Luận văn teaching essay writing to the 10th form students at nguyễn mộng tuân high school thanh hóa province

7 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NÓI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES ane, LE LAN HUONG TEACHING ESSAY WRITING TO THE 10°" FORM

7 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NÓI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES:

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

ane,

LE LAN HUONG

TEACHING ESSAY WRITING TO THE 10°" FORM

STUDENTS AT NGUYEN MONG TUAN HIGH SCHOOL, THANH HOA PROVINCE:

DIFFICULTIES AND SOLUTIONS

May viết bài luận cho học sinh lớn 10 trường THPL Nguyễn Mộng 'Tuân, tỉnh Thanh Hỏa: Những khó khăn vả giải pháp khắc phục)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Languge Teaching Methodolgy

Code: 60.14.10

TIANOIE - 2013

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NÓI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES

LE LAN HUONG

TEACHING ESSAY WRITING TO THE 10'™

FORM STUDENTS AT NGUYEN MONG TUAN

HIGH SCHOOL, THANH HOA PROVINCE:

DIFFICULTIES AND SOLUTIONS

(Dạy viết bài luận cho học sinh lớp 10 trường THPT Nguyễn Mộng

Tuan, tinh Thanh Hoa: Những khó khăn vả giải phán khắc phục)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Tield: English Language Teaching Methodulogy Code: 60.14.10

Supervisor: Dr Nguyén Huy Kỷ

HANOI - 2013

1 Rationale of the study

2 Objectives of the study

3 Research questions

4, Methods of the study

5 Significance of the study

Scope of the study

7 Organization of the study

PART I: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1.1 Teaching essay writing

1.1.1 What is writing?

1.1.2, From paragraph to essay

1.1.3 What is an essay and its parts?

1.1.4 Typos of essays

1.5 Stages of writing an essay

1.2 Approaches to teaching writing

1.3 Summary

CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY

2.1 The research context

2.1.1, The teachers at Neuyén Mong Tuan high school

2.1.2 The students at Neuyén Méng Tuân high school

2.1.3 Writing lessons in the new textbook “Tiéng Anh 10”

2.2 ‘The research methodology

2.2.1 Participants

2.2.2 Data collection instruments

2.2.3 Procedures of data collection

2.3 Sumuary

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Data analysis

3.1.1, Data analysis of teachers’ survey questionnaire

3.1.2, Data analysis of students’ survey questionnaire

3.2 Data analysis of interviews

3.3 Data analysis of classroom observation

3.4, Tindings and discussions

3.4.1 Difficulties in learning essay writing from the 10“ form

students at Nguyễn Mộng Tuân high school

3.4.2 Difficulties in teaching essay writing to the 10" form students

al Neuyén Méng Tuan high school

3.4.3 Suggested solutions to overcome the difficulties in teaching essay writing

to the 10" form students at Nguyén M6ng Tuan high school

3.5 Summary

PART LE CONCLUSION

1 Recapitulation of the study

2 Limitations of the study

3 Suggestion for further studies

REFERENCES

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Teachers’ opinion about the importance of writing

Table 2: Reasons of teaching writing to the 10“ form students

Table 3: Students’ attitude about writing lessons in teachers’ viewpoint

Table 4: Teachers’ view of periods of teaching writing

Table 5: Teachers’ opinions of difficulties when teaching essay writing

Table 6: Degree of difficulty of stages in teaching essay writing

Table 7: Essay wriling activilics in the classroom

‘Table 8: ‘eachers’ opinions on the writing lessons

Table 9: Teachers® frequency in assigning studonts more wring lasks

Table 10 Teachers’ expectation for better teaching and learning situation Table 11: Students’ opinion about the importance of writing

Table 12° Students’ evaluation of their writing skill

‘Table 13: Difficult writing stage in students’ opinion

Table 14 Students’ opinions an causes of difficulties

Table 15: Aclivities in pre-writing slage

Table 16: Work arrangement while writing

Table 17: Aclivities in writing lessons

Table 18: Students’ expectation for better teaching and learning situation

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PART I: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Nowadays, English plays an important role in many aspecls of life TL has been taught in Vietnamese schools as one of the most important subjects at all level of education The Leaching and learning of Fnglish in our country has today changed from the linguistic competence to the communicative competence As a result, our new English textbook series were compiled under the impact of the communicative approach which focuses on four skills: reading, speaking, listening and writing Compared to the other three skills, writing is considered to be the most difficult skill to master Therefore, teaching, writing is not an easy job One of the teachers’ challenges in high school

education is to develop the skills and knowledge necessary for Vietnamese students Lo

write Unglish essays effectively In high school context, where exposure to linglish is typically limited to three periods each week students receive little practice in writing in Enghsh, only one period (45 minutes) per uniL Most teachers are nol salisfied with reading and giving feedback on their students” essays because many essays are nonsense, lack of ideas or even the content, of some essays is very similar to each ater, especially when they write about the same topic Conversely, students are not mterested in learning essay writing They tend to wanslate ideas from mother tongue into Lnglish, express ideas

in long sentences, and are not aware of different kinds of writing, which leads them unable to write in real life Because of limited background knowledge, they often feel bored when doing written work, especially when lacking support and motivation from teachers

