VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST–GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** PHẠM THỊ THÚY DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS TO[.]
VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST–GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** PHẠM THỊ THÚY DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS TO ETHNIC MINORITY GRADE 9TH STUDENTS AT ĐỒNG LƯƠNG SECONDARY SCHOOL , LANG CHÁNH, THANH HĨA PROVINCE (Những khó khăn việc dạy kĩ viết cho học sinh dân tộc thiểu số lớp trường Trung học sở Đồng Lương, Lang Chánh, Thanh Hoá) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Language Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 HA NOI – 2013 z VIET NAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST–GRADUATE STUDIES ***************** PHẠM THỊ THÚY DIFFICULTIES IN TEACHING ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS TO ETHNIC MINORITY GRADE 9TH STUDENTS AT ĐỒNG LƯƠNG SECONDARY SCHOOL , LANG CHÁNH, THANH HĨA PROVINCE (Những khó khăn việc dạy kĩ viết cho học sinh dân tộc thiểu số lớp trường Trung học sở Đồng Lương, Lang Chánh, Thanh Hoá) M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Language Teaching Methodology Code: 60 14 10 Supervisor: Lê Văn Canh, PhD HA NOI – 2013 z ABBREVIATIONS CLT= Communicative Language Teaching ESL= English as a Second Language iv z LISTS OF CHARTS Chart 1: Students’ preferences for learning writing skills Chart 2: Students’ opinions on frequency of teachers’ feedback in each writing lesson Chart 3: Students’ opinions on difficulties of learning writing skills Char 4: Students’ strategies to solve their difficulties in writing Chart 5: Students’ opinion on forms of writing Chart 6: Students’ preferences for teachers’ methods in teaching writing v z TABLE OF CONTENTS DECRALATION……………………………………………………………….….i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………….ii ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………… ……….iii ABBREVIATIONS…………………………………………………………… iv LISTS OF CHARTS……………………… …………v TABLE OF CONTENTS…………………………………………………………vi PART ONE – INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the study…………………………………………………… … 1.2 Aims of the study………………………………………………………………2 1.3 Research questions………………………………………………………… 1.4 Methods of the study……………………………………………… 1.5 Scope of the study………………………………….……………………….….3 1.6 Significance of the study…………………………………………………… 1.7 Organization of the study………………………………………………….… PART TWO - DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1 Difficulties of Writing English as foreign languages……………………,, …4 1.1.1 Content……………………………………………………………… …… 1.1.2 Form……………………………………………………….…………… … 1.1.3 Spelling ………………………………………………………….………… 1.1.4 Punctuation …………………………………………………………….……7 1.1.4.1 Use commas when appropriate ……………………………………….… 1.1.4.2 Use a hyphen when using two words to act as one adjective (unless the first word ends in -ly) ………………………………………… ……………….…… 1.1.5 Grammar ………………………………………………….…………………9 vi z 1.1.5.1 Avoid using sexist wording, such as "he" or "his" when you are trying to refer to both boys and girls or to both women and men …………………………11 1.1.5.2 Do not combine singular and plural forms of words in the same sentence ………………………………………………………………………………….…11 1.1.5.3 Do not write fragmented sentences Every sentence needs a subject and a predicate ……………………………………………………………………….…11 1.1.5.4 Do not confuse "its" and "it's." "Its" is the possessive form of "it," whereas "it's" is a contraction for "it is." ……………………………….……………….…12 1.1.5.5 Do not confuse "effect" and "affect." ………… …………………….…12 1.1.5.6 Use apostrophes in the appropriate place to indicate possession………………………………………………………… ………… …12 1.1.7.7 Do not use an apostrophe to indicate a plural form of a word Only use it to indicate possession ………………………………….…………….…………… 13 1.1.6 Usage …………………………………………………….……………… 13 1.2 Causes of the difficulties……………………… ……………………….… 14 1.2.1 Teachers’ teaching methods…………………….…………………….… 14 1.2.2 Difficulties related to the students’ variables………………………….… 16 1.3 Teaching Strategies to reduce the students' difficulties…………………… 16 1.3.1 Encouragement to students…………………………………………… ….16 1.3.2 Provide guidance throughout the writing process ……………… ………18 1.3.3.Remind students that writing is a process that helps them clarify ideas …………………………………………………………………………….…… 19 1.3.4 Give students opportunities to talk about their writing.………………… 19 1.3.5 Use computers to help students write better ………………………………19 1.3.6 During class pause for a three-minute write ……………………… …….19 1.3.7 Have students write a brief summary at the end of class …………………20 vii z 1.3.8 Have one student keep minutes to be read at the next class meeting …………………………………………………………………………………….20 1.3.9 Use peer response groups………………………………………… ………20 CHAPTER TWO: THE STUDY 2.1 Overview of the textbooks…………………………… …………………… 22 2.2 Context of the study………………………………………………………… 23 2.3 Methodology………………………………………………… …………… 24 2.4 The participants………………………………………………………………24 2.5 Data analysis of student’s survey questionnaire ………………………… …25 CHAPTER THREE: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS…………………… 31 PART THREE - CONCLUSION 3.1 Summary …………………………………………………………………… 34 3.2 Limitations of the study………………………………………… ………… 34 3.3 Suggestions of the study……………………………………………….…… 35 REFERENCES…………………………………………………………….