the reality of teaching and learning english writing skill at tran nguyen han high school in hai phong and recommendations

LIST OF TABLE S Table 1: Checklist of writing tasks in English 11 textbook ...18 Table 2: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards appropriate time for teaching and learning English wri

I hereby certify that this minor thesis is the result of my own work submitted in partialfulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, except where reference ismade in the text of the thesis and that the thesis in whole or in part has not been submittedfor a higher degree in any other tertiary institution

Pham Thuy Trinh

2009, September

On the completion of this work, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to mysupervisor, Mr Khoa Anh Viet, MA for his precious advice, instructions, suggestions, andespecially, invaluable critical feedback and correction as well as his invaluableencouragement

My special thanks go to Dr Le Hung Tien and all the lecturers who have been teachingK15 MA course in Viet Nam National University - College of Foreign Languages, and tothe post- graduate staff for their legitimate contributions to the success of the course

I also wish to acknowledge the great support and precious help with the data collection andanalysis of the leaders, colleagues, and students of five classes at Tran Nguyen Han highschool Without them, I could not have finished my thesis

Last but not least, my heart-felt thanks are due to my family and other individuals whoalways stand by me for their love and understanding and encouragement, material andspiritual support throughout this thesis

Based on such findings, the study has also suggested some ways to reduce the difficultieswhen teaching and learning writing and to help to improve the quality of teaching andlearning writing at Tran Nguyen Han high school.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES vi

PART A INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 The significance of the study 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Methods of the study 2

PART B DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1 Definitions of writing 4

1.2 Writing versus Speaking 5

1.3 Writing Difficulties 6

1.4 Approaches to teaching writing 6

1.4.1 The Controlled to Free Approach 6

1.4.2 The Free-Writing Approach 7

1.4.3 The Paragraph-Pattern Approach 7

1.4.4 The Grammar- Syntax-Organization Approach 7

1.4.5 The Communicative Approach 8

1.4.6 The Process Approach 8

1.5 Writing in the communicative classes 11

1.5.1 Purpose 11

1.5.2 Audience 12

1.5.4 Forms 14

1.5.5 Responding to students’ writing 15

1.6 Summary 16

CHAPTER 2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 17

2.1 The context at Tran Nguyen Han high school 17

2.1.1 The teachers 17

2.1.2 The students 17

2.2 The new “ Tieng Anh 11” textbook 17

2.2.1 Grade 11 writing objectives 17

2.2.2 Writing lessons 17

2.3 Research questions 18

2.4 The participants 18

2.5 Instruments 19

2.6 Summary 19

CHAPTER 3 DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 20

3.1 Data analysis 20

3.1.1 Data analysis from teachers’ survey questionnaire 20

3.1.2 Data analysis from students’ survey questionnaire 25

3.2 Findings 30

3.2.1 The teacher’s and students’ attitudes towards the teaching and learning of writing 30

3.2.2 Students’ difficulties in learning writing 31

3.2.3 Teachers’ difficulties in teaching writing for grade 11 students 31

3.3 Summary 32

CHAPTER 4 RECOMMENDATIONS 33

4.1 Techniques in pre-writing stage 34

4.1.1 Identifying the purpose and audience 34

4.1.2 Analyzing models 35

4.1.3 Brainstorming 35

4.1.4 Interview 36

4.1.5 Asking journalists’ question 36

4.2 Techniques in the while-writing stage 37

4.3 Techniques in the post-writing stage 37

4.4 Techniques for motivating students 37

4.4.1 Using oral presentation 37

4.4.2 Using games 38

4.4.3 Providing an appropriate tone of feedback 38

4.5 Summary 38

PART C Conclusion 39

REFERENCES I APPENDIX 1 III APPENDIX 2 VI APPENDIX 3 IX APPENDIX 4 X

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURESI LIST OF TABLE S

Table 1: Checklist of writing tasks in English 11 textbook 18

Table 2: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards appropriate time for teaching and learning English writing skill 21

Table 3: Teachers’ opinions on the writing lessons 22

Table 4: Difficulties encountered by the teachers 22

Table 5: Teachers’ expectation for better teaching and learning situations 24

Table 6: Difficulties encountered by the students 25

Table 7 : Students’ personal views of causes of difficulties 26

Table 8: Students’ expectations for better teaching and learning situations 30

II LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: The importance of writing as perceived by 11th form students 20

