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Developing a diagnostic language assessment of Japanese EFL learners' English language email writing

Research Project

Project/Area Number 19K00826
Research Category

Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)

Allocation TypeMulti-year Fund
Section一般
Review Section Basic Section 02100:Foreign language education-related
Research InstitutionThe University of Aizu

Principal Investigator

Nicholas Allan  会津大学, コンピュータ理工学部, 准教授 (50811048)

Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) BLAKE John  会津大学, コンピュータ理工学部, 准教授 (80635954)
Mozgovoy Maxim  会津大学, コンピュータ理工学部, 准教授 (60571776)
Project Period (FY) 2019-04-01 – 2022-03-31
Project Status Granted (Fiscal Year 2020)
Budget Amount *help
¥3,640,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,800,000、Indirect Cost: ¥840,000)
Fiscal Year 2021: ¥1,170,000 (Direct Cost: ¥900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥270,000)
Fiscal Year 2020: ¥1,170,000 (Direct Cost: ¥900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥270,000)
Fiscal Year 2019: ¥1,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,000,000、Indirect Cost: ¥300,000)
Keywordspragmatics / pragmatic failure / politeness / formality / assessment / corpus / Language Assessment / EFL / Writing / Pragmatics
Outline of Research at the Start

In this project, we create a computerised assessment of learners' English language emails, that can identify errors related to formality, politeness and organisation, and also give immediate individualised feedback to help learners improve. Effectiveness of the feedback is evaluated over time.

Outline of Annual Research Achievements

In this year, we made a number of achievements relating to the project. Email text data was collated into a corpus of approximately 1,300 texts. Using expert English users, the corpus data were manually annotated for specific instances of pragmatic failure, relating to email organisation, formality and politeness. We used multiple expert English users to ensure that the annotation done was reliable.
In this way, we were able to identify patterns of pragmatic failure by the Japanese EFL learners when writing English language emails in a variety of different scenarios. The scenarios varied in terms of difficulty, with the participants required to adapt their language to suit the varying social contexts. For each email text, the annotators identified instances of perceived pragmatic failure (pragmatically inappropriate language), and tagged them using software specifically designed for the project.
After carrying out an analysis of the findings, we used the results to begin developing a basic prototype of a computerised assessment of EFL learners' English emails. This online system aims to be able to automatically identify pragmatic failure in learner emails, and offer feedback that will allow them to improve their writing. It will also track their progress across tasks.

Current Status of Research Progress
Current Status of Research Progress

2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.

Reason

The project is progressing smoothly in terms of creating the corpus, manually annotating the text data, and beginning the prototyping of the computerised assessment. One issue that has not been smooth relates to the current Coronavirus pandemic- because of the pandemic, it has been more difficult to disseminate findings to the community than would normally have been the case.

Strategy for Future Research Activity

Continuing the project, we aim to continue developing the basic prototype of the computerised email assessment. Upon initial completion of the prototype, we will pilot it with a small number of volunteer participants. We will use the feedback to improve the system until it is ready to be used by a larger number of participants. We then aim to trial the system with larger groups of participants, and gather data on how effective the system is in terms of: a) accurately identifying pragmatic failure; b) promoting improvement in participants' English email writing.

Report

(2 results)
  • 2020 Research-status Report
  • 2019 Research-status Report

Research Products

(7 results)

All 2020 2019

All Journal Article (3 results) (of which Int'l Joint Research: 3 results,  Peer Reviewed: 3 results) Presentation (4 results) (of which Int'l Joint Research: 3 results)

  • [Journal Article] A failure mode and effects analysis of pragmatic errors in learner e-mails2020

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Journal Title

      SHS Web of Conferences 77: 02001

      Volume: 77 Pages: 1-6

    • DOI

      https://doi.org/10.1051/shsconf/20207702001

    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report
    • Peer Reviewed / Int'l Joint Research
  • [Journal Article] Diagnostic language assessment: Lessons learned from rapid prototyping2019

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Journal Title

      Chang. M. et al. (Eds) (2019) Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Computers in Education. Taiwan: Asia-Pacific Society for Computers in Education

      Volume: 1 Pages: 679-684

    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report
    • Peer Reviewed / Int'l Joint Research
  • [Journal Article] Annotating pragmatic errors in a Japanese learner corpus of English emails2019

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Journal Title

      Learner Corpus Studies in Asia and the World, 4:94-109

      Volume: 4 Pages: 94-109

    • DOI

      JaLCDOI: 10.24546/81011995

    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report
    • Peer Reviewed / Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Japanese EFL learners and email writing: Developing a pragmatics-focused corpus.2020

    • Author(s)
      Nicholas, A; Blake, J.; Mozgovoy, M.
    • Organizer
      The 55th RELC International Conference, March 15-17 2021
    • Related Report
      2020 Research-status Report
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] A failure mode and effects analysis of pragmatic errors in learner e-mails2020

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Organizer
      The 2nd ACM Chapter International Conference on Educational Technology, Language and Technical Communication (ETLTC 2020)
    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Diagnostic Language Assessment: Lessons Learned from Rapid Prototyping2019

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Organizer
      27th International Conference on Computers in Education, Taiwan.
    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Annotating errors in a Japanese learner corpus of English emails2019

    • Author(s)
      Allan Nicholas, John Blake
    • Organizer
      Learner Corpus Studies in Asia and the World, 4th Meeting, Kobe, Japan
    • Related Report
      2019 Research-status Report

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Published: 2019-04-18   Modified: 2021-12-27  

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