Common errors in writing journals of the freshmen majoring in english at ho chi minh city open university

Second, writing strengthens students’ learning, thinking and reflecting on the English language Rao, 2007.. This extensive writing or writing journals activity encourages students to pr

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ABSTRACT

Writing, a productive skill, 1s often considered as one of the most difficult skill of language learning In reality, many language learners find it difficult to write in English

because it’s quite different from writing in Vietnamese

The purpose of this study is to investigate the common errors that the freshmen at the Faculty of Foreign Languages of Ho Chi minh city Open University often commit when they write journals Besides, this study attempted to make some recommendations to help improve the current situation of teaching and learning English at this school The subjects of the study were 115 first year students of The

Faculty of Foreign Languages

The research findings revealed that there were a variety of errors produced by the

students in their journals The greatest number of errors that occurred in this study

belong to two categories: lexical errors and syntactic errors Syntactic errors consist of tense errors, verb form errors, subject & verb agreement, adjective & noun, prepositions and articles Lexical errors consist of errors in word choice, word form and spelling

Based on the research findings some recommendations were made The study was expected to help students improve their writing skill

iv

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 InfTOUCfIOT G- << TH TT HH TH HH 0004 1

1.2 Staternent OÝ DUTDOS€S, Ă G TH HT 3 1.3 Purpose of the study - - HH TH TH 1000 804 re 5

1.4 Research QU€SfÍOTIS - - << 9 họ HT Họ TH 5 1.5 Significance of the stUdyy - sọ Họ TH TH Tp 6

I0 ïv ii c-Tbà¡ 0.) T0 6 1.7 Significance of the stUỦyy - sọ co in nung 10

1.8 Overview of thesis Chapf€TS - Án ng ng eh 11

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 13 2.1 Methodology of teaching and learning WTIting - «<< c<ssseseesee 13

2.1.1 Product approach «HH HH ng 14 2.1.2 sóc Tooo in 16 2.1.3 Process-product approachh - se, 18

2.1.4 Genre approach - 4s HT TH nọ nhe 18

2.2 Review of related ]it€TafUT€ Án TH ng ry 20

2.2.1 L1 interference as a cause of L2 writing €rforS . 20

2.2.2 ETTOTS COTT€CIOTL - G6 SH ng ng g1 kg 20 2.3 Implication for the presenf stUdy' Ăn HH1 1s, 30 2.4 Chapter SUTTNITTATY - 1S TH TH HT nưp 30 Chapter 3: METHODOLOGY 31 kWNu- 2i n 31

ki» vi SN 5Ầ 31

kXsov 32

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3.5 Benefits of writing JOUTTIAÌS - - - << 39 ng nh ng gan 33 3.6 Approaches to writing and keeping jOurfiaÌS <5 5< + sxssessesesze 35 kWYĐ 0 nh 41

Chapter 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONS OF FINDINGS sevecseseeee 42 na chẽ — - 42

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4.1.4 Articles nh ố 47

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LI'À/0 6i 48 4.1.7 Verb ÍOTIm 5 sọ TH cọ TH Họ Hi nh 48

4.1.8 Subject and verb aBT€€1m€TI( - - - ÁS- TY ng 1g nekp 49

4.1.9 Ajective and noun OF€T- .- G5 S1 91 11119158518558511515 xe 50

Z2 nh 53 4.2.8 Ajective and 1OUTI OT(€T 5< s2 4 3 3 3 90 1 1 HH gà ng ng 53 4.3 Research question 2 .-. s-cc«cc<ceesee vesusesasesseesssesasesseenseenes 57 c9 0 an ố 60

Chapter 5: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS .-.-o« 61

5.1 Summary of results 0 cc 61

5.2 RecornrmnernidaIOTIS - «c9 TT gi ngán ngà ng can 62 5.2.1 Recommendations to teaCÌ€TS 5 5 SH 4H HH 1 vn, 62 5.2.2 Recommendations to stUC|€TI{S - - - s29 Sex n1 9 x01 reế 63 5.3 Limitations and recommendations for further studies - s5 - 64 5.4 Chaptersummary ¬ 65 REEERENCES 66 APPENDICES 71

APPENDIX A Total number of errors recorded from individual student 71

APPENDIX B Length of 20 jourmals ccccssssscssssesscsescecsssecsneenscsssscsenscesrssseecsseves 77

APPENDIX C Samples of students’ writing journals 0 cessesessseessceseeeseseeeeteres 84

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1 A model of writing diagram of process wrifting -.- 17

Figure 4.2 The frequency of types Of €TTOTS - 5 HH ng gu xe 54

vũ

“LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.Í Á comparison of genre and orientations - - c5 s<<<<sss+<c+ 19

Table 4.1.1 co (co an 42 Table 4.1.7 Types of wrong verb ÍOTTm - -s- «cv ng ng ng ng 49 Table 4.2 Students’ comrmon €TTOTS - - G5 < << < s9 9 in n1 rg 51 Table 4.3.1 Students’ writing fluency in terms of numbers of Words - 58

Table 4.3.2 Students’ fluency in WTifing Ăn HH ng ni 59

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Chapter One: Introduction

p £ This thesis was carried out to identify the common errors that the freshmen at the

Faculty of Foreign Languages of HCMC OU often commit when they write English This chapter starts with the introduction to the study together with statement of the study It also deals with the research questions, and the significance of the study Finally,

it gives the overview of the thesis chapters

1.1 Introduction

Writing has been defined in a number of ways which reflects the complexity of

waiting process Lannon (1989) views writing as the process of transforming the material

jnto a message with a definite meaning In other words, writing is a developmental

‘process In Teaching of English, Shankar (2003) has defined writing as a reflective activity The writers need enough time to think about the specific topic and to analyze

and classify the background knowledge Then, they need a suitable language to structure these ideas to have a complete product According to Tan and Miller (2008), writing as

an international, social communication that involves literacy as well Furthermore, it is taken as a means of social practices, through which patterns of participation, gender preferences, network of support and collaboration, time use, space, tools, technology and resources are included Zamel (1983), a pioneer in ESL wniting research, considered writing process as a “non-linear, exploratory, and generative process whereby writers

discover and reformulate their ideas as they attempt to approximate meaning”

Evidence of the growing importance of English L2 writing is becoming

increasingly dominant in both educational programs and in professional writing in non-

English dominant countries (Leki, 2001) “Becoming a proficient writer is one of the

major objectives of many students, especially for those who want to become members of international business, administrative or academic communities”, (Tribble, 1997 p.8)

