How Multilingual Writers Talk About, Write About, And Engage With Sources in First-Year Composition

This study makes a contribution to the rhetoric and composition field by documenting the research and writing processes of a diverse group of 15 multilingual writers in first-year composition (FYC) at a small private southeastern university. I collected and analyzed data from three assignments: 1) a video think-aloud capturing participants’ first online search for sources, 2) a two-page reflection on the use of sources in the first full draft of students’ research paper, and 3) their first full draft of the research paper. The study is the first to systematically examine how multilingual writers in FYC at a U.S. university engage with sources from the start of approaching a research-paper assignment through writing a first full draft. The study adapted methods from two large-scale studies—Learning Information Literacy Across the Curriculum (LILAC) and the Citation Project (Blackwell-Starnes and Walker; Jamieson and Howard). While the study’s findings emerge primarily from qualitative data and interpretation, the results are supported with quantitative data and analysis in a mixed-methods approach. The study’s findings show that the 15 study participants learned a great deal about the expectations of the “community of practice” (Lave and Wenger) of the FYC classroom. In particular, they acquired the language of the “community of practice.” A critical number of participants explained the why or how of “paraphrasing” or use of “quotation.” They referred to “peer-reviewed” sources. However, results were uneven among participants in demonstrating understanding of the expectations of practice in the FYC classroom. Four students showed continuity by integrating source material in their research paper from a source that they had found in their first online search. Students’ papers contained 15 instances of what I call “sustained paraphrasing”—including at least three sentences that restate content from a particular source. However, only five of those examples of sustained paraphrasing were effective. The study shows the need for more research on pedagogical models for teaching multilingual writers in FYC the functions of sources and meaningful integration.