Luận văn the challenges in teaching and learning writing skill with the textbook english 11 basic stream at tinh gia 5 high school thanh hoa

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAT, STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES HOANG THI MAI HUONG CIIALLENGES IN TEACIHNG AND LEARNING WRITING

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAT, STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

HOANG THI MAI HUONG

CIIALLENGES IN TEACIHNG AND LEARNING WRITING SKILL WITH THE TEXTBOOK ENGLISH 11 ( BASIC SEREAM) AT TINH

GIA 5 HIGH SCHOOL, THANH HOA PROVINCE

(NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN TRONG VIỆC DẠY VÀ HỌC KỸ NĂNG VIET

THEO SACH TIENG ANH 11 (HE CO BAN) DOI VOI GIAO VIÊN VÀ

TIỌC SINH TRƯỜNG TIPT TINTI GIA 5, TENII THANIIIIOA)

NOR PROGRAMME THESIS

English Teaching Methodology

60 14 10

Hanoi, 2013

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

HOANG THI MAI HUONG

CIIALLENGES IN TEACIHNG AND LEARNING WRITING SKILL WITH THE TEXTBOOK ENGLISH 11 ( BASIC STREAM) AT TINH

GIA 5 HIGH SCHOOL, THANH HOA PROVINCE

(NHỮNG KHÓ KHĂN TRONG VIỆC DẠY VÀ HỌC KỸ NĂNG VIET

THEO SACH TIENG ANH 11 (HE CO BAN) DOI VOI GIAO VIÊN VÀ

TIỌC SINH TRƯỜNG TIPT TINTI GIA 5, TENII THANIIIIOA)

NOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology

Supervisor: Dé Ba Quy, MEd

Hanoi, 2013

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

1 REL: English ng a foreign language

2 BSL: English as a second language

iv

LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS

Table I: The differences between the process writing and the product writing

Table 2: Checklist of writing tasks in the new “Tieng Anh 11° textbook

Table 3: The purposes of teaching writing

“Table 4: Teachers’ general thoughts of the writing lesson

Table 5: Problems in teaching writing

Table 6: Students’ actions in the writing lesson

Table 7: Factors influence students’ participant and interests

Table 8: Evaluation of forms of writing texts in the textbook

Table 9: Activities to allract studenis to the lessor

Table 10: Activities to improve students’ writing skill

‘Table 11 : Purposes of learning writing skill

Table 12 Problems in learning writing

Table 13 Activities 1o make lesson more interesting:

‘Table 14: Activities after writing

Chart 1; The importance of wriling skill

Chart 2: The capability of using English of the students ?

Chart 3: Teachers’ general thought of the tasks in textbook

Chart 4° Students’ fecling of the writing skill

Chart 5: Students’ general thought of the writing tasks in the textbook

Chart 6; Students’ frequency in completing the tasks in textbook

Chart 7: Teachers’ frequency of giving suggestions before writing

Chart 8: Mistakes in students’ pieces of writing

1, Rationale of the study

sa Auns and objectives of the study

3 Rœscarch questions

4, The scope of the study

5 Design of the study

PART I: DEVELOPMENT

Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1 DeBnitions of writing: cào cà co

