resources beyond sample paragraphs and essays, textbooks or worksheets. In their writing assignments, participants responded to prompts such as “Describe an
important experience in junior high school” or “What are the characteristics of a good student?” In choosing how to respond, participants discussed the prompt during and sometimes after class, selecting supporting statements which they found “easy” to write at length. In their first essays, they described writing about “my opinion”; however, this was rarely a strongly held belief, but rather a position for which it was easiest to brainstorm many supporting points. As Tomomi explained, “I have to explain my opinion, but I did not have strong opinion about this” (interview, 25.7.16). To support “My opinion”, participants used their past experiences in high school or present experiences in the Global Programme as examples to illustrate their claims.
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For example, Kokoro described using his current experience at WTU as an example in his essay on the benefits of studying abroad:
Interview: Okay, so you got Jim’s comments. [He said] some parts are vague, what did you do in the conversation with Kenichi?
Kokoro: My second reason is, it is easy to study abroad in university. And supporting sentence is, a university, especially this university, there are lots of facilities, SALC, Language Centre, and a lot of videos related to other languages, so I think there are a lot of good sources to study abroad, I think these will connect directly to study abroad. But this is maybe weak. So I asked him, how can I revise it.
(Kokoro, interview, 8.6.16) Although Kokoro judged the example to be “maybe weak” after reading Jim’s written feedback, his difficulty was in connecting this “supporting sentence” to the topic of studying abroad, leading him to seek support from his friend, Kenichi.
As the semester progressed, however, participants began to feel certain aspects of their personal experience could also be “too specific” (Yoko, interview, 27.7.16) or “minor” (Usami, interview, 2.11.16) and not appropriate for “the reader” (Tomomi, interview, 15.6.16). In contrast, academic writing should be “general” (Kokoro, interview, 18.5.16) or understandable to people more socially distant. It was difficult for participants to articulate the reason for this change, as illustrated by the vagueness of this quote from Kokoro:
Kokoro: Event paragraph is (1.0) but this is academic writing, so I have to write more general, ippantekina [generally]. Interviewer: Why do you think so?
Kokoro: Because (.) academic writing.
(Kokoro, interview, 18.5.16) From analysis of participants’ reactions to various instances of Jim’s feedback, it appeared his attempts to teach students to attend to the audience and purpose of their writing were misinterpreted as a devaluing of personal experience. For instance, in revising her Opinion Essay in second semester, Usami paraphrased an example from
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her own experience to appeal to an imagined reader. Figure 4.1a below shows her original draft two with the phrase “in my case” to introduce her own experience. Figure 4.1b is her revised draft three, in which her experience has been reframed as “In this situation”:
Figure 4.1a. Usami’s second draft of the “Opinion Essay” in second semester. Handwritten comments are from her peer editor, Kai. The original version is above and transcribed version is below.
Figure 4.1b. Usami’s third draft of the “Opinion Essay” in second semester showing revisions after Kai’s feedback.
Usami explained that her own personal experience was too “minor”: “I wrote in my case situation, so, yeah, it is not necessary, doesn’t need my situation (1.0) sugoi minor opinion ni nacchau kara [it will become a very minor opinion] (1.0) takusan tooiku ni iru hito kara, kochi demo ii kana [this might be good even for many people who are distant]” (Usami, interview, 2.11.16). While Usami’s revisions are
appropriate based on what Jim had taught, her inference is that “my case situation” is The attendance of all classes is checked by teachers とか？
Some students to commute to school, then, if take long hours
classes
They have a required, they. students 例だと からの文にが らない 思うから。ね の例を？？な ら。
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no longer valid. Indeed, her phrase “takusan tooiku ni iru hito [many people who are distant]” is analogous to “the reader”, referred to by other participants. Participants oriented toward this imagined reader and included support and examples they believed appropriate. However, the imagined reader had not been defined by their teacher. Unable to imagine a reader more socially distant from themselves, participants actually oriented towards a reader who was “teacher or students who is similar to my age” (Tomomi, interview, 15.6.16); “Jim (1.5) or my friend” (Tomomi, interview, 18.1.17); “GP students toka [and so on]” (Yoko, interview, 27.7.16). Because the participants could not imagine this distant reader, they were also unable to imagine what supporting sentences would be appropriate. The participants followed their teacher’s advice to remove personal experience from their writing without understanding its purpose. Therefore, the participants had re-interpreted Jim’s
attempts to socialise them into academic writing practices, re-situating their academic writing in their local, social network interactions rather than in an imagined academic community of distant “readers”.
The Intermediate class teachers who participated in my study encouraged students to use their personal experience in all writing assignments. The Intermediate class participants were not asked to imagine a distant reader for whom personal experience would be inappropriate. Therefore, their understanding of the reader as teacher or classmate was not problematised by teachers’ comments. For instance, Yuri felt adding personal experience to essay would make it easier to understand for
“yondahito [the reader]”:
Yuri: Rei ga sonnani gutai teki janakatta node sore o nakushite mmm (1.0) jibun no keiken ga kakikaeta hō ga motto tsutaeyasui essay … yondahitoga(.) reitoka
haitteruhouga souzoushiyasui (.) wakariyasui.
The example isn’t very specific, instead of this, it’s better to replace it with my own experience, which would be an easier to understand essay … the reader (.) examples would be easy to imagine (.) Easy to understand.
