Challenges faced by teachers and 10th graders in teaching and learning english writing skills at a high school in hanoi

VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES
*****************

QUÁCH THỊ HẢI HẠNH

CHALLENGES FACED BY TEACHERS AND 10TH GRADE STUDENTS
IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS AT A
HIGH SCHOOL IN HANOI

(Những thách thức đối với giáo viên và học sinh lớp 10 trong việc dạy và
học kỹ năng viết tiếng Anh tại một trường THPT ở Hà Nội)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English teaching methodology
Code: 8140231.01

Hanoi – 2020


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

QUÁCH THỊ HẢI HẠNH

CHALLENGES FACED BY TEACHERS AND 10TH GRADE STUDENTS
IN TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS AT A
HIGH SCHOOL IN HANOI

(Những thách thức đối với giáo viên và học sinh lớp 10 trong việc dạy và
học kỹ năng viết tiếng Anh tại một trường THPT ở Hà Nội)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field

: English Teaching Methodology

Code

: 8140231.01

Supervisor : Hoàng Thị Xuân Hoa. PhD

Hanoi – 2020


DECLARATION
I hereby declare that the thesis entitled “Challenges faced by teachers and
10th graders in teaching and learning writing skills at a high school in Hanoi” is my
entirely own work and effort in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the
Master’s degree at the Faculty of Post - Graduate Studies, University of Languages
and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi. The material in this
research has not been submitted to any other universities or institutions wholly and
partially.
Quach Thi Hai Hanh

i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my
supervisor, Mrs. Hoàng Thị Xuân Hoa, PhD for her insightful comments,
criticism, wholehearted guidance and kind support that she gave me while I was
carrying out this research. Undoubtedly, this thesis would hardly be accomplished
without her assistance.
I also specially thank many teachers and staff of the Faculty of Postgraduate
studies, University of Languages and International Studies, for their valuable
knowledge and guidance and assistance during my time of study at the Faculty.
I am also grateful to my colleagues as well as my students at a high school in
Hanoi, who have helped me a lot in my data collection to fulfill this paper.
Last but not least, my heartfelt thank was sent to my family for their support
and strong encouragement to me throughout the study.

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ABSTRACT

English writing skill can be seen as the most challenging among four
language skills. When teaching and learning writing skills, most teachers and students
are confronted with a wide range of obstacles. The presented study aims at
identifying teachers’ and students’ difficulties in teaching and learning English
writing skills at a high school in Hanoi. Data of the research was gathered by means
of two major research tools a questionnaire for teacher and interviews for both
teachers and students. The collected information revealed that the 10th graders had
low motivation in learning writing, poor writing ideas, lack of frequent practice and

the teachers' teaching methods were seen as the most prevalent problematic factors
having huge impact on and learning writings of the students. Especially, time
distribution and ignorance about writing skills by both teachers and students were
also reported as predominant elements by the respondents. Based on the major
findings, a couple of suggestions and recommendations are proposed to improve the
quality of teaching and learning English writing skills at the high school.

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

CLT : Communicative language teaching
EFL : English as foreign language
FL

: Foreign language

GTM : Grammar -Translation method
L1

: First language

L2

: Second language

SL

: Second language

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LIST OF CHARTS AND TABLES

Pie chart 4.1: Interest in learning writing skills ........................................................25
Bar chart 4.2.: Benefits of learning English writing skills ........................................26
Table 4.1: Challenges when learning English writing skills .....................................28
Table 4.2: Expectations and suggestions ..................................................................30

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION ....................................................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................. iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS................................................................................. iv
LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................1
1.1. Rationale of the study...........................................................................................1
1.2. Objectives of the study .........................................................................................3
1.3. Research questions ...............................................................................................3
1.4. Scope of the study ................................................................................................3
1.5. Significance of the study ......................................................................................3
1.6. Methods of the study ............................................................................................4
1.7. Organization of the study .....................................................................................4
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ................................................................5
2.1. Writing skills ........................................................................................................5

