{"id":{"repo_id":"uiuc","oai_identifier":"oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/108350"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/uiuc/oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/108350","repository":{"repo_id":"uiuc","name":"University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign","base_url":"https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/oai-pmh"},"display":{"title":"A study of the Illinois ESL etextbook from the perspective of students and instructors","abstract":"With the advancement of technology, the utilization of etextbooks as an educational tool has become a common practice in many different educational institutions in the US and other parts of the world. In such a context, student and instructor perspectives regarding etextbooks have been the focus of research in a wide variety of disciplines, but the use of etextbooks and their special interactive features in ESL Writing (English as a Second Language Writing) remains largely under-explored. The existing literature is also predominantly based on the use of such textbooks produced mainly by manufacturing companies. In contrast, the subject of this study is an in-house etextbook designed by the Illinois ESL program. This etextbook has been specifically customized for the needs and expectations of an international undergraduate student population learning Academic Writing at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Through a mixed methods approach, the research study explored student and instructor experiences about the use of the Illinois ESL etextbook and its special features in the teaching-learning process. According to the findings, certain etextbook features are more frequently used and perceived as more useful than others by research participants but, overall, a majority of the participants showed high levels of satisfaction with the etextbook. The results provide pedagogical implications on how instructors could integrate the etextbook to future academic writing class sessions. Some pedagogical implications may also inform administrative decisions about possible updates to the etextbook and, perhaps, the design of etextbooks for ESL Writing students in general.","abstract_html":"With the advancement of technology, the utilization of etextbooks as an educational tool has become a common practice in many different educational institutions in the US and other parts of the world. In such a context, student and instructor perspectives regarding etextbooks have been the focus of research in a wide variety of disciplines, but the use of etextbooks and their special interactive features in ESL Writing (English as a Second Language Writing) remains largely under-explored. The existing literature is also predominantly based on the use of such textbooks produced mainly by manufacturing companies. In contrast, the subject of this study is an in-house etextbook designed by the Illinois ESL program. This etextbook has been specifically customized for the needs and expectations of an international undergraduate student population learning Academic Writing at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Through a mixed methods approach, the research study explored student and instructor experiences about the use of the Illinois ESL etextbook and its special features in the teaching-learning process. According to the findings, certain etextbook features are more frequently used and perceived as more useful than others by research participants but, overall, a majority of the participants showed high levels of satisfaction with the etextbook. The results provide pedagogical implications on how instructors could integrate the etextbook to future academic writing class sessions. Some pedagogical implications may also inform administrative decisions about possible updates to the etextbook and, perhaps, the design of etextbooks for ESL Writing students in general.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Hewage, Nalaka Saman"],"institution":"University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign","degree_name":"M.A.","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Teaching of English Sec Lang","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Sadler, Randall W","Kang, Hyun-Sook"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2020,"date_issued":"2020-08-27T00:51:33Z","date_published":"2020-08-27T00:51:33Z","updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:48Z","subjects":["ESL Writing, etextbooks, etextbook features, students, instructors, satisfaction"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright 2020 Nalaka Hewage"],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108350","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Sadler, Randall W","Kang, Hyun-Sook"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Hewage, Nalaka Saman"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date","label":"Dc Date","values":["2020-08-27T00:51:33Z","2022-08-27T00:51:40Z","2020-05-15","2020-05"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["text","Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Teaching of English Sec Lang"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["M.A."]