Determination of Hearing-Impaired Students' Requirements for Editing and Revision of Written Texts

AbstractThe editing and revision stages are an important part of the writing process. This study documented the types of revisions, revision units, and revision methods used during writing conferences with hearing-impaired students. The study included seventeen hearing-impaired students educated with the auditory/oral approach and enrolled in grades six to eight. The study used descriptive methodology. Revision taxonomy was used to evaluate the data. The study findings showed that the most frequent types of errors committed by hearing-impaired students were replacing one type of affix with another, and adding the wrong type of affix to words. In the unit in which the errors were corrected, there was a greater need to perform corrections on the affixes of the words. Students could correct their errors by finding them independently, or having them pointed out during revision. Students were found to correct their mistakes mostly by listening. The results show that one-to-one writing conferences are very important for developing expressive writing among hearing-impaired students.Key WordsEditing and Revision Process, Hearing-impaired Students, Reading-Writing Activities, Writing Conferences, Writing Skills.Writing expression is a transfer of feelings, notions, and experiences of individuals through writing (Kavcar, O? uzkan, & Sever, 1997; Sever, 2000). During this transfer, it is necessary to specify and arrange the message; select appropriate words; and construct sentences (Go? u? , 1991). Hearing-impaired students have difficulties with context, vocabulary, and spelling rules. They generate short and simply structured sentences, and their sentences may show problems with morphological subject-object agreement (Erdiken, 1996; Gormley & Sarachan-Deily, 1987; Yoshinaga-Itano & Snyder, 1985). The Writing ProcessThe process of writing comprises four stages: pre-writing, drafting, revising and editing, and publishing (Calkins, 1994; Cunningham & Allington, 2003; Danielson & LaBonty, 1994; Fitzpatrick, 1999; Gunning, 2003; Hyland, 2002; Richek, Caldwell, Jennings, & Lerner, 2002; Schirmer, 2000; Tompkins, 2000). Hearing-impaired students require one-to-one writing conferences in which teachers serve as a model. Revising and editing enable students to revise their ideas, add or remove ideas, and correct sentences by identifying spelling and punctuation errors (Danielson & LaBonty, 1994; Girgin, 2003a; Gunning, 2003; Luckner & Isaacson, 1990; Reimer, 2001; Richek et al., 2002). Revising and Editing: A writer identifies problems and errors in written work and edits the structure to produce a corrected version (Beal, 1987). Recognizing mistakes in writing, choosing appropriate modifications, and correctly implementing these modifications are regarded as a process of cognitive problem solving (Fitzgerald, 1987). Young writers or those with inadequate language or knowledge experience have problems recognizing errors in written works (Beal, 1990); however, hearing-impaired students have difficulty finding mistakes and correcting them appropriately (Graham, 1997). Students with disabilities experience difficulty elaborating on the contents of their writing during the revision process (Graham, MacArthur, & Schwartz, 1995). Writing ActivitiesWe conducted an analysis of international studies on writing expression abilities among hearing-impaired students and compared their performance to that of students with normal hearing. Strong and weak aspects of writing were specified; variables affecting writing ability were emphasized, and various teaching methods were discussed (Gormley & Sarachan-Deily, 1987; Klecan-Aker & Blondeau, 1990; Schirmer, Bailey, & Fitzgerald, 1999; Truax, 1985; Yoshinaga-Itano & Downey, 1992, 1996; Yoshinaga-Itano & Snyder, 1985). Previous studies examined questions posed to teachers during writing conferences with hearing-impaired students (Livingston, 1989) and the ability of students to make appropriate revisions (Gormley & Sarachan-Deily, 1987). …