t9 Roles of writing

3 Approaches to the teaching of writing

3.1 Controlled-to-Free Approach:

3.2 The Froo-Writing Approach:

3.3 The Paragraph-Patlern Approach:

3.4 The Grammar-Syntax- Organization Approach

3.5 The Communicative Approach,

3.6.1 Product Approach

3.6.2 Process Approach

4 Whal makes wriling difficult to acquire?

CHAPTER 2: THE CONTEXT OF THE STUDY

2.1 The context ; Tih Gia 5 high school

2.2 The new ‘Tieng Arh 11? texthook

CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS AND STUDY FINDINGS

3.1 Teacher’s survey questionnaires

3.2, Students’ survey questionnaires

3.3 Class observation

3.4.1 Poor facilities and large size classes

3.4.2 Teachers’ and students’ inappropriate attirudes towards the writing

skill

3.4.3 Unsuitable tasks in the textbook

3.4.4 Students” poor linguistic competence

3.4.5 Students” lack of background knowledge

3 4.6 Passive leaming style

3.4.7 Teachers’ difficulties

3.5 Suggcsted solutions to overcome the challenges

3.5.1 Raising the students’ awareness of the importance of the writing

3.5.2 Improving students’ linguistic competence

3 5.3 Make the work arrangement effective

3.5.4 Making writing lesson vivid and interesting

3.5.5 Providing effective correction wark

3.5.6 Assigning more practical writing tasks

3.5.7 Creating a positive and supportive learning atmosphere

PART UL: CONCLUSION

1 Conclusion

2 Limitations of the study

3 Suggestions for further research,

REFERENCES

APPENDIX

Survey questionnaire (for students)

Survey questionnaire (for studeris)

Lists of classroom observations

PART I: INTRODUCTION

This very first part of the thesis is to introduce the rationale for the study, the

aims and objectives of the study as well as the rescarch questious which the study was to carry out to find out (he answers It alse presents the scope of the study as

well as the design of the study

1 Rationale of the study

Nowadays, as learning a second language is paid more and more special attention to, there has been a growing tendency towards the cmphmsis on communicative competence in language teaching and teaming, Writing, therefore,

is regarded as a productive skill which provides students with opporlumties to pul all the language elements they have learnt into practice and to show communicative competence effectively

However, in fact, writing is not often as important to many students as other skills such as reading and speaking and it tends to get rather neglected in many Vietnamese language classes

Furthermore, writing itself is a very complex and difficult skill to acquire

Therefore, Leaching sludents to write well is one of the mosl challenges trí

education In studying the teaching writing skill process at Tinh Gia 5 high school, T have been found that there are a lot of difficulties in teaching and learning English, especially the writing skill Among four language skills, taught in English, writing can be seen as the most boring and hardest one ‘thus, teaching and leaning writing

xkill aL Tĩnh Gia 5 high

hool is”! paid atlerdion, even that some teachers liad Lo

out down this skill lessons Facing up this problem, so many questions about teaching and leaming writmg skill always concem me a lot: “What problems might

the students face wher learning skill? What should be done Lo help them overcome those problems? How should we teach each form of written text so that the students can learn it effectively? ete ” I, therefore decided to do the research on

“Challenges in teaching and learning writing skill with the textbook Fnglish 11

(basic stream) at Tinh Gia § high school, Thanh Hoa province” in hope that the findings and solutions mentioned in this study will make a significant contribution

lo improve the teaching and learning of the writiry skill al Tinh Gia 5 high school

as well as those at other high schools

2 Aims of the study

‘The primary purpose of this study is to explore the teaching and learning of the writing skill by teachers and prade-1] students at Tinh Gia 5 high school It focuses

on finding out the challenges in leaching and learning the writing skill in dhe new

"Tieng Anh 11’ textbook at this school

The second purpose is to propose some suggestions to deal with teachers’ and students’ challenges and assis them to teaching as well as learning writing more effectively

3 Research questions of the study

This study attempts lo seck (he answers Lo the following questions:

1 What are the challenges of teachers and eleventh-grade students at Tỉnh Gia

5 high school in teaching and leaning the writing skill in the new “Tieng Anh 11’ textbook?”

What should be done to help teachers and grade-11students at Tỉnh Gia 5

high school overcame their challenges?

4, Scope of the study

This minor thesis is comducted at Tih Gia 5 high school im order to recognize

difficulties in teaching and learning writing skills of both the teachers and the 11”

form students Factors causing such challenges are then found out To go ahead, the

thesis also offers some suggestions to better the current contoxt

5 Design of the study

‘his study has three parts: Part A Introduction, Part 3 Development including lilorature review, the sludy, dala analysis and study [indings, Par C —

Conclusion

The introduction part prescuts the rationale, aims and objectives, rescarch questions and scope of the study, and design of the study

The lilerature review chapler vonccplualizes the framework of the study through the discussions of writing,

The study gives the specific details of school and the new ‘Tieng Anh 11°

textbook Besides, a general description of method is presented in this chapter

‘The last chapter concentrates on the data analysis, study findings and some suggestions to help the grade-11 students and teachers at Tinh Gia 5 high school

overcome the challenges in teaching and learning of the writing skill with the new

“Tieng Anh 11’ textbook

The conclusion part at the end gives a conclusion, imitation and suggestions

for further research,

PART Ib: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

In this chapter, some definitions of writing, the roles of writing will be presented

to help the readers be clearer about writing Besides, this chapter gives an overview

of relevant literature and researches that deal with approaches in teaching writing

skill and finally the researcher will give the answer for the question ‘what make writing difficult to acquire?’

