Strategy and self-regulation instruction as contributors to improving students' cognitive model in an ESL program

Writing instruction has often neglected the personal and strategy variables. It has also often neglected students' relationship need as writing is often done alone. An actual classroom implementation of strategy and self-regulation instruction was carried out to find out whether instruction would help students to plan and revise their essays and if students had the competence and ability to regulate their writing, would it improve their attribution, self-efficacy and self-determination. Findings suggest that strategy and self-regulation instruction has equipped students with the knowledge on how to plan and revise their essays. This improvement is mainly due to the utilization of four self-regulation variables: self-evaluation, organizing and transforming, seeking information and seeking social assistance. Furthermore, strategy and self-regulation has improved students' self-efficacy. After instruction, they responded more positively to negative feedback. Strategy and self-regulation instruction also helped to improve students' self-determination. Students realized that writing more would not improve their writing unless they were able to diagnose their mistakes. Therefore, more students sought peer help after instruction. Strategy and self-regulation instruction did not have an obvious effect on attribution. This was probably because students already have good attribution. Nearly all the students quoted ability and effort as the cause of their success. They also believed that intelligence was developmental and so had a desire to improve themselves.