…… 37 APPENDICES…………………………………………………………………… I Appendix 1………………………… ………………………………… ……… I Appendix 2……………………………………………………………………… III Appendix 3……………………………………………………………………… IV viii z PART ONE – INTRODUCTION This chapter presents the rationale, the aims of the study, the research questions and the methods used to achieve the aim The scope and the significance of the study are also presented Finally, the chapter introduces the organization of the study 1.1 Rationale of the study Today English is considered one of the most important factors to the trend of globalization in all fields of life over the world Thus, English as Second Language has been taught in many countries and the demand to use English fluently as well as to acquire four basic skills is becoming essential among all students As a result, methodology has been studied for years to find out the most effective ways of teaching and learning English In Vietnam, secondary school students have to acquire four skills of English as reading, speaking, listening and writing when they study English Among them, writing is considered the most difficult skill and at grade 9th students need to write fluently In order to this, students should be provided with opportunities to practice writing skill a lot In fact, each writing lesson is often boring because of some following reasons First of all, almost of the teachers and students not like to teach and learn this skill very much It is quite difficult for the teacher to design an interesting lesson and to make students easy to understand Students find it difficult to express their ideas, emotion, attitudes and not confident in using grammar structures and vocabulary Another reason is that writing lessons not have interesting activities to learn like other skills Most lessons only require students to sit down and write This does not attract to students and makes them bored Although the researcher of this study were aware of the difficulties the students of Muong ethnics encountered frequently in their writing through z marking their writings, the data had never been collected and analyzed systematically This fact encouraged the researcher to carry out this study in the hope that data-based sources of the students can be identified This information is believed to help the researcher find more practically effective ways to reduce these students’ writing difficulties 1.2 Aims of the study This research is designed to explore the difficulties in teaching writing skills to ethnic minority 9th students These difficulties are explored indirectly through students’ self-reported difficulties they encountered in learning to write English It is expected to achieve the following aims: (i) to investigate the difficulties in teaching writing English via the students’ self-reported difficulties they are faced with; (ii) to gain understanding of why the students have those difficulties in writing English; (iii) to find ways to help students reduce the difficulties they have in learning to write English in the context of a secondary school in a mountainous area 1.3 Research questions In order to achieve the mentioned aims above, the following research questions are raised for this study: What difficulties ethnic minority grade students encounter in writing English? Why they have those difficulties? 1.4 Methods of the study This is a survey study, and the major method used for the study is quantitative Data were collected by the questionnaire which was developed and administered to the students by the researcher herself In addition, the information from friendly chats with the teachers was also used Data were then analyzed quantitatively in terms of the percentage z Questionnaires for students will help the researcher understand why they not want to learn this skill and why the teacher often ignores it From that, the researcher will give some suggestions to improve both teachers’ methods in teaching and in learning Moreover, she also provides some ways to increase the students’ preference in learning it 1.5 Scope of the study This study focuses on the investigation of the difficulties of the ethnic minority grade students in one school located in a mountainous area of Thanh Hoa province only There is no intention to generalize the results In other words, what is true to the group of students participating in this study may not be true to other groups of students 1.6 Significance of the study The research is carried out with the hope that the results of the study will provide significant insights into difficulties both teachers and students in teaching and learning this skill This may lead to suggestions for improving teachers’ difficulties and helping the students more successfully in their writing revision 1.7 Organization of the study This study has three main parts: introduction, development, and conclusion The introduction briefly states the rationale of the study, the aims, research questions, scope, methods, the significance and the design of the study The development consists of three chapters: Chapter provides a review of literature on writing in general Chapter contains the core part of the study including the context of the study, the methodology, the collection and analysis of the data for the research, the findings and implications Chapter mentions the findings and discussions for improving difficulties in teaching and in learning The conclusion at the end gives a summary of the main issues that have been discussed so far in the study and suggestions for further research z ... feedback in each writing lesson Chart 3: Students? ?? opinions on difficulties of learning writing skills Char 4: Students? ?? strategies to solve their difficulties in writing Chart 5: Students? ?? opinion... reduce these students? ?? writing difficulties 1.2 Aims of the study This research is designed to explore the difficulties in teaching writing skills to ethnic minority 9th students These difficulties. .. difficulties in teaching writing skills in general and in Dong Luong secondary school in particular 1.1 Difficulties of Writing English as foreign languages Writing is “frequently accepted as being the