2.1.1. Definition ..........................................................................................................5
2.1.2. The importance of writing.................................................................................6
2.1.3. Approaches to second language writing instruction .........................................7
2.2. Challenges in teaching and learning writing skills ..............................................9
2.2.1. Problems faced by students in learning writing skills ......................................9
2.2.2. Problems faced by teachers in teaching writing skills ....................................10
2.3. Strategies for improving the writing skills .........................................................12
2.4. Previous studies ..................................................................................................13
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY .........................................................................16
3.1. Context of the study ...........................................................................................16
3.1.1. The high school in Hanoi ................................................................................16
3.1.2. English language training in the high school ..................................................17

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3.2. Subjects of the study ..........................................................................................18
3.3. Survey research design .......................................................................................19
3.3.1. Research methods............................................................................................19
3.3.2. Data collection instruments .............................................................................19
3.3.3. Procedure of the study.....................................................................................21
3.4. The data analysis ................................................................................................22
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ...................................................24
4.1. Findings ..............................................................................................................24
4.1.1. Findings from the students’ questionnaire survey and interview ...................24
4.1.2. Findings from the teachers’ interview ............................................................34
4.2. Discussion ..........................................................................................................37
4.2.1. Discussion of the students’ questionnaire survey and interview results .........37
4.2.2. Discussion of the teachers’ interview results ..................................................40
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS .........................42

5.1. Recapitulation ....................................................................................................42
5.2. Implications ........................................................................................................43
5.3. Limitations of the study .....................................................................................44
5.4. Suggestions for further study .............................................................................45
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................46
APPENDICES ........................................................................................................... I
Appendix 1: Bảng câu hỏi khảo sát dành cho học sinh lớp 10 ................................... I
Appendix 2: Survey questionnaire for 10th graders ................................................. IV
Appendix 3: Results for the survey questionnaire for 10th graders ......................... VII
Appendix 4: Câu hỏi phỏng vấn dành cho học sinh .................................................. X
Appendix 5: Interview questions for the students and their answers......................... X
Appendix 6: Câu hỏi phỏng vấn dành cho giáo viên ............................................. XIII
Appendix 7: Interview questions for the teachers and their answers..................... XIII

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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This chapter presents the background of the study and the statement of the
problem, the objectives of the study, the research questions, the scope of the study,
the significance of the study, the method of the study and the structure of the study.
1.1. Rationale of the study
Among four language skills (speaking, listening, reading and writing),
writing is the one that a language learner expects to master. Hyland (2003) argues
that writing is an activity that must be learned so that students can effectively
communicate their ideas in writing. It is therefore imperative that teachers help
students develop writing skill that allow them to express themselves properly and
effectively in L2 writing. Sokolik (2003) states that writing is a mixture of process
and product. This process provides a collection of ideas or a stage of people who

talk when they make up a piece of writing, while the final product is considered a
piece of writing. Writing also brings learners the chance to find solutions to deliver
their ideas in foreign language (Setiawan et al, 2014).
Foreign language training requires sharing out four fundamental skills:
listening, speaking, reading, and writing, which is a complicated process. When
teaching these skills, teachers frequently circulate a certain teaching sequence:
beginning with listening, speaking, reading, and then writing (Hedge, 2000). Also,
Hedge (2000) reports that learners dedicate 45% of their energies to listening, 30%
to speaking, 16% to reading, and 9% to writing. There is no doubt that writing skill
is put at the end of the chain because it seems to be highly complex and difficult to
master even for native people. As stated by Grabe and Kaplan (1996, p.87),
“probably half of the world’s population does not know how to write adequately
and effectively". It was agreed that "it is easier to learn to speak than to write no
matter if it is a first or second language”(Nunan, 1989, p.12). Tangpermpoon (2008)
assumes that compared to other language skills such as listening , speaking and
reading, writing is the most difficult skill to acquire as it needs writers to have a lot