EFL/ESL Writing has always been considered an important skill in teaching and

learning As commented by Rao (2007), EFL writing is useful in tworespects First, it

tes students’ thinking, organizing ideas, developing their ability to summarize,

m yze and criticlze Raimes (1983, p.6) also pointed out that “the close relationship between writing and thinking makes writing a valuable part of any language course” She, therefore, identified the different components for producing a clear, fluent and effective piece of writing: content, the writer’s process, audience, purpose, word choice, organization, mechanics, grammar and syntax In short, correct language, punctuation mechanics and logical content are considered important to communication in written work Second, writing strengthens students’ learning, thinking and reflecting on the

English language (Rao, 2007)

Writing reinforces the grammatical structures, idioms, and vocabulary that they were taught to students When students write, they also have a charicé to be adventurous

with the language, to go beyond what they have just learned to say, to take risks As a

result, they necessarily become involved with the new language In other word, the

effort to express ideas and the constant use of eyes, hand, and brain is a unique way to reinforce learning As students struggle with what to put down next or how to put it

down on paper, they often discover something new to write or a new way of expressing

their ideas They discover a real need to find the right word and the right sentence

One of the ways to help enhance students’ writing kills is to assign them to do extensive writing, in this case, the present study employs writing journals This

extensive writing or writing journals activity encourages students to process classroom activities and learning (Homstad& Thorson, 1996) Homstad and Thorson claim that in the writing journals, the topics may be assigned or chosen by the student The writing journal is a place in which students can explore various topics and means of expression

to develop fluency by writing extensively without fear of the instructor’s red pen.The writing journal focused on the present study will provide the researcher with real

situations when the students use free expressions without any control from the

instructors/lecturers Therefore, their common mistakes or errors will be naturally

revealed in order that the instructors/lecturers might be informed to adjust themselves for better training

: This paper investigated a case in an academic writing course among the first year

feadents at HCMC OU The study focuses particularly on the challenges faced by

‘stisdents in writing journals and identified common grammatical, structural and syntactic

errors made in writing tasks Based on the analyzed data, the students’ common errors or

mistakes will be presented in order to help the instructors/lecturers be aware of and to

enhance students’writing skills Moreover, the paper suggests some suggestions for

further research

1.2 Statement of the problem

According to Norrish (1983) writing is not easy and in some way, more difficult than speaking Writing is more complex in that it tests a per8on’s ability to use a language and the ability to express ideas As a result, a person needs to write not only coherently but correctly, which requires more time and effort (Lui& Braine, 2005) This difficulty of writing leads students to be more susceptible to producing errors Homstad and Thorson (1996) state that writing in a foreign language may prove too frustrating and difficult for students, have often been reluctant to incorporate writing-to-learn activities into their pedagogy This study was designed to identify important features of

students’ errors, the causes of their errors, and implications for teaching writing

Of the three elements of writing, content, organization, and language, it is fair to say that language has been considered the most problematic difficulty for L2 writers due

to their limited language proficiency or limited linguistic knowledge Silva (1993)

explains that inadequate language knowledge, sometimes, leads to ineffective L2 writing

on account of the differences between first and second language Olsen (1999) notes that

some EFL writers cannot create an effective written work due to the inadequacy of

syntactic and lexical competence, which at times makes them confused with the systems

of the target language they are learning Moreover, in her book, Weigle also states that

“because of theconstraints of limited second-language knowledge, writing in a second language may be hampered because of the need to focus on language rather than content” (2002, p.35) She claims that it is impossible for L2 students to write in a

‘second language properly without linguistic knowledge regarding grammar and

“vocabulary In addition, Connor (1996, p.83-84) suggests “taking cohesion into account,

‘while coherence is treated as a feature of discourse organization” According to him,

syntax errors are errors that affect texts larger than the word, namely phrase, clause, sentence and ultimately paragraph In other words, they are referred to as (1) phrase structure errors, (2) clause errors, (3) sentence errors, and (4) intersentence errors (cohesion) In the development of a paragraph, the fourth type of errors, cohensive errors, often occurs Halliday and Hasan (1976, p.48) identified “five types of errors: reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction and lexical cohesion” While cohesion is based on grammar or meaning, between parts of a piece of writing, coherence, on the

other hand, refers to a reasonable connection or relation between ideas, statement, etc In

addition, James (1998, p.162) concluded that “coherence is related primarily to content,

to the conceptual relatedness of propositions” Olsen (1999) carried out research in

English written by Norwegian EFL learners Language problems on different linguistic levels were analyzed and the theory of compensatory strategies was used The results

showed that less proficient learners had a higher number of grammatical, orthographic and syntactic errors, which can be attributed to cross-linguistic influence Moreover,

Sattayatham&Honsa (2007, p170-194) carried out a research identify the most frequent errors of first year students The result showed that the most frequent errors were at syntactic and lexical levels which led to the overgeneralization, incomplete rule

application, and building of false concepts In short, we can conclude that L2 writing can

be more difficult of syntactic properties of the two languages are very different, which makes L2 students rely on their first language when writing in a second language

bs Purpose of the study

: Nowadays, English, undoubtedly, is a must for applying a job Every company

¿ ires for fluently English writing skill as their requirement Most students know its importance However; they hardly know how to improve their wniting skill

As mentioned above, this paper focuses on some common errors that the freshmen

in this school commit to when they write journals And give out some recommendations

to help them improve their writing skill I think what they learn in the first year is very important for their following years It seems like a base for them to step forwards If this

base is constructed firmly, it will help the students go higher in English knowledge If not, students may be failed in their writing skill

In my research, I want to analyze the common errors in writing journals of the freshmen at HCMC OU and point out how the writing journals affects students’ writing

fluency Finally, I'd like to offer some more possible and optional techniques for

teachers in teaching writing skill

In the context of students at HCMC OU, the first year students have many limitations in writing English Pham Ho (2013) found that they committed a lot of grammatical errors They also have poor sentence structures Moreover, they find it hard

to express their ideas in English (Personal communication, 2012)

