New in the McGraw-Hill second language professional series, this volume is a welcome addition to current resources for English as a second language (ESL), English as a foreign language (EFL), and foreign language (FL) teachers seeking an introduction to research and practice in second language (L2) writing instruction. The book unifies insights from multiple sources from a SLA perspective. An experienced language teacher, teacher educator, and researcher, Williams emphasizes that writing involves more than text production; “it is also a learning and thinking process” (p. 76).
Although grounded in SLA theory, the volume synthesizes rather than surveys research findings and is geared toward nonspecialists, principally students, preservice teachers, and practitioners who “feel unprepared to teach [L2] composition” (pp. 1–2). Consistent with the Professional series format, the text eschews bibliographic references: Readers seeking primary sources will find bibliographic citations only at each chapter's conclusion. Decidedly practical in orientation, chapters include prompts designed to help readers apply the content to classroom practice. Sample materials (e.g., instructional activities, student writing, scoring rubrics) punctuate most chapters, which conclude with a synthesis of main points and a list of readings for beginning students.
Chapter 1 introduces factors that influence SLA, such as implicit and explicit knowledge, input, system and item learning, attention, practice, and time, acquainting readers with the cognitive, sociocultural, and educational contexts for academic L2 writing. In chapter 2 Williams considers how texts, L2 writers, and instructional processes influence language development, stressing the importance of audience awareness in teaching L2 writing. The chapter curiously underrepresents social constructionist and discursive models of L2 literacy. Offering general guidelines for designing classroom tasks, chapter 3 presents methods and techniques suitable for L2 learners at beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels. The chapter also appraises technological approaches to teaching L2 writing. Chapter 4 focuses on text production activities involving invention, drafting, and revision. The author effectively summarizes the conventional wisdom on managing teacher and peer response in L2 classrooms.
Chapter 5 pursues these themes by assessing mixed research findings on teacher feedback and peer response and suggests implications for educational practice. Chapter 6 elaborates on the feedback topic by outlining basic principles of writing assessment. The chapter begins with a nontechnical survey of key “terms, concepts, and issues in testing,” (p. 119) that some readers might find less than complete. Core constructs such as reliability and validity, for example, are treated in the simplest terms. Omitting trait-based scoring, the author describes both holistic and analytic rating scales, the most commonplace tools used for evaluating student writing. Portfolio assessment is appropriately introduced, although the discussion is surprisingly brief, given the widespread adoption of alternative assessment in many L2 settings.
In chapter 7, the author loops back to the volume's distinctive SLA focus by exploring the effects of production, instruction, and feedback on L2 writing. Readers will find this chapter particularly valuable, as it treats writing performance as a salient contributor to L2 development. The author carefully reviews the functions of output in language learning and highlights the impact of metalinguistic knowledge, negative evidence, and explicit grammar instruction on L2 writing skills, including editing. The book's final chapter examines programmatic options for L2 writing instruction, describing and comparing methodological alternatives such as task-based and content-based models. End matter includes two appendixes (one contains student writing samples and the other presents model assessment guidelines), a brief glossary, and a topical index.
As with any introductory book with ambitious goals, readers might appreciate unique strengths while noting inevitable weaknesses. This book's discussion of classroom practices, for example, alternates somewhat unsystematically from one setting to another. Although unquestionably practical in purpose, this volume is not a comprehensive how-to manual, as the extent of genuinely hands-on material is minimal. Similarly, most procedural examples and vignettes, although insightful, are presented in largely abstract language and thus lack contextualization in a specific ESL, EFL, or FL setting. Consequently, readers might infer that the conditions and constraints in these divergent situations are comparable—contrary to the author's explicit message that FL and L2 contexts are profoundly distinct. These flaws notwithstanding, Williams has admirably succeeded in developing “a short, accessible text that would be as useful as possible” to ESL writing instructors and in creating a resource “for those … interested in teaching academic literacy in foreign languages” (p. xiii). She has likewise produced a volume centered on the premise that “our students are always second language learners” (p. xiv).
