.The conclusions of this study can be listed as follows.Firstly,iWrite automatic writing evaluation system can improve the writing scores of secondary vocational students in general.Students’ average scores in EC are higher than students’ average scores in CC in all dimensions,and are significantly higher in the aspect of language(p=.03<.05).Secondly,for students in higher score group and lower score group,there exists a significant difference both in total scores and the four dimensions of writing,as both p values are below.05.From the perspective of comparing the mean scores,the improvement of language in lower score group is most obvious,followed by the improvement of technical specification and language in higher score group.It is easier for students to find appropriate words and phrases to express their feelings,and students are more careful about technical specification such as spelling after using iWrite.Due to the limit of time,the change of content in neither higher score group nor lower score group is obvious.Thirdly,for students’ writing attitude,students’ writing confidence is elevated.Students develop good writing habits and grasp more writing methods.Meanwhile,some students are able to use metacognitive strategies to make an outline before writing,and some students’ self-efficacy has also improved.They can revise their writing over and over again according to iWrite feedback.When facing topics,they are not at loss with the help of detailed suggestions,and it is easier for them to express their thoughts.Students can adjust inappropriate words and phrases in time when they are writing.Besides,students will evaluate whether their results meet goals or requirements of writing after completion.Compared with simple teachers’ feedback,the supplement of iWrite automatic writing evaluation system allows students to have more freedom.Thus,most students like this mixed way.However,some students hold the view that adding iWrite is more complicated than traditional teacher feedback.Automatic evaluation systems like iWrite can effectively solve problems like teachers having limited time to provide students with personalized instructions.iWrite can not only help students improve writing scores but also improve their writing behavior,and cultivate students’ autonomous learning ability.In a word,iWrite automatic scoring system can be a supplementary means in teaching,but it can’t fully replace teachers’ correction.