Abstract
This study aimed to investigate the text structures in the English and Chinese essays and to explore how and why these rhetorical patterns came into being. Three female juniors were first asked to write an English essay at the end of the first semester and, after an interval of a winter vacation, write again in Chinese on the same persuasive topic. In addition, while completing the two writing tasks, they had to verbalize their thoughts. Also, to supplement the think-aloud protocols, they had to fill out a questionnaire about their writing processes once they finished the writing assignments. Moreover, interviews were conducted to reveal more information about their personal backgrounds and opinions towards writing. Five research questions were designed to guide this thesis research: (1) What is the relative attention the three advanced L2 student writers enrolled in the advanced level writing course at National Tsing Hua University pay to organization when they are composing English and Chinese persuasive writings? (2) Do the student writers differ with regards to their organization strategies when composing in the two languages? (3) When students write persuasive essays, can we find similar or dissimilar rhetorical patterns in individual students* Chinese and English writings? If we can, how do these patterns affect the quality of each student*s writing? (4) What are the roles that past L2 instructional and personal writing backgrounds play in the student writer*s L2 writing products? The findings specific to the research questions were: (1) The attention level on the dimension of organization was higher in the English writing task. However, a higher amount of attention in the writing process did not guarantee a higher score in the written product. (2) The organization strategies employed by individual writers were similar across languages but fewer in the Chinese writing task. (3) All three participants employed rhetorical patterns that were different to some extent in their English and Chinese essays. There was a clear relationship between the organization score and the holistic score in English essays. (4) The confidence in writing essays, the frequency of self-initiated reading and writing experience were important factors that affected effective writing.