Improving grade 10 student’s writing skill through error correction

The relationship between the errors, the correction and the process of teaching and learning writing skill... Pointing out basicerrors as well as instructing students to correct is one o

THANH HOA SERVICE OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

TRIEU SON No2 UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL

Field: English

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

1.INTRODUCTION

1.1.Rationale………… ……… ……….… 1

1.2 Aim of the study……….2

1.3 Scope of the study……… ….……… 2

1.4 Method of study……… 3

2.CONTENTS 2.1 Theoretical and practical background……….…… ……4

2.1.1 Writing……….………4

2.1.1.1 The concept of "writing" in the theory of language 4

2.1.1.2 Writing process 5

2.1.2 The concept of " errors " and "correction"……….……… 6

2.1.2.1 An overview of errors 6

2.1.2.1.1 Concept:……… ………….6

2.1.2.1.2 Classify errors……… ……7

2.1.2.2 An overview of the correction 8

2.1.2.2.1 Error correction……… ……….……….8

2.1.2.2.2 Some basic methods of error correction for students………8

2.1.3 The relationship between the errors, the correction and the process of teaching and learning writing skill .9

2.2 The state of the problem ……… ……….… ….… 10

2.3 Solutions:…… … ……….……… ……….………… … 11

2.3.1 Teachers 11

2.3.1.1 The steps in the evaluation process of students’ writing…….… ….11

2.3.1.1.1 Identify "What errors need be corrected……….… 11

2.3.1.1.2 Determine "how many errors should be corrected……….… 11

2.3.1.1.3 Form methods of correction……….… ……… 11

2.3.1.2 The steps after evaluating students’ writing……….… …… ……….13

2.3.1.2.1 Organize general comments after marking ………… ………13

2.3.1.2.2 Provide students with the basic principles of writing and exercises

involving errors which students often make……….…………13

2.3.2 Students 13

2.3.2.1 Change the attitudes of students towards the correction 13

2.3.2.2 Emphasize the importance of reviewing and correction 13

2.3.2.3 Instruct students how to find and point out errors 14

2.3.2.4 Apply repeatedly drafting .15

2.4 The effectiveness of the experience 15

3.CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS……… ………….……….18

REFERENCES……….……….………… ………….…20

1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale for the study.

Being an international language, English is used in all aspects such as science, technology, communication, business and so on This is the reason why it has become a compulsory subject in most of Vietnamese schools In order to reach the goals of the subject, not only teachers but also students have been looking forthe best teaching and learning approaches

After graduating from educational universities, we have been working asteachers of English at Triệu Sơn No2 upper secondary school Our school islocated in a countryside area, so we meet lots of difficulties in teaching andlearning, especially in English subject It can be seen from the result of entranceexaminations that most of the students in our school are not good at English Thismakes us try our best to find and apply suitable ways to improve their English.The English group of our school has six members, who all graduated fromuniversities of education As young teachers, we always work hard with greatenthusiasm Annually, we manage time as much as possible to observe thelectures of our colleagues, then we hold the meetings to share experiences andgive supporting ideas to make the following lectures more successful

When studying a foreign language, we must pay attention to manyfactors, for example vocabulary, pronunciation, intonation, grammar, etc Amongthem, writing is considered as one of the most important skills, which a learnerhas to master if he really wants to acquire language competence LearningEnglish is not an exception, especially in time of international economicintegration, when most information sources are written in English, it requireswriting skill Therefore, The Ministry of Education and Training has long chosenEnglish a compulsory subject in the GCSE In the 2014 GCSE exam, twenty fivepercent of the exam’s content was comprised by writing In the 2015 combinedexam ( GCSE and university entrance), writing also accounts for 20 percent ofthe exam’s content This is more evidence of writing skill’s importance inlearning English For students, they have ever done and will have to approachmany forms of writing forms to achieve their language competence However,according to Nunan ( the Professor of Teaching English to Speakers of OtherLanguages), producing a coherent, fluent and extended piece of writing isprobably the most difficult thing to do

In the process of learning foreign languages, making errors is aninevitable thing, especially while learning writing, students have difficultieswriting texts because they require consistency and coherence Pointing out basicerrors as well as instructing students to correct is one of the best ways to helpthem improve their writing skill Analyzing situations in which students oftenmake errors also helps to improve writing skill