1 Definitions of writing

Writing is an important language skill so we have to understand “what is writing? How to write well 2 ” There are many definitions of writing Byme (1991-1) stated about writing that “When we write, we use graphic symbals that is, letters or combinations of letters which relate to the sounds we make when we

speak Then, writing can be said to be the act of forming these symbols: making

marks on flat surface of some kind The symbols have to be arranged, acvording

to certain conventions, to form words, and words have to be arranged to form

sentences”

Lannon (1989) make a conflicting definition that writing is a process of transforming the material discovered by research inspiration, accident, trial and error, or whatever into a message with definite meaning a process of deliberate

decision Having the same opinion with Lannon, White (1991:3) assumed that

writing is a thinking process in its own right and is not a simple process but a

complex one “ writing is a form of problem-solving which involves such processes

a3 generating ideas, discovering a “voice” with which to write, planning, goal- seiting, monitoring and evaluating with which to express exact meanings”

From another view of writing, Candlin and Hyland(1999: 107) asserted wriling

as “ an cngagemont ina social process, where the production of text reflects methodologies, arguments and rhetorical strategies constructed to engage

colleguages and persuacle (hem of the claims that are made.”

In language teaching, writing is “a language skill which is difficult to acquire” and it is “not a skill that is readily picked up by exposure” (‘Irible, 1996:3), Rivers

also definiled thal “ writing ig nol a skall that can be learned or developed im

isolation but it should be taught and developed in corporation with other skills and aspects of the language studied”, It is a process that occurs over a period of time,

particularly if we take into account the sometimes extended periods of thinking that

precede creating an initial draft

In short, writing is an art that writers want to communicate with certain groups

of audience Through the pieces of writing, writers are able (lo organize

intellectually, manage everyday affairs, express ideas or argue By writing they can have control of both information and people

2 Roles of wri

6

Writing emerges with its own functions and brings along communicative code of

the writers When making a piece of writing, the writer implies a message or a

corlain purpose Tn the modern world, writing (wrillen language) severs a range of functions in everyday life Nunan (1991:84) poimed out, writing is:

1 Primarily for action: public signs ( on roads and stations), product labels

and instructions ( on food, tools or toy purchased), recipes, maps,

television and radio guides, bills, menus, telephone directories, ete

2 Primarily for social contact: personal correspondence, letters, postcards, greeting cards

3 Primarily for information: newspapers and magazines, non-fiction boaks

(text books, public notices, advertisement, guidebooks and travel

literature, etc.)

4 Primarily for entertainment: light magasines, comic trips, fiction baoks,

poetry and drama, film subtitles, games including computer games

To master language, obviously it is impossible for learners not to Jean writing skill well As a basic productive skill, writing provides students with a chance to put

all the language cloments they have Iearned into practice White (1991-1)

cmphasized the significance of writing that “Through writing we arc able to share ideas, arouse feelings, persuade and convince other people We are able to discover and articulate ideas in ways that only writing makes possible.”

