Teaching Comparison Essay using Mentor Text: Investigating
Students’ Perception on the Use of Mentor Text in Comparison Essay
Writing Class
Enny Irawati and Nova Ariani
Department of English, Faculty of Letters, Universitas Negeri Malang, Jalan Semarang No. 5 Malang
Keywords: Comparison, Mentor Text, Questionnaire.
Abstract: Comparison essay requires students to be able to develop clear and organized essay writing. The previous
experience in teaching comparison essays, the researchers conclude that most of their students were not able
to elaborate thesis statement adequately which covers developing ideas, organizing essay, and using
language accurately. Therefore, mentor texts are used to help students tackle this problem. Mentor texts are
texts selected and used from which students learn the writing craft. Twenty-six undergraduate students of
English Language and Literature program from Department of English, Faculty of Letters in Malang
participate in the study. This study aims at finding out how students use the mentor text as a reference
during text production and how they feel about the mentor text application in comparison essay class. The
result supports Turner (2015) finding where the use of mentor text make the students as better writers and
allow them to see many of the aspects where writers or authors use when they write. The majority of the
students show awareness in developing ideas, organizing their essay, and using English written language
correctly. In addition, students discover new vocabulary which they use in their writing.
1 INTRODUCTION
In the Catalogue of Department of English Year
(2016) it is stated that by the end of their study, one
of skills the graduates of Sarjana program needs to
have is the ability to communicate ideas effectively
and appropriately in written forms both in academic
and non-academic contexts. The skills referred to by
the syllabus are reading and writing skills. In the
English Department, Faculty of Letters, Universitas
Negeri Malang, writing is taught in three
consecutive courses: Paragraph Writing, Essay
Writing, and Argumentative Writing. Essay Writing
is the middle writing skill because in producing this
type of writing students use all what they have
learned in the previous writing classes. The course
description of Essay Writing Course states that “The
course is designed to develop the students’ ability to
write expository essays using different methods of
development; logical division of ideas,
chronological order, comparison and contrast, cause
and effect, and classification.”
From the researchers’ experience, this course has
been taught using a combination of at least two
approaches: the process approach and the genre
based approach (GBA). The presence of modelling
reflects the use of GBA while producing an outline
and revising and editing reflects the employment of
the process approach. Modelling has been done by
presenting model texts as found in Oshima and
Hogue (2006) Writing Academic English, and
Smalley’s (2011) Refining Composition Skills:
Academic Writing and Grammar. Model texts are
analysed and discussed in terms of how hook is
achieved, how thesis statement and topic sentences
are developed, how supporting details are collected
and used to support the thesis, etc. Then students
practice writing the essay’s components either
individually or in group, and may also be asked to
produce an essay in group. The process usually ends
in students’ selecting a topic from a list and develop
an essay individually. The essays produced by
students then are revised and edited, either by the
lecturer or through peer editing and revising, before
they come to their final form.
The use of model texts is beneficial as stated by
Scrivener (2010) that from model texts students can
learn about the layout, the overall message, the
424
Irawati, E. and Ariani, N.
Teaching Comparison Essay using Mentor Text: Investigating Students’ Perception on the Use of Mentor Text in Comparison Essay Writing Class.
DOI: 10.5220/0008219400002284
In Proceedings of the 1st Bandung English Language Teaching International Conference (BELTIC 2018) - Developing ELT in the 21st Century, pages 424-429
ISBN: 978-989-758-416-9
Copyright
c
 2022 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

organization of the items, the use of specific phrases
and sentences, distinctive grammatical features, the
style and tone, and the effect on the reader.
Recently, the use of model text has progressed
into what is called mentor text. A mentor text serves
as models of how to write well within a genre
(Pytash & Morgan, 2014). The use of mentor text in
teaching writing is in line with the concept of
reading and writing connection. In this concept,
writers read before they write. Reading provide the
writers with ideas, language choice, structure, and
other writing craft that they can emulate. In this
case, mentor texts are read, studied and imitated by
writers in the process of text production. The
practice of using mentor texts has been described in
professional books as being effective with students.
Mentor texts are pieces of literature that we can
return to again and again as we help our young
writers learn how to do what they may not yet be
able to do on their own (Dorfman & Cappelli, 2017).
These texts can play a role as a mentor in the process
of learning and teaching writing just as stated by
Dorfman and Cappelli (2017). Moreover, in terms of
new literacies, digital literacies, and media literacies,
we must help students read like writers by exploring
these new texts and analyzing them with the eyes of
those who construct such texts (Gainer, 2013). With
this, the importance of utilizing mentor texts in
teaching writing is crucial for scaffolding the
materials. The scaffolding method is similar to what
the curriculum cycle has in the first stage which is
Building the field. In this stage the purpose is to
ensure that students have enough background
knowledge of the topic so they can write about it. In
addition, Derewianka and Jones (2012) strongly
suggested reading and writing should take place
through scaffolded, sequenced instruction, which
includes teacher modelling, shared instruction and
collaborative practice, with the goal that successful
independent outcomes will be achieved.
