Do dialogue journals with recasts improve the writing skills for adult learners with limited literacy skills?

This study examines dialogue journaling with low-literacy adult English language learners and looks for statistical improvements in specific grammatical morphemes. General instructor responses and recasts were also explored. Key influences included current and past students, educational colleagues and experts in the field (Peyton, Staton, Reed and Jones). The study analyzed dialogue journal entries for a 3-month period, with adult low-literacy English language learners in a community education class. Using general responses and recasts, the author responded to the entries and looked for improvements in specific grammatical morphemes. Additionally, a pre-test, questionnaire (before and after study) and post-test were used to determine the results. For this time period, the response method did not make a difference in improvement, and the actual use of the grammatical morphemes did not seem to improve statistically. However, there were many other benefits including participant confidence and a closer community atmosphere within the classroom