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["ESL Writing, etextbooks, etextbook features, students, instructors, satisfaction"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["en"]},{"key":"dc:rights","label":"Dc Rights","values":["Copyright 2020 Nalaka Hewage"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108350"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description","label":"Description","values":["With the advancement of technology, the utilization of etextbooks as an educational tool has become a common practice in many different educational institutions in the US and other parts of the world. In such a context, student and instructor perspectives regarding etextbooks have been the focus of research in a wide variety of disciplines, but the use of etextbooks and their special interactive features in ESL Writing (English as a Second Language Writing) remains largely under-explored. The existing literature is also predominantly based on the use of such textbooks produced mainly by manufacturing companies. In contrast, the subject of this study is an in-house etextbook designed by the Illinois ESL program. This etextbook has been specifically customized for the needs and expectations of an international undergraduate student population learning Academic Writing at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Through a mixed methods approach, the research study explored student and instructor experiences about the use of the Illinois ESL etextbook and its special features in the teaching-learning process. According to the findings, certain etextbook features are more frequently used and perceived as more useful than others by research participants but, overall, a majority of the participants showed high levels of satisfaction with the etextbook. The results provide pedagogical implications on how instructors could integrate the etextbook to future academic writing class sessions. Some pedagogical implications may also inform administrative decisions about possible updates to the etextbook and, perhaps, the design of etextbooks for ESL Writing students in general.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2022-05-01","The student, Nalaka Hewage, accepted the attached license on 2020-05-13 at 12:26.","The student, Nalaka Hewage, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2020-05-13 at 13:45.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2020-05-15 at 09:19.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #15380 on 2020-08-25 at 17:44:26","Made available in DSpace on 2020-08-27T00:51:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 HEWAGE-THESIS-2020.pdf: 1610859 bytes, checksum: 43eaabf54fe7964ca0279a5012d5e85a (MD5) LICENSE.txt: 4210 bytes, checksum: 6ffc632936d4079ccb66a852ce4e656f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2020-05-15","Embargo set by: Seth Robbins for item 115965 Lift date: 2022-08-27T00:51:40Z Reason: Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Limited"]},{"key":"dc:format","label":"Dc Format","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["A study of the Illinois ESL etextbook from the perspective of students and instructors"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Sadler, Randall W","Kang, Hyun-Sook"],"dc:creator":["Hewage, Nalaka Saman"],"dc:date":["2020-08-27T00:51:33Z","2022-08-27T00:51:40Z","2020-05-15","2020-05"],"dc:description":["With the advancement of technology, the utilization of etextbooks as an educational tool has become a common practice in many different educational institutions in the US and other parts of the world. In such a context, student and instructor perspectives regarding etextbooks have been the focus of research in a wide variety of disciplines, but the use of etextbooks and their special interactive features in ESL Writing (English as a Second Language Writing) remains largely under-explored. The existing literature is also predominantly based on the use of such textbooks produced mainly by manufacturing companies. In contrast, the subject of this study is an in-house etextbook designed by the Illinois ESL program. This etextbook has been specifically customized for the needs and expectations of an international undergraduate student population learning Academic Writing at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Through a mixed methods approach, the research study explored student and instructor experiences about the use of the Illinois ESL etextbook and its special features in the teaching-learning process. According to the findings, certain etextbook features are more frequently used and perceived as more useful than others by research participants but, overall, a majority of the participants showed high levels of satisfaction with the etextbook. The results provide pedagogical implications on how instructors could integrate the etextbook to future academic writing class sessions. Some pedagogical implications may also inform administrative decisions about possible updates to the etextbook and, perhaps, the design of etextbooks for ESL Writing students in general.","Submission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'Closed Access', the embargo will last until 2022-05-01","The student, Nalaka Hewage, accepted the attached license on 2020-05-13 at 12:26.","The student, Nalaka Hewage, submitted this Thesis for approval on 2020-05-13 at 13:45.","This Thesis was approved for publication on 2020-05-15 at 09:19.","DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #15380 on 2020-08-25 at 17:44:26","Made available in DSpace on 2020-08-27T00:51:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 HEWAGE-THESIS-2020.pdf: 1610859 bytes, checksum: 43eaabf54fe7964ca0279a5012d5e85a (MD5) LICENSE.txt: 4210 bytes, checksum: 6ffc632936d4079ccb66a852ce4e656f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2020-05-15","Embargo set by: Seth Robbins for item 115965 Lift date: 2022-08-27T00:51:40Z Reason: Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Author requested closed access (OA after 2yrs) in Vireo ETD system","Limited"],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108350"],"dc:language":["en"],"dc:rights":["Copyright 2020 Nalaka Hewage"],"dc:subject":["ESL Writing, etextbooks, etextbook features, students, instructors, satisfaction"],"dc:title":["A study of the Illinois ESL etextbook from the perspective of students and instructors"],"dc:type":["text","Thesis"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Teaching of English Sec Lang"],"thesis:degree_level":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["M.A."],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-22T22:24:48Z"}