Analyses and comparisons of linguistic complexities in the last two decades of university entrance English exams in China and Turkey: A corpus-based study

Date

2021-09-09

Author

Yu, Xiaoli

Metadata

Show full item record

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Item Usage Stats

252
views

0
downloads

Based on corpus data, this study aimed to conduct multi-dimensional analyses and comparisons of linguistic complexities between the high-stakes university entrance English exams in China and Turkey over the past 20 years. For the subcorpus of China, forty-two sets of the target English exams were collected; meanwhile, twenty sets of the English exams were collected to form the subcorpus of Turkey. Employing the quantitative research method, the lexical and syntactic complexity of the target corpus were examined from a longitudinal perspective and compared between the two countries. The results showed that both the lexical and syntactic complexity of the exams in the two countries over the past 20 years have not transformed significantly, which may indicate the stagnation regarding the enhancement of the exam designing despite various reforms in the curricula and educational policies in both countries. Although the lexical complexity levels of both countries’ exams have slightly increased over the years, the exams in Turkey showed more waving changes between the years compared to the gradual increase in the lexical complexity level of the exams in China. With respect to the comparison between the two countries’ exams, the findings showed that the exams in China presented significantly higher levels of lexical density and diversity; whereas the exams in Turkey revealed a significantly higher level of lexical sophistication. The comparison regarding the syntactic complexity demonstrated a more mixed variation between the two countries. The findings were further discussed in line with the existing literature; additionally, suggestions were offered to shed light on the potential improvement regarding the exam designing and policymaking in both countries.

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/92342

Conference Name

British Association for Applied Linguistics 2021

Collections

Department of Foreign Language Education, Conference / Seminar

Suggestions

OpenMETU
Core

Analysis of the Problem Based Learning Implementations Students and Tutors Perceptions and Actions Ateş, Özlem; Eryılmaz, Ali (2015-03-01) This study aims to analyze the implementation of problem-based learning (PBL) in engineering education regarding perceptions and actions of tutors and students. A case study design was employed in this study. To this end, four tutors, their five PBL modules, and fourteen students were selected. Observations and interviews were used to collect qualitative data. The results indicated that there was a difference between participants’ perception of PBL and their actions during tutorials. Participants’ level of ...
Evaluation of the Turkish Language Teaching Program for foreigners at Minsk State Linguistic University in Belarus : a case study Yıldız, Ümit; Aksu, Meral; Department of Educational Sciences (2004) The aim of this study is to evaluate the Turkish Language Teaching Program for Foreigners at Minsk State Linguistic University in Belarus. The study aims to answer the following two main questions: 1) what are the discrepancies between the current status and the desired outcomes of the Turkish program at MSLU? 2) What aspects of the Turkish program should be maintained, strengthened or added? In order to answer these questions, data were collected from students who were attending the program in the 2002-200...
Evaluating the effectiveness of an online standardization platform for english as a foreign language (EFL) oral examiners Yıldız, Gökhan; Aşkun, Cengiz Savaş; Department of Computer Education and Instructional Technology (2019) This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of an online standardization platform prior to speaking exams at a foundation university in Ankara. The study was conducted in December 2018 and twenty-four instructors of English participated in the study. This study investigated how consistent instructors were in face-to-face and online standardization groups in grading ten sample oral exams within their groups. Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) analysis was conducted for both groups. The results demon...
Exploration of English as a foreign language students’ perceptions about online authentic readings / Yaman, Mustafa; Savaş, Perihan; Department of English Language Teaching (2014) This study was carried out in order to find out the effects of online reading of current news articles from authentic news websites and answering the comprehension questions about those texts on motivation and perceptions towards the reading of English preparatory students. The study was conducted at a state university whose medium of instruction is English. Twenty-seven pre-intermediate level students participated in the study. To collect data about the reading motivation of the students towards doing read...
A SURVEY OF MATHEMATICS EDUCATION DOCTORAL PROGRAMS IN TURKEY Ubuz, Behiye; Çakıroğlu, Erdinç; Erbaş, Ayhan Kürşat (2011-07-15) This paper aims to review the current state of doctoral programs in mathematics education in Turkish universities. In this context, we first provide some brief background information about higher education system and teacher education policies in Turkey. Then the major national initiatives towards future faculty development efforts are explained. Finally, the nature and components of mathematics education doctoral programs in Turkey is provided. In doing so, we provide information about admission procedures...

Citation Formats

X. Yu, “Analyses and comparisons of linguistic complexities in the last two decades of university entrance English exams in China and Turkey: A corpus-based study,” presented at the British Association for Applied Linguistics 2021, Newcastle Upon Tyne, İngiltere, 2021, Accessed: 00, 2021. [Online]. Available: https://hdl.handle.net/11511/92342.