Ihave been teaching writing to the 10" form students at Nguyén Méng Tuan high school with the textbook “Tiếng Anh 10” for two years, and I encountered many dillicullies in the writing lessons Therefore, the situation envouraged ine lo carry out the

study “Teaching essay writing to the 10th form students at Neuyén Mang Tuan high

school, Thanh Hoa province: Difficulties and solutions” with the hope of improving the

teaching and leaning essay writing for my colleagues and my students.

2 Objectives of the study

The primary purpose of this study is to explore teachers’ perception of the

importance of eaching cssay writing to the 10 form sIudents øL Nguyễn Mộng Tuan high

school

The second aim is to investigate leachers’ difficulties in leaching essay wriling Lo

the 10" form students with the new textbook “Tieng Anh 10” at Nguyễn Mộng Tuân high

school

Finally, T would like to offer some suggested solutions for improving (urther the teaching of essay writing for teachers of English at Nguyễn Mộng Tuân high sehool

This study is carried out with the hope that it will be thearetieally and practically

helpful to both teachers of English and the 10" form students al Nguyén Méng Tuan high

school

3 Research questions

The study intends to find out the answers for the following questions:

1 Whal are teachers’ perceptions of the imporlance of leaclong essay writing Lo

the 10" form students at Nguyễn Mộng Tuan high school?

2 What are the difficulties experienced by the teachers who are teaching essay

writing in the {exthook “Tieng Anh 10” Lo the 10 form sIuderts aL Nguyễn Mộng Tuần

high school?

3 What should be done to help overcome those difficulties for teachers of English

at Nguyễn Mộng Luân hiph school?

4, Methods of the study

With the aim of Linding oul dhe difficullics im teaching essay wriling with the new

textbook “Tiéng Anh 10” to the 10" form students at Nguyễn Mộng Tuan high school,

this study adopls mainly quanlilalive and qualitative methods

There are three main instruments of data collection are questionnaires, classroom

observation and interviews.

Informal interviews with the teachars at Nguyễn Miộng Tuân high school are conducted

The purpose of interview is to investigate difficulties teachers face when they teach essay

writing to the 10" form students

Survey questionnaires for the 10" form students at Nguyén Mộng Tuân high school are to

collect information about their views of writing difficulties and causes of them,

Classroom observation is used to record more information trom teachers

5 Significance of the study

The significance of this study is to reveal that problems teachers of English at Nguyén

Méng Tuan high school encounter when they teach essay writing to the 10 form

sludenls The study is tended o find out how the leachers cope and manage their

problems in order to help the 10" form students at Nguyễn Miộng Tuân bigh school to

write better Also, this study is carried out with the hope that its findings can give some suggested solutions for English high school teachers so thal they can have teaching

practice better in writing lessons

6 Scope of the study

The study is conducted at Nguyén Méng Tuan high school in order to recognize

difficulties in teaching and Teaming essay wriling skills of both the teachers and the 10

form students with the new textbook “Liếng Anh 10” On the basis of findings, some

suggested solutions were advanced to further improve teaching essay writing to students

Within its scope, the study is limited only to the 10 form students at Neuyen Neuyén

Mộng Tuén teaching context

7, Organization of the study

This thesis has 3 main parts: introduction, development and conclusion,

The introduction presents the rationale, objectives of the sludy, research questions, methods of the study, significance of the study, scope of the study, organization of the

study, which offers readers an overview of haw the research idea is generated

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‘The development consists of 3 chapters

Chapter 1 provides the theoretical background of essay writing It focuses on writing definitions, from paragraph lo essay, essay definitions and ils parts, types of essays, slages

of writin an essay, approaches to teach writing

Chapler 2 discusses ihe methodology of the study, ie describes the study context,

participants and instruments Besides, the textbook “Tidng Anh 10” is thon claborated Chapter 3 is about data analysis and discussion In this part, questionnaires, interviews and classroom observation are analyzed and presented In this chapler, T will give some feasible solutions for better teaching and learning Hnglish essay writing,

The conchision summarizes the whole study issue and provides suggestions for further

study Besides, the limitations of the thesis are also pointed oul

definitions of an essay and ils parts, types of essays, and stages of wriling au essay The

second section discusses approaches to teaching writing,

1.1 Teaching essay writing

1.1.1 What is writing?

Writing is an essential area of development in a native and foreign language ‘Therefore, there are various opinions of writing given by different researchers