Figure 2: The importance of writing as perceived by the teachers 20

Figure 3: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards students’ writing competence 21

Figure 4 : Teachers’ pre-writing techniques 27

Figure 5: Work arrangement in While-writing stage 28

Figure 6: Teacher’s activities during the While-writing stage 28

Figure 7: The main source of feedback on students’ writing 29

PART A INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

In the process of globalization, English plays an important role in enhancingeconomy, politics, culture and international relations between many countries Therefore,there is a great demand for teaching and learning English in the world as well as in VietNam English users today focus more on the ability to communicate in spoken and writtenlanguages However, according to Trang and Baldoff (2007), the education quality has notmet the society’s expectation because mostly high-school graduates cannot communicate

in English effectively in both oral and written forms Under the urgent demand ofimproving the quality, Vietnam’s English language teaching has recently undergone acomprehensive reform Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training has issued a newset of textbook for high school students in order to develop students’ communicativecompetence The new textbook displays two new teaching approaches They are learner-centered and communicative approaches However, regarding Vietnam’s context, thechange will create a lot of difficulties to teachers of English who are too familiar to the oldteaching methods, especially in teaching writing skill, which seems to be the most difficultwork in teaching English

At Tran Nguyen Han high school, teaching writing skills is really a big challenge.For the teachers, they used to teach the old textbooks in which writing has no place.Therefore, they have no experiences in teaching theme-based writing Another problem

is the students’ low level of English proficiency That is why they find it difficult towrite Moreover, lack of motivation also faces the students They often get bored andindifferent in the writing lessons In my opinion, the current problem must be workedout and appropriate teaching techniques should be made Up to present, a fewresearches have been carried out on the teaching of writing for students in Hai Phong.Most of the researchers have studied others problems concerning teaching other skills

in Hai Phong

As a teacher of English, who is aware of the fact and wishes to contribute somesuggestions for possible improvements in the teaching and learning of writing skill, Idecided to do the research entitled “ The reality of teaching and learning English writingskill at Tran Nguyen Han high school in Hai Phong and recommendations.”

2 Aims of the study

The main purpose of this study is to research the current reality of teaching andlearning writing skill to 11th form students at Tran Nguyen Han high school on the basic offinding out the difficulties experienced by the teachers and the students Furthermore, somesuggestions are made to stimulate the students and some recommendations are made toimprove teaching methodology for the teachers at Tran Nguyen Han high school

3 The significance of the study

Pedagogically, the findings and comments of the study are believed to be relevant toimproving the teaching of writing to the students The study may help teachers to maketheir writing lessons more effective so that they can help their students develop writingskill as well as other language skills

4 Scope of the study

The study focuses on the reality of teaching and learning English writing skill to 11grade students at Tran Nguyen Han high school In addition, some recommendations for abetter writing teaching and learning situation are presented Although the author is wellaware that the survey statistics are not fully representative of all high school studentsstudying English in Hai Phong, she hopes to propose some of the most popular facts thatoccurring in this study

5 Methods of the study

Both quantitative and qualitative methods are employed to carry out the study With theaim of increasing validity and reliability of the data collected, the survey questionnaires will bedelivered The purpose of the survey is to collect data about the current situation of teachingand learning writing at Tran Nguyen Han high school Informal interviews with the colleaguesand the students are also conducted Besides, reviewing the related documents is also amethod to establish the theoretical background for the study

6 Design of the study

The study is expected to consist of three main parts:

Part A includes the rationales, aims, significance, scope, and methods of the study

Part B includes 3 chapters

Chapter 1 deals with definitions of writing, the differences between writing andspeaking, writing difficulties, approaches to writing and writing in the communicativeclasses

Chapter 2 discusses the methodology of the study, i.e describes the study context,participants, and instruments Besides, the introduction of the new “Tieng Anh 11”textbook is elaborated

Chapter3 is about the data analysis and findings It describes how collected data isanalyzed and presented

Chapter 4 provides recommendations for better teaching and learning English writing skill

Part C is the conclusion which summarizes the thesis and offers some suggestions forfurther research Besides, the limitations of the thesis are also pointed out

PART B DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1 Literature Review

1.1 Definitions of writing

There are a lot of definitions of writing According to Byrne (1991), writing can bedefined as the act of forming graphic symbols When we write, we use graphic symbol(alphabet, grammar, and structures) to make visual meaningful utterances Therefore, onone level, writing can be said to be the act of making marks on flat surface of some kinds.However, writing is not just simply putting words, sentences together Many researcherstended to focus on the nature of writing as an entity of linguistic creation For example,Brannon, Knight and Neverow-Turk (1982, p 2) pointed out “ writing is a creative art, not

as assembly line operation of locking words together into sentence and bolting sentencestogether into paragraphs in accordance with a predefined plan.”

