VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES ******************* CHU THỊ THÙY CHI “PEER COLLABORATION” IN DEVELOPING WRITING SKI[.]
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES ******************* CHU THỊ THÙY CHI “PEER COLLABORATION” IN DEVELOPING WRITING SKILLS AMONG GRADE 10 STUDENTS IN AN UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL IN HUNG YEN (“Hợp tác đồng cấp” nhằm phát triển kĩ viết học sinh khối 10 trường THPT Hưng Yên) Field : English Teaching Methodology (applied program) Code : 8140231.01 HANOI – 2019 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES ******************* CHU THỊ THÙY CHI “PEER COLLABORATION” IN DEVELOPING WRITING SKILLS AMONG GRADE 10 STUDENTS IN AN UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL IN HUNG YEN (“Hợp tác đồng cấp” nhằm phát triển kĩ viết học sinh khối 10 trường THPT Hưng Yên) Field : English Teaching Methodology (applied program) Code : 8140231.01 Supervisor : Dr Vu Hai Ha HANOI – 2019 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis would not be accomplished without the enormous encouragements from my professors, colleagues, students, and my family I want to show my true gratitude to Dr Vu Hai Ha As my supervisor and instructor, he has always been patient and careful in giving me guidance towards my study and has taught me precious lessons in life I would like to acknowledge my colleagues and friends who are always willing to support me I also give special thank to my parents, my younger sister and my younger brother who have always been by my side and helped me overcome difficulties From the bottom of my heart, I would like to thank my husband who has always motivated me and filled me with love, warmness, and hope i DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY I declare that the thesis entitled “Peer collaboration in developing writing skills among grade 10 students in an upper-secondary school in Hung Yen” is my own work in the fulfillment of the requirement for the Degree of Master at Faculty of Postgraduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University Except for quotations and citations which have been acknowledged, this thesis does not contain published materials and credited thesis CHU THỊ THÙY CHI ii ABSTRACT Although collaboration in writing has been used in foreign language classrooms because of its effectiveness, very few studies have been carried out to examine learners‟ perception of this process The aims of the study are to investigate the performances of peer collaboration and how it affects developing writing skills through the students‟ perspective This case study was conducted in an upper secondary school in Hung Yen with 45 grade 10 students in a class The data of the research was collected by means of observations and interviews The results illustrated a lot of ways in which peer collaboration was applied in writing lessons Besides, this study also revealed the students‟ perspective about the benefits they enjoyed as well as the difficulties they encountered Most students agreed that peer collaboration had positive impacts on expanding knowledge and improving skills for students However, it was unavoidable that there were still some drawbacks, especially in terms of personal and interpersonal ones Keywords: writing, peer collaboration iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .i DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY ii ABSTRACT iii TABLE OF CONTENTS iv LIST OF TABLES vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale for the study 1.2 Aims and objectives of the study 1.3 Research methodology 1.4 Significance of the study 1.5 Structure 1.6 Summary CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Theoretical background 2.1.1 Writing and teaching writing in ELF 2.1.2 Peer collaboration in EFL 2.1.3 The way(s) peer collaboration can be carried out in writing lessons 10 2.1.4 The benefits of peer collaboration in writing 13 2.1.5 The drawbacks of peer collaboration in writing 14 2.2 Writing skills for Grade 10 students in Vietnam 15 2.3 Review of previous related studies and gap for research 16 2.4 Summary 19 CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 20 3.1 Research paradigm and research design 20 3.1.1 Research paradigm 20 3.1.2 Research design 20 3.2 Research setting and participants 21 iv 3.2.1 Research setting 21 3.2.2 Participants 22 3.3 Data collection 23 3.3.1 Instruments 23 3.3.2 Data collection procedure 25 3.4 Data analysis 26 3.5 Methodological limitations 26 3.6 Summary 26 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 28 4.1 Response to Research question 28 4.1.1 Observation results 28 4.1.2 Interview results 28 4.2 Response to Research question 32 4.2.1 Observation results 32 4.2.2 Interview results 32 4.3 Response to Research question 35 4.3.1 Observation results 35 4.3.2 Interview results 36 4.4 Discussions 39 4.5 Summary 43 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 44 5.1 Recapitulations of main findings 44 5.2 Practical implications 45 5.3 Research limitations and future research 47 5.4 Summary 48 REFERENCES 49 APPENDICES