Abstract:

There are undoubtedly many variables affecting the development of writing skills. And, one of them is the writing topic. The writing topic’s being determined, being optional, or being unalterable can affect the writing. And, with this study, it is aimed to determine the effect of writing topic on writing performance. In line with this aim, it is tried to be determined whether the fifth graders are more successful in the topic title that they determined by themselves or that is given to them. The study was carried out with the fifth graders studying at the center of Inonu town of Eskisehir Province. The data of the study were collected through the written expressions which the students were made to write. In this context, the students were made to conduct two different writing studies with one week intervals in Turkish lessons. With respect to this, in the first implementation, the students were not given any topic title and they were set free. Next week, the topic was said to the same students, directive explanations about the topic that they were going to write were carried out. And, it was demanded that they wrote with respect to this. In the light of the findings obtained, it has been seen that topic depended writing studies increase the students’ sentence numbers, word numbers, conjunction numbers, etc. At the end of the study, it can be said that topic dependent writing studies are more effective with respect to the topic independent writing studies.

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