1Running head: PEER-EDITING IMPROVES ACADEMIC WRITING

22PEER-EDITING IMPROVES ACADEMIC WRITING

Action Research ProposalPeer-Editing Improves Academic Writing for Tenth GradersRena D. ToutounjiEDFN 508 M4-Introduction to ResearchThe College of New Jersey Global Education Program

Mallorca Summer 2015

Abstract

This action research study will be about how peer editing improves the quality of expository/persuasive writing for my tenth grade students. I hope to find out more about how students can utilize peer editing to improve their rough drafts. I plan to use a mixed methods approach in my study. The target population will be my tenth grade students whom I will be teaching beginning in August. The timeline of the research study will be throughout the first semester, which is from August 2015 to December 2015. Every second week of the month, students will submit a non peer-edited writing sample. Then, every fourth week of the month, students will submit a peer-edited writing sample, similar to the type submitted during week two.

Peer Editing Improves Academic Writing for Tenth Graders

Introduction and background about the setting and problem(s):I have been teaching at Lincoln Community School (LCS) for five years. LCS is an International Baccalaureate (IB) school that consists of a Primary Years Program, Middle Years Program, and Diploma Program. The students who attend Lincoln come from a middle and upper socioeconomic background. Parents either work for embassies, multi-national corporations, or privately owned companies, so they are mostly highly educated. About 60% of students speak English as a second language. The language of instruction at LCS is English. Beginner and intermediate English Language Learners (ELLs) are not usually accepted in 9th grade because they are expected to demonstrate adequate language proficiency. There are also students who transition from the French school, Lycee Francais dAccra, to LCS in 9th or 10th grade. They generally have a high level of oral fluency, but they struggle with academic writing in English. By tenth grade, students are expected to achieve a high level of academic language proficiency; otherwise, they will struggle in the Diploma (DP) program. I have been an EAL/English teacher at LCS for five years. I have taught Diploma English A2, high school English, and middle school English and humanities. Next year, Ill be teaching two middle school EAL classes, ninth grade and tenth grade English. When I assign summative written tasks to my students, I assign peer editing for them to look at each others rough drafts. Students are paired randomly, and they are given a checklist to assess each others written work. Then they generally have a week to finalize their papers and turn in their final draft. They are given an 85-minute block period to work on peer editing. I dont see their peer-edited responses because I only mark their rough drafts and final drafts. Students either peer-edited a hard copy of the rough draft or electronically using track changes. For seventh graders this year, I also had them color code the point, evidence, and explanation in different colors in order to establish coherence in their essays. The problem that I have identified is that students use peer-editing checklists to quickly edit spelling and punctuation errors but neglect to offer critical feedback on content, structure, and sentence structure. For example, when I assigned my seventh graders a peer-editing task period for 85 minutes to peer edit their persuasive essays about the community, students wrote insufficient comments on each others papers and used a few editing symbols to proofread and edit each others work. They kept referring to me for help, which defeats the purpose of peer editing. They would take about twenty minutes to peer edit and then begin to self-edit their own papers. I want this to become a meaningful exercise for students and encourage them to become critical thinkers.