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of lexical and syntactic information, as well as organizational concepts in L2 to
produce a successful written text.
However, unlike other skills, writing in English is not practiced outside the
class, so what is learned inside the class is practiced inside and has little opportunity
to be enhanced outside. Moreover, writing is frequently seen as an element of
teaching and learning both grammar and syntax, which consequently underestimates
the nature and significance of writing, and its acts of growth. Therefore, the
enhancement of this skill captures significant attention to learn and teach from the
very beginning stage of language training. Both native and nonnative learners, see
writing as a remarkable difficulty, but it is much more challenging for learners of

English as a second language (Hyland, 2003). These obstacles mainly occur from
incompetence in syntax, coherence, idea expansion, content selection, sentence
subject, rhetorical conventions, mechanics and organization, the absence of
vocabulary, and the improper use of vocabulary.
From my personal experience as a teacher at a high school in Hanoi, where
English writing skill is regarded as one of the most difficult language skills,
students seem bored and unexcited to participate the writing lessons. In those
lectures, they often learn to camouflage their lack of reading and writing skills, so it
is often difficult for teachers to identify their weaknesses until the graders hand in
papers or take exams. In fact, many learners have believed that “English” as well as
“writing” is only about dictation and grammar. For these learners, writing is an
inevitable failure. Even a big number of students are confident that they will not be
able to acquire good writing skills, because they cannot recognize good writing with
correct spelling, grammar, and so on. They seem not alert of the importance of
writing skills during their learning phase. Moreover, their English exams often
mostly requires their grammatical range and lexical resource, but not much writing.
Despite such issues which cause teachers and students a lot of difficulties,
little research has been done on the challenges faced by teachers and students in
teaching and learning English writing skills at a high school in Hanoi, especially the

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teachers and 10th graders. The reasons above bring the author a choice to do
research with the title "Challenges faced by teachers and 10th grader students in
teaching and learning English writing skills at a high school in Hanoi" with an
expectation to pinpoint difficulties in teaching and learning English writing skills so
as to propose a number of possible suggestions to facilitate and better English
writing skills for the students.
1.2. Objectives of the study

The study was carried out to detect the challenges faced by teachers and 10th
graders in teaching and learning English writing skills at a high school in Hanoi.
Based on the findings, a number of feasible solutions were recommended in order to
enhance the quality of English language writing skills at the high school.
1.3. Research questions
The research was conducted at a high school in Hanoi to find out the answers
for two following questions:
1. What are challenges in teaching English writing skills to 10th graders as
perceived by the teachers at a high school in Hanoi?
2. What are challenges in learning English writing skills as perceived by the
10th graders?
1.4. Scope of the study
The research goes insight the challenges in teaching and learning English
skills of writing as perceived by the teachers and 10th graders at a high school in
Hanoi in the academic year of 2019-2020. The result of the study was used as the
basis for suggestions to eliminate the obstacles and to enhance the writing skills of
10th grade students at the high school.
1.5. Significance of the study
The study was designed in the hope to develop insight into the reality of
teaching and learning English writing skills to point out factors affecting teachers
and 10th graders when teaching and learning writing skills at a high school in Hanoi.
Furthermore, the study was also expected to facilitate the English language writing

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skills in this high school. As a result, it will encourage both teachers and students to
be more active in writing lessons, and especially facilitate the teachers to draw their
10th graders' attention and promote their motivation and involvement in English
writing lessons. Consequently, the lesson will become more attractive, beneficial

