The reality of teaching and learning English writing skill at Tran Nguyen Han High school in Hai Phong and recommendations = Thực trạng của việc dạy và học kỹ n

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI
University of languages and international studies
Department of post- graduate studies

***************

PHẠM THUÝ TRINH

THE REALITY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH WRITING SKILL AT
TRAN NGUYEN HAN HIGH SCHOOL IN HAI PHONG AND
RECOMMENDATIONS

(Thực trạng của việc dạy và học kỹ năng viết
tại trường THPT Trần Nguyên Hãn - Hải Phòng và một số giải pháp)


M.A MINOR THESIS




Field: English Teaching Methodology

HANOI-2009
Code:
60. 14. 10
Cohort:
MA 15

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY HANOI
University of languages and international studies
Department of post- graduate studies

***************


PHẠM THUÝ TRINH


THE REALITY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING WRITING SKILL AT TRAN
NGUYEN HAN HIGH SCHOOL IN HAI PHONG AND RECOMMENDATIONS

(Thực trạng của việc dạy và học kỹ năng viết
tại trường THPT Trần Nguyên Hãn - Hải Phòng và một số giải pháp)



M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology











HANOI-2009
Code:
60. 14. 10
Cohort:
Supervisor
MA 15
Khoa Anh Viet, M.A.

iv

TABLE OF CONTENT

DECLARATION i
ACKNOWLWDGEMENTS ii
ABTRACT iii
TABLE OF CONTENT iv

LIST OF TABLES vi

PART 1. INTRODUCTION 1
1.1. Rationale of the study 1
1.2. Objective of the study 1
1.3. The significance of the study 2
1.4. Scope of the study 2
1.5. Methodology of the study 2
1.6. Design of the study 2

PART 2. DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1. LITERATURE REVIEW 4

1.1.Definition of writing 4
1.2. Writing versus speaking 4
1.3.Writing Difficulties 5
1.4. Approaches to writing 6
1.4.1. The controlled to free approach 6
1.4.2. Free writing approach 6
1.4.3. The paragraph-pattern approach 7
1.4.4. The grammar syntax organization approach 7
1.4.5. The communicative approach 7
1.4.6. The process approach 8
1.4.6.1. Pre- writing 9

v
1.4.6.1.1. Brainstorming 9
1.4.6.1.2. Planning 9
1.4.6.1.3. Debating 10

1.4.6.1.4. Interviewing 10
1.4.6.1.5. While- writing 10
1.4.6.1.6. Post- writing 10
1.5. Writing in the communicative classes 11
1.5.1. Purpose 11
1.5.2. Audience 12
1.5.2.1. The importance of audience in writing 12
1.5.2.2. Audience diversity in writing class 12
1.5.2.3. Readership 13
1.5.4. Forms 14
1.5.5. Responding to students’ writing 14
1.5.5.1.Written comments 15
1.5.5.2. Talking about the paper 15
1.5.5.3. Students’ responses to student writing (peer feedback, peer correction, or peer
review) 15
1.6. Summary 15

CHAPTER 2. 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 18

vi

CHAPTER 3. DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS
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 32
3.3. Summary 34
CHAPTER 4. RECOMMENDATIONS
4.1. Techniques in pre-writing stage 35
4.1.1. Identifying the purpose and audience 35
4.1.2. Analyzing models 36
4.1.3. Brainstorming 36
4.1.4. Interview 37
4.1.5. Asking journalists’ question 38
4.2. Techniques in while- writing stage 38
4.3. Techniques in post- writing stage 38
4.4 Techniques for motivating students 39
4.4.1. Using oral presentation 39
4.4.2. Using games 39
4.4.3. Providing an appropriate tone of feedback 39
4.5 Summary 40

PART C.CONCLUSION 41
REFERENCE I
APPENDIX IV
APPENDIX1 VI
APPENDIX VI
APPENDIX IX
APPENDIX X

vii

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
I. LIST OF TABLES
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 23
Table 5: Teachers’ expectation for better teaching and learning situations 25
Table 6: Difficulties encountered by the students……………… 26
Table 7: Students’ personal views of causes of difficulties 27
Table 8: Students’ expectations for better teaching and learning situations 31

II. LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: The importance of writing as perceived by 11
th
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 28
Figure 5: Work arrangement in the while- writing stage 29
Figure 6: Teacher’s activities during the while- writing stage 29
Figure 7: The main source of feedback on students’ writing 30

1

PART A. INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
In the process of globalization, English plays an important role in enhancing economy,
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 Viet Nam.
English users today focus more on the ability to communicate in spoken and written
languages. However, according to Trang and Baldoff (2007), the education quality has not
met the society’s expectation because mostly high-school graduates cannot communicate
in English effectively in both oral and written forms. Under the urgent demand of
improving the quality, Vietnam’s English language teaching has recently undergone a
comprehensive reform. Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training has issued a new
set of textbook for high school students in order to develop students’ communicative
competence. The new textbook displays two new teaching approaches. They are learner-
centered and communicative approaches. However, regarding Vietnam’s context, the
change will create a lot of difficulties to teachers of English who are too familiar to the old
teaching methods, especially in teaching writing skill, which seems to be the most difficult
work in teaching English.

In 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’s why they find it difficult to
write. Moreover, lack of motivation also faces the students. They often get bored and
indifferent in the writing lessons. In my opinion, the current problem must be worked
out and appropriate teaching techniques should be made. Up to present, a few
researches 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 some
suggestions for possible improvements in the teaching and learning of writing skill, I

2

decided to do the research entitled “ The reality of teaching and learning English writing
skill 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 and learning
writing skill to 11
th
form students at Tran Nguyen Han high school on the basic of finding
out the difficulties experienced by the teachers and the students. Furthermore, some
suggestions are made to stimulate the students and some recommendations are made to
improve 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 to

improving the teaching of writing to the students. The study may help teachers to make
their writing lessons more effective so that they can help their students develop writing
skill 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 11 grade
students at Tran Nguyen Han high school. In addition, some recommendations for a better
writing teaching and learning situation are presented. Although the author is well aware
that the survey statistics are not fully representative of all high school students studying
English in Hai Phong, she hopes to propose some of the most popular facts that occurring
in this study.

5. Methods of the study
Both quantitative and qualitative methods are employed to carry out the study. With the aim of
increasing validity and reliability of the data collected, the survey questionnaires will be
delivered. The purpose of the survey is to collect data about the current situation of teaching
and learning writing at Tran Nguyen Han high school. Informal interviews with the colleagues
and the students are also conducted. Besides, reviewing the related documents is also a
method to establish the theoretical background for the study.


3

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 and speaking,
writing difficulties, approaches to writing and writing in the communicative classes.

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 is
analyzed 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 for
further research. Besides, the limitations of the thesis are also pointed out.

















4

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 be defined
as the act of forming graphic symbols. When we write, we use graphic symbol (alphabet,
grammar, and structures) to make visual meaningful utterances. Therefore, on one 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 researchers tended 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 sentences
together into paragraphs in accordance with a predefined plan.”

Other researchers considered writing as a communicative process with purposeful
interaction 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, and
texts.” Oluwadiya (1990) considered the nature of writing as “a process” of “via-text
communication” between an addresser and an addressee.

However, writing, in language teachers’ opinions, is “a language skill which is difficult 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 that precede creating an
initial draft.” ( Harris, 1993, p. 10).

In short, the definitions of writing are various. However, writing is characterized with
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 needs practice and
study to develop. It requires both physical and mental powers from the writers.

5

1.2. Writing versus Speaking
Both writing and speaking are productive skills. However, according to some researchers,
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 “its
explicitness, density and standard language” (p. 160). He asserted that the distance
between the reader and the writer deprived the writer of speech-related advantages like the
real context, paralinguistic feature etc. The writing content, thus, was expected to be more
explicitly, 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,” writing process is
“recursive, planned” and “time consuming” (p. 5). Harmer (2004) concluded that writing
process with “its recursiveness and multiple drafting” , (p. 8) is more complex than
speaking process.

In terms of interaction, according to Ur (1996), due to the “detachment” of space and time
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 the
addresser and the addressee (p. 8). Consequently, the writers tend to encounter common
difficulties in defining audience (Brown, 1994, p. 326) and receiving feedback from
readers (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, are two
different stories. This sheds more light on the characteristics of writing.