3 Approaches to the leaching af writing Writing seems to be a difficult skill and a challenge to both teachers and learners Identifying approaches adapted in teaching writing can help teachers find out effective techniques to overcome difficulties and attain the objectives in teaching, therefore help students improve writing skill

Tn order to produce a good piece of writing, leamers have to deal with a lot of elements ‘the following diagram demonstrates these elements clearly:

Producing a piece of writing (Raines, 1983:6)

SYNTAX CONTENT Sentence strusiure, relevance, charity

sentence boundaries, originality, stylistic choices, etc kegis, ote GRAMMAR THE WRITER'S

PROCESS rules for verbs,

Getting ideas, agreements, articles,

Clear, fluent and Getting start pronouns, ete Tản ed,

handwriting, of ideas

spelling, NG Aupuxce

pronunciation, etc Ỉ The reader(s)

ORGANIZATION WORD CHOICE

idiom, tone topic and support,

Raimes (1983:5-10) asserts that on the basis of stressing different features of this diagram and combining them with how teachers think writing is leamed, a variety

of approaches to (caching of wriling have been developed Rammes presents six approaches to teaching writing: ‘The Controlled-to-Kree Approach, ‘the Kree- Writing Approach, The Paragraph-Pattem Approach, the Grammar-Syntax- Organization Approach, The Communicative Approach and The Process Approach 3.1 Controlled-to-Free Approach

The Controlled-to-Free Approach in writing is sequential This approach stresses three features of the diagram above: grammar, synlax and mechanics In low level, students are taught how to write by doing sentence-level exercises or controlled compositions to imitate copy or manipulate Therefore, they often make mistakes When student reach Irigh or advanced level, they are allowed lo try some free composition, in which they can express their ideas

In conclusion, this approach emphasizes accuracy rather than fluency Syntax, grammar and mechanics are main stress

3.2 The Kree-Writing Approach

of the approach

Tn contast with the controlled-lo-free approach, the free-wriling approach

focuses more on fluency In this approach, students are encouraged to write as much

as possible and as quickly as possible without worrying about making errors Teachers in this approach have stressed quantity of writing rather than quality by assigning vast amounts of free writing, on given topics with only minimal correction

of errors They are allowed to write freely without worrying about grammar and

spelling Content and fluency are taken into account first

3.3 The Paragraph-Pattern Approach

Different from the two approaches mentioned above, the paragraph-pattern

approach slresses on (he orgatization Ta thts approach, teachers focus on teaching

students how to construct and organize paragraphs by doing kinds of oxercises such

as sentence ordering, sentence inserting ar sentence deleting, etc Students simply

copy paragraphs, analyze Uwe form of modet paragraphs and Uhen write a parallel

~

ons Byrne (1991:23) pointed out the advantages of this approach: “this approach identifies and tries to overcome one of the central problems in writing: getting sludonis (o express themselves effeclively at.a level beyond the sentence.”

3.4 The Grammuar-Syntax- Organization Approach

This approach mainly stresses the necessity to work simultaneously on more

than one feature in the composition diagram: grammar, syntax and organization

‘Teachers give students writing tasks that lead them to pay attention to organization

while they also work on the necessary grammar and syntax For example, to write a

clear sel of instructions on haw to use a mobile phone, students need more than the

appropriate vocabulary They need the simple forms of verbs, an organization planned based on chronology; sequence words like first, next, then, finally, ete In

genoral, Uris approach is the

combination of the purpose and the form of the writing

3.5 The Communicative Approach

The goal of this approach is communicative competence, so it emphasizes on the

purpose of the writing and the audience for it Sludents are encouraged to behave like writers in real life and to ask themselves the key questions: Why am 1 writing this? And who will read it?

Conventionally, the teacher acts as the audience for the students’ writing Llowever, to make it more real life closed communication, students become readers for each other They read each other’s writings, respond, rewrite in another form and make comments, but not correct Also teachers can specify readeis outside classroom, thus giving stadent writes a context in which to select appropriate

content, language and levels of formality

3.6 The Process Approach

The teaching of writing has recently moved away from a concentration on the

wnileu product to an emphasis on the process of writing, which leads 10 the

emergence of process approacl, This approach encourages studonts to share the ideas, feelings and experience It is more global and focuses on purpose, theme, text

type, 1c the reader is emphasized Thus, students should ask (themselves nol only

questions about the purpose and audicuce but also the crucial questions: How do I write it? Llow do | get started?