and exciting with the active and enthusiastic participations of both teachers and
their students.
1.6. Methods of the study
Both qualitative and quantitative approaches were employed to get reliable
results for the study. The data were collected from a survey questionnaire and
interviews to investigate the problematic factors that are considered as hindrances
on the effectiveness of teaching and learning English writing skills at a high school
in Hanoi. Based on those, implications for better quality of teaching and learning
English language, especially teaching and learning English writing skills at 10th
grade at a high school in Hanoi are also proposed.
1.7. Organization of the study
The thesis consists of five main parts:
Chapter 1: Introduction: presents the background of the study and the
statement of the problem, the aims and the objectives of the study, the research
questions, the scope of the study, the significance of the study, the method of the
study and the structure of the study.
Chapter 2: Literature reviews: reviews the writing skills; challenges in
teaching and learning writing skills; strategies for improving students’ writing skills
and an overview about the previous studies.
Chapter 3: Methodology: provides a brief introduction about the setting of
the study and the methodology applied in the study.
Chapter 4: Findings and discussion: demonstrates the findings of the study and
discussions of the findings.
Chapter 5: Conclusion and recommendations: summarizes what have been
addressed in the study; points out the limitations and suggestions for further study.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter has introduced the theoretical background about writing skills,
challenges faced by teacher and students when teaching and learning writing skills,
strategies for improving students’ writing skills and previous studies. Among these,
the researcher has detailed the first, the second and the third sections with an aim to
clarify and highlight the significances of writings, approaches and techniques for
teaching and learning writing skills.
2.1. Writing skills
2.1.1. Definition
It is said that it is challenging to give out an appropriate definition of writing
because different groups of people with their different needs and purposes for writing
take on different definitions.
According to Tribble (1996), writing is a difficult-to-acquire language skill
which involves certain types of training. The roles of writing are to document things,
complete tasks, develop arguments and bring ideas together. He also reports that
writing “is not a skill that is readily picked up by exposure” but “normally requires
some forms of instruction” (Tribble, 1996, p.11). Ur (1996) endorses Tribble when
saying that most people intuitively develop the spoken language (at least their own
mother tongue), while the written form is in most cases intentionally taught and
master. Harris (1993) assumes that writing is a process that takes place over a
period of time, particularly if we consider the often prolonged period of thought that
precedes the development an initial draft. Byrne (1988) considers writing “the act of
forming” “graphic symbols: that is, letters or combinations of letters”. He also adds
that writing is “a sequence of sentences arranged in a particular order and linked
together in certain ways” (Byrne, 1988, p.1). Wingersky (1999) argues that writing is
a process of making communication with others in which the writer delivers his ideas
and thoughts in written forms to readers. It is a process of thinking in which the writer
discovers, organizes, and communicates his or her thoughts to the reader. As stated

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by Farbrain and Whinch (1996), moreover, it is about conveying meaning by using
words that have been chosen and put together in written or printed form.
Additionally, Boughey (1997) refers to the criteria of writing in social
communication when he claims that writing is a process that requires writers to
explore, challenge, and make associations for themselves between propositions.
All things considered, writing is a difficult but productive skill which gives
students opportunities to simultaneously expose their language skills and practice
communicative skills. Therefore, it is necessary that writing skill need to be taught
and learned carefully.
2.1.2. The importance of writing
Mc Arthur, et al (2008) indicate that writing provides an importance mean
to personal self-expression because it prioritizes language teaching and learning
that leads to the fact that teachers have raised more importance of writing skill
for the past few years so as to enhance their students' language level. It is evident
that social relationships which exist thanks to the individuals’ creation via
discourse, are not only discourse. Hyland (2003) states that writing is one of the
key approaches which is used to create a coherent social relationship through
interacting with others. As indicated by Alexander (2008), strong writing skills
may improve the students' opportunities for success, because if their writing is not
good, the readers might misunderstand and misinterpret.
In the school environment, Bello (1997, p.83) considers writing a powerful
language ability which plays an important role in fostering language acquisition as
learners experiment with terms, phrases, and large chunks of writing in order to
effectively express their ideas and to strengthen the grammar and vocabulary they
learn in class. He also claims that "one of major failing in the traditional curriculum
could be attributed to lack of attention given to writing, which is an important
avenue for thinking." Bello (1997, p.83-85).
As aforementioned statements, writing is one of the ways to convey thoughts

or ideas to the others. It is also the skill in studying English which requires the

