Résumé:
The present paper aims at investigating the importance of raising students’ awareness about
writing style variation inside and outside the classroom to improve learners’ academic writing.
One of the difficulties facing students is the use of the inappropriate style inside the
classroom. This issue is the result of students’ lack of awareness and shortage of knowledge
about the convenient language style to use in the academic environment. On the contrary,
awareness about the appropriate style could enhance students’ skills and improve their writing
in relation to the situation in function. Thus, it is hypothesized that there could be a correlation
between style variation awareness and enhancing students’ academic writing. To test this
hypothesis, qualitative comparative study is conducted on third year students. Two data
gathering tools are used. First, students’ test is conducted to collect samples of the students’
classroom writings from one group out of six (36 participants out of 230), and 40 corpuses of
their Facebook online communication. Both corpuses are contrasted to identify the extent of
formality and informality in their inside and outside the classroom written English. Second, a
questionnaire, as a follow-up tool, is needed for further understanding. The analysis of the
gathered data taken from three groups out of six (100 participants out of 230), reveal that
students lack of awareness about formal and informal registers impacts the use of the
appropriate language style in academic setting. The results of this study confirm that a linear
relationship exists between style variation awareness and the improvement of students’
academic writing. Therefore, it is recommended to raise students’ awareness about writing
styles for the crucial role it plays in improving students’ written English.