Some difficulties in writing essays of english majored sophomores at tay do university

TAY DO UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF LINGUISTIC AND LITERATURE RESEARCH PROPOSAL ON SOME DIFFICULTIES IN WRITING ESSAYS OF ENGLISH-MAJORED SOPHOMORES AT TAY DO UNIVERSITY Supervisor: Nguyễn Thị Thúy Hằng, M.A Student’s name: Trần Quốc Mẫn Code: 1652220201036 Class: English 11A May 2020 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University ACKNOWLEDGEMENT My research could not be finished without the support of many people Therefore, I would like to extend my profound gratitude to all those who have helped me to complete this research Firstly, I would like to express my most sincere thanks to my supervisor, Ms Nguyen Thi Thuy Hang for her enthusiastic guidance and useful admonition during the study process Secondly, I also send my special thanks to all lecturers in the Faculty of Linguistic and Literature of Tay Do University who provide knowledge to me for the past four years Last but not least, I would also like to give my deep gratitude to my family and my friends for always supporting and encouraging me throughout the years of studying This is the motivation to help me complete this research Once again, thank you all very much I Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University COMMENTS …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… II Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT……………………………………………….…… …… I COMMENTS………………………………………………………… …………… II TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………… ……… III ABSTRACT………………………………………………………………………… V CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 The significance of the study 1.3 The organization of the study CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 The definitions of writing 2.2 The importance of writing skill………………………………………………… 2.3 The definitions of essay 2.4 Types of essay 2.5 Some problems in writing essays 2.5.1 Grammatical problems 2.5.2 Problems of vocabulary 10 2.5.3 Problems of organizing ideas 11 2.5.4 Problems of punctuation 11 2.6 Causes of students’ problems in writing essays 12 III Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH AIMS - RESEARCH QUESTIONS – HYPOTHESIS …………………………………………………………………………………………14 3.1 Research aims 14 3.2 Research questions 14 3.3 Hypothesis 14 CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 16 4.1 Design 16 4.2 Participants 16 4.3 Instruments 17 4.3.1 Questionnaire 17 4.3.2 Interview 17 4.4 Procedure 18 CHAPTER 5: EXPECTED OUTCOME 19 REFERENCES……………………………………………………………………… VI APPENDIX A……………………………………………………………………… IX APPENDIX B…………………………………………………………………… XIV IV Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University ABSTRACT The research “Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University” is conducted to find students’ problems in writing essays in order to help them study better in writing The participants of this research are the Englishmajored sophomores, course 13th at Tay Do University The two main instruments of this study are questionnaires and interviews that will be collected and analyzed the data by the researcher The results of this study will show some difficulties which Englishmajored sophomores at Tay Do University are encountering in writing essays V Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University CHAPTER INTRODUCTION This chapter presents (1) the rationale, (2) the significance of the research, and (3) the organization of the study 1.1 Rationale Every country has its own language to communicate By using language, they can communicate with each other It means that language is a mean of communication Learning English is not odd for everyone in our country People realize that they need knowledge to survive in their lives The knowledge that they need is not only from their own country but also in other countries To make relationship with them, people need English communication because English is a global language which is used over 53 countries and territories The official language of the Europe and international events, and group global officials is also English, the language of communication Furthermore, English is also used by 400 million people in the world as a mother tongue, and more than one billion people users apply English as a second language In the integration era, Vietnam expands the door of globalization Many foreign companies have been investing in different fields Thus, people who are good at English will have many job opportunities Therefore, in the recent years Vietnam has promoted English language training into education because of its importance That is the reason why several students choose English language as their major In English, there are four main skills such as reading, writing, listening and speaking However, writing is a quite important skill for all English learners in general and the students at Tay Do University in particular because they learn this subject from the first year to the last Hence, writing affects students’ studying so much Writing could be a Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University difficult skill to be learnt due to the fact that it is not a simple cognitive activity; rather it is believed to be a complex mental production which requires "careful thought, discipline and concentration" (Grami, 2010, p 9) Al Fadda (2012) found out that main challenges ESL students encounter are differentiating between written and spoken words and phrases, reviewing grammar including subject-verb agreement and joining sentences together to make a coherent paragraph Therefore, writing becomes the most difficult skill when it is learnt by the foreign language learners Rass (2001) asserted that Writing is a difficult skill for native speakers and non-native speakers because writers must be able to write it in multiple issues such as content, organization, purpose, audience, vocabularies and mechanics such as punctuation, spelling, and