5 Significance of the study

This study benefits both the teachers and the students at the Faculty of Foreign

Languages of HCMC OU The results obtained in this study help the teachers know

‘more about the students’ problems in their writing through common errors they often commit Therefore, the teacher can find ways to help their students overcome the

problems as well as to select appropriate methods and techniques in their classes As for the students, when they can overcome the writing problems, their writing skill will be

better

1.6 Writing journals and types of journals

According to, Rasinski & Padak (1996) and Thistlethwaite (2000), journals are

collections of personal writing about or around a topic or general theme Entries should

be made on a regular basis — daily or frequently — and are usually kept together in a notebook or folder The important thing is to write, the only way for learners to improve

their writing or to demonstrate to themselves that they indeed can write This is a general

strategy for writers at all levels but is particularly appropriate for beginning writers Learners should date each journal entry Journals are not writing assignments to be corrected or graded, but should be used for communicating and writing practice The writer may elect to revise and extend some of the journal entries into more formal

assignments rather than starting from scratch

e Personal Journals/Diaries:

Personal Journals in which learners reflect their own experiences can be written

or dictated to a scribe, and can include drawing as well as writing If young

children keep a diary, parents should also keep one in order to model the process for children Entries in personal journals can be good first drafts for teaching the writing process

Moreover, a journal is some form of notebook in which daily writing (or at least

‘regular writing) is recorded Journals help people clarify their thoughts Jotting down

feelings, responses, and insights into daily events gives writers an opportunity to

discover what they think and how they feel about different topics Journal writing is informal, casual writing By writing about different topics, learners not only improve your writing skills, but also they have an opportunity to explore their thoughts without being chastised for grammar, usage, or other errors Journals are idea books; they are

places where writers are free to “think” in writing

e Dialogue Journals:

Dialogue Journals are kept by two people (teacher and learner, or child and parent) in which a written conversation over a variety of topics takes place Learners write informally about a topic of interest, a concern, a book they are reading, or a topic they are studying

e Response Journals/Reading Journals:

In Reader-Response Journals, learners are asked to respond to some experience and can take a variety of forms:

Noting new vocabulary words Writing about the character they identified with

Making predictions about what might happen next

Writing about the part they liked Writing about how the reading made them feel

Writing about what they would have done in the particular situation

described

Writing about how they could use what they Just read about Entries may be open ended or directed, e.g what advice would you give the

character, what do you think will happen if this story continued, or how the

character is like me

Double-Entry Journals:

For a Double-Entry Journal, learners divide their journal paged into two parts In the left-hand column, they write quotes or notes from their reading In the right-

hand column, learners write their response or reaction to the information they

have written in the first column

Types of Journals Learning Logs:

Learning Logs are journals in which students reflect on learning experiences they

take part in They can respond to questions they have about the experience or content, reflect on how well they understand the presentation, connect the

material to their own lives, or comment on their interest in the content

According to Sharilee Swaity 2012, there are many popular types of journal that people like to keep:

Daily Event Journals (Diaries) These are journals that keep track of events, often mundane, that act as a record for the future Several famous persons were

known to keep daily event journals These types of journals are usually used less for reflection, and more for recording facts and details They may also give

opinions about events These types of journals are sometimes called diaries Reflective Journals These are journals for expressing feelings, emotions and

insights These types of journals are good for reflecting on a person's life A

person may use a reflective journal to help them with life's problems, in a private,

safe manner

Christian Journals Some people like to use a journal to write about their

Christian walk They may use the journal to write down prayers, meditate on Scripture or to reflect on a devotional

Gratitude Journals A gratitude journal is a way to remember to be thankful The idea of this kind of journal is to write down at least one thing every day for which you are grateful

Mother Daughter Journals: A journal kept as a communication dialogue between mother and daughter

Travel Journals are another type A travel journal is for keeping track of what you see, hear and feel while you're on the road This is a great idea because

adventures always happen when you travel!

Nature Journals are for noting what a person sees while they are out in nature Gardening Jounals are for making notes about what you have done in your yard

and garden The benefits of keeping a garden journal is that a person knows what they have planted from year to year — what worked and what did not

Weight Loss Journals are tools used for losing weight They can be used to

write down food eaten, track exercise and montitor the emotions often involved in overeating

Health Journals are for keeping track of your physical symptoms so that you can tell the doctor or other health professional what is happening with your body Art Journals are journals that use art as well as text to for self-expression I have seen such beautiful art journals out there, that it is almost intimidating! This is a true art form that has grown and developed at a tremendous pace in the last few years

Idea Journals can be used to jot down ideas as they occur throughout the day This is an especialy useful for anyone whose job entails being creative and coming up with new ideas When I first started teaching, I used to carry an idea journal in my purse to write down lesson plan ideas.

: Dream Journals are for keeping a record of dreams One reason for a dream

, journal is that it is so easy to forget dreams as soon as one wakes up Writing it

down in a journal preserves it to look at later

Writer's Journal Now, this category may seem redundant, since almost all of these involve writing! But by a writer's journal, I mean a journal specifically for writers to write down their ideas, jot notes and sources for pieces they are working on

E? Writing errors and types of writing errors ¬—

According to Paul (1996 — 2013), there are 4 main types of mistake in written

h nguage: spelling, punctuation, grammar and usage

?

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Bpelling mistakes: English spelling is irregular and even many native-speaker adults

have difficulties with it Spelling mistakes do not usually prevent the reader from

understanding what the writer is trying to say, but they can create a negative impression

Punctuation mistakes: ESL students need to learn certain aspects of the English punctuation system, such as the way to punctuate direct speech In general, however, the

most serious of punctuation mistakes are made not only by ESL students, but by native

speakers too These mistakes are due to the lack of a clear understanding of what a

sentence is, and they result in fragments (incomplete sentences) or run-ons (‘sentences'

that do not end when they should)

Grammar mistakes are the next type of error commonly made by ESL students For example, learners often do not choose the correct English verb tense for expressing an

idea or do not use it in its correct form They may fail to use the articles (a/the) correctly,

or place words in the wrong order in a sentence

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£ mistakes are the final type of error often seen in ESL students’ writing A usage

ike does not break a grammar "rule", but is a word or string of words that a native

ke would never use to express the particular meaning that the ESL student is trying

Ravey It is usage problems rather than grammar problems in extended pieces of

_ g that immediately identify even the most proficient of ESL students as non-native

Biers Once again, the short-term solution to usage problems is to ask a native

; er to check the work; and the long term solution is to do lots of reading in English

: According to Dr Jeffrey Kahn, Illinois State University, all of the mistakes that

hc be made with respect to grammar, mechanics, and punctuation In Understanding

i Using English Grammar by Betty Schrampfer Azar (2000), common error types for

lt language learners are: Subject-Verb Agreement Errors; Verb Tense Errors; Verb

xm Errors; Singular/Plural Noun Ending Errors; Word Form Errors; Sentence

ructure Errors; Word Choice Errors; Articles; Prepositions of Location, Time or

irection; Phrasal Verbs

B Overview of thesis chapters

This thesis consists of five chapters including (1) Introduction, (2) Literature view, (3) Methodology, (4) Data analysis and Discussions of findings and (5)

clusion andRecommendations

Chapter 1 (Introduction) introduces the background to the study, the statement of

irposes, the research questions, the significance of the study and the organization of the ady