6

1.3. Writing Difficulties
According to Byrne (1979), there are three difficulties that a writer must face up while
composing a text, i.e. psychological problem, linguistics problems and cognitive ones.

In terms of psychological problem, speech takes place with the interaction of both speaker and
the listener. Writing, on the other hand, is solitary without the possibility of interaction or the
benefit of feedback, which makes the act of writing psychologically difficult for writers.
With regard to linguistics problems, writers encounter the restricted use of means of
expression. Speech is spontaneous. We have little time to pay attention either to organizing
our 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 even
ungrammatical utterances are tolerated. Speakers have a considerable range of devices to
help get their meaning across, while writers can only resorts to their own efforts and their
choice of sentence structures as well as sentence linking to ensure that their text can be
interpreted on it owns.

Furthermore, writing also requires us to master the written form of the language for
effective communication in writing and the methods of organizing ideas in a logical and
comprehensible 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 writing, namely: The Controlled-to-Free
Approach, The Free-Writing Approach, The Paragraph-Pattern Approach, 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 are often

given sentence-level exercise or controlled compositions to imitate, copy and manipulate.
Students therefore make few mistakes. Only at advanced level are students allowed to try
some free compositions, in which they can express their own ideas.

7

In short, this approach stress upon three features: grammar, syntax and mechanics and on
accuracy rather than fluency. Thus, students are likely to have good grammatical
competence 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 teacher. Teachers may begin
their classes by asking students to write freely on any topic without worrying about
grammar and spelling. Frequent practice helps them write fluently with confidence.
Teacher does not correct these short pieces of free writing. They simply read them and may
comment on the ideas the writer expressed. Moreover, the emphasis in this approach is on
audience, content and fluency. However, concern for accuracy and form is seen as of little
importance in this approach. This shortcoming has very likely negative effect on learner’s
grammar competence in writing.

1.4.3. The Paragraph-Pattern Approach
The Paragraph-Pattern approach stresses on organization. They copy paragraphs and
imitate model passages. They put scrambles sentences into paragraph order. They identify
general and specific statements and choose to invent an appropriate topic sentence or insert
or delete sentences. This approach is based on the principle that in different cultures people
construct and organize communication with each other in different ways. Therefore,
students should invest time in learning 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 approach stresses on
simultaneous work more than only on organization of an essay.
Teacher adopting this approach often devises writing tasks which draw their students’
attention to organization while working on grammar and syntax. For example, to write a
clear set of instructions on how to operate a calculator, the writer needs more than the
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 the
combination of the purpose and the form of the writing.

8

1.4.5. The Communicative Approach
The communicative approach emphasizes the audience and purpose of a piece of writing.
In writing class adopting this approach, students are encouraged to ask two questions 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 some methodologists
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 of responding
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 new audience 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 as possible.
 You are writing to your pen pal’s mother in London, telling her about your dearest
friend. Your friend wants to change her style (hair style, dressing style, etc.) but
you cannot offer any suggestion, so you need your pen pal’s mother to give some

advice to your friend.
 Your dearest friend and your pen pal are both attending a summer camp in London
next month, and you want them to meet each other. Write to your pen pal, describing
your friend 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 for them to
write. Therefore, this approach should be exploited to teach writing to secondary students
as it can vary the situation and context of students’ writing.

1.4.6. The Process Approach
The teaching of writing has recently moved away from a concentration on the written product to
an emphasis on the process of writing, which leads to the emergence of Process Approach.
Process Approach to writing came to play in the 1970s. This approach encourages students’
communication of ideas, feelings, and experiences. It is more global and focuses on purpose,

9

theme, text type, i.e. the reader is emphasized. Thus, writers not only concern about purpose and
audience but also have to make decision on how to begin and how to organize a piece of writing.
Writing is a process, so students are given time to set out ideas, make plan, write a first
draft, revise what has been written after a peer feedback, then they can edit their writing or
write other drafts before the final version is produced.
There are different points of views 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 four
stages in writing process: pre-writing, drafting, revising and editing. The author of this study
takes 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 experience that influence active students’
participation in thinking, talking, writing and working on the topic under the focus in a
writing lesson (Tribble, 1996). For 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 the
whole writing process, and the task at this stage may include deciding on the purpose, the
audience, 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 this stage.
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 to initiate
some sort of thinking process. Whatever the writing assignment is based on- a reading,
picture, 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 a

10

short 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 and outlining

their writings (Coffin et al., 2003). Planning is an orientation for students to have logical
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 judgments about the
relevance and logicality of their ideas and make wise choice of which ideas to be used to
compose a text.