Wriling is defined as a social process by Candlin and Hyland They staled “Writing is

therefore an engagement in a social process, where the production of texts reflects

methodologies, arguments and rhetorical strategies constructed to engage colleagues and

persuade thern of the claims that are made” (1999: 107, cited m Phimg, 2004)

Ilowever, writing, in language teachers’ opinions, is “a language skill which is difficult to

acquire” (Tribble, 1996: 3) Tl “normally requires some form of instruction? and “is nol a

skill that is readily picked up by exposure” (Tribble, 1996 11)

As for Byme, one of several authors on writing skills, gave a long and complex definition

of wnting: “When we write, we use graphic symbols thal is Iellors or combinations of letters which relate to the sounds we make when we speak On one level, then, writing can be said to be the act of forming these symbols; making marks on a flat surface of some kind ‘The symbols have to be arranged according to certain conventions, to farm words and words have to be arranged to form sentences.” (Byrne, 1991:1)

In other words, it can be said that writing is encoding of a message of some kind that is,

we lranslale our Lhoughls and idcas into language So, in a way, writing represcnls our

thoughts and ideas What one thinks leads to one’s writing in the form of sentences and

by organizing the sentences into a cohesive text where we are able to communieale with

our readers successfully.

After considering some different views of writing, let’s see how to write a good paragraph and then an essay

1.1.2 Fram paragraph to essay

Before a student starts writing essays, they should be taught how to write a good

paragraph Langan (1999) defined “A paragraph is a series of sentences aboul one wain

idea, or point A paragraph typically starts with a point, and the rest of the paragraph provides specific details to support and develop that point.”

A paragraph is made up of 3 kinds of sentences (Ihe topic sontence, supporting sentences and the concluding sentence that develop the writer’s main idea

The topic sentence states the main idea of a paragraph, and it also limits the topic to ane

or Lwo areas that are discussed completely within one paragraph Ii bnefly indicales what

the paragraph is going to discuss or this reason, the topic sentence is a helpful guide to

both the writer and the reader The writer can see what information to include The reader,

then, ean see whal the paragraph is going to be aboul and is, therefore, belter preparad to

understand it

The topic sentence should be written al the begimming of the paragraph because il tells the

reader what you are going to say and you can look back at the topic sentence as you write the supporting sentences

The supporting sentences develop the lopic sculences by giving spavilic details, explanations, or proofs about the topic sentence

Here are examples of topic sentences and supporting sentences:

‘Topic sentence: ‘I'raditional American family relationships have changed greatly in the last thirty years

- x out of x marriages ending divorce

- x oul of x children live in homes with only one parent

- x percent of couples living together are not legally married

Topic sentence: Tokyo is the most expensive city ini the world

- Cost of a diner at a medium-priced restaurant

- Rent for an average two-bedroom apartment

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- Cost of a ride on public transportation

- Cost of a medium-priced hotel room

The concluding sentence signals the end of the paragraph and summaries the main points of the paragraph It gives a final comment on the topic and leaves the reader with

the most important ideas to think about

The concluding sentence reminds the readers of the topic sentence, it is like the topic sentence but in different words not copying the topic sentence

TL ean be begun with: “Allin all, Tn any event, In brief, Indeed, Tn other words, Tn shorl,

‘Therefore, In conclusion, In summary, Finally, eto”

Tiere are examples of topic sentences:

- River ralting is a challenging sport wilh special requirements

- Gold, a precious metal is prized for two important characteristics

And here ave the concluding sentences:

- Tn short, if you are fearless and int good physical condition and ean teact quickly, river rafting is the ideal outdoor sport for you

- Tn conclusion, gold is lreasured! nol only for ils beauty but also for it utility

Indeed, a good paragraph contains five elements: a topic sentence, supporting sentences, possibly a conchiding sentence, unity, and coherence Unity means that in a paragraph a writer concentrates on onc main idea which is very oflen stated in the first sentence of a paragraph, and this idea is developed into further detail with the help of supporting details After the students know how to write a good paragraph, they start developing the entire essay

11.3 What is an essay and its part?

An essay has been defined in a variety of ways

According to Wikipedia, an cssay is “lypically a short piece ol writing, usually from an author’s personal point of view Essays are non-fiction but often subjective, while oxposilory, Uncy can also include marative Easays can be lilerary criticism, political

inanifestos, leamed arguments, observations of daily life, recollections, and reflections of

the anthor.”