Chapter 2 (Literature Review) covers the studies related to this study which msists of three main parts The first part deals with the methodology of teaching and aming Writing The second part gives the review of related studies The third part is

e implication for the present study

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R hapter 3 (Methodology and Data analysis) presents the research methodology

foyed to collect data with information about the setting of the research, the

‘ lation, the instruments, the procedure of collecting data and data analysis

Chapter 4 (Results and Discussion of findings) reports the results and interprets

h ults presented then discusses them in relation to the two research questions and to

ir ults of previous research in the field

: Chapter 5 (Conclusion and Recommendations) summarizes the main findings of

® study On the basis of the problems and the causes of the problems that are kovcrcd and analyzed In Chapter 4 Besides, some solutions are put forward to

ie ove the English teaching and learning at the Faculty of Foreign Languages of

F MC OU There are also some recommendations for further study in this chapter

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Chapter Two: Theoretical Framework and Literature Review

: This chapter provides a critical review and analysis of the literature relevant to the

; in three sections: The first section (2.1) discusses the Methodology of teaching and

b ing Writing (Product approach, Process approach and Genre approach) The second

ion (2.2) deals with related studies L1 interference as a cause of L2 writing errors

Error correction.The third section (2.3) is the implication for the study

by Methodology of teaching and learning writing

Until the 1980’s, the focus of ESL writing was mainly accuracy For example, up

b the early 60’s, the audio-lingual method, which emphasized practice, punctuation,

find grammatical structure (Reid, 1993) was predominating In this method, learners

h ould have to copy sentence structures provided by the teacher until they acquired it

Ms t this point, teachers and researchers had little knowledge about or experience in

teaching writing (Reid, 1993), so those people had no choice but stick to the audio- Aingual method As a result, research into ESL writing gained little attention In the 70's, there was a gradual, but small change in ESL writing The classes still focused on

'grammar and accuracy, which stemmed from the audio-lingual method, but learners

‘would copy the provided sentences, and change them where necessary, or fill in the

‘blanks This is called controlled writing This trend continued into the early 1980s with value placed on grammatical structure, or with language-based writing Then some ESL

teachers and researchers started with a pattern-product approach or writing-based

‘approach, which focuses on creative composition and the organizational conventions

used in U.S academic prose (Reid, 1993) This approach is still applicable in the current

academic setting because of its practicality In the 1980s, ESL writing moved from a

language-base approach to the process approach It is unclear what brought the process

approach to ESL Reid (2001) claims that the issue arose for two reasons First, researchers recognize the newly developing field of Native English Speaker

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composition and realize the needs of English L2 students in the academic environment

In the process approach, writing was taught as a process of self-discovery; writers express their feelings in a climate of encouragement Kroll (1990), on the other hand,

points out that the introduction of the process approach to ESL composition seems to have been motivated by dissatisfaction with controlled composition and the current- traditional approach He goes on to say that “neither approach fosters thought or its expression nor encourages creative thinking and writing” (p.15) For those possible

reasons, the process writing approach began to be embraced by various ESL researchers

and teachers

For effective writing in EFL/ESL classroom, ELT practifioners suggest three approaches: product, process and genre The best practice in any situation will depend

on the type of student’s competence level, the text type being studied, the curriculum

and many other factors In this connection, it is worth mentioning what Gardner and Johnson (1997) argued, ‘“‘Writing is a fluid process created by writers as they work In actuality, the writing process is not a highly organized linear process, but rather a continual movement between different steps of the writing model” (p.36) In EFL/ESL

classrooms, product and process approaches have dominated much of the teaching of writing over the last 20 years In the last ten years, we have seen the growing

importance of genre approaches in the classrooms

2.1.1 Product approach

A product approach is “‘a traditional approach in which students are encouraged to

mimic a model text, usually is presented and analyzed at an early stage” (Gabrielatos,

2002, p.5) In another word, the product-oriented approach emphasizes mechanical

aspects of writing, such as focusing on grammatical and syntactical structures and

imitating models For example, in a typical product approach-oriented classroom,

students are supplied with a standard sample of text and they are expected to follow the standard to construct a new piece of writing Nunan (1999) also claims that the focus of

this approach is on coherent, error-free text and students will initiate, copy, and

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transform models provided by textbooks or by teachers Modeling is at the center of this approach and it has always been considered as a beneficial source for providing

feedback to students as well as being an effective teaching tool, if appropriately integrated into the context of writing process (Saeidi&Sahebkheir, 2001) Product

approach model consists of four stages (Steele, 2004)

1) Stage one: Students study model texts and then the features of the genre are highlighted For instance, if studying a formal letter, students’ attention may be drawn

to the importance of paragraphing and the language used to make formal requests

2) Stage two: This stage comprises controlled practice of the highlighted features, usually in isolation So if students are studying a formal letter, they may be asked to practice the language used to make formal requests, such as the “I would be grateful if you would ” structure

3) Stage three: This is the most important stage where the ideas are organized

Those who favor this approach believe that the organization of ideas is more important

than the ideas themselves and as important as the control of language

4) Stage four: This is the end product of the learning process Students choose from the choice of comparable writing tasks To show what they can be as fluent and

competent users of the language, students individually use the skills, structures, and vocabulary they have been taught to produce the product However, there are some disadvantages in this approach Murray, in his book, (1980) mentions the main disadvantage of using model texts in L2 writing classes He believes model texts prevent L2 learners’ creativity Particularly the way that model texts have been used in

the product-based approach has been criticized that is reading the text, analyzing it and

then starting to write (as cited in Saeidi&Sahebkheir, 2001, p.131) Moreover, Escholz

points out that the product-based approach encourages the learners to use the same plan

in different settings, apply the same forms, regardless of content, thereby inhibiting

writers rather than empowering or liberating them On the other hand, Escholz emphasizes that when models are appropriately integrated into the content of the writing process, they become useful teaching tools Models can lead students to be

15

aware of various aspects of writing such as style, vocabulary, organization and structure (as cited in Saeidi&Sahebkheir, 2001)

complete and polished responses to their writing assignments without going through

stages of drafting and receiving feedback on their drafts, be it from peers and/or from

the teacher, followed by revision of their evolving texts” (pp 220-221) In this approach the focus is on the steps involved in drafting and redrafting a piece of work