Other researchers considered writing as a communicative process with purposefulinteraction between the participants For example, NuNan (1999, p 100) stated, “Writing

is not a solitary act, rather, it is the result of the interaction among people, contexts, andtexts.” Oluwadiya (1990) considered the nature of writing as “a process” of “via-textcommunication” between an addresser and an addressee

However, writing, in language teachers’ opinions, is “a language skill which isdifficult to acquire” (Tribble, 1996, p 3) It is “a process that occurs over a period of time,particularly if we take into account the sometimes extended periods of thinking thatprecede creating an initial draft.” ( Harris, 1993, p 10)

In short, the definitions of writing are various However, writing is characterizedwith some basic features, i.e being linguistics, creative, progressive and interactive.Besides, the word “writing” itself may imply an act, a process, or a skill, which needspractice and study to develop It requires both physical and mental powers from thewriters

1.2 Writing versus Speaking

Both writing and speaking are productive skills However, according to someresearchers, writing is different from speaking in terms of three criteria, i.e linguistics,creating process and interaction

In terms of linguistics, Ur (1996) distinguished writing from speaking based on “itsexplicitness, density and standard language” (p 160) He asserted that the distancebetween the reader and the writer deprived the writer of speech-related advantages like thereal context, paralinguistic feature etc The writing content, thus, was expected to be moreexplicitly, densely and universally comprehensibly presented than that of speech

In terms of producing process, these two productive skills are also different Raimes(1983) found out that while “speaking is usually spontaneous and unplanned,” writingprocess is “recursive, planned” and “time-consuming” (p 5) Harmer (2004) concludedthat writing process with “its recursiveness and multiple drafting,” (p 8) is more complexthan speaking process

In terms of interaction, according to Ur (1996), due to the “detachment” of space andtime in writing, the writer tend to be cut short of “immediate feedback and interaction”with “known” audience, which are supposedly available to the speaker (p 161) Harmer(2004) also point out the two features of face-to-face interaction which writing is devoid

of, i.e immediate verbal or non-verbal reactions and frequent role swapping between theaddresser and the addressee (p 8) Consequently, the writers tend to encounter commondifficulties in defining audience (Brown, 1994, p 326) and receiving feedback fromreaders (White, 1981)

To conclude, regarding the three criteria investigated in previous studies, i.e.linguistic feature, producing process and interaction, writing and speaking, by nature, aretwo different stories This sheds more light on the characteristics of writing

1.3 Writing Difficulties

According to Byrne (1979), there are three difficulties that a writer must face upwhile composing a text, i.e psychological problems, linguistics problems and cognitiveones

In terms of psychological problems, speech takes place with the interaction of bothspeaker and the listener Writing, on the other hand, is solitary without the possibility ofinteraction or the benefit of feedback, which makes the act of writing psychologically difficultfor writers

With regard to linguistics problems, writers encounter the restricted use of means ofexpression Speech is spontaneous We have little time to pay attention either to organizingour sentence structure or to connecting our sentences We repeat, backtrack, expand and so

on, depending on how people react to what we say, while incomplete and evenungrammatical utterances are tolerated Speakers have a considerable range of devices tohelp get their meaning across, while writers can only resorts to their own efforts and theirchoice of sentence structures as well as sentence linking to ensure that their text can beinterpreted on its own

Furthermore, writing also requires us to master the written form of the language foreffective communication in writing and the methods of organizing ideas in a logical andcomprehensible way that can be understood by not present readers or unknown ones

In conclusion, writing not only imposes on us a psychological effect but also causes

us problem regarding its content both linguistically and cognitively

1.4 Approaches to teaching writing

Raimes (1983, pp 5- 10) presents 6 approaches to teaching writing, namely: TheControlled-to-Free Approach, The Free-Writing Approach, The Paragraph-PatternApproach, The Grammar-Syntax-Organization Approach, The Communicative Approach,and The Process Approach

1.4.1 The Controlled to Free Approach

The Control-to-Free Approach in writing is sequential At lower level, students areoften given sentence-level exercises or controlled compositions to imitate, copy and

manipulate Students therefore make few mistakes Only at advanced level are studentsallowed to try some free compositions, in which they can express their own ideas