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students' great effort. Good writing skill can facilitate the students to absorb other
skills in English better and more effectively and through writing, the learners can
enrich lexical resource and consolidate grammatical structures which closely serve
reading and speaking purposes.
2.1.3. Approaches to second language writing instruction
Writing as a product
The product approach to writing focuses on the finished products of the
writing work rather than the process. As stated by Nunan (1989), the product
approach to writing focuses on the end result of the act of composition, that is the
letter, essay story and so on. The writing teacher who uses the product approach
will be concerned to see that the end product is readable, grammatically correct and
obeys discourse conventions relating to main points, supporting details and so on.
Getnet (1994) shares a view that the product approach is an orientation
whose primary focus is the end result of what students produce. Formal accuracy
and correctness in grammar, spelling, use of vocabulary, convention of layout etc.
are given the utmost priority. The product approach of writing is an accuracyoriented approach that focuses on the control of mistakes in order to eliminate them
from written works (Byrne, 1988). Suggestions by Hedge (1988) include a couple
of points which students should bear in their mind in the product approach of
writing as the followings:
a. Getting the grammar right.
b. Having a range of vocabulary.
c. Punctuating meaningfully.
d. Using the conventions of layout correctly.
e. Spelling accuracy.
f. Using a range of sentence structures.

g. Linking ideas and information across sentences to develop a topic.
h. Developing and organizing the content clearly and convincingly.
Writing as a process

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The process approach to writing focuses on the composing process of writing
instead of on the written final products. Encouraging students to have a sense of
purpose and audience, while writing about a certain topic, is the major task of
teachers who teach in line with the process approach. Hedge (1988) states that good
writers appear to go through certain processes which lead to successful pieces of
written work. She has proposed the following steps that good writers follow in the
process approach of writing.
a. The writers start with an overall plan in their head.
b. They think about what they want to say and who are they writing for.
c. They then draft out sections of the writing and as they work on them, they
constantly reviewing, revising and editing their work.
The genre approach to writing
Genres are ways by which a text can be seen as belonging to specific
domains. Dean (2008) argues that genre relates to spoken and written contexts for
language use in which our perceptions of the kinds of discourse occurring are
influenced by our knowledge of conventions that are in place for that kind of
discourse, that is, genre conventions . The fundamental foundation of genre is that
“we don’t just write, we write something to achieve some purpose: it is a way of
getting something done” (Hyland, 2003, p.18). Martin (1992) defines genre as a
goal focused because they focus on achieving specific purposes. These moves
and stages within a genre are communicated and unique to different cultures.
This is to help readers of that culture to relate and understand the message
communicated in writing.

Reader-oriented approach to writing
Reader-oriented writing is considered as social communication between the
writer and reader. Language, in this case, is viewed as a social process as Meyer et
al. (1991) claims that language occurs in an individual’s life through an ongoing
exchange of meanings with significant others. This description concentrates on the
writer’s immediate setting, and how it has influence on the writer and as a result,

8


writing. The means of communication is purposeful and according to its purpose,
writing is composed in a particular way that it is familiar to the targeted reader. The
reader expects in what s/he will read about and the writer has to meet their
requirements. Besides, the meaning between the writer and reader is negotiated
through a discourse that is familiar to both sides. In this approach, the teachers may
give models of different genres applied in a specific theme to familiarize their
students with how the text follows its rhetorical moves. The main objective of this
approach is to communicate clearly with the reader, and this is ultimately achieved
through the vision that writing is a social act.
Free writing approach
According to Hyland (2003), the focus in the free-writing approach is on the
writer. Writing here is viewed as “a creative act of discovery”, and of “sharing
personal meanings”. This approach is also called “expressivism”. Under the concept
of personal expression, free writing teaching approach allows the student to explore
their own ideas and find their own voices. The free writing approach relies on
quantity rather than quality (Raimes, 1983).This approach stresses mainly on the
student because the topics and ideas originate from the students, when the teacher has
the role to provide guidance and facilitation for the students to find their opinions and
self-expression. Error correction is kept to a minimum. The teachers encourage their
students to write freely on any topic for a short duration because it is expected that the

learners will step by step write more fluently (Raimes, 1983). The teacher’s role is to
comment on the content in the class and not correct them. It is an indirect approach to
teaching as grammatical forms and genres are not taught to the learners.
2.2. Challenges in teaching and learning writing skills
2.2.1. Problems faced by students in learning writing skills
According to Hyland (2002), students face a lot of writing difficulties at
various levels of their learning. Such problems can in general be categorized into
linguistic, psychological, cognitive, and pedagogical groups. They address the
conceptual components of English; since an incorrect structure complicates the

