tailieunhanh - Relationships of L1 and L2 Reading and Writing Skills

This document contains 10 units organised as in-service training (INSET) sessions, each of which can be used singly or as part of a continuing programme of work. Although the document is arranged in a logical sequence, it is not necessary to use the units in order. Each is designed to be free-standing and could be used alone to meet a particular need identified by teachers. Units summarise current thinking on the most effective ways to teach and to achieve progression in writing, using available research and resources to provide a comprehensive one-stop shop for teachers in Wales. Clearly, a document of this kind cannot provide much more than the main. | Relationships of L1 and L2 Reading and Writing Skills W i4HISB WW iS T te B Eri Fukuda I. Introduction Influenced by the first language L1 research on reading-writing relationships recent English language education has highlighted the connection between the two literacy skills. The assumption underlying this approach is that cognitive knowledge is shared by domains of reading and writing Fitzgerald Shanahan 2000 . The shared cognitive domains were also hypothesized to function as a basic competence from which literacy skills in distinct languages stem according to the interdependence hypothesis advocated by Cummins 1994 . This transferability of the skills across languages has been reported in first and second language L2 reading research and Clarke 1980 introduced the short circuit hypothesis in his study on L2 reading. The author argued that the transfer of reading skills from L1 to L2 can be restricted by limited L2 language proficiency which has not reached the threshold level the point when the transfer begins to occur. Regarding this intervention of L2 language proficiency Alderson 1984 questioned whether poor L2 reading skills were attributed to poor L1 reading skills or limited L2 language proficiency. Carrell 1991 examined this issue and found both L1 reading skills and language proficiency were critical elements to predict L2 reading skills. Other studies yielded similar results to Carrell 1991 and concluded that L2 language proficiency was the stronger predictor of L2 reading skills. Meanwhile L2 writing research on the transferability of the skills across languages has remained inconclusive. Nevertheless according to Grabe 2001 the transferability of L2 writing skills could also be determined by the L2 threshold level. The scholar pointed out that this notion of the L2 threshold level was versatile in L2 writing as well. Moreover theoretically the transferability of writing skills could be supported by Flower and Hayes s 1981 cognitive process theory of