effects of competency-based approach on enhancing complexity, accuracy, and fluency of writing among iranian upper- intermediate pre-service teachers

Purpose: this study aimed at investigating the effect of competency-based approach on enhancing complexity, accuracy, and fluency of writing of pre-service teachers. methodology: to this end, an oxford quick placement test (oqpt) was administered to 100 iranian pre-service teachers studying at farhangian university, of whom 40 upper-intermediate learners were selected and assigned to an experimental group (n = 20) and a control group (n = 20). the selected participants were both male and female and aged from 19 to 22. both selected groups were then given a writing test as the pre-test. subsequently, the experimental group received the competency-based treatment and were proposed to some real-world issues and there was no time limit. however, the traditional styles used for improving the writing skill of the subjects in the control group and a specific time limit was considered for the subjects to do the job. after that, a writing post-test and an attitude questionnaire were delivered to the participants. the obtained data was analyzed using one-way between group analysis of covariance (ancova) and one-sample t-test. findings: the results indicated no significant difference between pre-test and post-test scores of the control group, whereas, the post-test scores of the participants in experimental group were significantly better than their pre-test scores especially regarding complexity. conclusion: the findings suggest that the teachers should take competency-based approach into consideration in their target language classes to have a more fruitful educational process.