CORRELATION BETWEEN SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS’ METALANGUAGE AWARENESS’S SKILLS AND WRITING SKILLS

ORTAOKUL ÖĞRENCİLERİNİN ÜST DİL FARKINDALIK BECERİLERİ İLE YAZMA BECERİLERİ ARASINDAKİ İLİŞKİ

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to determine the potential relationship between metalinguistic awareness skills and writing skills of middle school students. The population of the research is formed by 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th grade students which attend the 2014-2015 school year in Uşak city center. The sample of the research have been selected by medium and high leveled (according to their success in Turkish lesson) 60 middle school students, 33 female and 27 male students that attend in Uşak province Middle School which can be expressed as a “medium level” school according to the TEOG test. This number is specified to be 15 people from each grade level (5th, 6th, 7th and 8thgrades). Phonological, morphological, semantic, syntactic tests have been applied to measure the metalinguistic awareness level of the students, metalinguistic awareness test was obtained from the sum of these tests. The obtained results were evaluated by three domain experts and researchers; prediction of the tests of students writing skills was examined. To measure the students ' writing skills "complete story " method has been employed; the compositions were evaluated according to the analytical scoring scale which was prepared by Çetin(2002) by three experts and researchers. According to the obtained data and analyses it is possible to say that there is a significant relationship between middle school students’ metalinguistic awareness skills and their writing skills. To the matter in hand as the dimensions of metalinguistic awareness skills; we can also discuss the same case when phonological, morphological, semantic and syntactic awareness skills taken separately. This awareness skills, writing skills of middle school students showed that a significant proportion of procedure. It has been observed that, students with high awareness skills also have high writing skills; students which have low writing skills are also low in these skills. It emerged the fact that contributing to the development of metalinguistic skills of the students, will also develope their writing skills Metalanguage awareness is described as thinking about language, organizing language’s structural skills consciously by many researchers. (Chaney, 1994, Edwards and Kirkpatrick, 1999). Researchers mostly studied metalanguage in children for language’s different components (phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics) (Chaney, 1994; Edwards and Kirkpatrick, 1999; Tunmer, Bowey and Grieve, 1983; Vellutino and Scanlon, 1987). Studies showed that metalanguage awareness developed gradually in childhood period and continued in primary school period. (Acarlar and Turan, 2002: 64). In general, children cannot show these attitudes until they are four or they seven or eight in some cases. Sayar and Turan (2012) referred in their studies that the highest change in metalanguage development is between 7-8 ages, metalanguage development continues in childhood period remarking those 8-12 ages of children show a faster and more correct performance than children who are between 4-7 ages in metalanguage tasks. Although many studies can be seen about the correlation between metalanguage awareness with reading skills, it is not possible to say same things about writing skills in this issue. Researching the correlation between metalanguage awareness and writing skills is important for teaching students to have this skill and raising awareness of people about this topic. The aim of this research is to determine the possible correlation between metalanguage awareness skills of secondary schools students and writing skills. The population of the research is 5th, 6th. 7th. and 8th grade students who studies in the Center of Uşak city in 2014-2015 education term, 33 girls and 27 boys, totally 60 students who studies in one of the central secondary schools and who have normal level success according to TEOG data and who are in normal and upper level (according to their success in Turkish lesson) are selected. This number is determined as 15 students in each grade (5th, 6th, 7th and 8th grades) In this research which aims to identify possible correlation between metalanguage awareness skills and writing skills, descriptive model is used as existing situation is aimed to be shown as it is (Yıldırım and Şimşek, 2006); obtained data is subjected to content analysis. To evaluate metalanguage awareness of students, phonological, morphological, semantically, syntactical awareness tests are applied and metalanguage awareness test is obtained with the sum of these. Obtained data is evaluated by three field expert and researchers, tests are researched whether they are any meaningful correlation with students writing skills. To evaluate students writing skills, “story completion” method is applied and compositions are evaluated by three field experts and researches according to composition analytical scoring scale which was prepared by Çetin (2002). When we examine metalanguage awareness skills which was obtained from the sum of phonological, morphological, semantically, syntactical skills and point level of writing skills, it is observed that the more total point that was obtained from all tests increase, the more writing skills points increase. It is possible to see 6th grades are most successful grade in both metalanguage awareness skills and writing skills points, then7th grades, and then 8th grades follow, from the chart. When we look at the correlation between metalanguage awareness skills and writing skills, it is determined that 5th grade classes took the lowest points in both tests metalanguage awareness skills tests and practices that were done to determine writing skills. It is possible to say that this situation is related with student’s cognitive development level, 6th, 7th and 8th grade students have not shown very different graphics than each other in terms of the correlation between metalanguage awareness skills with writing skills. This situation shows 5th

Özet

Bu araştırmanın amacı, ortaokul öğrencilerinin üst dil farkındalık becerileri ile yazma becerileri arasındaki olası ilişkiyi belirlemektir. Araştırmanın evrenini Uşak, ili merkezinde 2014-2015 öğretim yılında öğrenim gören 5, 6, 7 ve 8. sınıf öğrencileri oluşturmuş; örneklemi için TEOG verilerine göre başarısı "orta düzey" olarak ifade edilebilecek Uşak ili merkez ortaokullarından birinde okuyan 33'ü kız 27'si erkek; orta ve yüksek düzeydeki (Türkçe dersi başarılarına göre) 60 ortaokul öğrencisi seçilmiştir. Bu rakam her sınıf düzeyinden (5, 6, 7 ve 8. Sınıflar) 15 kişi olacak şekilde belirlenmiştir. Öğrencilerin üst dil farkındalık seviyelerini ölçmek için, fonolojik, morfolojik, semantik, sentaktik farkındalık testleri uygulanmış, bunların toplamından üst dil farkındalık testi elde edilmiştir. Elde edilen veriler 3 alan uzmanı ve araştırmacı tarafından değerlendirilmiş; testlerin öğrencilerin yazma becerisini ile anlamlı bir ilişkisinin olup olmadığı incelenmiştir. Öğrencilerin yazma becerilerini ölçmek için "öykü tamamlama" yöntemine başvurulmuş; kompozisyonlar Çetin (2002)'in hazırlamış olduğu kompozisyon analitik puanlama ölçeğine göre 3 alan uzmanı ve araştırmacı tarafından değerlendirilmiştir. Elde edilen veri ve analizlerden ortaokul öğrencilerinin üst dil farkındalık becerileri ve yazma becerileri arasında anlamlı bir ilişkinin olduğunu söylemek mümkündür. Üst dil farkındalık becerilerinin alt boyutları olarak ele alınan fonolojik, morfolojik, semantik ve sentaktik farkındalık becerileri ayrı ayrı ele alındığında da yine aynı durum söz konusu değildir. Üst dil farkındalık becerilerinin ortaokul öğrencilerinin yazma becerilerini anlamlı bir oranda bir yordadığı, farkındalık becerileri yüksek olan öğrencilerin yazma becerilerinin de yüksek olduğu; bu becerilerin düşük olduğu öğrencilerde yazma becerisinin de düşük olduğu gözlemlenmiştir. Öğrencilerin üst dil becerilerinin gelişimine katkı sağlanmasının yazma becerilerini de geliştireceği durumu ortaya çıkmıştır