In short, this approach stresses upon three features: grammar, syntax and mechanicsand on accuracy rather than fluency Thus, students are likely to have good grammaticalcompetence and low communication skills

1.4.2 The Free-Writing Approach

Unlike the Controlled Approach, this approach emphasizes content and fluency.Students are often given the topics and write with little correction from teachers Teachersmay begin their classes by asking students to write freely on any topic without worryingabout grammar and spelling Frequent practice like this will help them write fluently withconfidence Teachers do not correct these short pieces of free writing They simply readthem and may comment on the ideas the writer expressed Moreover, the emphasis in thisapproach is on audience, content and fluency However, concern for accuracy and form isseen as of little importance in this approach This shortcoming very likely has negativeeffect on learners’ grammar competence in writing

1.4.3 The Paragraph-Pattern Approach

The Paragraph-Pattern approach stresses on organization Students work withparagraphs They copy paragraphs and imitate model passages They put scrambledsentences into paragraph order, they identify general and specific statements, they choose

or invent an appropriate topic sentence, they insert or delete sentences This approach isbased on the principle that in different cultures people construct and organizecommunication with each other in different ways Therefore, students should invest time inlearning to organize their ideas well in the target language

1.4.4 The Grammar- Syntax-Organization Approach

Adding some improvements to the Paragraph-Pattern Approach, this approachstresses on simultaneous work more than only on organization of an essay

Teacher adopting this approach often devises writing tasks which draw theirstudents’ attention to organization while working on grammar and syntax For example, towrite a clear set of instructions on how to operate a calculator, the writer needs more thanthe appropriate vocabulary He needs the simple forms of verbs, an organizational plan

based on chronology; sequence words like first, then, next, etc In the preparatory stage,these vocabulary and structures are reviewed and taught In short, this approach is thecombination of the purpose and the form of the writing

1.4.5 The Communicative Approach

The communicative approach emphasizes the audience and purpose of a piece ofwriting In writing classes adopting this approach, students are encouraged to ask twoquestions as if they wrote in real life:

- Why am I writing this?

- Who will read it?

The traditional audience for student writing is the teacher, but since somemethodologists argue that that writers do their best when they write for a real audience,teacher have extended the readership to other students in the class, who will do the work ofresponding and commenting, not correcting their classmate’s work Therefore, one topic like

“describe your dearest friend” can take on new dimensions when the teacher sets a newaudience to it:

 You are writing to a pen pal in London telling him or her about your dearest friend.You love your friend very much, so what you want to make the description as beautiful aspossible

 You are writing to your pen pal’s mother in London, telling her about your dearestfriend Your friend wants to change her style (hair style, dressing style, etc.) but youcannot offer any suggestion, so you need your pen pal’s mother to give some advice toyour friend

 Your dearest friend and your pen pal are both attending a summer camp in Londonnext month, and you want them to meet each other Write to your pen pal, describing yourfriend in detail so that he or she can recognize your friend when they are there

Providing a reason and an audience for students may well provide motivation forthem to write Therefore, this approach should be exploited to teach writing to secondarystudents as it can vary the situation and context of student writing

1.4.6 The Process Approach

The teaching of writing has recently moved away from a concentration on the writtenproduct to an emphasis on the process of writing, which leads to the emergence of Process

Approach Process Approach to writing came into play in the 1970s This approach encouragesstudents’ communication of ideas, feelings, and experiences It is more global and focuses onpurpose, theme, text type, i.e the reader is emphasized Thus, writers not only concern aboutpurpose and audience but also have to make decisions on how to begin and how to organize apiece of writing

Writing is a process, so students are given time to set out ideas, make plan, write afirst draft, revise what has been written after a peer feedback, then they can edit theirwriting or write other drafts before the final version is produced

There are different points of view on the number of stages comprising the writing process.According to Oshima and Hogue (1991), writing process has four stages: pre-writing, planning,writing and revising draft and writing the final copy to hand in Tribble (1996) identified fourstages in writing process: pre-writing, drafting, revising and editing The author of this studytakes the views that are close to the ways Tribble , Oshima and Houge defined writing process-that is, the writing process comprises three stages: pre- writing, while- writing, and post- writing