(Nunan, 1999) Its chief concern is to discover what writers do when they write, by

focusing on different stages that the writers will go through Matsuda (2003) states, the notion of writing as process was introduced to L2 studies by Zamel (1976), who argued

that advanced L2 writers are similar to L1 writers and can benefit from instruction emphasizing the process of writing Rather than the view of writing as a reproduction of previously learned syntactic or discourse structures, the process-based approach emphasized the view of writing as a process of developing organization as well as meaning (p.21) As cited in Tangpermpoon (2008), O’ Brian (2004) defines the concept

of process approach as an activity in which writing is regarded as the discovery of meaning and ideas

The Process Approach Model comprises of eight stages (Steele, 2004) Stage one (Brainstorming): This is generating ideas by brainstorming and discussion Stage two

(Planning/ Structuring): Students exchange ideas into note form and judge quality and

usefulness of the ideas Stage three (Mind mapping): Students organize ideas into a mind map, spidergram, or linear form This stage helps to make the hierarchical

relationship of ideas which helps students with the structure of their texts Stage four

(Writing the first draft): Students write the first draft This is done in the class

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frequently in pairs or groups Stage five (Peer feedback): Drafts are exchanged, so that

students become the readers of each other’ work By responding as readers students

develop awareness of the fact that a writer is producing something to be read by someone else and thus they can improve their own drafts Stage six (Editing): Drafts are

returned and improvements are made based on peer feedback Stage seven (Final draft):

A final draft is written Stage eight (Evaluation and teachers’ feedback)” Students’

writings are evaluated and teachers provide a feedback on it

The following diagram shows the cyclical nature and the interrelationship of the

There are advantages and disadvantages of process-based approach Schmitt

(2002) indicates that the process approach considers the composing act as a recursive,

explanatory and generative process Myles (2002) also believes that the process

approach to writing is only appropriate when learners have the opportunity to receive

feedback on their written text Therefore, process-based approach to writing, by giving

an opportunity to learners to receive feedback, allows students time to reflect and seek

input as the reshape their plans, ideas and language In addition, the process-based

approach is seen to be more effective than the product-based approach, since it allows

students to explore and develop personal approach to writing (Sutikno, 2008) But

h spite of all its advantages, lack of a good model can be seen as a drawback in this pproach According to Torghabeh, Hashemi, and Ahmadi (2010), the model can partly liminate the burden of devising content from the learners

f 2.1.3 Process-product approach

i

F As cited in Tangpermpoon (2008), Brookes and Grundy (1990) believe that if we teach the writing approaches separately this will result unbalanced L2 writing performance Therefore by integrating these approaches to writing, ESL/EFL learners

can transfer the skills they have gained from each approach from’oné mode to another

and have a much better writing performance Accordingly, writing teachers can start

teaching ESL/EFL learners the rhetorical patterns in the product-based approach and familiarize them with different text organizations through working on models, and combine it with feedback parts and interaction in the process-based approach

2.1.4 Genre approach

Genre-based approach considers writing as a social and cultural practice The

purpose of this writing involves the context where the writing occurs, and the

conventions of the target discourse community In this sense, relevant genre knowledge

needs to be taught explicitly in the language classroom The genre approach to teaching writing, as Paltridge (2004) claims, emphasizes the teaching of particular genre students need for later social communicative success The focus would be the language and

discourse features of particular texts and the context in which the text is used The

notion of genre is defined as “abstract, socially recognized ways of using language” (Hyland, 2003, p.21) which are purposeful communicative activities employed by members of a particular discourse community (Swales, 1990) Genre approach

emphasizes more on the reader, and on the conventions that a piece of writing needs to follow in order to be successful accepted by its readership (Munice, 2002) The following table upholds a comparative study of genre and process approach

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Attribute Process Genre

Main Idea Writing is a thinking process | Writing is a social activity

Concerned with the act of Concerned with the final product

writing

Teaching Emphasis on creative writer Emphasis on reader expectations

How to produce and link ideas | How to express social purposes

effectively

Advantages | Makes processes of writing Makes textual converitions

transparent transparent

Provides basic for teaching Contextualizes writing for

audience and purpose

Disadvantage | Assumes L1 and L2 writing Requires rhetorical understanding

similar of texts Overlooks L2 language Can result in prescriptive teaching difficulties of texts

Insufficient attention to Can lead to over attention to product written products

Assumes all writing uses Undervalue skills needed to same processes produce texts

There are some limitations that can be found in the genre approach Paltridge (2001) mentions that genre approach combines both the knowledge of text as well as

social, cultural for the students; as a result, specification of the either is a difficult job It

is also suggested by Swales (2000) that a genre approach over-focuses on the reader while paying less attention to learner expression

Both product and process approaches have their benefits and drawbacks;

accordingly, it is believed that complementary use of both approaches helps student

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writers develop their skills in using language by experiencing a whole writing process as well as gain knowledge from the mode] texts As a result, the current English writing in Vietnam can be improved and proficiency in their writing can be enhanced

2.2 Review of related literature

2.2.1 L1 interference as a cause of L2 writing errors

According to Wang and Wen (2002), L2 writers obviously get stuck when writing

in the target language because their mother tongue mainly affects the use of the second language; as a result, they may at times combine the systems of the two languages in

their L2 writing, which is called “language transfer or syntactit transfer” This is considered a severe problem of L2 writing as Fromkin et al (2003) clarify that L2

learners are so dependent on their L1 syntactic properties that they transfer some L1 grammatical rules in their L2 writing, eventually causing such errors Why do students

transfer L1 structures when writing in L2 language? Bhela (1999) describes this as the case resulting from the learner’s assumption of language equivalence However, no

language is identical regarding structures, lexicons, and systems; hence, the students’ prediction of equivalence leads to the cause of error and mistake production in their

second language written outcomes Furthermore, Hashim (1999) defines the term L1 interference as a cross-linguistic and language transfer, which is referred to the interference of the students’ mother tongue when they perform their language

competence and performance either in spoken or written forms Here, it means that L1

interference has, over the past few decades, become a major problem of those who learn anew language, and it tends to happen in the productive skills like speaking and writing Jie (2008) also supportively explains that the influence of the mother tongue affects L2 learning as “language is taken as a set of habits and learning as the establishment of new habits, a view sprung from behaviorism, under which language is essentially a system of

habits”

