How summaries, notes, and outlines improve EFL learners'writing

This study aimed to evaluate the impact of three instructional methods—summarizing, note-taking, and outlining—on the lexical and grammatical writing accuracy of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners. Participants were selected from a language center in Tehran, Iran, following the administration of the Oxford Placement Test. Sixty-seven upper elementary participants were chosen for the study. After treatment sessions, two teacher-made tests were employed to assess learners' progress in lexical and grammatical writing accuracy. Results indicated improvements in all three groups, with the note-taking group exhibiting the most significant enhancement and the outlining group displaying the weakest performance. Detailed analysis revealed that the Corrected Model, Intercept, Pre-test, and Grouping significantly contributed to the observed variance in lexical writing accuracy. Similar analyses for grammatical writing accuracy highlighted the substantial effects of these factors. In conclusion, the study suggests that the note-taking group may experience the most significant improvement in both lexical and grammatical writing accuracy among EFL learners. However, further research is needed to refine instructional strategies and enhance language learning outcomes.