Task-based Writing Instruction to Enhance Graduate Students’ Audience Awareness

This case study investigated the effects of task-based writing instruction on graduate students’ audience awareness. The researchers chose six graduate students purposefully and invited them to a focus group interview to understand their current sense of audience in writing. Accordingly, a series of audience-focused tasks were designed, validated and piloted. The participants had been exposed to these tasks through a series of online workshops for six months. During this time, they were asked to keep journals. The analysis of students’ journals and the content analysis of their writing products showed t hat the participants could develop a sense of audience over time.