Linguistic Features in Young English-as-an-Additional-Language Learners’ Writing: A Classroom-Based Longitudinal Study

Abstract

This longitudinal study examines patterns of linguistic changes in young English-as-an-additional-language (EAL) learners’ written responses across tasks, score levels, and test administrations over a 1-year period. Writing samples were collected from 114 learners ages 8 through 14 using a descriptive task and an email task. The written responses were scored holistically by trained raters, and five linguistic features were extracted using automated text analysis tools. Results showed that higher scoring responses were generally longer, exhibited greater lexical diversity, included words acquired later in life, contained less imageable vocabulary, and demonstrated greater syntactic variety. Task type also influenced the response characteristics. The email responses tended to show greater linguistic complexity than the descriptive responses, particularly at the lower score levels, although the differences between tasks diminished at higher score levels. Analyses across administrations revealed systematic differences in response characteristics over time, with larger changes observed between the first and second administrations than between the second and third administrations. Among the linguistic features examined, syntactic variety showed the strongest association with both score differences and temporal variation, whereas lexical sophistication measures displayed more nuanced and nonlinear patterns. These findings highlight score-, task-, and time-sensitive variations in young EAL learners’ written responses and the importance of examining different linguistic dimensions when characterizing young learners’ writing quality in classroom-based longitudinal data.

Hsieh, C.-N., & Cai, H. (2026). Linguistic features in young English-as-an-additional-language learners’ writing: A classroom-based longitudinal study (TOEFL Research Report No. TOEFL-RR-110). ETS. https://doi.org/10.64634/0t8dx119