Writing comparison essays require students to be
able to develop the thesis statement and support it
with appropriate and adequate supporting ideas in
such a way so that it can be meaningful to the
readers. From the previous experience in teaching
comparison essays, the researchers conclude that
most of their students were not able to create strong
thesis statement and inadequate supporting ideas and
inaccurate language use. Therefore, mentor texts are
used to help students tackle this problem. Mentor
texts are texts selected and used from which students
learn the writing craft. Mentor texts have also been
studied and proven to have a beneficial influence on
students’ writing knowledge. The students learn to
examine, replicate, and implement author’s
strategies and techniques (Turner, 2015).
Mentor texts were viewed as writing guides,
sources of literature that can be used to teach the
craft of writing. These texts can be viewed as the
“more knowledgeable other” when teaching students
to write (Turner, 2015). Dorfman and Cappelli
(2017) further elaborate how mentor texts can guide
writers to imitate the writing styles and strategies
used by the author, and “help writers notice things
about an author’s work that is not like anything they
might have done before, and empower them to try
something new” (p. 3).
The need to investigate students’ perception is
crucial because it will serve as a basis for
pedagogical implication for teaching comparison
essay and writing classes. As using mentor texts in
teaching writing is considered new in our English
department, the researchers will try to elicit
students’ opinion on what they feel and think on
how the use of mentor text helps them in essay
production. The research is aimed at founding out
what students learn from mentor text in terms of
developing ideas, what students learn from mentor
text in terms of organizing essay, and what students
learn from mentor text in terms of language use.
2 METHODS
This research employs qualitative design since it has
the characteristics stated by Bogdan and Biklen
(1982). First, it is conducted in natural setting, i.e.
the classroom where the teaching and learning
activity normally takes place. Secondly, the
researchers act as the key instrument. Third, the data
collected is in the form of words not numbers.
Fourth, it aims to find out meaning from the
perspectives of the research subjects, i.e. the
students. In conclusion, qualitative design is
appropriate method for this study.
The research is conducted in the campus of
Universitas Negeri Malang, Building D8, Room 102.
A group of third semester students taking Essay
Writing is the subject of the study. There are 26
students majoring in ELL in this class and the course
outline can be found in appendix 1. The students are
taught comparison essay using one mentor taken
from Great Essays book by Folse, Muchmore-
Vokoun, and Solomon (2002) with title “Not as
Different as You Think” was used as a mentor text.
The data collected in the study consist of
statements from the subjects as they fill out the
questionnaires provided in the form of Google form;
Teaching Comparison Essay using Mentor Text: Investigating Students’ Perception on the Use of Mentor Text in Comparison Essay Writing
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The data was used to answer the main and specific
problems of the study. The data was collected after
the students are taught using mentor text and asked
to write comparison essay during which process they
are suggested to use mentor texts for reference.
The research instruments used in the study is the
questionnaire in the form of Google form. The
questionnaire is to elicit students’ experience when
using mentor text as their reference during text
production. The questionnaire includes three aspects
stated in the research problems, i.e. what students
learn from mentor texts in terms developing ideas,
organization of the essay, and language use. The
data from the questionnaire was analysed by scoring
them and then put them into categories. The
categories reflect the levels of subjects’ advantage in
using the mentor texts.
The treatment in using mentor text was
conducted through the following steps. First, a
comparison essay taken from Folse et al. (2002)
entitled “Not as Different as You Think” was
distributed to the subjects. Students were asked to
read the essay loudly; one student read one
paragraph. After that, there was class discussion on
several aspects of the essay. The discussion centred
around how the hook was presented, what
information was included in each paragraph, how
the information was structured, how the writer ended
the essay in the concluding paragraph. In addition,
language focus was done by identifying what new
words were used, and students practiced making
new sentences using words found in the text and
they wrote down the sentences on the white board.
After text mentoring, students were asked to
write a comparison essay which topic was similar to
the one in the mentor text. However, the subjects
found it difficult to compare two countries, so they
were allowed to choose topics that they felt
comfortable to develop into an essay. The essays
were home assignment and the products were sent to
the researchers’ email.
3 FINDINGS
3.1 Developing Ideas, Writing
Organization and Language Use
The study aims to explore what the students learn
from mentor text in Essay Writing class. There are
25 responses from the google form questionnaire.
