Do University Students Understand the Five Sentence Types?

Through the Rasch Analysis by a Common Item Design

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the extent to which Japanese university students have understanding of the Five Sentence Types, and provides pedagogical implications for teaching EFL at Japanese high schools and universities. A total of 248 university students participated in this study and responded to a multiple-choice test, wherein they matched 26 to 34 short sentences with one of the five types. Item analyses and the Rasch analysis utilizing common item design revealed that significant differences were found in item difficulty estimates across and within the sentence types. The results also suggested that the students may lack fundamental knowledge about the principles underlying the Sentence Types, which is likely attributable to the students’ general preference for learning English by rote. Discussions are made about how EFL teaching can be improved utilizing the framework of the Five Sentence Types.