1.4.6.1 Pre-writing

Pre-writing can be defined as any structural experiences that influence active students’participation in thinking, talking, writing and working on the topic under the focus in awriting lesson (Tribble, 1996) On other words, pre-writing stage is the “information-gathering phase in the process of writing” ( Scarcella & Ofxord ,1992, p 125 )

According to Gu Yue Gou (1990, p 170), pre-writing is a very important stage of thewhole writing process, and the task at this stage may include deciding on the purpose, theaudience, the content, and the general outline

White and Adrnt (1991) briefly categorized prewriting activities into three types:generating, focusing and structuring activities

In the view of Bryne (1988), students generate ideas and also develop fluency in thisstage Pre-writing involves activities like brainstorming, outlining, debating, interviewing, etc

1.4.6.1.1 Brainstorming

According to Raimes (1983), brainstorming is a technique whose purpose is toinitiate some sort of thinking process Whatever the writing assignment is based on- areading, a picture, a textbook topic, personal experience…- it can be preceded by student

talk, especially by a brainstorming activity, with students producing relevant vocabulary,making comments, asking questions and making associations as freely as they can in ashort time After brainstorming orally together, students can then do the same on paper,writing down as many ideas as they can without worrying about grammar, spelling,organization, or the quality of the ideas

1.4.6.1.2 Planning

In this stage, groups of students spend time organizing and focusing ideas andoutlining their writings (Coffin et al., 2003) Planning is an orientation for students to havelogical sets of ideas that would be later employed in their pieces of writing

1.4.6.1.3 Debating

This is an activity in which groups students orally present two sides of an argument.Oral debates provide the opportunity to develop some writing skills such as planning,selecting, marshalling, and organizing ideas Debating helps students make judgmentsabout the relevance and logicality of their ideas and make wise choice of which ideas to beused to compose a text

1.4.6.1.4 Interviewing

In this activity, students are asked to interview other group members for writingideas When the students write the record of an interview, they convey to other genuineinformation transmitted to them by other students The interview is an useful techniquebecause it creates a relaxed atmosphere in which students have chance to get to know eachother and writing could be more enjoyable and interesting to students

Besides individual work in this stage, group work and pair work can be used

1.4.6.3 Post-writing stage:

Hedge (1988) asserted revising and editing after composing was an integral part of thewriting process There are two main post-writing activities The first, mentioned by Harmer(2003) is self-revision and self-editing The second type of post-writing activity is rewritingbased on the feedback or comments from the teachers or their peers (Harmer, 2004)

1.5 Writing in the communicative classes

If one writes to communicate, he or she must have in mind an intended reader and areason for writing beforehand In other words, the communicative approach stresses thepurpose of a piece of writing and the audience for it Students are encouraged to behavelike writers in real life and to ask themselves the crucial questions about purpose andaudience:

- Why am I writing this?

- Who will read it?

Or:

- What is the purpose of this piece of writing?

- Who am I writing this for?

1.5.1 Purpose

The specific nature of a writing task in a communicative class is formed by acombination of factors in which the purpose, form, and readership are of crucial importance

Purpose here is used to indicate “the writer’s communicative intentions” (Harris,

1993, p.18) Purpose, according to him, falls into types:

 Instrumental purpose: Writing is considered a means of practicing the grammar,vocabulary, discourse structures of the target language

 Personal purpose: Writing is a way of expressing the self and discovering thoughthe act of writing something more of one’s individuality and social identity

Some consider the purpose of the text as its communicative function Therefore, textscan be grouped, for example, according to whether they are intended to entertain, inform,instruct, persuade, explain, argue a case, present argument, and so on

Feist thinks that defining your purpose helps you choose the information you need

before start writing: “…what you say about topic largely depends upon your purpose forwriting” (1996, p 24) He also states that one’s specific purpose is likely to fall into one offive categories:

 To explain something: you might write a paragraph to explain why certain dressesare in fashion this spring

 To persuade your reader to do or think something: you might write a paragraph topersuade your customers to purchase new dresses in a fashion line

 To compare two things: you might compare this spring’s fashion with the last spring’sfashion

 To describe something: you might simply want to describe what this spring’sfashion look like

 To give your opinion about something: you might write about why you like ordislike this spring’s fashion

Other authors believe that most good writing fulfills one of the four purposes: i to express oneself, ii to inform, iii to persuade, iv to entertain (Troyka & Nudelmen, 1994,

p 22) They state that once writers have a specific purpose for a piece of writing, it willhelp them to select the most appropriate ideas for their topics and to determine the mosteffective way to express those ideas to the reader

Thus, before any piece of writing is produced, the first and foremost question to beraised is “Why am I writing this?” The answer to this question will help the writer indeciding the content as well as the form of the product

1.5.2 Audience

1.5.2.1 The importance of audience in writing

According to Troyka & Nudelman (1994), the goal of any pieces of writing is tocommunicate effectively with the people who are going to read them, or the audience.Audience can be as specific as your classmates, your instructor, your friends, your family,

or your boss Sometimes, the general public who read your local newspaper is youraudience Different audience will differently affect your writing’s content, vocabulary, andtone Therefore, as you write, ask yourself:

 Who is going to read this?