This approach lays particular slress on a cycle of wriling aclivilics which move students from the generation of ideas and the collections of data through to the

“publication” of a finished text The diagram below show the process of writing:

1 facus on the process writing that leads to the final written product

2 help students understand their own composing process

3 help them to build repertories of strategies for prewriting, drafting and

rewriting

give students time to write and rewrite

“ place central importance on the process of revision

kì 7 let students discover what they want lo say ax they wrile

~ give students feedback throughout the composing process (not just the final product) as they attempt to bring their expression closer and closer

fo allention.

8 encourage feedback from the both the instructor and peers

9 include individual conference between teacher and students during the process of composition

‘There are various approaches to teaching writing as mentioned It is true to say

that there is not necessarily any “right” or “best” way to teach writing skill The best

practice in any situation will depend on the type of student the text type being

studied, the school system and many other factors (Steele, 2004) Hereunder wants

to clarify the two most popular approaches used in BSL/ EFL classreom, namely:

Product Approach and Process Approach

3.6.1 Product Approach

Product Approach is a traditional approach which is a largely “prescriptive and producl-centered” way of leaching This approach pays much aliontion lo the final outcome of a wnting process and supposes that students need to produce only one

writing version of the task The model of this approach is outlined by Steele (2004)

as follows:

Stage 1: Students study a text model and mimic its highlighted feature Kor

example, if studying a formal letter, student should pay attention lo the anportance

of paragraphing and the language used to make formal requests If studying a story, the focus may be on the techniques used to make story interesting, and students focus on where and how the writer employs these techniques

Stage 2 Students are involved in controlled practice of the highlighted features, usually in isolation If studying a formal letter, they may be asked to practice the

language used ta make formal requests

Stage 3: Students work to organize ideas

Stage 4: Students choose from a choice of comparable writing tasks

Individually, they use the skills, structures and vocabulary they have been taught to

produce the product; to show what they can do as fluent and competent users of the language

3.6.2 Process Approach

On the contrary, Process Approach focuscs on the process rather than the final product, Steele comes up with a typical sequence of activities

Stage 1: Generating ideas by brainstorming and dixcussion Students could be

that a writer is producing something to be read by someone else, and thus can

improve their drafts

Stage 6: Drafts are returned improvements are made based upon peer feedback

Stage 7: A final draft is written

Stage 8: Shudents once again, exchange and read other’s work and perhaps even write a response or reply

Comparing the two approaches, Steele summarizes their differences in the table below:

* text as a resource for comparison * imitate model text

* ideas as starting point “organization of ideas is more important

than ideas themselves

* more than one draft * one draft

* more plobal, focus on purpose, theme, | * features highlighted inchuđing text type, i.c., reader is emphasized controlled practice of those features

© emphasis on creative process * emphasis on end producl

Table 1: The differences between the process writing and the product writing

From the analysis and the comparison of the two approaches, it is undeniable that each approach has its own strengths and weaknesses It is also the fact that there are few classrooms where loachers are devoted 19 one approach as to exchide all others Normally, they still use techniques drawn from other approaches as the

students need them and those techniques are useful in the context of the class The

writing lessons in new ‘Tiéng Anh 11? textbook were compiled following, both Product Approach and Process Approach This Combined Product- Process Approach is found to be more popular, appropriate and effective The suggested general outline for a writing lesson following this approach may be

Stage 1: A model is given

Stage 2 Students work on the model, analyze its typical features, and pay attention

to the language and structure of the model

Stage 3: Students work in groups’ pairs to find out the ideas for the writing topic/

task und produce an outline,

Stage 4: Students write the first draft individually’ in pairs/ in groups The model is used for comparisem

Stage 5: Drafts are exchanged Students give comments on each other's work

Stage 6 Drafts are returned and changes or improvements are made based on peer feedback

Stage 7: Students write final drafis

Stage 8: Final drafts are exchanged once more; students give response or reply to

each other

Stage 9 Teacher gives feedback

4, What makes writing difficull fo acquire

According to Byme (1994:4), there are three problems causing writing become a dilficull, activity for most people, both in the mother tongue and in a foreign language They are psychological problems, linguistic problems and cognitive problems

hand, writing is essenlially a solitary aclivily and the fact thal we are required to

write on our own, without the possibility of interaction of the benefit of feedback, in itself makes the act of writing difficult

to organizing our sentence structures or to connecting our sentence: to some extent

the laller is maintained through the process of interaction, We repeat, backtrack, expand and so on, depending on how people react to what we say Incomplete and

ever ungrammiatical ullerances usually pass urmoliced,

In writing, we have to kecp the channel of communication open through our own efforts and to ensure, both through our choice of sentence structure and by the way our sentences are linked together and sequenced, that the text we product can

be interpreted on its own

© Cognitive problems :