Literature ReviewPrior research has shown that peer editing is an effective method in student learning. In Using self-assessment and peer-assessment to enhance students future-learning in higher education, the authors argue that peer editing enhances future learning. Brew (1999), cited in this article, wrote, Assessment and learning must increasingly be viewed as one and the same activity When teachers share with their students the process of assessment - giving up control, sharing power and leading students to take on the authority to assess themselves the professional judgment of both is enhanced. Students need to learn to become independent thinkers in order to make a smooth transition into higher education and the workplace. These authors argue that peer editing is a technique that promotes independent and higher order thinking. According to Falchikov (2007, p. 3) in Thomas et. als article, peer-assessment should allow learners to practice making reasonable judgements about the extent to which their peers have achieved expected outcomes. Three strategies that Falchikov recommends to use in peer-assessment are modeling, scaffolding, and fading. Teachers must model good exemplars of how they would use assessment tools. Then the next step is scaffolding where teachers show initially start with structured grading schemes (for example, rubrics), before moving to less structured systems where students negotiate the assessment criteria, before students eventually developing their own criteria (Falchikov, 2007, p. 3). He also stressed the importance of clear instruction on how to use the criteria and rubrics in order for students to eventually attain higher grades, better academic work, increased motivation, mindfulness, learning, and reduced anxiety (p. 3). The last stage is fading whereby the teacher releases onus on the students, and they effectively begin to do a peer-review with minimal support. The qualitative research article consists of case studies that present ways of using peer-editing effectively. First, it is important to have discussions with students and administer online surveys to students about their anxiety and concerns. Next, the study recommends using technological tools, such as a wiki, that allow people to collaborate without the need to be physically present in the same room. Finally, teachers are advised to show students exemplars of good, average, and poor quality papers to help calibrate their judgments prior to conducting their assessments (Thomas, et. al, 2011, p. 12). Sharon Pianko and Abraham Radzik conducted another qualitative study that involved group worksheets which would guide the discussion for each students paper (Pianko & Radzik, 2001) and student feedback. This article focuses on the role of peer editing in teaching instruction. The Student Editing Method is a study about how peer editing is effective but should be used in moderation and not replace teacher editing as suggested by other researchers. One advantage of peer editing, as pointed out by the authors in this study, is that it trains students to write for a larger audience instead of just the teacher. Since students learn over time what their teachers expectations are, their writing becomes stilted and not genuine. Moreover, the students can relate to their peers better than they can relate to their teachers. As a result, students consider peers comments for further clarification on ambiguous ideas. They would also attempt to produce better work in order to impress their friends.On the other hand, the findings of the study indicate that peer-editing cannot be used for developing editorial techniques if students lack or have very little knowledge of writing skills poor sentence skills, grammar, and usage skills, punctuation skills, etc. (Pianko & Radzik, 2001, p. 223). Students demonstrated weak editing skills and couldnt detect errors or correct the errors that they had identified. The authors concluded that peer-editing should be an addition to (certainly not to the exclusion of) feedback from the instructor in individual conferences with students (p. 224).On the other hand, The Effects of Peer Editing on the Writing Proficiency of Low-Achieving Tenth Grade Students argues that peer editing increases writing proficiency. This quantitative quasi-experimental design (evaluative study) was conducted to evaluate the positive outcome of a highly structured peer editing on writing for low proficiency tenth graders. The first four weeks were spent on revision of composition writing and instruction on how to read and use the editing, rating sheets. Then during the last six weeks, the focus shifted to organization and writing about a topic of interest for both the pretest and posttest. Students were assigned in different pairs every week and exchanged papers to provide critical feedback using the same editing/rating sheets as did the teachers. This indicates that further research can be done to show that teachers could spend less time grading papers by employing peer editing as a teaching technique in writing instruction as opposed to former research that has not validated the benefits of peer editing over teacher editing.Even the lowest achieving students could actually benefit from peer editing equally, or even more so than teacher editing. In the long run, this research is beneficial because it shows that teachers no longer have to stress themselves with giving too much feedback. It went so far as to suggest that they might not have to mark every written assignment. Instead, they could focus on teaching composition and have the students peer edit each others work. This facilitates the writing instruction since peer editing has proven to be a useful teaching and learning technique.