Langan (1999) described that an essay does the same thing a paragraph does: it starts with

a point, and the rest of it provides specific details to support and develop that point However, a paragraph is @ scrics of sentences aboul one main idea, or point, while au essay is a series of paragraphs about one iain idea, or point- called the central idea Jn

other words “An essay is a group of paragraphs that develops one central idea” by

Smalley and Ruetten (1986)

Oshima and Llogue (1991) gave a similar definition of an essay: “An essay is a piece of

wriling several paragraphs loug instead of jusl one or two TL is wrillen about one topic,

just as a paragraph” and an essay has three main parts: an intreductory paragraph (or introduction), a Body (two or more paragraphs) and a concluding paragraph (or conclusion)

‘The introductory paragraph consists of bwo parts: general statement and thesis statement General statements introduce the topic of the essay and give background information on

the tope Thesis slalemenit stafes Ihe main topic, tists the subdivisions of the lupic, may

indicate the method of organization

Ex: 4 person born in the 20" century has seen a lot of changes take place in abnost all

areas of human life, Some people are excited by the challenges that these changes offer;

others want to return to the simpler, less automated lifestyle of the past Living in the 20”

century has certain advantages such as a higher standard of living bul it alse has some disadvantages such as a polluted environment, the depersonalization of human relationships, and the weakening of spiritual values

The body cousists of one or more paragraphs Hach paragraph develops a subdivision Lach paragraph should begin with a topic sentence that introduces the issue to be discussed in the paragraph, which is followed by further information A linking sentence continues the logical How to Uke next paragraph,

The concluding paragraph is a summary of the main points or restatement of your thesis

in dilferent words and your final comment on the subject, based on the information you

have provided.

Lx: In conclusion, although the 20" century has indeed given us a lot of advantages by making us richer, healthier, and freer to enjoy our lives It has, in my opinion, not made

us wiser The 20" century has also made our Rarth dirtier, our people less humane and our spiritual lives poorer We should continue to enjoy the benefits of technological

advancements because they free us lo pursue our interests and goals However, we must

make an effort to preserve our natural environment for future generations Moreover, we should take the time now to make our lives mare meaningful in an increasing impersonal world

Of the three parts, the longest part should be the body ‘'o connect the three parts of an essay, the use of transitional signals is also important

Transitions are words or phrases that link one idea fo Ihe next; hey are signals which

help the reader follow your thoughts ‘[ransitions are used to connect ideas within

paragraphs and when leading from one paragraph to the next Transitions fall into several

categories The following seven categories list transilions for same of the most common

situations in writing:

To shaw a time relationship First, second (stc.); First of all, then, nexl, afler that, fisally

To add an idea or example in addition, also, another, furthermore, moreover, besides,

similarly, for example, for instance

To add an opposite idea: On the other hand, however, but, Although, even though

To show comparison: Similarly, likewise, also, and

To show cause-effect: Therefore, thus, consequently, as a result, so, Because, since,

To show conclusion: In brief, all in all, indeed, in other words, in short, in the end

To clarify: in other words, for instance, that is, put another way

Example of using transitions:

“Belly goes to the Wriling Center every Tussday and Thursday Consequently, hor English grades have improved dramatically After two months of tutoring, Betty became

an English tulor Tu addition, she visils the math lab every Friday However, her math grade has not improved as much Therefore, she will contumue to get help with her math

homework” (Fawcett, Susan, and Alan Sandberg Evergreen: A Guide to Writing)

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“In addition” signals that Betty goes to ‘the Math Lab and The Writing Center

“Consequently” signals the effect of English tutoring, on Betty’s grades

“Aller” signals the time period between the start of Belly’s tutoring sessions and her getting a job as a tutor

“However” signals a contrast belween Belly’s improvement in English and math

“Therefore” signals the conclusion that Betty will recerve more help in math, which she lacks

LALA, Types of essays

‘There exist many types of essays which students, academicians may be involved with at some point of their lives or career Essays can be classified by their purposes

According (o Faweett, and Sandberg (1992) there were 8 lypes of essays: Tlustration,

Narrative, Descriptive, Process, Definition, Comparison or Contrast, Classification and

Persuasive In illustration essays the writer used specific examples to support a thesis or

lo prove a slalement Narrative essays required the writer to retell a meaningful incident,

an event or personal experience The writer had to describe something such as a place, a

producl, a piece of equipment or cells under a microscope, cfc in a descriptive essay