Writing is learned through a process of instruction: we have to master the

written form of the language and to learn certain structures which are less used in

specch, or perhaps not uscd at all, but which are important for elective

communication in waiting, We also have to learn how to organize our ideas in such

a way that they can be understood by a rcader who is not present and perhaps by a reader who is not known to us Vurthermore, writing is a task which is often imposed on us, perhaps by circumstances This is nol only has a psychological effect, it may also cause a problem in terms of content what to say Being at a loss for ideas is a familiar experience to most when we are obliged to write

Summary

‘This chapter has so far touched upon issues relating to the topic of the study Lt has discussed issues concerning writing: definitions of writing, roles of writing, the

teason Tor Leaching writing, approaches to leaching wriling and what make writing

difficult, Although writing in terms of definition can be seen differently, its roles cannot be denied Writing skills, therefore, must be taught thoroughly at school It is unavoidable thal they have a problem with teaching mothodology in writing lessons

Hence, writing activities has taken into consideration because teaching techniques

will be discussed in the next chapter.

CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY

In this chapter, the first part are general details about the context of the study and the next part introduces about the new ‘“Lieng Anh 11” textbook Later on this chapter is a detailed descriptions of the methods used in the study

2.1 The context : Tink Gia 5 high schoal

There are totally eight teachers of English, two males and six females Their Rnglish proficiency and toaching method are nol equally qualified Two of them have graduated for one year from Hue University so they don’t have many

experiences in teaching The rests graduated from English Department in Hong Due

University From my perspective, their interests im teaching are so varied, uot all of

them are really devoted to their teaching job

The 11" form students at Tinh Gia 5 high school are seventeon years old and have learnt Linglish, including writing skills, for five years Because the schoo! has just changed from semi-public school to the public school, most students are low proliency in all subjects including Fnglish Therefore teackring Fnglisty for these students is a big challenge for the teachers at this school

Thore are cleven classes of grade-11, Each class includes 40 students Generally speaking, the average class size of 40 students is rather big and inconvenient ‘The desks are arranged traditionally with iwo rows of six desks There is a narrow isle in the middle and two narrower ones on the sides, no other empty space left where the teachers and the students oan move to and fro if they implement different interactive aclivilies Moreover, the classrooms are nol equipped wilh modern facilities such as television, computer, and projector, except for a board

2.2 The new ‘Tieng Anh 11° textbook

The new “Tieng Anh 11° consists of sixteen units and six revision lessons Each

unill presents a lopic and is Tepresented via five lessons: reading, speakmg, listening,

writing and language foous respectively Such division aims to improve studants’ communicative skills and systematize important linguistic components

221 Objectives

* General objectives:

The textbook helps students with the following general objectives:

(i) Using English as a communicative tool to read, speak, listen and

write in target context at basic level

(ii) Acquiring fundamental and systematic target English knowledge (tii) Getting an overview of English speaking countries: people and

cultures: conserving and developing out national traditions and cultural identity

* Specific objectives:

Students will be able to achieve certain goals of each language skills underpinning in the texthook

(i) Reading: comprehending texts via practicing different reading skills:

skimming, scanning, etc enriching vocabulary and structures

(i) Speaking: asking answering, presenting the given topics, using daily

communication species: asking and giving opinions, instructions, asking

directions, and so on

(if) Listening: comprehending main and specific information of the text or

dialogue; improving basic listening skills

(iv) Writing : writing shor! compositions or forms based on model writing

To sum up, the objectives are concrete, relevant and appropriate to the high

school context in Viet Overall, the ultimate goal of English language teaching

is to enable students to acquire the target language knowledge and comnmnicative

skills in practice, In brief, the objectives sct in ‘Tieng Anh 11° by the writers are

aligned with the world tendency of inglish language teaching

22.2 Writing lessen

The new ‘Tieng Anh 11° Lextbook is designed to develop both students?

