Development of writing skills based on mobile learning

Abstract

Nowadays the use of the mobile learning has an impact in the teaching of a second language since it is incorporating in the processes of learning in order to support the different abilities of the language particularly the oral skills. However, there are few studies that deal with improving writing skills through mobile devices. This article describes a quantitative study to test the effect of using academic and non-academic resources in mobile devices to develop writing skills in English in a group of freshmen university students. The theoretical framework used in this research examines the Systemic Functional Linguistics (Halliday) specifically, the genre theory of Martin & Rose (2007) and the approach of language learning assisted by mobile devices (MALL). The student’s writing skills were evaluated in the texts produced by them according to the generic structure of the text, cohesion, accuracy and mechanics aspects (spelling/capitalization and punctuation) before and after the m-learning experience. The data show a better performance in the student’s writing skills after using the resources; the results correlated significantly with the number of times of academic resources reviewed by students.

Keywords

• aprendizaje de segunda lengua
• habilidades escriturales
• género narrativo
• recursos
• aprendizaje móvil