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text’s context and interpretation, which a reader deciphers by requiring a mental
procedure (Quintero, 2008).
Likewise, Rico (2014) suggests that an incoherent text does not convey
ideas that cause learners to lose faith, even though they have mastered syntactic,
lexical, grammatical control over the composition of text. The loss of confidence
among students is also due to a teaching approach that is not in conformity with the
students’ learning styles and cultural contexts (Ahmad et al., 2013). In addition,
social media, contradictory input, lack of analytical and evaluative approach for
learners and large and unmanageable class sizes can have a negative effect on the
systemic and communicative performance of the students’ texts (Pineteh, 2013).
The social factors affecting second language writing, according to Myles
(2002), include motivation and attitudes. Research focusing on motivation and
attitude indicates that, unlike those with negative attitudes, learners with optimistic
attitudes and encouragement for writing for academic purposes achieve progress
(McGroarty, 1996). Butt and Rasul (2012) state that inadequate time for writing,

inappropriate teaching aids, overcrowded classes, conventional pedagogy and poor

academic backgrounds for students are some of the factors affecting the writing
skills of the students. Similarly, obsolete textbooks that fail to attract an audience
either encourage the value of writing skills or provide opportunities (Heider, 2012)
Kalikokha, C. (2008) assumes that collecting ample and valid information,
paraphrasing of summarizing information, and using an acceptable academic
writing style, is very difficult for most students. This is triggered by delayed essay
writing training, broad classes, L1 transition, and lack of communication between
students and teachers about the positive measures needed to resolve these issues.
It is clear that second language learners face various challenges in learning
writing skills as mentioned above. This study investigated whether the same
challenges face students in learning writing skills at a high school in Hanoi and
suggest intervention measures to mitigate the problem.
2.2.2. Problems faced by teachers in teaching writing skills

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Teaching writing seems to be the difficult part for teachers. Teaching English
at high school level is naturally much more different from teaching in other levels.
The challenges may somehow make the teachers’ teaching ineffective. The
following can be seen as the hindrances confronted by teachers.
Nowadays, teachers seem to have a hard time in motivating the students to
write. This derives from the fact that the students are not interested in learning
writing (Asep, 2014). Undoubtedly, the young has the perception that they can do
whatever they please as their parents have given them much freedom. When
students feel reluctant in learning, it is a sign of lack of motivation (Abrar, 2016).
Another obstacle in teaching English writing skills at the high school is that
pupils have different levels of English language. In fact, in many high schools,
students with different levels are placed in the same class which can result in
challenges for teachers to make provision for all the students at the same time

(Asep, 2014). Moreover, different levels of writing ability require teachers to apply
different approaches. As a result, the teachers feel challenging to plan their lessons
and prepare appropriate activities for the students.
Another hindrance is from student’s parental indifference. Lack of parents’
support make teachers having a hard time to help the students. Students who feel
lack of warmth and affection from their parents will draw them back from
succeeding in their learning process (Gündoğmuş, 2018). This is due to little
guidance, motivation and support from their parents.
Besides, lack of professional experience is another challenge faced by the
teachers (Gündoğmuş, 2018). Having lack of professional experience might lead to
stress and tension to teach high school students especially among novice teachers.
The multiple roles of teacher are also a challenge. Teachers’ experience depends on
the level of their previous experience and training. It takes time for the novice
teachers to adapt themselves with their students very well. Teachers can only
prepare appropriate activities if they know well about their students’ proficiency
level, and interests. Not only that, longer time is needed for teachers to prepare new

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teaching materials, appropriate lesson plans, suitable activities, and provide
comments or reflections.
Finally, Anyiendah (2017) argues that lack of students’ interest is another
challenge. Students feel lack of interest in writing because they need to know many
aspects in order to produce a good piece of work. The students need to know
punctuations, grammar, vocabulary, spelling and sentence structure in order to write
a good piece of writing.
2.3. Strategies for improving the writing skills
The writing skill of students can be enhanced by encouraging their interest,
motivation and enjoyment in learning, through technology (Graham & Perin, 2007).

