Immersing Students into the World of Academic English

Summary

The following is a summary of an article written by Christine Tardy for English Teaching Forum. Its title is Writing for the world: Wikipedia as an introduction to academic writing. This article deals mainly with how to guide students into the production of academic writing, using Wikipedia as a tool for such aim. For students’ production to be accepted into Wikipedia website, Tardy (2010) explains what requirements and steps must be fulfilled.

To start with, according to the author, it is essential to raise awareness in learners of the importance of avoiding plagiarism. Writers should be able to paraphrase, summarize, cite and quote in order to successfully write in an acceptable academic style. Moreover, the academic style requires from the students knowledge of the appropriate genres, styles, register and a high level of expertise on the topics dealt with in papers. In addition, for written pieces to be accepted into Wikipedia, not only knowledge is required, but also reliable sources of information.

Furthermore, the writer lists the steps to be followed in order to successfully write in academic English and, thus, to have the written piece admitted into Wikipedia. First of all, students should start by examining Wikipedia to have an idea of what is expected from them. Then, gathering information follows with outlining and paraphrasing so as to organize what is to be written together with the sources where information was taken from. The last steps are concerned with the writing process. Students should be encouraged to draft, revise, format sources, and polish, being revising and polishing better achieved, as the writer suggests, if they are carried out by peer review. Finally, publishing takes place.

To conclude, the author aims at providing the teacher with tools to immerse students into the community of academic English. Students’ productions are accepted into Wikipedia as long as they meet the requirements of academic style. Therefore, as Tardy (2010) asserts, writing to publish in Wikipedia gives students a real purpose and real audience to use academic English, which is assumed to help students gain valuable learning.

 

Reference

Tardy, C. M. (2010). Writing for the world: Wikipedia as an introduction to academic writing. English Teaching Forum, 1, 12-27. Retrieved from http://exchanges.state.gov/englishteaching/forum/archives/docs/10-48-1-c.pdf