 How much do they already know about my topic”

 What are their attitudes about my topic?

1.5.2.2 Audience diversity in writing class

For a long time, writing by pupils was almost always addressed to the teacher seeneither as an assessor or examiner – the person who told them whether it was a good orbad piece of work In an attempt to provide more flexibility and a greater sense of reality

in the writing curriculum, a greater diversity of audiences was proposed One of suchattempt is the classification formulated by the writing research team at the Institute ofEducation at London University (Britton et al., 1975) This identifies the followingcategories of audience:

(i) Self

Child or adolescent to self

(ii) Teacher

Child to trusted adult

Pupil to teacher, general (teacher- learner dialogue)

Pupil to teacher, particular relationship

Pupil to examiner

(iii) Wider audience (known)

Expert to known laymen

Child to peer group

Group member to working group (known audience which may include teacher)

(iv) Unknown audience

Writer to his readers (or his public)

of a complaints department of a company, for instance In real world, there are manywriting tasks for which the writer can have only a very generalized sense of the readership

In order for communication to be successful, writers need to know as much as possible

about a target audience Harris (1993, p 23) thinks that four factors need to be taken intoaccount:

- The formality or informality of the relationship between reader and writer

- The expertise of the readership – what degree of prior knowledge andunderstanding can be assumed?

- Cultural assumption – how far is it likely that the readers will share a commoncultural background with each other and with the writer?

- Attitudinal assumptions – are the readers likely to hold attitudes in common withthe writer or does the writer have to explain and justify his or her attitudes?

The writer’s awareness of each of these factors will influence a whole range ofdecisions that have to be made when writing In terms of classroom practice, Harris believesthat it seems to be more immediately realistic and helpful to build up pupils’ awareness ofsuch factors rather than to strive to create genuine “known” audiences or to postulate pseudo-audiences

1.5.4 Forms

Many attempts have been made to classify writing According to Harris (1993, p.16), “…the most long-established is the fourfold division of classical rhetoric – exposition,argument, description and narration.” In the system, pieces of writing are classified inrelation to writer’s intentions: is he or she wishing to make a point, to report on something,

to relate events and so on? This classification has determined the writing curriculum inschools with the focus on such text types as essays, compositions and reports

However, these types of writing, unfortunately, do not have any real place in society atlarge For example, for the same intended purpose to persuade, writers can rely on manydifferent text types Harris continues: “At one extreme, there are complex and lengthy reportsabout policy issues or such things as tenders for civil engineering projects These are full oftechnical details but are intended to persuade people to a course of action At the otherextreme, there are simple texts such as health warnings or posters supporting anti-littercampaigns that are also intended to persuade people to a course of action” (1993, pp 16-17).Thus, the essays and compositions, while highly valued in the world of education, play little or

no part in the world outside Obviously, the traditional classification does not thoroughly coverall types of texts Nowadays, a more satisfactory and relevant way of looking at types of

writing has been devised By forms of writing, such things as poster, brochures, pamphlets,letters, recipes, sets of instructions, lists, labels, stories, reports, poems, essays, play script, and

so on are meant

1.5.5 Responding to students’ writing

Responding to students’ writing, if limited to only teacher’s correcting students’mistakes, loses a lot of its communicative nature To make this step more meaningful andcommunicative, Raims (1983) introduced three useful techniques as follows:

1.5.5.2 Talking about the paper

One of the best ways to help a student revise a paper is to discuss it with the student

in person One-to-one conferences are extremely time-consuming and, in some teachingsituations, just not practical Often, however, a conference of just a few minutes can be soproductive that some teachers hold very short conferences before and after and even duringclass while other students are writing or working together in groups The virtue of theindividual conference, however short it is, is that a real discussion takes place