Describing a process or steps in the procedure of doing something was the aim of a process essay In definition essays students had to define a scientific term such as Disk Operating System in computer studies or TINA in biology otc When wriling a comparison or contrast essay, students might be asked to compare to find the similarities and differences between two things or two people They could also use same criteria to contrast two things or two people to discover which features this person or a thing had but the other one did not have Differing from the above-mentioned types of

essays, Classification essays required the writer to use some criteria to classify some

things or people or divide them into groups under some standards In a persuasive essay

the writer had to take a stand on an issue and tried to convince others to agree with him or

her with a question like “Do you agree or disagree?” He had to choose Lo agree or

disagree with the given topic Sample topics of a Persuasive essay could be “Should

everyone go to college?; Are we too dependent on computers?; Should cigarette smoking

be banned?, atc

Unlike Faweott and Sandberg, Smalley and Ructler: (1986) gave oul enly 5 types

of essays with different names: Hxample essay, comparison and contrast essay,

clas

icalion essay, process analysis essay, cause-and-effect analysis essay and

argumentative essay In Cause-and-Effect ossay the writer identified the causes of a phenomenon, a problem or something or predicted its good or bad effects

Although there are many types of essays, there are only four major Lypes while others types are variations from of the four hey are persuasive essays, comparative essays, narrative essays and expository essays A comparative essay asks that you

compare al least (wo (possibly more) items These ilems will differ depending on the

assignment ‘Though the assignment may say “compare,” the assumption is that you will

consider both the similarities and differences, in other words, you will compare and

contrast The calegory of expnsitory essay is also known as explanation or illustrative essay in academic writing because it is commonly used to elucidate and clarify a concept,

a silualion or a thought or nolion An exposilory essay explains a topic mi au authoritative

manner For instance, if you are writing about the film industry, you would narơw your topic to a specific aspect of this industry and create an essay structure that explains that aspecl thoroughly The content of the essay is intended to inform the reader

1

Stages of writing an essay

Raimes (2005) suggests that the writing process consists of planning, drafting and

revising However, Brandon (2005) presents a writing process of only three main steps

prewriting; organizing and developing support, and writing, revising and editing

Although there are many terms and patterns used in the writing process, the core

clements are similar, According to Porupan Boonpallanaporn (2007), they ean be summed

up as prewriting, writing, revising and editing Prewriting is the first stage of writing which helps students to gencrate ideas and prepares thei to wrile an essay At this stage, all ideas are preliminary and subject to change Techniques for generating ideas for essays suggested by Wyrick (2002), Trimmer (2004), Brandon (2005) are free-writing or

1E

looping, clustering or mind-mapping, brainstorming, interviewing, reading and note- taking, journal writing and surfing the Internet

Apart [rom generating ideas for au casay, students should also consider the purpose

of writing an essay and readers’ knowledge of the topic in order to select appropriate

ideas and information for their essays

Whiting or drafting moans producing a preliminary written version from the outline It is the way to convert ideas into words Most writers write straight through the first draft wilhoul slopping lo make correction At this slage, the oulline is used as a guide

to form the essay ‘Ihe writer also uses his/her linguistic competence and discourse imowledge to get the ideas across to the reader

Revising is the tine to make improvement 1o a piece of wriling Changes can be

made to content and organization by adding and deleting details, or improving clarity,

style and flow of ideas

Faiting includes checking various aspects on the surface level such as spelling, punctuation, capitalization, grammar or page formatting to ensure that appropriate

conventions are mel

Writmg steps’ prewriting, writing, revising and editing are therefore introduced to students in the hope that they will follow these steps, go through the process using critical thinking and reasoning skills and be able to produce a good piece of writing

Hyland (2003) emphasizes that the teachers’ role is to guide students through the writing process, avoiding an emphasis on form to help them develop strategies for generating, drafting and refining ideas Since writing has always been regarded as a difficult skill, instructors of English writing skills accept that students’ writing abilities

may not reach a satisfactory level They have attempted to deal with student errors in

writing which show thal they face severe difficulties duc Lo their lack of essay wriling strategies as well as Jack of language proficiency

Therclore, simply reading students’ exis, poinling out errors and giving leedback

by instructors might not be enough to help students improve their writing ability In order

to assist students to overcome difficulties it is necessary to examine what students

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actually think and do when they write ‘fhe results can reveal their strengths and weaknesses and will give opportunities for instructors to advise and provide assistance rogarding their writing practice in a more practical and flexible way, leading lo a more supportive classroom environment

1 2 Approaches to teaching writing

Thore arc various approaches to teaching writing that are presented by Ann Raimes

(1983) as follows:

1.21 The Controlled to Free Appraach:

In 1950s and early 1960, the audio-lingual method dominated second language learning which emphasized on speech and writing through mastering grammatical and syntactic

forms

Llere, the students are given sentence exercises, then paragraphs to copy or manipulate

grammatically These controlled compositions then followed by correction of errors, so

that it can lead to the free composition Overall, this approach focuses on accuracy rather than fluency