Methods and Data CollectionIn my study, my plan is to use a mixed-method approach. In August 2015, it will be my first time teaching tenth grade, so this is the main reason why I have chosen tenth graders as the subjects of my study. I am concerned about their academic writing and whether I can prepare them for the rigorous Diploma Program (DP), which they will encounter in eleventh and twelfth grade. Since this is the fifth year in the middle years program (MYP), they also have to write up a personal project that culminates the MYP study. My time frame for the proposed study is the first term from August to December 2015. Every month, I plan to assign a written assignment without peer editing every second week of the month and then another similar one with peer editing in the fourth week in order to compare the results. As I already mentioned in the abstract, I propose to use a mixed-methods approach. The instrumentations of the qualitative study include a KWL chart, rubrics and checklists, samples of student work, observations of students while peer editing, and questionnaire responses from student feedback. The instrumentation for the quantitative method is the table that compares the numerical grades of a written task to a non peer-edited written task of the similar type. Students will use a rubric borrowed from Common Core Standards and a peer-editing checklist that focuses on content, organization, sentence fluency, and conventions. First, I am interested in finding out about what students know about peer editing and how they use it. This will be addressed in a graphic organizer, the KWL chart (see Appendix C). The questions will be what students know, what they want to know, and what do they have learned after each peer-edited assessment.For the first two weeks, I plan to review the steps in writing an expository essay to remind students how to address a topic and consider the purpose, audience, and style. Then, my focus will be on the development of ideas and structure of a well-developed, organized five-paragraph essay following the PEE model, Point, Evidence, and Explanation. Students will review the writing steps in three stages: prewriting, drafting, and final draft. Finally, they will practice editing and proofreading their work by doing biweekly editing tasks (Everyday Edits) using an editing symbols sheet (see Appendix F) during the first term. The rubric is based on the Common Core Standards (see Appendix D). I will print hard copies of the rubric and go over it with the students. In the second week of August and every month until December, the first written task will be assigned with a rubric but no peer-edited checklist. Using the rubric, they will have two 85-minute periods to prewrite and compose their first draft. Their final drafts are due at the beginning of the third week. Then in the fourth week, I will assign the second written task with the rubric plus the peer-editing checklist. Again, the students will have two 85-minute periods to work on their pre-writing and first drafts. This time, however, the third period will be allocated for peer editing. Students should already be already familiar with the rubric, but I will introduce the peer-edited checklist and explain it to them for about 15 minutes. In random pairing, students will create a Google Docs and share it with me so that I can monitor their feedback and responses. I will walk them through it the first time as well as provide them with good and bad exemplars. The final draft will collected in the first week of September. By assigning the essay writing and peer editing in class, students will complete the work with greater consistency and thoroughness. While the students peer review their papers, I will record qualitative (descriptive) observations in a table (see Appendix B). I expect to support them in the first two months, but Im hoping to gradually release responsibility and onus to the students as they learn to become more critical, independent thinkers. Every month, I will collect samples of student work with and without peer editing. I will use the same rubric to assess their writing and provide critical feedback. During the first week of every month beginning in September, students will reflect on their work by noting what they have learned in the third column of the KWL chart. Next, I will distribute a qualitative questionnaire (see Appendix G) to gain student feedback about the peer review process every fourth week of the month. I will also tabulate the text-based responses from the questionnaire into a table (see Appendix B). The requirement will be to attach the peer-edited essay and completed checklist to the final draft and send it to me all in one document. Then I plan to record the data of the grades for the non peer-edited essays every second week in addition to the grades for the peer-edited essays every fourth week (see Appendix A). I will analyze the data in this quantitative study by comparing the numerical data of both variables. The way I plan to analyze my results is to keep a folder for the KWL charts, an electronic folder containing samples of student essays, a record of student grades in a table, and questionnaire responses from student feedback every month. I am hoping to find a pattern that will indicate an improvement and growth in their writing. Ultimately, this will show me whether or not peer editing improves the academic writing for expository/persuasive essays of my tenth grade students.My action plan is to share my research and findings with my colleagues in the English department on how to implement peer-editing as an effective teaching tool to improve students academic writing as well as how to save time on marking papers. As students become better critical peer reviewers, they will learn to write to a wider audience, and improve their academic writing. Consequently, teachers can spend less time on providing too much feedback, encouraging students to become more responsible for their own learning. I propose a replication of my action research in the second term from January to June 2016 to confirm and validate the data. I am hoping to see an improvement in my tenth graders writing as they gain more confidence and higher order thinking in peer editing with minimum guidance.

ReferencesKaregianes, M. L., & And, O. (1980). The Effects of Peer Editing on the Writing Proficiency of Low-Achieving Tenth Grade Students. Journal Of Educational Research, 73(4), 203-07.Pianko, S., & Radzik, A. (1980). The Student Editing Method. Theory Into Practice, 19(3), 220- 24.Thomas, G., Martin, D., & Pleasants, K. (2011). Using Self- and Peer-Assessment to Enhance Students' Future-Learning in Higher Education. Journal Of University Teaching And Learning Practice, 8(1).

