Although most teenage immigrants who came to the U.S. have experienced difficulties in attaining native English writing proficiency due to both economic and academic disadvantages, some have consistently been doing well in school. This paper documents their writing experiences by using Think Aloud Protocols and identifying L1 and L2 literacy sponsors who have assisted in attaining writing proficiency. While most emergent bilingual students in urban settings have suffered from lower scores on state standardized tests than native American peers (Menken, 2008; NYCDOE 2016), the group of high school Chinese adolescents in this study demonstrate high degrees of motivation, a proactive attitude in seeking help from literacy sponsors and keen use of effective writing strategies.;The data collection involved background interviews with focus on their literacy sponsors, their individual Think Aloud Protocol (TAP) sessions while completing English or social studies writing assignments and a 20-30 minutes post-TAP interview to clarify questions regarding TAP sessions. Their TAP transcripts were coded with Van Weijen, Bergh, Rijlaarsdam & Sanders' coding system (2009) of writing techniques to identify writing strategies employed in each essay. Their literacy sponsors were also categorized according to types of general educational support, literacy practices and formal or informal sponsors in reading and writing. In particular, the researcher first attempts to recognize the types of literacy sponsors, as defined by Deborah Brandt (1998, p. 166--167). They include all types of sponsors such as family members, teachers, friends, classes, programs and web resources. The extent to which these emergent bilingual students have been assisted is also explored to reveal how sponsors helped to improve their writing proficiency. Next, the metalinguistic knowledge possessed by these students is discussed to uncover what these student writers already know when they sit down to write their essays. The conclusion is that the dual language approach to language learning or writing should be advocated to take advantage of L1 writing proficiency. Additionally, results from data analysis of TAP transcripts believe that: (1) prewriting or planning proves to be the most important part of the writing process; (2) prior metalinguistic knowledge points to the necessity to promote L1 writing proficiency.
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