(Skkn 2023) findings and discussions this part shows the analysis of data and discusses the results of the study

1 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale In the globalization era, cooperation among countries has promoted the development of economy, culture, and society The largest language which has been spreading around the globe is English It helps people connect, have better understandings of the world, its challenges through information booming that satisfies advantageous access to travel, education, and cultures In Vietnam, English is a compulsory subject in the national curriculum from grade to grade 12 It helps students improve English communication and contribute to developing other skills for work and study more effectively Besides, this subject provides students with an essential international communication tool to update new knowledge about cutting-edge science and technology, cultural discovery Learning English raises their insights into people of other countries and makes them aware of global citizens The English subject's primary focus aims to develop the fluency and proficiency of language skills for students in listening, speaking, reading, writing, and linguistic knowledge Writing is a significantly productive skill that requires students to perform their language knowledge and ideas in different types of writing Throughout the curriculum of English 10, some types of letters cover most of writing lessons Although many students excel in writing skill, the number of students facing challenges in writing has gone up steadily This evidence can be seen in at most high schools in Vietnam that they not have enough input knowledge to produce written products The importance of letter writing is to teach students about the needs to present their problems and information exchange between the senders and the receivers in different fields Today, the international cooperation has contributed to the letter exchange through emails or express mail services That students master letter writing is a success for their future development The study "A study on collaborative writing model to enhance writing skill for the 10 graders" is selected to solve the challenges in letter writing skill students face Collaborative writing is regarded as a correlation to one of the 21 st century skills that allows students to communicate, discuss, draft, and revise their writing papers effectively Apart from the teacher’s instruction, students have many opportunities to share knowledge and support the completion together The more collaborative learning they have, the more insights into the lesson they will gain th 1.2 Aims of the study The purposes of the study are aimed at: - illustrating students’ attitudes toward writing skill - determining the implementation of collaborative writing model on teaching letter writing - validating how effectively collaborative writing helps students enhance students’ letter writing - devising learning and teaching methods to support students with the improvement of letter writing 1.3 Research methods This paper employs action research with three cycles to investigate the effectiveness of applying collaborative writing The first cycle deals with introducing collaborative model to students with tasks they will implement Turning to the second cycle, the survey will be given to students with the aims of eliciting the problems they face while collaborating with other peers, navigating their attitudes toward the writing tasks they have done All the collected data will focus on orientating appropriate methods for students to improve better learning outcomes In the third cycle, students will have to focus on completing their writing products in groups and individually Then, the evaluation and correction will be conducted by groups under the consultation of the teacher The author also allows students to provides feedbacks and recommendations to improve their performance Furthermore, students are encouraged to share their voices regarding what they learned, how they learned, and what they wish to further English skills via the interviews and the reflection form The recorded information will be evidence for the efforts and expectations they make Finally, the research covers the efficiency of collaborative writing model to promote students' progress in learning English 1.4 Scope of the study In this study, there are 90 participants who are the 10th graders at Que Phong high school Que Phong is a mountainous district located in the west of Nghe An province It is 173 kilometers away from Vinh city and shares a border with Laos Que Phong has many people from the Thai, Mong, and Kho Mu ethnic groups Most students at this school come from remote communes of Que Phong districts and had disadvantaged backgrounds Due to the influence of impoverished life and other factors, they have many difficulties in learning English Besides learning English at school, they have very little guidance to improve their English listening and speaking skills for themselves Despite having internet connections, very few students explore English materials online for their study According to the new general education program requirements, the empowerment of students’ behaviour and capability is the focus of quality enhancement of teaching and learning Recognizing the challenges in writing skill the students face, the collaborative writing model is used to help students practice language skills and collaboration, a crucial skill of the 21 st century skill Thanks to the empowerment of collaborative writing, students are expected to be motivated and inspired to fulfil their English learning outcomes and better autonomy in self-study 1.5 Design of the study Chapter 1: Introduction This part introduces the rationale, the purposes, the methods of the study, the research questions, the research methodology, the scope of the study, and the design of the study Chapter 2: theoretical background The former provides the literature review illustrating the summary information of the previous research papers The latter mentions the fundamental elements of key term concepts relating to the study and synthesizes the brief view of some researchers Chapter 3: Methodology This section describes the research methods Chapter 4: Findings and discussions This part shows the analysis of data and discusses the results of the