THE EFFECT OF GENDER, LEARNING STYLES ANDWEBBING GRAPHIC ORGANIZERS IN ARGUMENTATIVE WRITING CLASS AT HIGHER EDUCATION

Abstract

This research investigated the effect of webbing graphic organizers in l2 argumentative writing class at higher education with involving gender and learners’ learning stylefactors.The study applied quasi experimental design using a pretest-posttest. The participants were 66 learners. The treatment class 1 was treated withICT based webbinggraphic organizers (ICT-GO);the treatment class 2 was treated usingpaper based webbinggraphic organizers (P-GO); and the control classwas not given any treatments or No graphic organizers (N-GO). Athree-wayanalysis of variance was applied for analyzingdata.The analysisconfirmed types of treatments(F= 48.775; p=0.000); and
learners’learning styles(F= 7.228; p=0.002)contribute to writing ability. Italso indicated that an interaction effect occurred between gender and treatments (F=4.764, p=0.013)on the learners’ writing ability. In contrast, the finding found that gender (F= 0.894, p= 0.349); and interaction between gender and learning styles(F=1.030, p=0.364);learning styles and types of treatment(F=0.669, P=0.617); gender, learning styles and types of treatment 0.456 (F=0.884, p=0.456) did not give interaction effect to learners’ writing ability. The study concluded that gender, learning styles and graphic organizers had no effectsimultaneously on argumentativeessayability, and ICT based graphic organizer and visual learners got the highest score in their writing ability. The finding made some contribution on the knowledge body on graphic organizer theory.