Twenty-fifth International Conference on Learning

Abstract

Expository discourse, i.e. the use of language to convey information, is of enormous importance in education, given its role in the transmission of knowledge. Students’ ability to produce this type of discourse is inextricably related to academic success. However, research examining the developing ability of students to produce expository texts is relatively recent, and for Modern Greek quite limited. Aiming at shedding more light on the issue, samples of two written expository texts by children and adolescents aged 10, 13 and 16, as well as young adults aged 22-25 years were collected. A written narrative was also elicited from each participant. Data analysis focuses on word (e.g. word length), sentence (e.g. average sentence length clause density) and text level (e.g. text length) characteristics. In this presentation, results that indicate developmental patterns will be discussed. Age and text type-related differences are observed, highlighting the fact that language development is complex and continues well through adolescence.