English Writing Proficiency among Grade 9 Students in Sweden
Short description
The ability to write in English is an essential competence in today’s society, as English is increasingly used as a language of communication in higher education, professional contexts, and social media. This project examines Swedish compulsory school students’ written proficiency in English and how it has developed over time.
Data and Analytical Tools
The project uses a unique dataset of approximately 4,000 student texts written as part of the National Test of English for Year 9, collected between 2000 and 2022. Using modern language technology tools based on Natural Language Processing (NLP), linguistic and textual analyses are conducted to identify typical features at different proficiency levels, as well as patterns of change over time in, for example, vocabulary, syntactic complexity, and cohesion – aspects that are central to text quality.
Contribution to Knowledge
The results will shed light on whether, and if so how, students’ competence to write in English has changed in recent decades. This knowledge can inform future developments in English education at the system level (for example, curriculum design). Previous research has shown that increased use of English outside school can have a positive effect on students’ vocabulary, and that boys tend to use English outside school more frequently than girls. The project therefore examines potential gender differences in writing proficiency and how these may have evolved over time.
Through the analyses, linguistic profiles for different proficiency and grade levels can be identified and described. The project also investigates how various linguistic and textual measures correlate with teachers’ assessments, that is, how specific language features appear to influence teachers’ holistic assessment of students’ texts.
Further, the findings may provide insights into how automated text analysis could complement and support teachers’ holistic assessment of texts, with the potential to enhance the reliability of the assessment.
Project Team
- Eva Olsson, Associate Professor in Education, Department of Education and Special Education (Project Leader)
- Linda Borger, Senior Lecturer in Education, Department of Education and Special Education
- Sofie Johansson, Associate Professor in Multilingualism with a focus on Language Education, Department of Swedish, Multilingualism and Language Technology
