ESL Learners' Processes and Perceptions of Using Google Docs in Collaborative Academic Writing

Introduction

Collaborative writing, referred to as “the joint production of a text by two or more writers'' (Storch, 2011, p. 275) is a strategy that has been utilised by language instructors to promote second language (L2) development. Huang and Zhang (2019) distinguished two forms of writing approaches that can be utilised to promote L2 development: writing-to-learn (to promote the learning of language aspects such as grammar and vocabulary) and learning-to-write (to develop learners’ writing processes and understanding of genre). In collaborative writing, learners’ participation is essential at all phases of the writing process (Storch, 2019). Given that collaborative writing helps to prepare learners for real world collaboration (Elola & Oskoz, 2010), it is crucial to understand how collaborative writing affects learners’ L2 development, especially in relation to genre knowledge. As pointed out by Hyland (2003), this form of knowledge “is important to students’ understanding of their L2 environments, and crucial to their life chances in those environments” (p.24). In other words, learners’ success in using L2 for different communicative purposes in a range of real-world contexts (such as school, university, and work contexts) would depend highly on their genre knowledge. Considering that effective L2 writing also involves an awareness of genre, it is necessary to consider the pedagogical strategies that can be used to support its development such as collaborative writing.

Research on collaborative writing has highlighted its advantages. For example, Storch and Wigglesworth (2007) compared pair writing and individual writing of advanced ESL students on two writing tasks: a report (a commentary on visual data) and an argumentative essay. Their analysis found a significant difference between the two groups in the measure of grammatical accuracy, despite little difference in fluency and complexity. A recent meta-analysis on research on L2 collaborative writing appeared to support this finding, concluding that collaborative writing led to the production of more accurate writing compared to individual writing (Elabdali, 2021). Nevertheless, there are also factors that affect collaborative writing. Research has shown that low proficiency learners tended to focus more on lexical aspects of the writing compared to grammatical aspects while learners with higher proficiency were more likely to pay attention to both form and content (Storch, 2011).

With the advancement of technology, we see the transformation of collaborative writing practices with the incorporation of new technological tools. Researchers have investigated how different technologies such as wiki and Google Docs could be applied in collaborative writing. Computer mediated collaborative writing (CMCW) significantly enhanced English for Specific Purposes (ESP) learners’ business writing skills, interests in L2 learning, and collaboration skills (Wang, 2015). Others such as Hsu and Lo (2018) reported that English as a Foreign Language (EFL) dyads of learners improve significantly more in both the content quality and linguistic accuracy of their writing than individual writers.