Appendix ATableOutcome: Peer Editing Improves the Quality of Academic WritingVariablesAugustSeptemberOctoberNovemberDecember

Written TaskWeek 2Week 2Week 2Week 2Week 2

Grades

Peer-EditedWritten TaskWeek 4

Week 4Week 4Week 4Week 4

Grades

Appendix BOutcome: Peer Editing Improves the Quality of Academic WritingVariablesAugustSeptemberOctoberNovemberDecember

Week 4Week 4Week 4Week 4Week 4

Observations about how studentspeer-edit in the classroom

Text-Based Responses based on student feedback fromquestionnaire (in Appendix F)

Appendix CK-W-L ChartTopic:

What I KnowWhat I Want to KnowWhat I Learned

Appendix D

Appendix E

Peer Editing Checklist

Before you begin, make a copy of this document and save it on Google Docs. You will share your comments on the document with the writer of the essay and with me.Name of Editor:Writer of essay:

Ideas (highlight weak areas or write questions/comments in the body of the essay in GREEN) 1. Is there a strong, clear, focused thesis?2. Is the writing focused on the thesis throughout the piece?3. Is the topic sentence (point) written in a clear, effective complete sentence?4. Is the evidence provided relevant to the point made? Is there a clear connection between the reason and the evidence used to support it? If not, identify the paragraph number so the writer can provide more relevant evidence?5. Does the writer clearly explain how the evidence supports the point being made in the paragraph? If not, what is unclear?

Write comments, lingering questions, and your name in GREEN at the bottom of the piece.

Organization (highlight weak areas in RED)

1. Does my beginning/hook grab the readers attention? If no, how might the writer hook the reader using a personal experience or situation or a fact?2. Is there a logical sequence and order to the essay, i.e. does the writer follow the points laid out in the thesis?3. Does each paragraph have a topic sentence, and a closing sentence?4. Are the connections between the ideas clear and link back to the thesis?5. Does the conclusion paragraph restate the thesis statement? Does it challenge the reader to think about the topic and possible take action? If not, what could the writer do to improve the conclusion paragraph?6. Is MLA format adhered to for margins, spacing page numbers and header?7. Is MLA format used correctly for in-text citations? If not, what is incorrect?

Write comments/suggestions and your name in RED at the bottom of the paragraph.

Sentence Fluency

1. Do sentences begin in different ways?a. start with an -ing word; b. start with an -ed word;c. start with a prepositional phrase (to, for, by, on, etc); d. start with subordinating conjunctions: since, till, unless, when, where)2. Do sentences vary in length and structure (simple, compound, complex sentences)?3. Are there transition words to move the reader from one sentence to the next with ease?4. Does the writing have a natural flow when read aloud?

Write comments/suggestions and your name in BROWN at the bottom of the paragraph.

Conventions: Spelling, Punctuation, and Grammar (highlight error in blue) 1. Is each paragraph indented?2. Are there run-ons, fragments, or comma splices (R0, FRAG or CS)?3. Are all of the words spelled correctly?4. Do all sentences begin with a capital letter and end with a period or question mark? Are other words capitalized appropriately?5. Is the grammar correct and consistent?

Write comments/suggestions and your name in BLUE at the bottom of the paragraph.

Appendix F

Appendix G

Questionnaire

Please fill out this questionnaire as best as possible. Circle Yes or No.

Did you find peer editing useful for this writing task? YesNo

Explain your reasons why or why not in as much detail as possible.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

ReflectionThis final project has helped me gain more knowledge about how to conduct an action research project. Although I have read articles about research and attended class lectures, it was a challenging task to create an action research proposal. First, I found it difficult to select a topic that I would be interested in exploring, let alone carry out a research study. I brainstormed a list of situations and problems I could address in my school or classroom, and I initially thought of investigating the significance of formative assessments. I even thought about EAL workshops for mainstream teachers, which would have been a complicated study since my target population would have been the teachers instead of the students. Finally with the help of my professor, Karen Gordon, I was able to identify a problem and formulate a research question.This action research helped me understand the new terminology and apply it into a real-world context. I have always believed that students do not really value peer editing and only do it because they are assigned the task. However, I was interested in learning how to implement peer editing effectively in order to make it meaningful to the students and me.I learned how to collect the instruments for my data collection and how to implement the mixed-methods approach. I kept it simple and realistic so that I could take this action research study seriously when I return to school in August. The scholarly articles gave me insight on different types of research and methodologies. Moreover, I learned about how to gather the instrumentations for my data collection and analyze qualitative descriptive data. As for statistics, I have trouble reading them.I also realized that although we are not research professors, we could still conduct an action research study that can enhance our teaching in the classroom. We can even replicate a research study and see how it applies in our classroom.Finally, on the day of the research presentations, I gained a lot of knowledge from my peers. They were well prepared and explained their research proposals in an organized, systematic way, which also made me consider some of their research questions in the future. Overall, this has been a valuable learning experience.