Six questions were asked to elicit the students’
opinion in regards to what aspects they have learned
from mentor texts in the classroom. The following is
Table 1.1 which illustrate findings in regards to
students’ ideas, writing organization, and language
use.
Table 1: Ideas, Organization, and Language Use.
No. Statement
Strongly
Agree
Agree Disagree
Strongly
Disagree
1
Model text
“Not as
Different as
You Think”
gives me
ideas of
what to
write in my
essay.
28% 72% 0% 0%
2
Model text
“Not as
Different as
You Think”
gives me
ideas how to
organize my
essay.
20% 76% 4% 0%
3
Model text
“Not as
Different as
You Think”
gives me
ideas how
to use
English
correctly in
my essay.
12% 80% 8% 0%
The first three statements in the questionnaire
addressed issues regarding developing ideas in
essay, organization of the essay, and language use.
These statements helped to establish the foundation
of what aspects that students learned from the
mentor text in the writing class. The result showed
that in regards to developing ideas, organization of
the essay, and language use, students gained some
positive learning experience in using mentor text in
their essay writing. From the data, over half of the
students agreed that the mentor text provided them
with ideas of what to write in their essay. In
addition, 76% of the students also agreed that the
mentor text gave them ideas to organize their essay.
Lastly, 80% of the students thought that the mentor
text helped them to use English correctly.
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3.2 Referring to Mentor Text
The following three statements from the
questionnaire highlighted what aspects the students
refer to in mentor texts. The result illustrated how
students benefited from having mentor texts as a
model to analyze and imitate as they write their own
essay. Over half of students (56%) referred to the
mentor texts to express something in English. 64%
students referred to the mentor text to organize their
essay and write introductory paragraph.
Table 2: Referring to Mentor Text.
No. Statement
Strongly
Agree
Agree Disagree
Strongly
Disagree
1
When I am
writing my
essay, I
refer to the
essay “Not
as different
as You
Think” to
find how to
express
something
in English.
20% 56% 24% 0%
2
When I am
writing my
essay, I
refer to the
essay “Not
as Different
as You
Think” to
help me
organize my
essa
y
.
36% 64% 0% 0%
3
When I am
writing my
essay, I
refer to the
essay “Not
as
Different
as You
Think” to
help me
write the
introductoy
paragraph
of my
essay.
24% 64% 12% 0%
4 DISCUSSIONS: WHAT
STUDENTS LEARNED FROM
MENTOR TEXTS
After employing the mentor text in the class, most of
the students stated that they were strongly influenced
in the way they developed ideas, organized their
essays, and used language correctly in their writing.
4.1 Developing and Organizing Ideas in
Essay Writing
Some students mentioned that from the m ntor texts,
they learned to organize ideas easily, clearly, and
correctly. In addition, they learned to find a new
idea. “It helps me to find a new idea for my essay.”
Another student explained how she used a mentor
text for essay organization inspiration. “The
organization of ideas was really helpful how to write
essay easier. We can learn that a good essay is
begin with organization some ideas.” In addition,
another student mentioned they learned to write
every sentence carefully so all the sentences in a
paragraph will be related and organized. This
corroborates Pytash and Morgan (2014) finding
where they mentioned the importance of using
mentor texts with students provide them specific
possibilities to try in their own writing.
Another student mentioned the importance of
conjunction, “To use effective conjunction between
sentences to make coherence paragraph”. “I've
learned the use of particular conjunction to express
different ideas”. This statement also mentioned by
other students who pointed out how paragraphs
should be related and easy to be understood in order
to make a clear and coherence essay. In order to help
students to be aware of the structure of the
comparison essay, mentor text is utilized and
analyzed so they can imitate the structure. As such,
the use of mentor texts may seek to remedy writing
difficulties within various aspects of text production
including structure, genre, word choice, voice,
content clarity, idea development, and so forth
Oczkus, 2012 and Robb study, 2011 (as cited in
Alméciga et al., 2014). The use of such texts aligns
with current trends in the L2 writing paradigm as
texts in the target language are often brought to the
foreground of literacy instruction so that exemplary
writing can be examined and, it is hoped, replicated
in the students’ work Silva & Leki (as cited in
Alméciga et al., 2014).
Dorfman and Cappelli (2017) stated how mentor
texts can guide writers to imitate the writing styles
Teaching Comparison Essay using Mentor Text: Investigating Students’ Perception on the Use of Mentor Text in Comparison Essay Writing
Class
427

and strategies used by the author, and “help writers
notice things about an author’s work that is not like
anything they might have done before, and empower
them to try something new” (p. 3). Throughout the
study, students have managed to replicate what they
found in the mentor text in terms of developing and
organizing ideas. They demonstrated growth in
understanding how texts should be structured and
organized. In other words, this finding supported
Turner (2015) study where there was an increase in
students’ awareness of writing elements, techniques,
and strategies with the use of mentor texts. They
were mostly eager to finally manifest what they have
learned through mentor texts in their own essay
writing.