1.4.6.1.4. Interviewing

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

1.4.6.2. While-writing
The writer starts the while-writing stage as “composing” (Hedge, 1988), “drafting” (White
and Arnt, 1991).

According to Tribble (1996), during while-writing stage “writers are in dynamic
interaction with” (1) “the idea for their writing” (2) “their probable readers’ expectations”,
and (3) “the model of the genre they are currently composing” (p. 14) .

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

11

1.4.6.3. Post-writing stage:
Hedge (1988) asserted revising and editing after composing was an integral part of the writing
process. There are two main post-writing activities. The first, mentioned by Harmer (2003) are
self-revision and self-editing. The second type of post-writing activity is rewriting based on the
feed back 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 a reason
for writing beforehand. In other words, the communicative approach stresses the purpose
of a piece of writing and the audience for it. Students are encouraged to behave like writers
in real life and to ask themselves the crucial questions about purpose and audience:
- 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 classes is formed by a combination of
factors in which the purpose, form, and readership are of crucial importance.

Purpose here 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, discourses structures of the target language.
 Personal purpose: Writing is a way of expressing the self and discovering though
the act of writing something more of one’s individuality and social identity.

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



12

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 for writing” (1996, p. 24).
He also states that one’s specific purpose is likely to fall into one of five categories:
 To explain something: you might write a paragraph to explain why certain dresses
are in fashion this spring.
 To persuade your reader to do or think something: you might write a paragraph to
persuade your customers to purchase new dresses in a fashion line.
 To compare two things: you might compare this spring’s fashion with last spring’s fashion.
 To describe something: you might simply want to describe what this spring’s
fashion look like.
 To give your opinion about something: you might write about why you like or
dislike 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 will help them
to select the most appropriate ideas for their topics and to determine the most effective way
to express those ideas to the reader.

Thus, before any piece of writing is produced, the first and foremost question to be raised
is “Why am I writing this?” The answer to this question will help the writer in deciding the
contents 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 to
communicate 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 your
audience. Different audience will differently affect your writing’s content, vocabulary, and
tone. 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?

13

1.5.2.2. Audience diversity in writing class
For a long time, writing by pupils was almost always addressed to the teacher seen either
as an assessor or examiner – the person who told them whether it was a good or bad
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 such
attempt is the classification formulated by the writing research team at the Institute of
Education at London University (Britton et al., 1975). This identifies the following
categories 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)
(v) Additional categories
Virtual named audience
No discernible audience

1.5.2.3. Readership
When writers set about a task, what they need to know is the nature of their readership.
There are, obviously, many writing tasks for which there is a clear and unambiguous reader
or readership. A personal letter is written to an individual known to the writer, an office
memo is written to a known group of colleagues or an individual. Sometimes, the reader is
not known personally but by reason of his or her status – the head of a complaints
department of a company, for instance. In real world, there are many writing tasks for
which the writer can have only a very generalized sense of the readership.

14

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 into account:
- The formality or informality of the relationship between reader and writer.
- The expertise of the readership – what degree of prior knowledge and
understanding can be assumed?
- Cultural assumption – how far is it likely that the readers will share a common
cultural background with each other and with the writer?
- Attitudinal assumptions – are the readers likely to hold attitudes in common with
the 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 of decisions that
have to be made when writing. In terms of classroom practice, Harris believes that it seems
to be more immediately realistic and helpful to build up pupils’ awareness of such 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 in
relation 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 in
schools 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 at large.
For example, for the same intended purpose to persuade, writers can rely on many different
text types. Harris continues: “At one extreme, there are complex and lengthy reports about
policy issues or such things as tenders for civil engineering projects. These are full of technical
details but are intended to persuade people to a course of action. At the other extreme, there are
simple texts such as health warnings or posters supporting anti-litter campaigns that are also
intended to persuade people to a course of action” (1993, pp. 16-17). Thus, the essays and
composition, while highly valued in the world of education, play little or no part in the world
out side. Obviously, the traditional classification does not thoroughly cover all types of texts.
Nowadays, a more satisfactory and relevant way of looking at types of writing has been

15

devised. By forms of writing, such things as poster, brochures, pamphlets, letters, recipes, sets
of instructions, lists, labels, stories, reports, poems, essays, play scrip, and so on are meant.