I v LIST OF TABLES Table 1: The comparison between process writing and product writing Table 2: The summary of the previous studies 17 Table 3: The summarized findings of Research question 40 Table 4: The summarized findings of Research question 41 Table 5: The summarized findings of Research question 43 vi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION This introductory chapter presents the rationale for the study, the scope and the significance of the study Besides, the researcher demonstrates three questions as well as indicates the aims and objectives of the study 1.1 Rationale for the study Nowadays, English is becoming more and more popular in international communication It is not only expressed in speaking but also performed in writing Obviously, writing plays a very important role in many aspects of life However, writing skill is primarily taught by applying some certain forms based on the teacher‟s instructions Apparently, the traditional approach has not fully encouraged and developed students‟ creativity yet because most of their writings depended on available and similar ideas in an outline Therefore, it is necessary to find a beneficial approach through which both teachers and students care to promote the quality of writing lessons According to Nunan (1992), educators tended to change from the traditional teacher-centered approach to a learner-centered one and they hoped to create an equal environment for teachers as well as students to work In addition, integrated skills were considered a noticeable trend which was expected to bring innovation in English learning and teaching Students not only created writing products but also improved their language competence through peer collaboration Indeed, collaborative learning has existed for a long time in new education in the world Shehadeh (2011) indicated that collaborative work was internationally popular in teaching and learning the second language The writer also assumed that learning in collaboration could help students develop writing skill, gain more experience as well as improve other skills Moreover, Storch (2005) pointed out that cooperation in writing could support students to promote social interaction, especially in communication Writing was no longer an individual process because it could be carried out by teammates As a consequence, writing lesson could be more active and interactive through collaborative activities because students had more opportunities to express their opinions as well as exchange their ideas to make their products better Collaboration was believed to become advantageous in the development of teaching and learning a foreign language Actually, the positive impacts of collaborative writing were investigated by a lot of researchers For example, teachers found an effective technique to apply in writing classes (Al-Nafiseh, 2013) On the other hand, students expanded their knowledge by learning from others and they supported each other to finish the tasks (Dobao, 2013) Peer collaboration created a beneficial opportunity for all members of the group to improve important skills such as problem-solving, motivation and self-study In short, collaborative writing, especially peer collaboration was used as an effective supporting tool in teaching and learning English Although the application of peer collaboration has been explored in some studies, it was not common to apply this process to real lessons Apparently, teachers still preferred traditional teaching approaches because teaching writing based on tasks in the textbook was more popular However, learner-centered approach is becoming more and more attractive since students want to improve their skills and enhance their knowledge through peer interaction in classes Students are expected to develop their integrated skills instead of the only one As a result, teachers need to change to make learning environment more active and interactive One of the most appreciated suggestions was designing writing activities through peer collaboration This study was supposed to investigate some real experiences of applying collaboration in teaching and learning English writing 1.2 Aims and objectives of the study With the expectation that students‟ writing skill could be improved by using peer collaboration, this study was carried out to explore how collaborative writing activities have impacts on writing teaching and learning process In addition, it also explored the students‟ perspective on the application of writing collaboration To ... 2.1.1 Writing and teaching writing in ELF 2.1.2 Peer collaboration in EFL 2.1.3 The way(s) peer collaboration can be carried out in writing lessons 10 2.1.4 The benefits of peer. .. backward and forwards, or writing through emails and live chat Harmer (2004) indicated that there were three main stages: pre -writing, while writing, and post -writing: Pre -writing: planning (for and... study grade 10 students in an uppersecondary school in Hung Yen based on three main points: (1) to look for the ways in which peer collaboration is performed in writing classes; (2) to examine students? ??