1.5.5.3 Students’ responses to students’ writing (peer feedback, peer correction,

or peer review)

To reduce teachers’ work load, students should be given the chance to give feedback

to their peers In this way, they exchange papers and give written comments or evenindividual talk to one another about the writings as the teacher does Through thisprocedure, students learn a lot from each other and at the same time get to know each otherbetter Ur stated “Peer correction can be a time-saving and useful technique; also, criticalreading for style, content and language accuracy is a valuable exercise in itself This can be

a substitute for first-draft reading Student can work together on their first drafts, givingeach other feedback on content, language, and organization, they then rewrite and give inthe final version to the teacher” (1996, pp 171-172)

By doing this, peer feedback also helps students gain awareness of audience

However, teachers should give them the framework to keep the activity under control.

1.6 Summary

In short, this chapter conceptualizes the discussion of issues and aspects concerningtopic of the study First, it concerns the concepts and ideas of teaching writing, thedifferences between speaking and writing and the differences approaches used in teachingwriting Secondly, it focuses on theoretical background of communicative writing classeswith an emphasis on context and audience The practical contents of the research, i.e.research methodology, discussion of the results and recommendations concerning thespecific research context, are to be described in details in the following sections

Chapter 2 Research Methodology 2.1 The context at Tran Nguyen Han high school

2.1.1 The teachers

The English language group consists of 10 teachers aged from 24 to 46 Threeteachers graduated from English Department, University of Languages and InternationalStudies Four graduated from English Department, Haiphong University The othersgraduated from the in-service center in Haiphong city Half of the teachers were trainedunder the strong influence of the traditional teaching methods The rest - the younger ones

- were trained to teach English based on communicative approach Their interests inteaching are different, not all of them are really motivated to their teaching job

2.1.2 The students

The 11th form students at Tran Nguyen Han high school are seventeen years old.Although they have been learning English for four years at lower-secondary schools, theirEnglish knowledge is still limited Besides, they have no clear determination on Englishlearning goal

2.2 The new “ Tieng Anh 11” textbook.

The new “ Tieng Anh 11” textbook composed by Van, H V et al., (2006) has been inuse since 2006 as the official textbook to learn general English at grade 11.The textbookconsists of 16 units in terms of 16 topics There are five parts in each unit representedthrough 5 lessons: Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing, and Language Focusrespectively The book adopts two new approaches: learner–centered and communicative,aiming at students’ better use of English “as a tool of communication at basic level interms of listening, speaking, reading and writing” (Van, H.V et al., 2006, p 33)

2.2.1 Grade 11 writing objectives

The aim of the course is to equip students with English writing skill for basiccommunication For grade 11 students, the objective is to develop students’ abilities toprovide 100 - 130 word paragraphs on familiar topics

2.2.2 Writing lessons

In the textbook, reading, speaking and listening lesson are divided into three parts:pre-task, while-task, post-task In contrast, 30% of the writing units consist of one topicand some prompts

In order to realize the course objective, the writing section focuses on daily andpopular topics The required competences and objectives of the writing lesson in each unitare detailed in the following table:

1 Friendship Writing about a friend

2 Personal experiences Writing a personal letter to describe a past experience

3 A Party Writing an informal letter of invitation

4 Volunteer work Writing a formal letter expressing gratitude

5 Illiteracy Describing information in a table

6 Competitions Writing a letter of reply

7 World Population Interpreting statistics on population from a chart

8 Celebrations Describing a celebration’s activities

9 The Post Office Writing a formal letter to express satisfaction or

dissatisfaction

10 Nature in danger Describing a location

11 Sources of energy Describing information from a chart

12 The Asian Games Describing the preparations for the coming Asian Games

13 Hobbies Writing about a collection

14 Recreation Describing a camping holiday

15 Space Conquest Writing a biography

16 The Wonders of the

world

Writing a report on a man- made place

Table 1: Checklist of writing tasks in English 11 textbook _++_thth

2.3 Research questions

The thesis is designed to seek answers to the following questions:

- What is the present situation of teaching and learning English writing skill at TranNguyen Han high school?

- What difficulties do the teachers and the 11th form students encounter in teachingand learning writing?

- What are the suggested ways to effectively improve the current situation ofteaching and learning writing at this school?

2.4 The participants

The study was conducted with the participation of 100 students and 10 teachers These

students were selected at random from 100 students of 5 classes 11A1, 11A2, 11A3, 11A4,11A5.