For teachers who bear the primary responsibility for helping studentsachieve this skill, the effectiveness of teaching depends mostly on what kinds oferrors need correcting and on the ways to correct From errors, studentsthemselves can realize whether they meet writing requirements or not Thisenables teachers to assess students' achievement Then, “How are errorscorrected appropriately?”, “Whether or not error correction will ever helpimprove students’writing skill? “What are the best methods to apply ?” These arethe questions which have always emerged to me in my teaching period

With the experience through the process of teaching writing skill for

students in grade 10, I would like to submit the topic: "“Improving grade 10

student’s writing skill through error correction” to make a small contribution

to the education renovation Hoping that with this experience, we will make

lessons more logical and interesting when applying it into our teaching approach

1.2 Aims of the study

For the reasons given above, this article may give a clue about the high

temperature and wind speed in Britain, especially the English 10 Small plates:

- Give to one more comprehensive English 10

- Provide a few basic facts about the role of the lagoon operation

- Recognize the impact of climate change on public health

•To investigate students’ attitudes towards writing skill through error

correction in English 10 and the difficulties they face

• To study whether the modified writing skill could help students improvetheir writing skill

1.3 Scope of the study

Suggested writing skill from unit 1 to unit 16 Due to the limited knowledge,

energy and time, the researcher was unable to carry out the investigation on a large scale This action research was only conducted for only 8 weeks with the four writing lessons and in the context of 40 tenth-grade students at Trieu Son No2 High School in the academic year 2017-2018 only Hence, the results of the

study is only limited to the above teaching context and participants

1 4 Methods of the study

The author has applied the following methods in this study:

Data collection results from interviews (for teachers), surveyquestionnaires (for students) and class observations

Data analysis is done through coding, classifying, and reporting theinformation.

- The consultant must prepare a plan for the project to be implemented, in a timely manner,in a coherent manner

- Activities must be short, simple

- Actions should be consistent

- Actions should be based on students’ strengths

- The activities in the project should be a long-term, sustainable solution for students

2 CONTENTS 2.1 Theoretical and practical background:

2.1.1 Writing

2.1.1.1 The concept of "writing" in the theory of language

To have access to teaching writing skill appropriately and effectively,understanding the concept of "writing" in term of language is necessary Thereare many definitions of "writing" Each linguists have their own definitions,which depends on the criteria that they consider important

As Byrne (1979) wrote that " a series of icons arranged by convention toform words and words are arranged into sentences" In this view, we can noticeany activity that makes up the words / sentences, whether it means or not, isconsidered to be "writing"

Writing, in terms of theoretical subject, is not as simple as the concept thatByrne gave It is a complex process, according to Lannon (1989) ,"the processconverting the material discovered by inspiration, random, trials and errors, oranything in the message with full of meaning - Writing is a process of carefuldecisions "(page 9) By this definition, writing skill must contain the meaningfulmessage This definition is more perfect than that of Byrne (1979) because ittends to write on purpose with clear orientation

In the process of teaching and learning, writing is considered as “alanguage skill" (Tribble, 1996, p.3) It is not only the language presented in theform of texts but also the development and presentation of ideas in a logical andstructural way It is" a process that occurs over a period of time, especially when

we take the time to think before writing a first outline "(Harris, 1993, Page 10).Compared with the concept coming up previously, this concept is the mostsatisfactory because it covers all aspects of writing skill: form (texts), purpose(expressing the idea) , and texture (texture)

When writing, we know that a written document is the product of anindividual for the purpose of communication with other people indirectly Thatmeans the recipients do not stand in front of the writer to hear from the writer.Thus the writer has to make sure that his text is not only accurate but alsounderstandable to readers

Some factors need to be considered when writing in Raimes (1983)

SYNTAX CONTENT Sentence structure Relevance, clarity, logic,

etc… etc…

GRAMMAR WRITINGPROCEDURE

Tense rules, writings, ideas, drafts, recheck,etc…

pronouns, etc… clear and effective

FORM ideas

hand writting, pronounce, OBJECT OF RECEIPT punctuation, etc readers

TEXTURE PURPOSE

theme, coherence, unity, passages CHOICE reason for writing

Vocabulary, idioms, expressions

2.1.1.2 Writing process

According to Tribble (1996), the process consists of four steps:

1 Before writing: This is the step the writer conducts before drafting,including the selection of themes, thoughts, notes, discussions, arranging ideas,outline, gathering information (examples, interviews, searching information,data processing)

