The Effect of Extensive Reading On Writing Style Instruction
廣泛閱讀效果對寫作風格教學之影響
張真維 Chen-wei Chang
Over the past decades, there has been numerous studies reporting that
extensive reading not only facilitates learners’ reading skills, language skills, but also
personal growth and learning motivations. Among theses studies, Palmer, who was a
pioneer to distinguish the intensive reading and extensive reading, stated that
extensive reading (ER) means to read “rapidly” with “quantity” (Palmer, 1964, p.111,
cited from Day & Bamford, 1998, p. 5). Richards and Platt (2003) also referred that
“extensive reading means reading in quantity and in order to gain a general
understanding of what is read.” “It is intended to develop good reading habits, to build
up knowledge of vocabulary and structure, and to encourage a liking for reading.” (p.
168). In other words, students spend most of their time to read a lot of easy, enjoyable
books without needing to answer comprehension questions, to write reports or
translation. ER is much like the way people read for pleasure in their native language.
For that reason, Day and Bamford (1998) suggest that it is best if the book is
self-selected. Any material can be used, graded readers which present stories with
controlled vocabulary and, at times, limited grammar and information flow are often
used. These are books that can help readers become fluent, skilled readers.
More specifically, many researches found that the benefits of extensive reading
include gains in reading proficiency (Kutiper, 1983; Tudor & Hafiz, 1989; Robb &
Susser, 1989; Nash & Yuan, 1992/1993), reading speed (Bell, 2001), reading habits
(Nash & Yuan 1992/1993), listening proficiency (Eley & Mangubhai, 1983), speaking
abilities (Hafiz & Tudor, 1990; Elley, 1991), writing proficiency (Haifiz & Tudor,
1989), positive affect (Krashen, 1993), and even spelling abilities (Krashen, 1989).
These studies provide valuable insights and pedagogic implications for educators and
teachers with desires to implement their instructions in the classroom.
Moreover, the majority of researches have shown that extensive reading is the
key to achieving higher reading proficiency (Krashen, 1993). Krashen (2004) have
even suggested that free voluntary reading (FVR) is the key to students in
improvement in reading skills, linguistic competence, vocabulary, spelling and writing.
Researchers focus on the benefits of extensive reading program to the language
learning of learners; some of them provide a specific perspective to argue that
extensive reading leads to language knowledge that supports better writing abilities.
For example, Elley and Mangubhai (1983) stated that extensive readers outperformed
“on the tests of reading comprehension, vocabulary, oral language, grammar, listening
comprehension, and writing” (p. 55). Yu and Wong (1991) indicated that ER
motivates learners and leads to improvement in writing. Beniko Mason’s studies
(Mason and Krashen 1997) also showed that extensive reading benefits learners in
writing as well as reading. Lastly, Krashen (2004) also states that “those who report
they read more write better” (p. 132).
Those results summarized in the previous section have demonstrated that a large
amount of reading (ER) can be means of comprehensible input to stimulate language
acquisition. These results are consistent with the Input Hypothesis, which claims that
“we acquire language by understanding messages, that ‘comprehensible input’ is the
essential ingredient in language acquisition.” (Krashen, 1989, p. 440) In Krashen’s
Input Hypothesis (1993), it assumes that learners can acquire “i+1” language (“i”
represents students’ current level of competence, “i+1” means the difficulty of the
language is just beyond the students’ current competence) if they understand “i+1”
message. This claim, by receiving comprehensible input, states that “we acquire
language by understanding input that is a little beyond our current level of acquired
competence” (p. 32). On the contrary, Day and Bamford (1998) suggest that in order
to develop L2 learners’ language proficiency, “i minus 1” material are better choice as
they can provide L2 learners with linguistic exposure without too many “i+1”
distractions. Hence, whether large amounts of comprehensible input “i+1” or “i-1” are
necessary for significant language acquisition and that extensive reading with graded
readers can be an enjoyable, motivating source of such input, depending on learners’
linguistic competence. In other words, in order to acquire language fluency and
proficiency, learners need to encounter these unfamiliar words and linguistic forms
repeatedly through reading of quantity. As a source of plentiful out-of-class input and
a resource for interaction in the classroom, an extensive reading program can be a
useful component of a course focusing on writing skills by accumulating the
knowledge of the language and knowledge of writing system.
