Computer-assisted EFL writing and evaluations based on artificial intelligence: a case from a college reading and writing course
ISSN: 0737-8831
Article publication date: 14 October 2020
Issue publication date: 14 February 2022
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this study is to explore students' expectations and perceived effectiveness of computer-assisted review tools, and the differences in reliability and validity between human evaluation and automatic evaluation, to find a way to improve students' English writing ability.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the expectancy disconfirmation theory (EDT) and Intelligent Computer-Assisted Language Learning (ICALL) theory, an experiment is conducted through the observation method, semistructured interview method and questionnaire survey method. In the experiment, respondents were asked to write and submit four essays on three online automated essay evaluation (AEE) systems in total, one essay every two weeks. Also, two teacher raters were invited to score the first and last papers of each student. The respondents' feedbacks were investigated to confirm the effectiveness of the AEE system; the evaluation results of the AEE systems and teachers were compared; descriptive statistics was used to analyze the experimental data.
Findings
The experiment revealed that the respondents held high expectations for the computer-assisted evaluation tools, and the effectiveness of computer scoring feedback on students was higher than that of teacher scoring feedback. Moreover, at the end of the writing project, the students' independent learning ability and English writing ability were significantly improved. Besides, there was a positive correlation between students' initial expectations of computer-assisted learning tools and the final evaluation of learning results.
Originality/value
The innovation lies in the use of observation methods, questionnaire survey methods, data analysis, and other methods for the experiment, and the combination of deep learning theory, EDT and descriptive statistics, which has particular reference value for future works.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The paper is supported by the MOE(Ministry of Education in China) Industry-Academy Cooperation Program “Study on the Effect of Group Cooperation on Undergraduates’ Improvement in EFL Reading and Writing” (Grant No. 201902184036).This paper forms part of a special section “Informetrics on Social Network Mining: Research, Policy and Practice challenges - Part 2”, guest edited by Mu-Yen Chen, Chien-Hsiang Liao, Edwin David Lughofer and Erol Egrioglu.
Citation
Wang, Z. (2022), "Computer-assisted EFL writing and evaluations based on artificial intelligence: a case from a college reading and writing course", Library Hi Tech, Vol. 40 No. 1, pp. 80-97. https://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-05-2020-0113
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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