Teaching the academic argument in a university EFL environment

An educational challenge that many university EFL students face is the production of written academic arguments as part of their required essays. Although the importance of argumentative writing in education is uncontested, and research shows that EFL students find difficulties in producing such texts, it is not adequately dealt with for the L1 Arabic writer. In this paper, an explicit instructional approach in teaching the academic argument in required essays in an advanced EAP course is described. The approach is based on the thesis-support element of argumentation and organizational plans operationalized through a teaching/learning cycle. The instruction of the academic argument in the essay is scaffolded through five steps of the cycle: building the context, modeling and deconstructing texts, constructing texts jointly, constructing texts independently and linking related texts. Qualitative analysis of a few student sample essays indicated improved argumentative structure and transfer of acquired argumentative writing skills to new topics. Although the improvements can not be generalized, it is considered a successful attempt in providing needed explicit instruction for L1 Arabic students in an EFL environment and which also could be used with students in any EFL context. Reflections and developments for future improvement of the instructional approach are made.