TO WRITE OR NOT NO WRITE

IN THE FIRST GRADE – THAT IS

THE QUESTION
Mara Šućur i Ines Jerković
 What age is considered to be optimal for writing in a
foreign language?

 two opposite schools of tought

 
AN EMPIRICAL STUDY ON FIRST-GRADERS´
DEVELOPMENT OF WRITING SKILLS

 first-graders who did not have Englih as an obligatory

school subject
 purpose: to gain an insight into introducing writing at the
beginnning of learning English
PARTICIPANTS
 sixty first-graders
 experimental group

 control group
DATA COLLECTION
 1. Croatian dictation (6 short sentences)
 2. Croatian dictation (7 sentences)

 3. Croatian dictation (12 sentences)

 4. Croatian dictation (9 sentences)

 1. English dictation (10 words and 4 short sentences)

 2. English dictation (9 words and 7 sentences)

 3. English dictation (22 words and 2 sentences)

 4. English dictation (9 sentences)

 1. Croatian dictation (handwriting)
 2. Croatian dictation (capital initial letters)

 3. Croatian dictation (puntuation marks)

 4. Croatian dictation („č” and „ć”)

 English dictations
 number of errors
RESULTS
EXPERIMENTAL GROUP
Variable Number of Mean Minimum Maximum Std. Dev.
examinees

HANDWRITING 30 1.50 0.00 6.00 1.74

CAPITAL LETTERS 30 1.37 0.00 6.00 1.75

PUNTUATION 30 0.77 0.00 3.00 0.90

„Č“ & „Ć“ 30 1.00 0.00 8.00 1.68

DICTATION 1 – C 30 2.10 0.00 8.00 2.41

DICTATION 2 – C 30 2.87 0.00 12.00 3.03

DICTATION 3 – C 30 2.33 0.00 11.00 2.64

DICTATION 4 – C 30 3.47 0.00 14.00 3.35

DICTATION C 30 10.76 1.00 41.00 10.01

RESULTS
CONTROL GROUP
Variable Number of Mean Minimum Maximum Std. Dev.
examinees

HANDWRITING 30 3.93 0.00 12.00 3.45

CAPITAL LETTERS 30 2.97 0.00 13.00 4.01

PUNTUATION 30 3.93 0.00 10.00 3.76

„Č“ & „Ć“ 30 3.27 0.00 8.00 2.43

DICTATION 1 – C 30 4.70 0.00 14.00 4.09

DICTATION 2 – C 30 7.10 0.00 27.00 7.28

DICTATION 3 – C 30 10.43 0.00 33.00 8.26

DICTATION 4 – C 30 8.53 1.00 24.00 5.73

DICTATION C 30 30.76 3.00 89.00 23.10

STATISTICAL PARAMETERS
 Significant differences in variables between control and
experimental group

 The Mann Whitney Rank Sum Test

 Outcome of researchSpelling skills in English as

influence in Croatian..
 Performing in the Croatian dictations- experimental and
control group

 The conclusion:
 Early writing skills in English- effects upon skills in
Croatian
 First graders- motivation and attitude toward writing in
English

 Interview- 6 questions

 Two possible answers

 Attitude towards writing…?

 The pupils were interviewed individually…

 1. Do you like writing in English?

 negative 3, positive 27

 2. Do you prefer writing in English to writing in

Croatian? 7 croatian, 23 English
 3. What do you like about writing in English?

 The most frequent reasons for preferring writing in

English?

 x, w, y
--strange, shorter words, no Č..

- “Secret code”
 The non phonetic nature of the English..

 Graded much less frequently

 4 Do you prefer writing to speaking in English? 80%

speaking
 Why preference for speaking?

 Speaking skill also better represented in the

 curriculum…

 5 Do you prefer singing to writing in English? 70% singing

 Why answer like this?

 6 Which do you prefer in Croatian- writing or speaking?

 57%speaking , 43% writing

 7 Would you like to write more or less in English? 87%

for more
 What is your favourite activity in the English class?

 Basic writing in a foreign language at this age should be

based…

 Frequent homework..
 Dictations- practice and checking..

 Teacher as source of confidence and support

 Encouraging curiosity and motivating interests, sharing

joy bcz of first words written in English
THANK YOU!