Likewise, certain metacognitive, cognitive, and socio - affective approaches may also
be used to allow student to know the writing process and to practice it (O’Malley &
Chamot,1990). Hedge (2005) claims that good writing goes beyond creating simple
and accurate sentences, because learners need to be guided in the most effective and
innovative way to write and communicate their thoughts. Furthermore, teachers
should adapt their pedagogical methods and develop activities that could inspire and
empower students by allowing them the abilities to select topics of interest to each
other (Quintero, 2008). It will probably reshape their writing habits through
prolonged practice, and physical and cognitive skills that offer the writer power over
the presentation of linguistic and domain specific information (Kellogg & Raulerson,
2007). In addition, language and content teachers may find it easy to track their
students from a specific perspectives (Nik, et al., 2010). To encourage their
expressive ability, teachers may use techniques to get feedback from students to be
put down on a piece of paper. Perhaps notably, attitudes towards writing and
discussing the problems need to be improved. In addition, immediate and critical
feedback on their performance is required to increase their confidence (Haider,
2012). Kroll (2003) indicates that assessment is an important part of the
instructional process in determining student’s progress because it provides guidance
for revision, feedback to both the students and teachers that they can use to improve
their training quality of writing skills. Also, according to Kroll (2003), feedback on

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ESL students’ written assignments is necessary to boost learner’s ability in any L2
writing course. Thus, the goal of feedback is to teach skills that will assist the
students to better their writing proficiency to the point where they recognize what is
expected of them as writers. He further observes that learners should be encouraged
to analyze and evaluate feedback themselves in order for it to be more effective. As
identified by Williams (2005), there are two common categories of feedback that

teachers give on their students’ writings namely: feedback on form and content.
Through the observation, he reveals that the most prevalent methods of feedback on
form include all teachers' correction of surface errors, teacher's markings that
indicates the place and type of error but without correction, and underlining to
indicate the presence of errors.
2.4. Previous studies
There have been various researchers worldwide working on the aspect of
diagnosing the challenges confronted by teachers and students when teaching and
learning English writing skills. A variety of research studies inside and outside
Vietnam have been conducted to find out difficulties in teaching and learning
English writing skills so as to figure out the problems.
Hidayati (2018), in his study clarifies challenges faced by teachers when
teaching writing to English as a foreign language (EFL) in Indonesia, states that
there are internal and external factors leading to the challenges that the teachers face
when teaching writing skill. The internal factors include the learners’ abilities,
native language intervention, learners’ enthusiasm and reading habits while the
external factors include the state of the class, the teaching aids, and the time
available for writing. Moreover, Almubark (2016) pinpoints the higher number of
students in each class, the lack of motivation among the students, the topics in the text
books, lack of vocabulary, mother tongue interference as problematic factors that
hinder lecturers from teaching and students from learning English writing skill.
Likewise, Dwivedi and Chakravarthy (2015) in their study share that teachers' roles,
students' preparation, teacher and student involvement, working in group… are
hindrances from bettering teaching and learning English writing skill. As a result, all
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researchers have pinpointed challenges in their studies and then propose solutions so as
to enhance teaching and learning quality of the English writing skill.
In Vietnam, the concern about how to effectively teach and learn English

