Effects of Composition Idea Support Using an "Idea Sheet"

Abstract

Learners who are not good at writing often do not know what to write. Therefore, the author developed a task sheet for assistance in developing ideas: an "idea sheet". The sheet enables learners to visualize their thoughts and subsequently expand their ideas by giving them a framework within which to inscribe their thoughts. This study was designed to verify the effects of activities for inscribing ideas using the idea sheet. All 29 subjects were Chinese students, of whom 17 were classified into an experimental group and 12 into a control group. First, subjects of both groups were asked to write the first composition as a preliminary examination. Next, only the experimental group subjects were asked to do an idea activity using the idea sheet. Then all subjects of both groups were asked to write the second composition. To elucidate the effects of the idea sheet, a two-way factor analysis was conducted of variance for the results of the experimental versus the control group, against the first versus the second composition. Results showed effects such as improved scores related to content (logical consistency) and increased numbers of sentence clauses used.