1.22 The Free-Writing Approach:

This approach stresses writing quantity rather than quality This focuses on fluency rather than accuracy It is based on the principle that if once ideas are there, the organization follows Thus, teachors may begin their classes by asking students to wrile freely on any topic without worrying, about grammar and spellmg for five or ten minutes ‘the teacher does not correct these pieces of free writing They simply read them and may comment on the ideas the writer expressed, Alternatively, some students may volunteer to read their

own writing aloud to the class Concern for “audience” and “content” are seen as

important in this approach

1.23 The Paragraph - Pattern Approach:

This approach focuses on organization by copying the paragraphs or model passages It is based on the principle that in different culture or situations, people construcl and organi

conununication with each other in different ways In this approach, students are provided

with such kinds of exercises as sentence ordering, sentence inserting or sentence deleting, ete

1.24, The Grammar-Syntax Organization Approach:

‘This approach stresses on simultaneous work on more than one composition feature Ina

way, iLis inclusive here thal writing carmol be seen as composed of separate skills which

arc Icarned sequentially, So, students must be trained to pay attention to organization while they also work on the necessary grammar and syntax

1.25, The Communicative Approach:

‘This approach focuses on the purpose of writing and the audience for it ‘They are given some tasks where they have to behave as writers so that they can learn by doing it

- Why am T writing this? Who will read it?

‘Thus, this approach is quite functional in nature, which can provide the actual experience

to the learners

1.2.6 The Process Approach:

This approach shows the shift from praduct to process which shows

- How do T write this? How do T get starled?

Here, the students are trained to generate ideas for writing, to think of purpose, audience, and write multiple drafts in order to present written products that communicate their own ideas Teachers who use this approach give students lime to tray ideas and feedback on the content of what they write in their drafts As such, writing becomes a process of discovery for the students as they discover new ideas and new language forms to express them A writing process approach requires that teachers give students greater responsibility for, and ownership of, their own learning Students make decisions about

genre and choice of topics, and collaborate as they write

Thore are different points of view on the number of stages comprising the wriling process Byme (1991) suggests the following as a representation of the stages of writing: Listing idee

, Inaking an outlme, writing a drafi, correcting and improving the drafi, and writing

the final version As for Ron White and Valerie Arndt, they are keen to stress that

“writing is re-writing, that re-vision — seeing with new eyes — has a central role to play in

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the act of creating text” In their model, process writing is an interrelated set of recursive stages which include: Drafting, structuring (ordering information, experimenting with

arrangements, cle.), reviewing (checkity context, cormections, assessing impact, ediling),

focusing (that is making sure you are getting the message across you want to get across),

and generating ideas and evaluation (4 sing the draft and/or subsequent drafts)

Oshima and Hogue (1991) mentions four stages of writing such as pro-writing, planning, writing and revising draft, and writing the final copy to hand in

Pro-writing is the first slage in the wrilimg process There are two steps namely choosing and narrowing a topic and brainstorming Plame, (outlining) organizes the ideas the learners generated by brainstorming into an outline There are three steps on planning that

is: making sublists, wring the topic sentence, and outlining

In writing and revising draft stage, a writer does three steps: writing the first rough draft,

revising content and organization, and proofreading the second draft

Writing the final copy 10 hand in is considered as the final activity m a writing process, a writer has to rework the written drafts and polish them for the presentation or publication

During the wriling process,

sludents engage m pre-writing, plarming, drafting, and post-

writing activities However, as the writing process is recursive in nature, they do not necessarily engage in these activities in that order

1.3 Summary

In short, this chapter conceptualizes the discussion of issues related to topic of the study Firstly, it concentrates on the concepts of writing theoretical background of teaching essay writing such as definitions of an essay and its parts, structure of an essay, types of essays and stages of writing an essay Secondly, it mentions approaches to teach writing

As I wrote above, an essay is a group of paragraphs that develops one central idea An

intoduclion, a bedy and a conclusion are 3 parts of cssays There are many lypes of

essays, and each of these follow a certain structure about which the students are told by

the leacher and each of which they try to analyze belore the wriling itself, There are six approaches to teaching writing according to Ann Rimes ‘the practical contents of the

paper , ie research methodology, is to be described in details in the following sections

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CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY This chapter deals with the research context including the teachers and students at

Nguyễn Mộng Tuan high school, writing lessons in he new (exIbook “Tiếng Anh 10”, participants, data collection instruments, procedures of data collection

2.1 The research context

211 The teachers at Nguyễn Mộng Tudn high school

‘There are totally six teachers of linglish at Nguyen Mong Tuan high school from 24 to 45 Their English proficiency and teaching inethod are nol equally qualified Two of thom graduated from Faculty of English Language Teacher Hducation, University of languages

and International Studies, Ilanoi National University Two were trained English as their

second foreign language al Russian Department, Hanoi University Two graduated from

linglish Department, [long Due University Lalf of teachers were trained according to

traditional teacher-centered method, especially to the 10" form students In classes,

explanation, translation, asking and answering questions are the main class aclivilics The teachers are often asked to explain every new word, new structure and even to translate

the text into Vietnamese Our students are usually passive in the learning process