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Not only do foreign researchers pay much attention to LI interference in L2 students’ writing, but many Vietnamese researchers also do Vietnamese students

commit errors and mistakes in syntactic level because of the limited linguistic

knowledge That is, due to inadequate language knowledge, L2 writers make use of their

‘ mother tongue in L2 writing; therefore, the use of inappropriate structures and words are

always seen (Dam, P 2001) The interference, in his sense, is the students’ violation of the collocation restrictions It can be said that the Vietnamese learners tend to violate the -collocation rules in using words due to the limited vocabulary, which also further causes the interference to other levels like syntactic and discourse “levels Besides, L1

interference in Vietnamese students’ writing can be defined as a process in which

‘Vietnamese learners always think in Vietnamese before writing in English In a nutshell,

‘L1 interference, as defined and explained, is in relation to L2 writers’ prediction in terms -of syntactic equivalence between first and second or foreign language, which leads to

j such grammatical and lexical errors in L2 writing In order to assist student writers to enhance their writing performance, such problems should be identified Hence, an

“amount of research has, over the past few decades, focused on L1 interference that

“causes errors in L2 writing However, categories of the interference of the mother tongue are varied Bhela (1999) explored errors in L2 student writers The participants from Vietnamese were assigned to write stories according to the pictures given Then the L1

interference types found in each written story were classified The errors caused by the

mother tongue were as follows: 1) Apostrophe, 2) Punctuation, 3) Spelling, 4)

Preposition, 5) Capital letters, 6) Present & past continuous tenses, 7) Subject pronouns,

8) Vocabulary, and 9) Passive & Active voice By using the theories of Contrastive

Analysis and Error Analysis, L1 interference can be classified into three main

categories:

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1 L1 lexical interference: This sort of interference happens because of the lack of lexical competence Furthermore, the vocabulary levels of the two languages are

different; as a result, when writing or translating in English, Vietnamese students

normally use a form of direct translation, which leads to the errors in terms of word choice

2 L1 syntactic interference: This category is related to grammatical errors found in students’ writing It can be divided into seven sub-categories as follows: word order, subject-verb agreement, tense, the infinitive, the verb “have”, prepositions and noun

determiners

3 L1 discourse interference: This happens because of the differences between the

styles of Vietnamese and English text format, including essay patterns, organization, and concepts The sub-categories of this interference are language style level and level of cultural knowledge

In conclusion, it is fair to say that L1 interference in L2 writing has recently investigated in many contexts, and a number of L1 interference categories have been

found and proposed in the area of teaching L2 writing To consider the categories of L1 interference as illustrated above, those that affect L2 writing accuracy need to be determined, since L1 interference has been considered to be the main problem of L2

students’ writing difficulty

2.2.2 Errors correction

Despite the importance of error correction and the amount of emphasis that both

teachers and students place on it, however, doubts often arise on the effectiveness of

error correction due to the phenomenon that students keep making the same mistakes

even after being corrected many times (Semke, 1984, Sheppard, 1992) The pointless of error correction caused some scholars, Truscott (1996) in particular, to claim that

grammar correction is ineffective and harmful, and should be abandoned all together in the writing class By giving both empirical and theoretical reasons, Truscott proves that grammatical correction does not work Truscott also points out that grammatical

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` ection may even be harmful As a result, grammatical errors should not be seriously ged if they do not affect the transformation of meaning in the writing In case

atical correction must be provided, the teacher should specify what the error is,

d explain why there is such correction, all of which aim to provide learners with an explanation for the acquisition of structural knowledge, thus equipping learners with explanatory adequacy

Error feedback, also by the name of error correction, grammar correction, or

corrective feedback, can appear in different forms (Ancker, p2000) It can be either oral

(teachers provide oral feedback through individual conferencing with students) or written (teachers mark or correct student errors in written form); ditéct (teachers correct

errors for students) or indirect (teachers indicate the errors but not correct them);

comprehensive or selective; coded (teachers mark the types of errors with special codes, such as T for a wrong tense, SP for a wrong spelling, WC for a wring word choice) or uncoded (teachers indicate the errors without providing any explanations or codes)

Many studies that compare the efficacy of different types of error feedback have come to

the conclusion that indirect feedback, be it coded or uncoded, when coupled with verbal

conferencing can help students more than any other type of feedback because students

are alerted to errors, guided about the rules and given an opportunity to self-correct their arrors (Ferris & Helt, 2000) Several studies report that indirect feedback leads to either greater or similar levels of accuracy over time (Ferris &Helt, 2000; Lee, 1997) Ferris

also claimed that direct error correction led to more correct revisions than indirect

feedback, over the course of the semester, however, students who received indirect

feedback reduced their error frequency ratios substantially more than those who received

direct feedback

The student-teacher conference and peer feedback are two kinds of feedback that have been under studied The study of Bitchenere et al (2005) suggested that incorporating student-teacher conference into the feedback given to L2 writers can be beneficial The effects of the combination of direct, explicit, written feedback and

student-teacher-5-minute individual conferences and direct, explicit, written feedback

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h y, and no corrective feedback were compared They found a significant effect for the

pmbination of written and student-researcher conference feedback on the accuracy

; els of the use of the simple past tense and the definite article, but no overall effect on

: curacy improvement when the three error categories: the past simple tense, the definite

: ticle and prepositions were considered as a single group Giving feedback through

j dent-teacher conferences may very well provide the opportunity for scaffolding

h ough the interaction between the teacher and the student, which clarifies the

ronfusion that the students experience, and helps students maximize their achievements

ah ough the social interaction Although Bitchenere et al (2005) provided an evidence

Yor the effectiveness of student-teacher conferencing and that a corfésponding learning

lt eory may exist for using a student-teacher conference as a way of providing feedback

to students’ writing, there may be some disadvantages to it; that is, when the number of students in a class is over forty, there may be difficulties in arranging a twenty-minute

student-teacher conference for each student

Peer feedback, another method of social interaction, may be an option that can be

incorporated into the various feedbacks given in a large class Vygotsky’s original notion regarding scaffolding was that the experts provide instructional assistance to the

novices to facilitate their development However, recently, researchers have proposed that peer-to-peer interaction may also assist learning That is, a novice can also

simultaneously serve the role of an expert (Tudge, 1990) This idea has been applied in

second language acquisition The possible impact of the peer-to-peer interaction in L2

learning has gained increasing attention in recent studies (Kuiken & Vedder, 2002) By

peer-to-peer feedback, teachers may assign tasks to students which require them to co- construct outputs In order to construct the outputs together, students need to verbalize with each other their problems regarding meaning, forms and function, and engage each other in an interaction toward problem-solving Through such a process, the awareness

of the linguistic forms to be used in the output is believed to be raised through peer interaction, and further L2 acquisition is expected to be achieved However, although the

possible impacts of peer-to-peer interaction in L2 writing class on enhancing the

