Cultural Artifacts as a Mediator Between Social Interaction and English Writing Proficiency among Grade 10 Learners

Poor English writing proficiency is a problem in education. A predictive research design was employed, with 380 respondents from a stratified random sample completing a survey and an essay task. The data were analyzed using mediation analysis. Results revealed that cultural artifacts partially but significantly mediate the predictive-criterion correlation, affirming Sociocultural theory. Educators may consider increasing opportunities for learners to use both their home language and English during class discussions, incorporating authentic reading materials and culturally embedded texts into writing tasks, providing targeted teacher training on the integration of cultural artifacts in writing lessons, and encouraging future research on the potential impact of digital media, textbooks, and storytelling traditions as mediating resources. Future research should implement a formal rater calibration phase or utilize a multi-rater system where a subset of essays is cross-examined to compute Cohen's Kappa, Fleiss’ kappa or an Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC).

Cultural artifacts, mediator, social interaction, English writing proficiency, Grade 10 learners

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