The rest were trained to teach English based on the new teaching method, communicative

approach Irom my perspective, their interests in teaching are so varied, not all of them are really devoted to their (caching job

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Units

1 A day in the life of

2 School talks

2.1.3 Writing lessons in the new textbook “Tiếng Anh 10”

The new “Tiếng Anh 10° is the fifth volume which succeeds a new series of English

textbook from grade 6 to grade 9 Tl is designed to develop students” communicative

language skills including listening, speaking, reading, and writing via different interesting

and well- designed units The new ‘Tiéng Anh 10° consists of 16 urits of six themes

which arc rolated to many aspects of daily life: You and Me, Education, Community,

Nature, Recreation, and People & Places Lach unit presents a topic and is divided into

S$ main parts: reading, speaking, lisLening, wriling, and Ianguage focus

Owing to the new syllabus, each writing lesson makes up 20 % of 86 periods of the

English syllabus Although each lesson is not clearly divided into stages: Pre-writing,

While- writing and Posi- wriling, il can be easily noticed that the inilal tasks are a

preparation for the final task ‘here are totally 16 units, so 16 writing lessons are designed

with a view to making students familiar with real life situations on text The required

competences of he writing lesson in cach unit are delailed in the following table:

Required tasks Writing a narrative

The participants chosen for the study are 165 students from groups of 10A1, 10A2, 10A3,

and 10A5 and six teachers of Hnglish at Nguyen Mong ‘Tuan high school, four of whom

are teaching grade 10 at present

The students are both male and female at the age of 16 and have been learning Enelish for

A years at secondary school They are willing to support the study by completing survey

questionnaires and being ready for observation and interviews

2.22 Data collection instruments

In order to obtain adequate data for the study, three main instruments were used and

described as follows:

instrument 1 Survey questionnaires

The first data collection instrament was two survey questionnaires (appendix 1: survey

questionnaires for teachers, appendix 2: survey questionnaires for students)

‘The information is collected by means of survey questionnaires, containing both closed

and open-ended ilems Rach survey questionnaire includes two parts: Part 1 is some

personal information and part 2 comprises of questions relating to researched issue

First, the questionnaire for teachers consists of 10 questions written in English to find out

teachers’ perception of difficulties teachers encounter in leaching essay writing to the 10

form students based on the textbooks “‘Lieng Anh 10”, and their recommendations for

improving it

Next, the questionnaire for sludents consists af § questions wrillen in Vielnamese wilh the

hope to find out students’ opinions on the writing skill, students’ assessment of writing

topics and activilies based on the textbook ‘Tieng Anh 10”, the causes that lead to

students’ diffioultics in learning essay writing and students’ assessment of inappropriate

teacher pedagogical methodology, and their expectations for better study

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In 2 survey questionnaires above, the respondents were asked to answer and tick the closed-questions; however some questions have more than one option

Tnsirument 2: Interviews

‘The second research tool employed in this study was informal interview questions for

teachers There are 5 interview queslions for teachers im English in atternpl to explore

further the teachers’ background, their understanding of teaching essay writing at Nguyen Mong ‘Tuan high school, and their difficulties in teaching essay writing While formulating the interview questions, the interviewer made sure thal Ihe questions were clear, precise and motivating

Instrument 3: Classroom observation

Tn order to clarify the information from the questionnaires ard inferviews aboul the

difficulties that they are facing, the researcher observed some classes From these

observations, the researcher got a deep understanding about teaching and learning essay

wniling to the 10" forms studonis al Nguyen Mong Tuan high school

2.2.3 Praceduves of data collection

The dala of the research was collecied by means of questionnaire, inlerviews and

‘To obtain the data for the investigation, the questionnaires in Vietnamese were delivered

to 165 students during the class time The students were given clear instruction before

each question so that they could respond appropriately to each question

Aller the questionnaire was adiinistored, the respondents were crcouraged to read it thoroughly and answer frankly and truly Then they will be instructed to take as much time as they need to complete the questionnaire

Six teachers were chosen to take part in a one-to-oue interview It was conducted in a

quiet room free from distraction Before the interview began, the researcher explained the

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nature of the research and the purpose of the interview and the amount of time to complete the conversation Besides, the author also informed the interviewees about how the data were lo be recorded, and how the data were to be used later on in an allerupt to cope with the difficulties teachers encounter in teaching essay writing ‘The classroom observation was carried out in four less iu different classes

2.3, Summary

In this chapter, the research context and the research methodology were described with emphases on participants of the research, data collection instruments, procedures of data collection