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learners’ grammar accuracy are asserted in the theories, not many empirical studies are available to verify the actual effects of the designs based on the concept of peer-to-peer interaction Kuiken and Vedder’s (2002) experiment designed to examine the effect of

peer interaction in acquiring knowledge of passive forms, serves as one of the few recent

evidences showing peer interaction as a promising technique for acquiring grammatical knowledge More empirical studies are needed to test and modify the theories Also, in order to accommodate the widely varied teaching/learning conditions in different settings, various designs with peer interaction in L2 writing class are needed A comparison of the effects of various designs should also be the concern of L2 writing

studies

According to the Writing Study Group of the NCTE Executive Committee,

November 2004, writing instruction must include ample in-class and out-of-class opportunities for writing and should include writing for a variety of purposes and

audiences Writing, though, should not be viewed as an activity that happens only within

a classroom’s walls Teachers need to support students in the development of writing

‘lives, habits, and preferences for life outside school We already know that many

students do extensive amounts of self-sponsored writing: emailing, keeping journals or doing creative projects, instant messaging, making Web sites, blogging and so on As much as possible, instruction should be geared toward making sense in a life outside of school, so that writing has ample room to grow in individuals’ lives It is useful for teachers to consider what elements of their curriculum they could imagine students self-

sponsoring outside of school Ultimately, those are the activities that will produce more writing In any writing classroom, some of the writing is for others and some of the writing is for the writer Regardless of the age, ability, or experience of the writer, the use of writing to generate thought is still valuable; therefore, forms of writing such as

personal narrative, journals, written reflections, observations, and writing-to-learn

strategies are important

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Results of an analysis of grammatical errors in writing composition made by the

second year students of Madrasah Aliyah Asmaul Husna in academic year 2009-2010 by

Ahmad Dahlan University on March 21, 2010 revealed that writing errors categories are

the uses of articles, verb tenses, preposition, punctuation, capital letter, spelling, word form and word order

There were other studies on errors in writing As cited in a study of errors

committed by Isizlu speaking learners of English in selected schools by Muzi V

Nzama, El-Sayed (1982:73) revealed that the subjects of his study generated 1140

errors: 640 errors were verbs and verbals, 159 errors in pronouns, 143 in articles and the rest were nouns, prepositions and adjectives Karma and Hajjaj-(1989:151-152) and Farhat (1994:47) attribute many of the article errors to mother tongue interference Belhhaj (1997:120) investigated the errors his students generated in the translation

papers The result showed verb formed tense errors, relative clause, adjective errors, preposition errors, noun errors, articles errors and miscellaneous Radwan (1988) examined the types of grammatical and lexical errors in the nominal group The result showed that the errors made in the use of articles had the highest percentage

Haifa Al-Buainain (2009) conducted a case study, “Students’ writing errors in

EFL”, at the English Department (now called Department of Foreign Languages) in The University of Qatar that most EFL students are weak in writing courses, namely, Writingl, Writing 2 and Advanced Writing In general, the students writing

show the characteristic defects below which confirm Weirs (1988) conclusions: a) High frequency of grammatical errors; b) Lack of variety in grammatical structures employed; c) Use of inappropriate vocabulary; d) Use of inappropriate grammatical structures; e)

Limited range of vocabulary; f) Poor spelling; g) Inadequate understanding of the topic;

h) Deficiency in clear self-expression; j) Poor punctuation; k) Poor handwriting; 1) Untidiness

SaadiyahDarus and KhorHeiChing from School of Language Studies and

Linguistics, Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, UniversitiKebangsaan Malaysia also did research on writing errors It was a case study: Common Errors in Written

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English Essays of Form One Chinese Students This study aims to investigate the most

\ mmon errors in essays written in English by 70 Form One Chinese students in a

helected public school in Perak For all of these students, Chinese is their first language

(L1) Using an error classification scheme and Markin 3.1 software, 70 essays were

analyzed and categorized into 18 types of errors The results of the analysis show that

four most common errors were mechanics, tenses, preposition, and subject-verb

agreement

From these findings, the present study has a foundation to investigate the common

errors that the freshmen at the Faculty of Foreign Languages, HCMC OU, committed to

when they write English The instructor asked the students to writế journals every day and check their work every week without correction This is a kind of free writing, they

can write what they are interested in At the last week of the 15 weeks of Writing1, the

instructor collected the students’ journal writing for the researcher to analyse the data

A recent research by Pham-Ho (2013) was conducted at the Faculty of Foreign Languages at HCMC Open University The results showed the activities employed in the writing classrooms were in the world trends However, the students were assigned to

compose only from 4 to 6 writing during the 11-week course There seems to be not enough writing practice in terms of extensive writing to improve students’ writing fluency Moreover, the researcher discussed a new way in teaching writing There are 4 stages in writing activities First, students select the topics According to Hyland (2002,

p 80), “teachers should give suitable topics for students with specific purposes and clear steps in order that they feel comfortable to write” Weir (1993, p 134-135), had the similar opinion and stated that teachers should consider giving topics to students

carefully If the topics are not practical or not suitable for students’ ability, they cannot

write well Therefore, topic selection is very important in teaching and learning writing classes Second, that is pre-writing Many researchers call it “brainstorming” Most of

them think that this stage is one of the most important activities It helps students build the ideas before writing assignments Researchers such as Hyland (2002; 2003a),

Oshima& Hogue (2006) had the same point of view that students need to brainstorm

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i en they prepare for their writing task In a case study conducted in a foreign language

k s, Ojima (2006) showed that pre-writing stage helps students write better Students

Hl have good work if they have a good outline This stage can take 70% time

b uming in writing process.Third, students compose their ideas to make a complete iting task With their outline, they easily order the ideas to make the essay or

5 agraph coherent However, what they do in this stage is a draft Fourth, students have : ponses to the drafts

È According to Pham-Ho (2013), this stage decides the quality of their writing

h at’s the reason it becomes important First, after having the drafts, the writers give

fhem to their groups to have peer-feedback Then they correct what were identified in

b eir draft Next, they will hand in the revised drafts to their writing teachers to have

be dback Last, after correcting the teachers’ feedback, they hand in their writing to the

k achers The last stage is evaluation When students are satisfied with their writing, they submit their work for teachers’ evaluation

