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Corpora and Rhetorically Informed Text Analysis: The diverse applications of DocuScope
Edited by David West Brown and Danielle Zawodny Wetzel
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 109] 2023
► pp. 94–118

Language patterns in secondary and postsecondary student writing

 | University of Michigan
For as long as new college students have written English, they have done so badly. Or so, at least, is the headline story from 19th century Harvard reports to 21st century coverage. These claims keep us firmly in a language regulation paradigm focused on error, rather than a language exploration paradigm focused on knowledge and analysis: We hear a lot of complaints about what student writers can’t do, but we don’t learn much about what characterizes secondary and postsecondary writing. To do something different, this study uses DocuScope’s language cluster tool and two corpora (of incoming student Dirscted Self Placement writing and upper-level student writing, to three ends: (1) to illustrate language exploration as a productive (and fun!) orientation toward student writing at different levels, (2) to connect abstracted claims – alleged reasons that “new college students can’t write” – to rhetorical patterns in actual students’ writing, and (3) to use empirical writing data to debunk myths about college writing development. Ultimately, the study shows significant rhetorical differences between secondary and postsecondary writing that are linked to the different assignment tasks at each level. It also shows how we can use DocuScope language clusters to support students’ metacognitive awareness of secondary and postsecondary writing practices
Keywords: student writing, academic discourse, grammar, corpus analysis, corpus linguistics
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: Lamenting student writing
  • 2.Language regulation: What are students doing so wrong?
    • 2.1“Grammar” and mechanics
    • 2.2Disorganized structure
    • 2.3Generalizations and overstatement
    • 2.4Informality
    • 2.5Who knows
    • 2.6A confusing synopsis
  • 3.Language exploration: What are students doing?
    • 3.1Secondary versus postsecondary writing tasks
  • 4.Language exploration: The study
    • 4.1The study corpora
      • 4.1.1Secondary writing by students entering the university: The DSP corpus
      • 4.1.2Successful postsecondary writing at the university: MICUSP
    • 4.2Corpus details
    • 4.3Analysis methods
  • 5.Results
  • 6.Discussion
    • 6.1What are significant rhetorical differences between secondary and postsecondary writing?
      • 6.1.1Postsecondary writing rhetorical patterns
      • 6.1.2Secondary writing rhetorical patterns
      • 6.1.3No significant difference and low percent difference
    • 6.2How might these differences help explain claims about student writing?
    • 6.3How might we use patterns to support students’ metacognitive awareness of different secondary and postsecondary writing practices?
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 29 June 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/scl.109.05aul
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