The Effect of Negotiated Versus Product-Oriented Syllabi on Improving EFL Learners’ Writing Performance

The approach of teaching and learning writing has gone through significant advances over the past decades. The negotiated syllabus, in English as a foreign language (EFL) contexts, is now considered one of the most popular ones. However, the product-oriented syllabus is now somewhat neglected. Therefore, this study focused on the effect of process versus product-oriented syllabus on EFL learners’ writing performance. To this end, 44 Iranian upper-intermediate undergraduate EFL learners were selected from two intact classes based on convenience non random sampling. Each class was taught how to write an essay through one syllabus type, i.e. negotiated and product oriented during a 6- week period. The treatment took six sessions of about 90 minutes for each group. Before the treatment, the participants were given a writing test. After the end of the treatment, they were also given a writing post-test. The writing tasks were scored by two scorers. Finally, the collected data were analyzed through independent and paired sample t-tests to pinpoint the differences between the groups. The results revealed that the negotiated group had better performance after receiving the treatment. Moreover, both groups showed significant improvements in writing performance after the treatment. The findings indicated a need to consider a negotiated curriculumerformance after receiving the treatment. Moreover, both groups showed sign