2 Writing drafts: Writing drafts is the procedure the writer put ideas intosentences, paragraphs, concentrating on explanation, clarifying ideas and linkingideas

3 Reviewing: This is the an important step to have a complete text The writerwill think about what the readers expect, the readers are the center for the text toorient For instance, the writer will refine texture, link ideas or add conjunctions

4 Editorial: The writer will review the form of the writing, such as spelling,grammar, punctuation

As we can see from the above point of view, writing is a one-wayprocess, not relating to the reader Reid (1993) also made the same point butadded three more steps of the writing process: feedback, assessment and afterwriting This makes the process of Reid’s writing more satisfactory Briefly,

the steps of the writing process according to Reid (1993) may be illustrated in thediagram below:

In short, writing is an exercise form that two persons do not exercise and do

in such a way However, there are basic steps that the writer must also performwhen writing Researchers have different ways to illustrate the process ofwriting, but all agree that writing is a process under the rule of "recursion",requiring a major effort from the writer

2.1 2 The concept of " errors " and "correction":

2.1.2.1 An overview of errors:

2.1.2.1.1 Concept:

There were many definitions of errors given by famous researchers such asAbbort (1981), the Edge (1989), McKay (1989), Goldstein (1990), Hubbard(1991), Klassen (1993), Crosling (1996) etc Although they expressed in differentways but the concepts had the common points of the nature and function of theerrors

Goldstein (1990) defined the errors as "an action due to ignorance,shortcomings, or accidental distraction, straying away from the original direction

or not achieve the purpose"

Klassen (1993) gave a more simple definition about errors According toKlassen, an error is "a form or the structure that is not acceptable to the nativesbecause of the inappropriate use "

Meanwhile, Crosling (1996) gave his views respectfully towards thecriteria "Any deviation about method compared with the regular method isconsidered as an error "

Referring to errors, some researchers have the same opinion that not onlylanguage learners make errors but natives also make errors The natives oftenmake errors on two levels " pattern error " and "expression error " The seconderror is the common one with a higher frequency (McKay, 1984) Thus, the errorsshould be considered unconventional and inappropriate We can see that errorsoccur in all language levels from pattern one to expression one

2.1.2.1.2 Classify errors

Lippman, J (2003) classified errors into two categories: "general errors "

(coverage errors) and "specific errors "

General errors Specific errors 1 Thesis

The whole sentence the elements of the 2 Structure

is not exact: sentences are not exact, 3 Basis

word order, tenses, writings 4 Compatibility and

conjunction auxiliary verbs consistency

â â 5 The Suitability with Result Result the object and purpose

(Quote according to Lippman (2003))

There are many error classifications, depending on the purpose ofresearchers in the analysis and conformity with fact conditions of teaching andlearning languages

2.1.2.2 An overview of the correction:

2.1.2.2.1 Error correction:

When evaluating an writing we have the concept of "feedback", inwhich two elements must be distinguished: "assessment" and "correction" Onevaluation, learners have been identified as performing well or not in the writing

On correction, students receive detailed information about the writing such asexplanation, providing a better alternative spelling As a rule, correction can andshould provide information that the writer wrote correctly or wrongly and why,but generally both teachers and learners must see this concept as to correct errors

2.1.2.2.2 Some basic methods of error correction for students

In the general teaching process, teachers often have to resolve issues such

as "what errors to correct " and " how to correct effectively"

Gower and Walter (1983) offered 4 issues for language teachers to solveerrors in the writing process, which is " what to correct, when to correct, how tocorrect and how much to correct" Meanwhile, Raimes (1983) gave seven basicprinciples for correcting errors in the teaching process in the classroom:

1 For the students’ writing, the teacher does not need to mark the errors but stillneed to identify errors

2 Identify errors carefully and find the cause

3 Find more parts the student has successfully completed

4 Collect errors students have committed

5 Establish an error symbol table clearly and understandably

6 Regularly give reasons or error correction and remove carefully

7 Finally, handle errors carefully, and make it a habit for students

To solve problems " what to correct, when to correct", the researchers oftensuggest that teachers should choose immediate correction or to wait until there is

an other similar error in the lesson

To make the matter " how many errors to correct " is clearer, Gower andWalter offered a few suggestions:

• Attract students to the process of the correction