| Asia Pacific Journal of Corpus Research Vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 17-29 |
| Abbreviation: APJCR |
| e-ISSN: 2733-8096 |
| Publication date: 31 December 2021 |
| Received: 14 June 2021 / Received in Revised Form: 19 November 2021 / Accepted: 6 December 2021 |
| DOI: https://doi.org/10.22925/apjcr.2021.2.2.17
|
Using Small Corpora of Critiques to Set Pedagogical Goals in First Year ESP Business English |
| Yu-Chi Wang (Feng Chia University), Richard H. Davis (Feng Chia University) |
| Copyright 2021 APJCR
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0, which permits unrestricted, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Abstract |
| The current study explores small corpora of critiques written by Chinese and non-Chinese university students and how strategies used by these writers compare with high-rated L1 students. Data collection includes three small corpora of student writing; 20 student critiques in 2017, 23 student critiques from 2018, and 23 critiques from the online Michigan MICUSP collection at the University of Michigan. The researchers employ Text Inspector and Lexical Complexity to identify university students’ vocabulary knowledge and awareness of syntactic complexity. In addition, WMatrix4® is used to identify and support the comparison of lexical and semantic differences among the three corpora. The findings indicate that gaps between Chinese and non-Chinese writers in the same university classes exist in students’ knowledge of grammatical features and interactional metadiscourse. In addition, critiques by Chinese writers are more likely to produce shorter clauses and sentences. In addition, the mean value of complex nominal and coordinate phrases is smaller for Chinese students than for non-Chinese and MICUSP writers. Finally, in terms of lexical bundles, Chinese student writers prefer clausal bundles instead of phrasal bundles, which, according to previous studies, are more often found in texts of skilled writers. The current study’s findings suggest incorporating implicit and explicit instruction through the implementation of corpora in language classrooms to advance skills and strategies of all, but particularly of Chinese writers of English. |
Keywords |
| Corpus Linguistics, Academic Writing, Business English, Critique Genre, Pedagogy |
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The Authors |
| Yu-Chi Wang is an assistant professor in the Foreign Language Center at Feng Chia University in Taiwan. She received her doctoral degree in Foreign Language and ESL Education program at the University of Iowa and a master’s degree in Reading Education at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research interests include learner identity issues and topics related to teaching methodology and second language acquisition in the TESOL field.
Richard Hill Davis is an associate professor in the Foreign Language Center at Feng Chia University in Taiwan. He received his doctoral degree in English Language at Glasgow and a master’s degree in TESOL at National Kaohsiung Normal University. His research interests include ESP, EMI, Academic Writing and issues related to teaching methodology and second language acquisition in the TESOL field. |
The Authors’ Addresses |
| First and Corresponding Author Yu-Chi Wang Assistant Professor Foreign Language Center Feng Chia University No. 100, Wenhua Rd. Xitun Dist., Taichung City, TAIWAN Email: yuchiwang77@gmail.com Co-author  DOI QR Code |