With the methodology presented, I hope to get the most triangulated and reliable as well

as valid data

‘The next chapter will be the data analysis and discussion,

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CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS This chapter deals with the results from the questionnaires to the teachers and students and from interviews with teachers The Gudings from those resulls will lead to the

suggested solutions to make improvement for teaching essay writing to the 10" fam

students

3.1 Data analysis

This part of the thesis is the treatment of all the data collected from the survey quostionmaires conducted on six (cachors and 165 students, he direct interviews with 6 teachers, and the classroom observations

3.1.1, Data analysis of teachers’ survey questionnaire

Part}: Teachers’ personal information

Among 6 teachers taking part in the study, there are two males and four females ‘The teachers’ ages range from 26 to 45 There are 2 young teachers teaching English at high school for fewer 5 years, 3 teachers with 10 years of experiences, 1 teacher with 20 ycars

of experiences They have spent from one to three years teaching writing skills to the 10" form students Of these six teachers, four are currently taking charge of “ Tieng Anh 10”

Part 2: Analysis of teachers’ survey questionnaire

Table 1: Teachers’ apininn about the importance of writing

As we have seen the table below, most of the teachers highly appreciate the importance of

writing in the new textbook “Tieng Anh 10 Four of them thought that writing in the new

textbook “Tieng, Anh 10” is important (66%) One found writing very important, one viewed it not very important

2t

Question 2: Why do you teach writing to high school students?

Options Number Peroentage

a it helps students to express their thoughts in words 3 50%

b it helps students to communicate with many peaple 2 33%

c it helps students to learn new vocabulary and grammatical | 4 66%

structures

Table 2: Reasons of teaching writing to the 10 form students

All the teachers taking part in the survey claimed that teaching writing to the 10" form students helped students lo do written tests 66% of the leachers thought that leaching writing helped students to learn new vocabulary and grammatical structures However, only half of the teachers thought that it helped students to express their thoughts in words 33% of the respondents taught writing to the 10 form students because it helped their students to communicate with many people

Question 3: How are your students in the writing lessons?

a They arc inferosled im writing lasks in each lesson 0 0%

b They are nervous duc to dillicull tasks 1 16.7%

¢ They are bored with repeating activilics 9 0%

d, Most of them don’t know how to write 5 83.3%

Table 3: Students’ attitude about writing lessons in teachers’ viewpoint

According to the table most of the teachers thought that their students didn’t know how

to wrile (83.3%) Only one leacher (16.7%) reported Unat difficult tasks made students

nervous Teachers thought that their students are neither interested in writing tasks in each

lesson nor bured with repeating activiliss,

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Question 4: Do you think how many periods (45minutes/ period) of teaching writing

are appropriate for the 10" form students?

Table 4: Teachers’ view of periods uf teaching writing

Results from table 4 indicated that the most appropriate periods of teaching writing in

lcachors’ opinion are 2 periods a week (83%) Only 17% of the respondents found 3

periods a week proper There is no teacher who chose to teach writing 1 period a week or more than 3 periods a week It means that the number of periods of writing in class should

be taught such ina suitable time to help students to leam writing lessons better

Question 5: What are your current problems when teaching essay writing to the 10%

form students?

a Tavk of time for farther praciice 4 66%

b Large sive classes 2 33%

© Students’ Tow motivation 3 50%

d Students’ low background knowledge 4 66%

e Students’ low proficiency in linglish § 83%

£ Students’ lack of essay writing strategies 4 66%

g ‘teachers’ lack of experiences in teaching new textbook 6 100%

hh Teachers’ inappropriate methodology in teaching essay writing | 5 83%

Table 5: Teachers’ opinions of difficulties when teaching essay writing

Acuording to lable 5, the most difficult challenge is lack of experiences in teaching new textbook (100%) ‘This figure is higher than teachers’ inappropriate methodology in

leaching essay writing and students’ low proficiency in English (83%)

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‘the next challenges from teachers’ viewpoint are lack of time for further practice, students’ low background knowledge, and students’ lack of essay writing strategies (66%) Only 33% of the respondents have difficully with large size classes

Question 6: How difficult are the following stages of teaching essay writing?

Table 6: Degrce of difficulty of stages in teaching essay writing

The data shown in the table reveal that most of the teachers cope up with different degrees

of difficulty of stages in teaching essay writing

At the pre-writing stage, most of the teachers found it very difficult (66%), one teacher found it difficult (17%) and one found it neither difficult nor easy (17%) The most important problem involves 83% of the respondents is difficult to teach writing stage in essay writing lessons Only 17% of the respondents found writing stage very difficult

Coming next is 50% of the teachers who thought thal revising was a very difficult and

difficult stage of teaching essay writing At the cditing stage, one out of six teachers

thought that this stage was very difficult (17%) and 66% of the teachers found it difficult