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As the extract illustrates, Yuri replaced a “sonnani gutai teki [not very specific]” example with her own experience. Thus, because the Intermediate class participants were not asked to orient toward an imagined reader or remove personal experience from their writing, they developed different practices to the Advanced class
participants. The practices developed by the Intermediate class participants did not contradict the socialisation goals of their teacher because there was no contradiction between the inclusion of personal experience and orienting toward this local reader. The Advanced class participants did not understand the reason for this change from specific, personal experience to general “evidence from research” and accounted for it in different ways. Firstly, Yoko described this as a move away from shukan [subjectivity], but she was unable to articulate what it was a move toward. Secondly, Tomomi explained it simply in terms of choosing pronouns which match the contents of the writing: “So in the Business Essay, or Company History Essay, the subject is Shiseido [a Japanese cosmetic company], so I cannot use I my me in this essay” (Tomomi, interview, 14.12.16). Thirdly, it was simply a different type of essay, as Tomomi described: “In my opinions essay, it’s important to (.) include many logical explain, but business essay’s reasons and explanation is based on information, so (1.0) If I include many information and correct and sure information, the logic is sure” (Tomomi, interview, 19.10.16). Here, Tomomi’s definition of “logic” was to include “many information” which was appropriate for the type of essay she was writing. As such, she relied on her teacher to tell her what kind of information to include. As a result, the meaning of “logic” itself changed for the Advanced class participants; if personal experience was not appropriate in writing any longer, then personal
experience was not logical. Usami contrasted the writing she did later in the academic year to that she did earlier:
Usami: The hardest essay (.) I think, because, as I said I don’t like to talk logically [laughter] I’m not good at
supporting.
Interviewer: And was the logical (.) being logical and supporting, was that very important in this essay?
Usami: Yeah, yeah, yeah (.) I think two business essays not my opinion, so data and evidence is so important.
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Usami: [Laughter] I like to say, or talk, my opinion.
(Usami, interview, 3.2.17) In the extract, Usami described her preference for giving “my opinion” in which evidence for research was less important. In contrast, in the business essays, she was required to support her statements with “data and evidence”. For Usami, giving her opinion did not require her to be “logical”, whereas writing which was “not my opinion” was logical, harder and less enjoyable.
While EAP Advanced class participants began to feel their opinions were not relevant to their academic writing, their experiences still supported the socialisation in other ways. For instance, Tomomi thought back to her experiences of learning English as a child to negotiate the pressure of academic English writing. When confronted with a new assignment, an essay written under timed conditions, she drew on
experience to re-frame the challenging assignment as “not so difficult”: “I didn’t feel the pressure of time because I have practised English since I was three years old (1.0) it was not so difficult” (interview, 25.7.16). The participants’ first-hand business knowledge could be used as content in their writing and could also build their confidence. For example, when Usami’s peer reviewer advised her to substantially rewrite part of her essay on improving the sales of a local restaurant, Usami feels “confident” to ignore this advice because of the “real, actual reference” she had found through visiting the restaurant in question, and her family connections to its owner.
Furthermore, self-reflection remained important, in participants’ responses to peer and teacher feedback on their writing. Referred to as thinking deeply, participants believed self-reflection allowed them to use their time more freely and become more autonomous. Rather than merely “following” peer and teacher feedback, thinking deeply meant reflecting on comments, both understanding them and evaluating their usefulness. Yoko described her progress over the course of the academic year in these terms:
Last semester, when I get some comments from peer editor and Jim, I just read, and I changed kota kota, I just follow the comments (2.0) But I (1.0) subete kangaeru yo shi hajimeta [started thinking about everything] I started to do (.) think about all comments, and I (.) before I kacha kacha
[onomatopoeic sound of keyboard], I type, I think, and I write, then I ask de no hajimata [has started].
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(Yoko, interview, 21.11.16) In the extract, Yoko situated “subete kangaeru yo [thinking about everything]” at her keyboard rather than in a face-to-face interaction with her teacher or peer. Notably, however, successful self-reflection included the stage of “I ask”, returning to the peer or teacher to ask about feedback she did not understand. For Yoko, thinking deeply was also necessary to avoid overreliance on textual resources. Textual resources could be seen as writing what “the book said, the internet said. There is no imagination” (Yoko, interview, 31.1.17). However, when referred to as “thinking by myself”, self- reflection suggested a failed social network interaction which forced participants to work alone. When Tomomi’s peer editor did not provide sufficient feedback she mentioned, “I have to think by myself, but I couldn’t, I didn’t, come up with idea” (Tomomi, interview, 15.6.16). Thus, successful self-reflection was considered to making a choice to reflect individually on peer or teacher feedback.
To summarise, the participants attempted to understand their teachers’
expectations and revise their writing in response to peer and teacher feedback through textual resources, drawing on their personal experience and self-reflection. The participants constructed their own meanings for GP concepts such as “effort”, “research” and “logic” through materials including worksheets and sample essays from past students. Participants also used their classmates’ writing in this way, examining essays which had been highly evaluated by the teacher to understand, for instance, how long their writing should be and what type of research constituted “good effort”. In responding to Jim’s insistence that they remove personal experience from their writing, the Advanced class participants developed new meanings for “logic” and “my opinion” in which personal experience was no longer logical or appropriate for “the reader” of their academic writing. However, because the students were unable to imagine this reader, they did not develop understanding of audience and purpose in academic writing into which Jim had attempted to socialise them. Despite this, students in both classes were able to draw on their personal experiences both as content in their writing and to build their confidence as writers. Finally, self-reflection in the form of working alone was necessary to respond appropriately to peer and teacher feedback, but students required appropriate support from their peers and teachers to successfully self-reflect. In the following section, I will describe how
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students arranged discussions outside the classroom to support their participation in the Global Programme.