In other two studies, Pham-Ho and Uhasa (2009) and Pham-Ho and Uhasa (2011)

showed that peer-feedback is very necessary and effective It helps students share experiences and learn from each other to improve their writing skills In the teaching and

writing process, assessment of learning outcomes is very essential However, it’s not

completely in writing assessment Hyland (2002, p 88) argued that “writing is a process The teachers cannot evaluate students’ ability on their last articles” And Hughes (2001,

9 75) showed that “the best way to improve students’ ability is to make them write” So,

%rfolio is the most important way of assessment This is a kind of process approach in writing teaching

A research by Mullen (2001), the author showed that students should write to

mhance their skills He suggested students should write for their schools’ magazines In

his case, the Faculty of Foreign Languages at HCMC OU has developed students’ EFL

lournal Students are able to write what they like and popular with them That gives students a chance to practice and improve their skills Besides, writing teachers can help

28

eir students with their difficulties in writing and find the best method to apply in their iting classes as well as do their future researches on writing teaching

Luu Trong Tuan (2010) investigated to see if learners could get out of the writing Mifficulties by engaging in journal writing activity 85 second-year students from the two

writing classes at the Faculty of English Linguistics and Literature of the University of

Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City (USSH-HCMC) participated in the

study The study found that journal writing as an extensive activity is a beneficial

activity to foster learners’ writing motivation and enhance their writing skill as well as to

build a close bonding between teachers and learners

In “Tìm hiểu về các hoạt động dạy và học mơn viết tại khộ Ngoại ngữ DHM TPHCM”, Pham-Ho (2013) presented some problems that the freshmen at HCMC OU

encounter when they wrote their paragraphs or essays assigned by their writing teachers The researcher also interviewed the instructors and observed their classes to have an overview of writing teaching and learning at the Faculty of Foreign Languages at

HCMC OU Data collection was from the questionnaire, classroom observations, and

unstructured interviews at the 2" Semester of the Academic Year 2011-2012 This is a

descriptive research It was conducted in Writing-1 and Writing-3 classes 219 first year students and 5 writing teachers participated in the study

In the interview, one teacher gave her opinion that the students were bad at

grammar though they had studied basic grammar They had problems in grammar

usages, word choice and order the ideas in their writing According to another teacher,

the students had limitations in languages, sentence structures and grammar In general, the freshmen at the Faculty of Foreign Languages have difficulties in making outlines,

using grammar structures, sentence structures and languages Moreover, they aren’t

good at word choice or word connectors The most important problem is that they aren’t creative because they don’t like reading at all

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2.3 Implication for the present study

As discussed above, few studies above focused on training students with extensive writing activities to improve students writing fluency Writing journals is a kind of

*xtensive writing practice which helps students enhance fluency and overcome lifficulties in writing Writing journals refers to a daily of events or a kind of dairy,

students can find it easier to write what they like in their journals In addition, most

studies investigated the students’ writing errors in controlled manners such as

eacher/peer feedback Few have investigated those errors in “real situation” when the students use free expressions in their extensive writing Free expressions in writing

ournals usually lead to writing errors or mistakes and this is somehow the errors in the

‘eal situations when the students conduct their writing without any control from the mstructor/lecturer Therefore, the present study also takes this issue into account for

jJeeper investigation

2.4 Chapter summary

This chapter has just presented the literature relevant to the study such as L1

interference as a cause of L2 writing errors and Error correction

In the first section, it is an overview of Methodology of teaching and learning

writing (Product approach, process approach and Genre approach)

Furthermore, this chapter presents a research by Pham-Ho (2013) It drew a picture

of teaching and learning at the Faculty of Foreign Languages of HCMC OU

In the next section, the four common problems that the students often encounter are

reviewed including L1 interference as a cause of L2 writing errors and Error correction

In this chapter, some previous studies which relate to this study are also review

30

Chapter Three: Methodology This chapter contains five sections: the setting of the research, the subjects, the data

llection procedure, data collection and data analysis In other words, these sections

plain when and where the study was carried out, who were involved in the study, and

how the study was conducted

3.1 Pedagogical Setting

Ho Chi Minh City Open University has been operating for 19 years The University has three modes of delivery: on-campus, in-service “and distance The University’s vision is to be ranked in the top ten universities in Vietnam, achieve trust from society for providing quality formal training and to become the leading University

in informal and distance learning The University has developed cooperation with oversea universities to provide quality learning experiences for its students

The research was conducted at 422 DaoDuyAnh, PhuNhuan District, a branch of HCMC OU First year students of the Faculty of Foreign Languages study at this branch

3.2 Participants

At the second semester of the Academic Year 2011-2012 of the Faculty of Foreign Languages of HCMC OU, there were seven Writing-1 classes (363 students) The

samples of this study were the students from 3 Writing-1 classes The instructor was in

charge of and was the only one who assigned students to write journals every week His purpose of assigning the students to conduct these activities was to improve students’

writing fluency and to get students used to writing a foreign language, English This met the purpose of the researcher to collect data The researcher asked the lecturer’s

permission for collecting students’ writing journals for data analysis

The total samples were 115 students from 3 intact classes that were taught by one

instructor They were freshmen who enrolled in 2011 majoring in English The

mstructor asked the students to write journals every week during semester 2 Each

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dent had to compose around 5 writing journals every week The topics for writing

were selected by the students’ own choice They could find any problems during the day

br problems in their learning to write journals The instructor/lecturer asked them to use

free writing styles in order that they could produce any writing on any topic for their journals The instructor/lecturer did not provide any feedback in terms of grammar mistakes or errors committed by the students in their writing However, he checked every week if the students completed their duties in these kinds of assignments The student writers were announced that their efforts on writing journal assignments would receive 5% bonus at the end of the semester The course lasted 45 periods in 15 weeks

to writing the second language and to improve their writing fluency They could select any topic to write Writing a journal is different from writing diary The students came

up any topic in their minds during the day and they expressed their ideas into a journal The purpose of this genre is to encourage students to do extensive writing with belief (of

the instructor) to help enhance students writing fluency The students wrote their

journals in their notebooks At the end of the course, they submitted their journal writing

to the instructor/lecturer for data analysis,

The present study investigated the weekly writing journals to see the common srrors that the students often committed to when they expressed their ideas in authentic

situations This was just one kind of homework and the students were credited as 5%

bonus

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