高中學生議論文之主題發展

Abstract

句子的主題具備了啟動訊息、聯繫前後句、並呼應引導全文等功能，因此，主題之選用與安排，影響文章流暢與否。事實上，英文文章中的主題發展有固定模式與原則可循。本研究以主題發展模式，檢驗學生在議論文中主題發展的情形，並比較高低群學生在質與量方面是否有異同。\r\n 本研究資料取自138位高三學生於課堂上完成之議論文，經兩位全民英檢閱卷評分老師進行評分工作，由此篩選出高低分群兩組，之後進行實際的文章分析工作一找出兩組文章之主題發展模式，並計算各模式出現之頻率。結果顯示，高分群多使用文法正確、明確之指稱、重複字、同義字、或與全文主旨相關之主題，使用各種模式的比率普遍多於低分組，其中，在eXtended parallel progression 方面多於低分群達顯著水準，證明會回到與全文有關之主題是高分群的一大特色。另外，本研究亦另外發現兩種學生常用之主題發展模式，值得進一步探討。

The choice and ordering of themes have much to do with the local and global coherence. And there are established patterns of thematic progression in the text. The purpose of the study is to explore the ways our students employ the thematic progression patterns, and to find the similarities and differences between the high-and low-rated essays.\r\n The research materials are argumentative essays gathered from 138 senior high school students. Two GEPT trainee raters then give each essay a holistic score respectively based on the scoring scheme for Intermediate level of the GEPT. Then, the top and the lowest 33 essays are selected to be our data. Textual analysis is then performed by tracing thematic progression mode in each essay in terms of the established patterns. The t-units involved in each pattern are counted, and the use of each pattern between the two sets of essays is compared in detail.\r\n The results show thematic progression in high-rated essays is more easily identifiable for the use of overt, grammatical, and discourse-relevant cohesive ties as themes. Furthermore, the high-rated essays exceed low-rated essays in the percentages of t-units involved for almost every pattern. What differs significantly is the use of EPP (extended parallel progression) Pattern. Besides, we find another two common patterns in our data, contrastive theme pattern and rhematic association pattern.