linguistic competence and communicative competence Therefore, its contents are

divided into 5 main parts taught in 16 units and after every three units students have

a revision lesson galled “lest yoursell” The required competences of wriling lesson

in each unit are detailed in the following table

2 Personal experience Writing a personal letter to describe a past

exporicnee

3 A party Writing an informal letter of invitation

4 Volunteer work Writing a formal letter expressing gratitude

6 ‘Competition Writing a letter reply

7 World papulation Interpreting statistic on population form a

chart

Celebrations Desuribing a celebration’ s aclivities

9 The post office Wriling a formal letler to express

or dissatisfaction

10 | Nature in danger Desoribing location

1 Sources of energy Desoribing information from a chart

12 ‘The Asian Games ‘Describing the preparations of the coming

Asian Games

A total of 200 grade-I1 students chosen randomly from five classes and &

teachers of Linglish from the language group at ‘linh Gia 5 high school participated

in the study

The students are both male and female at the age of seventeen They have

been learning English for $ years

All the teachers of English at Tinh Gia 5 high school chosen for the research

have taught the new textbook for al IeasL one year OF thesc 8 teachers, lwo are male

and six are female

2.3.2 Instruments

In this study, two instruments employed for collecting data were

qusstiormaires and classroom observation

23.2.1 Questionnaires

Questionnaires can be seen as the main instrument to get information from

students and teachers It is believed that survey questionnaires are the most

commonly used descriptive method in educational research Iwo sets of

questionnaires were delivered to 200 grade-11 students and 8 teachers of English at

Tinh Gia $ high school in order to investigate the challenges that teachers and

eng, Anh 11’ textbook

students face up with in leaming and teaching the new

The questionnaires for students consisted of 9 questions and the questionnaires for

teachers inchide 10 questions.

23.2.2 Observation

Another instrument used in this study is classroom observation Through observation, the researcher got more valuable evidence on grade-l1 students’ classroom behaviors as well as their performances on writing tasks and leaming

activities,

2.3.3 Procedure

On the first day of the survey, eight questionnaires were delivered to the teachers While the teachers were completing the questions, the researcher was beside them lo give em clarification if any confusion arose

On the next four days, 200 questionnaires were delivered to the students and

all the 200 completed questionnaires were retired While the sludents were

completing the survey the researcher was also beside them to give them any explanation if any confusion arose All the information was collected through the

Tesearchi

*s earolul nole-taking for later analysis

The observations were conducted im two months in five writing classes

During these observations, the researcher would play the role of an observer and did not participate in any classroom activities Several teachers had been asked to have classroom observation Bemg informed about the purposes of the study, all the teachers were always ready to support it

Summary

‘The author has introduced the context at which the study was conducted By conceming conditions of teachers, students, and facilities, she has revealed the disadvantages of teaching and learning writing skills al this school, Tr addition, ant overview on the new “Liéng Anh 11° textbook has taken in terms of the objectives, the teaching approaches, and the writing skills

CHAPTER 3 : DATA ANALYSIS AND STUDY FINDING

In this chapter, the research data will be analyzed in detail It also addresses

the justification of the choice of data collection instruments: questionnaire survey

and observations as well as the participants of the study The findings of the

research are showed and based on the result of the survey and the observations,

some suggestions are given with the hope that can be applicable for the teachers and

students of the research contexts and the readers of the thesis

3.1 Teachers’ survey questionnaires

3.1.1 How important is writing skill in the new ‘Tieng Anh 11' textbook in comparison with other skills (reading, listening, speaking and language focus)?