study Chapter 5: Conclusion This part summarizes the main points and contents based on the results of the study The implication of the study and the recommendation for further research will be presented CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDS Theoretical backgrounds 2.1.1 Collaborative writing Collaborative writing is a type of group work taking place in the workplace and the classroom The target of collaborative writing is the accomplishment of writing tasks conducted by individuals working together to discuss orally or in written form, to plan, draft, and revise a document (Wiki, n d) The foundation for collaborative writing derives from the definition of collaboration that Storch addressed based on the study by Ede and Lunsford (1990) They claimed that collaborative writing was of the benefit of purposeful interaction and responsibility to plan, generate, and deliberate ideas According to this point of view, collaborative writing serves as a cooperative process and a unique product Flower and Hayes (1981) presented three main stages: the planning stage, interpretation or translation stage, and reviewing stage In the planning stage, learners work tother to organize information, set goals and generate the information necessary for the writing assignment Interpretation allows students to interpret plans and research notes into a written document Finally, the reviewing stage involves revising the original ideas and goals, evaluating the written draft, and editing the text Thus, Flower and Hayes (1981) propose that collaborative writing is a cognitive process or a group effort toward text performance A collaborative context is a community for learners and teachers to interact socially Furthermore, other members can exchange and share their experiences Foote (2009) considered collaborative writing played a significant role in students’ acquisition as it fosters learning and group dynamic Thanks to active participation, they are capable of managing all related materials and exploring the answers to the issues they work with other peers The additional exposure to decision making, conflict management, communication, and other social skills helps them be more successful Arndt (1993) stated that writing is not regarded as a de-contextualized soloperformance, but a person-to-person process of meaning construction between writer and reader 2.1.1 Collaborative writing model Pre-writing process: In this process, the team gets together, shares ideas and brainstorm together They also formulate an argument or draft thesis The final outcome, the way it should look, its purpose and intended audience should be planned Planning and logistics: The project is divided into sections and assigning the project to writers is accomplished They should think about the final outcome of the project, arrange for meetings and schedules too Research data/collection: The required sources and way to gather the sources are to be found out The writers are to be assigned for reading and processing of information Finally, there should be an analysis of the data Drafting/ writing: Every group member is assigned a particular section of the project The text is composed where the team meets for collaboration Revising/ editing/ proofreading: When sections of the document are drafted in a separate way They are then merged in order to get a single document They need to revise the structure and ideas of the paper Proofreading is also done to check for punctual errors, typo mistakes, formatting issues, spelling errors, and grammatical mistakes There are few techniques or strategies which need to be followed in a collaborative writing process When any writing plan is considered, they need to follow the belowmentioned process  Description of the writing project  Outline of the content  Strategy for success  For each section, content responsibilities must be assigned  Schedule for completed parts  Editing as well as revising the process  Production data There are other aspects too which the collaborative team should discuss and resolve  Meeting plan and plans if someone is away from the project  Sending and receiving of the project in an effective manner  In case if any writer has dropped out, then drafting a plan  Evaluation of one another and their expected grade  Resolving differences of opinion  Roles for all the group members The collaborative writers should make sure to exchange their contact details and also make a discussion about technical considerations They should make plans about merging projects to make it a single project They need to discuss the software graphics and word processing to be used and the specific style guide to be followed 2.1.2 Letters Letter is defined as “a written message addressed to a person or an organization usually put in an envelope and sent by post” A complaint letter is a request for an adjustment In other words, it is a letter that describes the damage; errors, or mistakes that happened to the delivered goods and therefore claims for compensation are known to be a complaint letter An invitation Letter is a document that presents a formal request for the presence of an individual, a group of people or an organization at an event An invitation letter may be formal or informal It could be used for a variety of events such as weddings, graduation ceremonies, annual dinners, anniversary parties and birthday parties Letters of confirmation are used by individuals, organizations and businesses every day, for a number of different purposes Broadly speaking they are used to recognize a previous agreement or to verify certain information upon request Letter of acceptance or refusal refers to the way whether the receivers want to approve of the request from sender or not CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.1 Participants The main participants of this study involve the 90 10th graders at Que Phong high school Que Phong high school, which is located in the Northern West of Nghe An province, has 43 classes with approximately 1,800 students On account of the mountainous topography sharing a border with Laos, Que Phong high school has faced low results in high school entrance examinations from students living here English is a mandatory subject across Vietnam, but students in remote areas have come under various drawbacks of English learning at different levels Even though they have