THE IMPACT OF TEXT ANALYSIS TASKS ON IRANIAN EFL LEARNERS' PARAGRAPH WRITING ABILITY

The present study sought to investigate the effect of text analysis tasks on Iranian intermediate EFL learners' paragraph writing ability. To this end, two intact classes at Islamic Azad University, Rasht Branch, were randomly assigned as the experimental and control groups. To make sure of their homogeneity, all the participants sat for PET. Based on the results of PET, 60 participants (30 in each intact class) remained and the scores of other students were excluded from the data analysis in the remaining phases of this study (i.e., pretest and posttest). A pretest of paragraph writing was then administered. Afterward, the experimental group received a 10-session treatment through which the participants in this group encountered and performed genre analysis tasks. A paragraph writing posttest then was administered. An ANCOVA was conducted to compare the means of the experimental group and control group in the posttest while considering the scores of participants in the pretest phase as a covariate. Based on the results of this study, text analysis tasks have significant effect on Iranian intermediate EFL learners' paragraph writing ability. Raising learners' familiarity with different genres and subgenres, and inclusion of more genre analysis tasks in writing courses can be mentioned as the most important implications of this study.