6

More important Equally important Less important

Chart 1: The importance of writing skill

Most of the teachers (75%) thought that writing skill was as important as other skills, two of them (25%) viewed it less important

3.1.2 What is (are) the purpose(s) of teaching writing at high school ?

To provide students with chances of communicating with each other | 38%

Table 3: The purposes of teaching writing

It can be seen from the table that the teachers might teach writing skills for

several reasons Most of them thought that writing helped their students revise the

vocabulary (88%) Besides, writing gave students more chance to practice grammatical structures (100%) Through writing the teacher can also check the

students’ ability of using English (75%), and the students can express themselves

(62%) Few of teachers (38%) said that the purpose of their teaching was to teach

students how to write effectively in different genres and communicate with each other,

3.1.3 Are tasks in the textbook suitable to your students’ ability?

Chart 3: Teachers’ general thought of the tasks in textbook

From the chart, we can recognize that the percentage of the answer “no” was

higher than the answer “yes” Many teachers (62%) thought that the tasks in the

textbook were not suitable to their students, they were difficult Because it is a fact that most students at Tinh Gia 5 high school were low profiency, even very low

profiency in using English The rests of teachers (38%) agreed that the tasks in

21

the new ‘Ticng Anh 11’ textbook were suitable to their students’ level Most off tasks were neither difficult nor easy ‘They were at average level and their students

can do these lasks well

3.1.4 What de pou think about the writing lesson in the textbook?

‘Evaluation of the writing lesson Agree Disagree Lesson length matches with lesson time 62% 38%

Type of writing are varity 100% 0%

Tasks are suitable to students” ability 38% 62%

Tasks are designed from low level to high one 100% 0%

‘Topics are familiar with students 62% 38%

Table 4: Teachers’ general thoughts of the writing lesson

There were many opinions when the leachers were asked to cvalne the textbook ‘Tieng Anh 11’ About the lesson length and the topics, 62% teachers

agreed that the lesson length matched with lesson time as well as topics were

familiar with students bul 38 % of them didn’t agree They thought that the length lesson was toc long to them finish the lesson on time All tasked were designed

from low level lo high one and there were many different types of writing int the

textbook however 62% teachers thought that the tasks were difficult to the students and only 38% of them agreed that the tasks were suitable to thei students

3.1.5 What problems do you often face up with when teaching writing?

The sare crowded and noisy so lhe teacher carmel control as | 75%

well as help cach student

Thore is no cooperation of the partners or group 75%

The textbook aclivities are not suilable and interesting 62%

Teacher’s lack of professional training in task design / adaptation |12%

Table 5: Problems in teaching writing

Rrom the rosulis im the tables, we can sec that there were many problems in teaching writing skills Students’ profiency in English, students’ low motivation,

passive learning style, sludents’ low background Imowledge were common

problems that almost teachers often faced up with when teaching writing(88%) Besides there was no cooperation of the partners or group(75%) Most students only

like working individually so group or pair work arrangement was not effective

Other problem was the task in the textbook 62% teachers said that the textbook

activities were not suitable and interesting to their students so it was difficult to attract students to the lesson Only one of them thought that difficults in teaching

writing came from teachers such as teachers’ low profiency in English, teacher’s lack of professional training in task design / adaptation, teachers’ understanding’

application of CIT Four other problems were given by 2 two teachers (25%) They

were lack of necessary facilities, fixed seat axrangement, time shortage and one reason from teachers was the inexperience in teaching new textbocks In general, it

can be proposed that their current problems were matly blamed on the students

They are nervous because of difficull tasks aud uninteresting topics 26%

They are molivated to the lask levels in each lesson 50%

They interested in different typos of writing 50%

They only sit on their scats and don’t take part in the given ateivities | 25

activelly

Table ó: Students’ actions in the writing lesson

‘As can be seen from the table, the majority of the respondents believed that

the students seemed to be in favor of the writing lesson A half of teachers stated

that their students were motivated Lo the task levels and imlerested in different flypes

of writing ‘Two respondents reported that the difficult tasks, the uninteresting topics made the students bored so they often didn’t either pay attention to the lesson or

take part in ihe given activities aclivelly Because of some reason,

94 (oauhorw admitted that most their students couldn’t write We will clearify these reasons in

the next questions

31.7 What factors influence your students’ participant

writing lesson?

and interests in the

Your methodology in teaching writing 88% 12%

Students’ background knowledge 100% 0%

Tests and exams 75% 35%

Students” motivation 58% 12%

Students” English ability 100% 0%