Investigating the academic writing potentials of freshmen at the University of Buea: Making a case for grammatical and lexical awareness
Main Article Content
Abstract
This study hypothesized “that one who has nothing to say has nothing to write” to investigate the effects of grammatical awareness on performance in language proficiency test among first-year university students at the University of Buea (UB). The sample comprised 100 first-year students purposively sampled from Use of English classes at UB. Using Piaget’s (1936) Theory of Cognitive Development, data for the study was collected and analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that pre-university students upon enrolment harbour stereotyped and somewhat erroneous forms and structures of grammar that eventually become difficult to get out of their minds, and these are often introduced by their teachers or sometimes the environment they come from. Based on the findings, the study recommends that teachers of English at every stage should endeavour to engage students with real-life language use as this has the potentials to improve the communicative abilities.
Downloads
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
This open-access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.
You are free to: Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially. The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Under the following terms: Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
No additional restrictions You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
How to Cite
References
Achiri- Taboh, B., & Lando, R. (2017). English in Cameroon: Issues of teacher language proficiency. International Journal of English Language Teaching, 4(1), 20-31.
Akbari, Z. (2014). The role of grammar in second language reading comprehension: Iranian ESP context. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 98, 122-126.
Chen, C. L., & Hirsh, D. (2012). Manipulating instructional method: The effect on productive vocabulary use. In D. Hirsh (Ed.), Current Perspectives in Second Language Vocabulary Research (pp. 117-142). Peter Lang.
Chiatoh, B. A., & Nkwain, C. N. (2020). Attitude of Francophone students towards Pidgin at the University of Buea (UB). International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation, 3(11), 87-93. Doi: 10.32996/ijllt.2020.3.11.8
Durairajan, R. (2019). Assessing and testing learners’ language proficiency. Language and Language Teaching, 5(9), 51-56.
Hedge, T. (2000). Teaching and learning in the language classroom. Oxford University Press.
Liao, Y. F. (2007). Investigating the construct validity of the grammar and vocabulary section and the listening section of the ECCE: Lexico-grammatical ability as a predictor of L2 listening ability. Spaan fellow, 1001, 37, 37-116.
Namaziandost, E. Banari, R., & Momtaz, S. (2019). Evaluating oral proficiency skill through analytics and holistic ways of scoring. Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews, 7(5), 424-433. https://doi.org/10.18510/hssr.2019.7547
Nation, P. (2001). Learning vocabulary in another language. Cambridge University Press.
Rao, P. S. (2019). Teaching of writing skills to foreign or second language learners of English. ELT Vibes: International E-Journal For Research in ELT, 5(2), 136-152.
Ur, P. (1996). A course in language teaching, practice and theory. Cambridge University Press.