4.2 Language Use: Vocabulary and
Grammar
Regarding the vocabulary, the majority of the
students stated that the mentor text has enriched
their vocabulary variation. “The use of vocabulary is
interesting. The writer show the vocabulary which I
don't know earlier. It helps me to improve the way I
choose vocabulary to make my essay interesting
even more.” The mentor text and the lecturer’s
instruction had paved the way for students to gain
new vocabulary. One student explicitly mentioned
the vocabulary they learned: “I have learned some
new words and the meaning. Then, the text it can
helps me to increase my vocabulary. For example,
the word "divisive" which I have found in the text.”
The exploration of mentor text in the essay writing
class enabled the students to discover new
vocabulary. Dorfman and Cappelli (2017) discuss
mentor texts that allow students to concentrate on
skills and strategies and help readers notice things in
published works, empowering them to try something
new in their own writing. When educators help
students see themselves as writers, they begin to
read like writers and to write under the influence of
reading.
In regards to grammatical range and accuracy,
one student mentioned “I have learned how the
sentences it can be connected with each other. Then,
I found the example of right sentences and grammar
for essay writing, which it can helps me to write a
good essay.” Another student elaborated further by
stating that “I have learned how to write carefully,
as the text's sentence structure is very simple yet
clearly explained.” One student specifically
mentioned the aspect that she learned from
grammar, “I've learned more about subject-verb
agreement in sentences”. It refers to what Newman
and Fink (2012) stated that writers learn to write by
emulating and adapting what their favorite author’s
do, which is the main concept of the mentor text
approach
5 CONCLUSIONS AND
IMPLICATIONS
To conclude this study, we found that the students
had a positive experience when they were taught
using a mentor text which supports Almeciga et al.
(2014) finding where mentor texts can have a
positive impact on the production of students’
academic writing. After employing a mentor text in
essay writing class, we also found that students had
shown awareness in developing ideas, organizing
their essay, and use English written language
correctly. In addition, students discovered new
vocabulary which they use these new words in their
writing. Thus, the use of mentor text encourages
students to be better writers and allowed them to see
many of the aspects where writers or authors use
when they write (Turner, 2015). The use of model
texts is beneficial as stated by Scrivener (2010) that
from model texts students can learn about the layout,
the overall message, the organization of the items,
the use of specific phrases and sentences, distinctive
grammatical features, the style and tone, and the
effect on the reader.
The point needs consideration is regarding how
the teacher needs to refine the delivery of mentor
text to students in the teaching and learning of
writing skill. The research and findings obtained
from this study would be beneficial for lecturers and
teachers of writing to implement mentor texts into
their classes to strengthen students’ competence in
writing and moreover their awareness of writing
aspects within an essay. Further research may
explore other types of writing and how mentor text
can increase students’ writing skill in writing
classes. These types of research may provide better
insight to improve the teaching and learning of
writing in all level of education and guide students
to become critically literate.
REFERENCES
Alméciga, E., Yesid, W., Evans, R 2014. Mentor texts and
the coding of academic writing structures: A
functional approach. How 21, 94–111.
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Bogden, C. R., Biklen, S. K 1982. Qualitative research for
education: An introduction to theory and methods.
Boston: Ally and Bacon.
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English Year 2016'.
Derewianka, B., Jones, P 2012. 'Teaching language in
context. Faculty of social sciences' - Papers.
Dorfman, L. R., Cappelli, R 2017. Mentor texts: Teaching
writing through children’s literature, K-6. Stenhouse
Publishers.
Folse, K. S., Muchmore-Vokoun, A., Solomon, E.V 2002.
Great essays, second edition, 2nd edition. ed.
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Gainer, J 2013. '21st Century Mentor Texts: Developing
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Newman, B. M., Fink, L 2012. 'Mentor texts and funds of
knowledge: Situating writing within our students’
worlds'. Voices from the Middle 20, 25.
Oshima, A., Hogue, A 2006. Writing academic English.
pytash,
K. E., Morgan, D. N 2014. 'Using mentor texts to teach
writing in science and social studies'. The Reading
Teacher 68, 93–102.
Scrivener, J 2010. Teaching english grammar. Macmillan
Publishers Limited.
Smalley, R. L., Ruetten, M. K., Kozyrev, J. R 2011.
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Grammar, 6 edition. ed. Heinle ELT, Boston, MA.
Turner, K 2015. 'The impact of using mentor texts and the
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