Here, the effect of ER has provided L2 learners with more opportunities as a
mean of comprehensible input to facilitate writing production (Output Hypothesis) in
the exposure of the second language. Output Hypothesis, advanced by Merrill Swain,
makes a claims that “output is necessary to increase fluency, that is, learners must
practice producing second language [written form] if they are to learn to use their
interlanguage system confidently and routinely” (Mitchell & Myles, 2004, p.174). For
example, Stotsky (1983) and Krashen (1984) reviewed a number of L1 studies that
appear to show the positive effect of reading on subjects' writing skills, indicating that
students who are prolific readers in their pre-college years become better writers when
they enter college. L2 studies by Hafiz & Tudor (1989) in the UK and Pakistan, and
Robb & Susser (1989) in Japan, revealed more significant improvement in subjects'
written work than in other language skills. These results shows that ER can lead to
improvement in writing
In addition, Mason and Krashen (1997) conducted two studies concerning the
effect of extensive reading on writing. In the first study, two group from a prestigious
university and two groups from a two-year college served as experimental group. The
experimental groups’ cloze test gain scores were significantly greater than those of the
control groups, which followed the traditional curriculum. In addition, students’
summaries written in English were rated by three native raters as good, average, and
not good. Through out one academic year, the result showed that there was significant
movement from average or not good to the category of good.
In the second study, a much larger choice of books was available (over 3000).
Two experimental groups used different languages (English vs. Japanese) to write
their summaries and the control group was asked to do the extensive work on cloze
exercise instead of following the traditional curriculum. The same 100 item cloze test
used in the previous study was administered as pre- and post test and a comprehension
test was used as post test only. The cloze test results showed that the extensive reading
groups made better gains than the comparison group and that only the English
response group showed the statistical significance. With respect to reading
comprehension test, both extensive reading groups made significantly greater gains
than the comparison group.
Moreover, the writing results demonstrated that it was the Japanese response
group that yielded greater gains on writing, which thus suggested that the
improvement in writing did not come from more writing (output hypothesis), but from
the input that extensive reading provided. This finding is consistent with Tsang’s
study (1996), which found that the extensive reading group had better writing
performance than the group that practiced writing. In Tsang's (1996) study, carried
out in Hong Kong secondary schools, it provided further persuasive evidence of the
effectiveness of extensive reading in fostering learners' language development. He
found that “the reading program was significantly more effective than the writing
program” (p. 225). Extensive reading programs can provide very effective platforms
for promoting reading improvement and development from elementary levels
upwards. Although they do require a significant investment in time, energy and
resources on the part of those charged with managing the materials, the benefits in
terms of language and skills development for the participating learners far outweigh
the modest sacrifices required. If such programs receive institutional support and can
be integrated into the curriculum so that they become agreed school policy, as
suggested in Davis (1995), they will likely be more readily and widely adopted,
particularly in countries where material and financial resources are adequate.
Generalizing the above studies, Grabe (2003) proposed a hypothesis, called
Extensive Reading Hypothesis, to depict the reading and writing relations. He states
that “extensive reading leads to better vocabulary knowledge, better verbal fluency,
better syntactic knowledge, better semantic memory, better metalinguistic awareness,
and broader knowledge of the world” (p. 249). Based on the findings, he continues
that “a major implication for reading and writing relation, …, is that connections
between reading and writing may variable, but they can be interconnected more
efficiently through extensive reading in combination with consistent writing practice”
(p. 249). He concluded the relationship between reading (input) and writing (output)
that they are both interdependent fundamental components in acquiring language
proficiency. More specifically, Swain (1985) stated the input-out relationships at the
level of language proficiency traits. Smith (1985) gave the theoretical explanations of
how input becomes intake through the processes of interactions in our cognitive
dimension. Moreover, Krashen (1989) proposed that “Output, especially writing, can
have very positive cognitive consequences” (p. 456). In his recent book, The power of
reading, he makes two crucial points: first is that “actual writing can help us solve
problems and make us smarter” and second is that “writing style does not come from
actual writing experience, but from reading”. (p. 132). In other words, it is referred
that reading and writing facilitate mutually. Sufficient input in form of reading can
stimulate writing productions, while output in form of writing can reinforce the
logical thinking of reading. In conclusion, input hypothesis proposed by Krashen and
output hypothesis proposed by Swain form a cyclic and interdependent correlation.
Whereas the above research has reviewed numerous previous studies of effects
of extensive reading program on language learning, a more specific perspective
proposed by Krashen can be observed in the field of research on second language
learners’ writing style that it is facilitated by extensive reading as means of input.
Therefore, this study is to investigate that the direct effect of extensive reading
program, as a mean of input, promotes learners’ writing proficiency, and as a
production (output) of cognitive processes, leads to learners’ writing styles.
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