1.5.5. Responding to students’ writing
Responding to student’s writing, if limited to only teacher’s correcting students’ mistakes,
loses a lot of its communicative nature. To make this step more meaningful and
communicative, Raims (1983) introduced three useful techniques as follows:
1.5.5.1. Written comments
Comments on students’ papers that take a form of a paraphrase of the ideas expressed, praise,
questions, or suggestions are more productive than an end comment like “Only fair”, “Good”,
or “Need more word”. Instead of filling students’ papers with all the red marks of correction,
teachers should communicate with students through the writing in order to improve them.
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 teaching
situations, just not practical. Often, however, a conference of just a few minutes can be so
productive that some teachers hold very conferences before and after and even during class
while other students are writing or working together in groups. The virtue of the individual
conference, however short it is, is that a real discussion takes place.

1.5.5.3. Students’ responses to student 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 even
individual talk to one another about the writings as the teacher does. Through this
procedure, students learn a lot from each other and at the same time to get to know each
other better. Ur stated “Peer correction can be a time-saving and useful technique; also,
critical reading 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, giving each other feedback on content, language, and organization, they then rewrite
and give in the final version to the teacher” (1996, pp. 171-172).

16

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 concerning topic
of the study. First, it concerns the concepts and ideas of teaching writing, the differences
between speaking and writing and the differences approaches used in teaching writing.
Secondly, it focuses on theoretical background of communicative writing classes with an
emphasis on context and audience. The practical contents of the research, i.e. research
methodology, discussion of the results and recommendations concerning the specific
research context, are to be described in details in the following sections.



17

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. Three teachers
graduated from English Department, University of Languages and International Studies.
Four graduated from English Department, Haiphong University. The others graduated from
the in-service center in Haiphong city. Half of the teachers were trained under the strong
influence of the traditional teaching methods. The rest - the younger ones - were trained to
teach English based on communicative approach. Their interests in teaching are different,
not all of them are really motivated to their teaching job.

2.1.2. The students

The 11
th
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, their English
knowledge is still limited. Besides, they have no clear determination on English learning 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 in use
since 2006 as the official textbook to learn general English at grade 11.The textbook
consists of 16 units in terms of 16 topics. There are five parts in each unit represented
through 5 lessons: Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing, and Language Focus
respectively. 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 in
terms 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 basic
communication. For grade 11 students, the objective is to develop students’ abilities to
provide 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 topic and
some prompts.

18

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

Units
Required tasks
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
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 Tran Nguyen
Han high school?
- What difficulties do the teachers and the 11
th
form students encounter in teaching and
learning writing?
- What are the suggested ways to effectively improve the current situation of teaching 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 11A
1
, 11A
2,
11A
3,
11A
4,
11A
5
.

19

2.5. Instruments
To reach the primary purposes of the study, two main instruments were used and described
as follows.
(i) Instrument one: Questionnaires
The questionnaire for the students was written in Vietnamese so that they would not
misunderstand 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. It aimed to
find out the teachers’ attitudes toward the teaching of writing, the difficulties they
encounter in teaching writing, the teachers’ knowledge of process writing, and the
teachers’ expectations for better teaching and learning writing skill.
(ii) Instrument two: Interviews
The interviews help to get better insights into the research questions. The interview
questions, including 10 items, were sorted out based on the survey questionnaires to get
more information in details. Ten teachers and 25 students were invited to discuss for
further information about the items raised in the questionnaires.
2.6. Summary
To conclude, this chapter presents the methodology of the study. In other words, it
describes the aims, context, participants, instruments of the study and introduces the new
“ Tieng Anh 11” textbook. Given the collected data, Chapter 3 will depict the data
analysis and the study results.