had access to English since primary school, they seem to be weak at basic English knowledge Turning to the English curriculum at the high school level, the target requires students to be familiar with different types of communication in the English context Although there have been loads of papers dealing with oral communication, this study tackles the written communication relating to letter writing Today, information exchange takes place virtually and via letters It is intriguing that all the English textbooks for class 10 to class 12 integrate letter writing into the writing sections of some units Not only these tasks widen students’ insight into the real-world context, but they also provide several orientations to approach the task completion relating to the topic’s units According to the challenges that the 10th graders endure, the collaborative writing model is an indispensable measure which is designed to redeem the step-bystep instruction of collaborative writing for students and enrich their knowledge of letter writing by inspiring them to discuss with peers, discover new real-world context, and gradually shape their mindset on producing authentic products meeting the lesson’s objectives By dint of the merits from which students can benefit, the difference in English levels among students can be supported by the interaction and practical development of skills that will be useful in their future learning Moreover, if they pass the inception of something new, they will be more confident enough to complete other learning tasks better and better 3.2 Methodology The author employs action research to measure the effective of collaborative writing model on students’ progress In the first cycle, the author presents drawbacks of students in writing In the second cycle, the author began to instruct the lesson and let students engage in collaborative writing models In the third cycle, the author evaluates students’ progress and reveals some strengths and improvement for better learning and teaching Brown (2001) states that “Questionnaires are certain written instruments that show responses to a set of questions or sentences, either by writing down their answers or sorting out from existing answers Markey & Gass (2005) claims that using questionnaires in language researches a valuable instrument that lets researchers investigate and gather information on participants‟ beliefs and motivations in such a short time with comparable information elicited from several correspondents For the outstanding advantage of questionnaires mentioned above, the author decided to use questionnaires in this paper to investigate students‟ attitudes and motivations towards communication acquisition Munandar (2009) claims verbal communication and creativity stimulate the fluency, flexibility, and production of output knowledge CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 4.1 The initial students’ writing results Prior to the access to collaborative writing, the 50 students were encouraged to complete a task on letter writing It is significant to emphasize the integration of letter writing into writing sections of some units in the textbooks After completing the first three units, they started to approach the letter writing lesson The content of this lesson requires students to write a complaint letter based on the given context the results of students' abilities to comple te the task number of students percentage 8.8% 22.2% 69.0% 20 62 The chart describes the number of students’ abilities to complete the task As soon as having been instructed to complete the writing task in the textbook, they could not perform the task well; however, as can be seen from the bar chart, nearly percent of students completed the task well, which shows that they fully understand and identify the problems so as to write the description of the information in the paper Next, the rate of students partially completing the task constitutes 22.2 percent with 20 students This group partially understood the form of letter writing and missed some parts of the information needed to fill in the letter Finally, the highest number of students who could not this task accounts for 69 percent, which reveals that they not have a good understanding of the content and basic information about letter writing despite being given instruction Compared to the above description of the students’ circumstances at Que Phong high school, they faced various challenges in learning English language skills, including writing, one of the most difficult output sections The main reasons for this problem relate to the acquisition of topic-based vocabulary, the ability to identify context, the expression of grammatical structures, the support of peers and teachers, and the shortage of time for self-studying Apart from learning time at school, they 10 not concentrate on investing more time in revising the knowledge and practicing the assignment Therefore, it is high time the author handled this problem with the incentive of using collaborative writing to increase students' engagement and enjoyment to gain better outcomes 4.2 The application of collaborative writing model into letter writing lessons The four types of letters, which are extracted from the textbook “Tieng Anh 10” to implement the collaborative writing instruction to students, contain a letter of complaint, a confirmation letter, a letter of invitation, and a letter of acceptance or refusal The focus of collaborative writing model zeros in on the planning, leadership, division of labour, effective communication, sharing of responsibilities for results and evaluation The following lesson plan is based on the document 5513 issued by the Ministry of Education and Training There are some changes in the sections in equivalence to the collaborative writing criteria 4.2.1 The implementation of letter of complaint UNIT 4: SPECIAL EDUCATION I OBJECTIVES Language Knowledge: - Pronunciation: the sound /ɔ / and /ɔ: / - vocabulary and expressions related to education - The + adjectives - Used to + infinitive - Which as a connector Skills: - Vocabulary comprehension: matching - Extensive reading: multiple-choice questions - Intensive reading: gap-fill - Making an interview: matching - Making an interview and reporting on results - monologue: Deciding on True or False statements - Gap-filling - Writing a letter of complaint