2.5 Instruments

To reach the primary purposes of the study, two main instruments were used anddescribed as follows

(i) Instrument one: Questionnaires

The questionnaire for the students was written in Vietnamese so that they would notmisunderstand the questions The questionnaire was designed to investigate the students’attitudes toward the learning of writing, the difficulties they encounter in learning writing,and the students’ expectations for better teaching and learning writing skill

The questionnaire delivered to the teachers was strictly conducted in English Itaimed to find out the teachers’ attitudes toward the teaching of writing, the difficulties theyencounter in teaching writing, the teachers’ knowledge of Process Approach, and theteachers’ expectations for better teaching and learning writing skill

(ii) Instrument two: Interviews

The interviews help to get better insights into the research questions The interviewquestions, including 10 items, were sorted out based on the survey questionnaires to getmore information in details Ten teachers and 25 students were invited to discuss forfurther information about the items raised in the questionnaires

CHAPTER 3 DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS 3.1 Data analysis

This part of the thesis is the treatment of all the data collected from the surveyquestionnaires conducted on 10 teachers and 100 students

3.1.1 Data analysis from teachers’ survey questionnaire

• Teachers’ personal information

Among the ten teachers taking part in the study, there are 1 male and nine females.The teachers’ ages ranges from 24 to 46 There are 4 young teachers teaching English athigh school for fewer than 5 years, 4 teachers with 5 - 10 years of experiences, 2 teacherswith 10 - 20 years experiences, no teacher who has more than 20 years of English teachingexperiences

They have spent from one to three years teaching writing skill to high schoolstudents

• The importance of writing as perceived by 11th form students and the teachers

12%

50%

20%

18% The least important

The most important

0%

60%

20%

20%

The least important

The most important

Figure 1: The importance of writing as

perceived by 11th form students

Figure 2: The importance of writing as perceived by the teachers

As can be seen from the figures, 18 percent of the students took writing the firstpriority For the teachers, 20 percent of them considered writing the most important 20percent of the teachers ranked writing at the second position

The low level of agreement about the importance of writing can be explained through

my interviews with the teachers and the students The teachers and the students pay muchmore attention to the results of the final exam and university entrance examination whichfocus on grammar, structures and reading skill That’s why both the teachers and studentsneglect improving other skills such as speaking, listening and writing

• Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards students’ writing competence

Figure 3: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards students’ writing competence

From the figure, it can be seen clearly that the majority of the teachers assessed their students’real ability still bad 55% of the students agreed with their teachers’ ideas 20% of the teachers and 12%

of the students responded that the students’ writing competence was really bad 28 % of the studentsthought their writing competence was quite good while only 10% of the teachers agreed with that Only5% of the students thought their writing competence was good and no teachers agreed with the idea

• Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards appropriate time for teaching and learning English writing skill

What are the appropriate periods (45 minutes/ period) for teaching and learning Englishwriting to 11th form students?

c more than 2 periods/week

Options (period/W) Number of teachers

Table 2: Teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards appropriate time for teaching and

learning English writing skill

As can be seen from the table, most of the teachers thought that the time for teaching andlearning writing one period a week at Tran Nguyen Han high school was not enough In myinterview, most of the teachers said that getting their students to make an outline and correctingtheir students’ errors were time-consuming Due to the students’ low level of Englishproficiency, the teachers spend a lot of time explaining new words and new expressions as well

as instructing how to make an outline The students also commit a lot of errors in their writing

so it takes the teachers much time to correct their students’ errors in class Some students withlow level of English proficiency cannot recognize the errors and cannot correct them.Thus, the teachers often write these errors on the board and correct them to save time

• Teachers’ opinions on the writing lessons

Agree Disagree

Topics are interesting but the knowledge relating to the topics is not

adequate

Writing section lacks particular context (purpose, audience) 8 2

Table 3: Teachers’ opinions on the writing lessons

As can be seen, the majority of the surveyed teachers thought that the writing lessons weregood with interesting writing topics but the knowledge relating to the topics was not adequate.Most of the teachers disagreed with the idea that tasks were beyond students’ ability Besides, most

of the teachers thought types of tasks were not various Many of them said in many units, studentsjust went through only one task which was based on given prompts This caused students to getmore difficulties in writing Furthermore, many of them reported that writing section lackedparticular context That means lack of purpose and audience

• Difficulties encountered by the teachers

I have the most difficulties in teaching:

Table 4: Difficulties encountered by the teachers