writing skill has been taken shaped for years. Huy, N. T. (2015) - a lecturer of Dong
Thap University, in a study about problems affecting learning writing skill of grade
11 students at Thong Linh high school, introduces the writing and types of writing,
highlights the importance of writing and concurrently pinpointed challenges when
teaching and learning writing skill, especially problems hindering graders from
bettering learning writing skill. He clarifies the factors and concludes that learners'
attitudes towards writing skill, lack of vocabulary and ideas, the correction
limitation of students’ written works, the lack of material sources to improve their
writing skill and the shortage of time for learning writing skill were the most
predominant elements that had huge influence on 11th graders' learning English
writing skill. As a result, he suggests solutions to limit the difficulties when
teaching and learning writing skill so as to better the quality of English language
outcomes in general and writing skill in particular. In addition, Thuy, N. H. H
(2009), in her study conducted with the aim to clarify problems faced by teachers
when teaching EFL writing in Vietnam, explores three main areas of problem: (i)
How to raise students’ awareness of why they should write in English, (ii) How to
teach students to write in English and (iii) How to assess students’ writing skill. The
author also concludes that the issues of teaching EFL writing can be solved thank to
various strategies such as psycholinguistics, second language acquisition, syntax,
sociolinguistics, and pragmatics, and that the solutions can help improve the
students’ English writing skill in particular and communicate competence in
general. Khang, N. D, Van, P. T. T & Nguyet, L. T. A (2011) in a study about the
effectiveness of activities for teaching EFL writing in a context of Vietnam is with a
purpose of clarifying the factors affecting the teaching and learning EFL writing.
Among the elements, the authors pinpoint the effectiveness of activities as one of
the major problematic hindrances on quality of teaching and learning English
writing skill.

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In fact, various studies about writing skills have been conducted worldwide
and in Vietnam. Significantly, all the scholars share a same view that there are
several types of writing and writing is a really important and challenging skill to
teach and learn. Also, they have clarified a vast of problematic issues confronted by
teachers and learners when teaching and learning writing skills, and accordingly
they have proposed a number of suggestions to address the problems. However, as a
teacher of English in a high school in Hanoi, the researcher finds that four main
English language skills have been taught and learnt equally, but the outcomes in
general and writing skill in particular have not met the demand as expectation for
various challenges. Additionally, in spite of the growing concerns of teachers and
researchers about difficulties faced by teachers and pupils when teaching and
learning English writing skills, the number of studies on the field remains modest.
This gives rise to my study to partly contribute to the body of research on the
importance of writing skill and also the hindrances confronted by teachers and
students so as to suggest possible solutions to enhance the quality of teaching and
learning English writing skill at the 10th grade at a high school setting, especially at
a high school in Hanoi.

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CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

In this chapter, the main issues relating to methodology was carefully
discussed. First, an elaboration of the research context was presented, particularly,
the English learning and teaching contexts at a high school in Hanoi. Second, some
important matters of methodology such as research tools, participants, and data
analysis were also thoroughly mentioned. Among these, the researcher paid close
attention on the research instruments with detailed description of the survey

questionnaire, the interviews and the data analysis process which laid foundations
for the research findings and discussion in the next chapter.
3.1. Context of the study
3.1.1. The high school in Hanoi
The high school which was chosen to be studied has been acknowledged as
one of the first “high school students training cradle” in former Ha Tay province
since November 1959 with the purpose of teaching and providing basic knowledge
of foundation sciences for adults in districts of Ba Vi, Phuc Tho, Son Tay and
neighboring areas.
In 1994, the school was allowed to recruit and train specialized majors with 4
original classes: Mathematics, Physics, Linguistics and English. In 2008, at the time
Hanoi was expanded geographically, the school became one of four educational
institutions at high school level the Hanoi Department of Education and Training
with the task of training specialized major students.
From the school year 2017 - 2018, the school was moved to a new campus
with a clean and beautiful campus of over 4 hectares. The school now has a modern
well-equipped facility for teaching and developing the comprehensive capacity of
the students.
The scale of this high school has been growing ever since. The organizational
scale of the school is always maintained steadily in accordance with the National
educational setting standard with 45 classes with the average of 35 students per class.

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