The Exploratory Practice: An Approach for Enhancing Students’ Learning Process Awareness

Abstract

Many EFL [English as Foreign Language] learners reach university unable to exercise control over their own learning in terms of setting goals, monitoring progress, evaluating activities, and organizing time and resources. To address this concern, an experimental research study was carried out in a Lebanese English medium university. The study attempted at developing the students’ learning process awareness through implementing the Exploratory Practice [EP] instructional technique in their writing classes. Then, the effects of this implementation were investigated. The study included an experimental group of 16 students and a control group of 23 students. Quantitative data were collected from a questionnaire devised to measure students’ learning process awareness which according to reviewed literature is one dimension of autonomy (Lamb & Reinders, 2007). The qualitative data were derived from record keeping, classroom observations, and video recording. The results showed a significant improvement of the experimental group in terms of students’ learning process awareness. Hence, this study recommends implementing EP in the context of teaching writing to develop students’ learning process awareness and empower their writing autonomy.