A course of free voluntary reading on linguistic principles for average to below-average writers in university

Abstract

Abstract This article describes an experiment in pedagogy for general writing improvement at the university level consisting of a course of Free Voluntary Reading (FVR), which can be offered either independently of or together with standard courses on writing. Evidence so far supporting the efficacy of FVR in helping students to improve their writing skills has largely come from the K-12 grades and university-age foreign language students, so whether it would prove useful for university students in general is open to question. A linguistic perspective is adopted, which entails a methodology for the experiment that differs in major respects from that which is typical in composition studies. The results of the experiment showed that a course of FVR, independently of instruction in writing, may be effective in improving university students’ grammatical fluency in writing.