capitalization (p.30) According to Caroll (1990), the most important invention in human history is writing It provides a relatively permanent record of information, opinions, beliefs, feelings, arguments, explanations, theories, etc Writing allows us to share our communication not only with our contemporaries, but also with future generations It permits people from the near and far distance to speak together In fact, writing originated from the need of saving cultural values and human’s spiritual It is the official element for the development of printed document, book and Internet In addition, in our lives, we sometimes need to make official texts, for the purposes of communication or other business In such cases, writing skill is the best supportive tool for us It plays an important role in our life Moreover, in writing subject, there are many kinds of different essays such as descriptive essay, narrative essay, comparative and contrast essay, argumentative essay etc that most of sophomores at Tay Do University have challenges when they learn However, a lot of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University still have difficulties in writing essays such as idea organizing, grammar, vocabulary, punctuation and etc For those reasons above, the researcher decides to conduct the study entitled Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University “Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University” 1.2 The significance of the study This study is conducted to help English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University find out the problems when writing essays Consequently, they can recognize the importance of writing essays as well as its meaningfulness In addition, students can improve their writing skills through this study 1.3 The organization of the study This research consists of five chapters, including (1) Introduction, (2) Literature review, (3) Research aims-Research questions-Hypothesis, (4) Research methodology and (5) Expected outcomes Chapter one introduces the rationale, the significance of the research The study organization is also presented in the final of the chapter Chapter two is the review of literature including an overview of writing, the importance of writing skill, the definitions of essays, the types of essays, some problems of writing essays and some causes of students’ problems in writing essays Chapter three focuses on research aims, research questions and hypothesis Chapter four mentions research methodology It includes the participants of the study, the instruments and the procedure of the research Chapter five presents expected outcomes for the research on some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University CHAPTER LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter provides theoretical framework, which this study is based on It is divided into six sections: (1) the concepts of writing, the importance of writing skill, (2) the definitions of essay, (3) the types of essay, (4) some problems in writing essays, and (5) causes of students’ problems in writing essays 2.1 The definitions of writing Nunan (2003) stated that writing is an intellectual activity of finding the ideas and thinking about the way to express and arrange them into a statement and paragraph that is clear to be understood by the people It indicates that the writers are asked to show the thoughts and organize them into a good composition In addition, writing presents the writer’s concept in understanding an issue which is shown to the public It requires the integration of ideas systematically written Writing is considered as an active creation of text which involves on the one hand lower-order transcription skills such as handwriting, punctuation and spelling, and on the other hand, higher-order self-regulated thinking processes such as planning, sequencing and expressing the content (Berninger at al, 2002) It requires the writer to express the content of writing into a good composition by considering the aspects of writing to be understood by the readers According to White and Arndt (1991), writing is a thinking process which demands intellectual effort, and it involves generating ideas, planning, goal setting, monitoring, evaluating what is going to be written as well as what having been written, and using language for expressing exact meanings It means that writing consists of some stages that should be done by the writer in conveying the message of writing Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University CHAPTER RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Chapter presents (1) the design of the study, (2) the participants and (3) the instruments The final part in this chapter is (4) the procedure of the research 4.1 Design This study is the combination of quantitative and qualitative research It is conducted to find out the difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University The accuracy and value of the study results are based on the instruments of the research such as the questionnaire and the interview The most important factor in this research is the participants, English-majored sophomores of the University The questionnaire is first designed Then, it is sent to students to gather information about their difficulties in writing essays Finally, the results from the questionnaire and the interview will be analyzed and show the conclusion on the difficulties in writing essays 4.2 Participants Participants of this research consist of all English-majored sophomores, the 13th course (2018-2022) at Tay Do University These students come from different areas including rural and urban, are both males and females and from 19 to 21 years old Vietnamese is their mother tongue and they learn English as their foreign language Besides, students have been learning English from to 12 years The results of this study are determined through the way that students will be received the questionnaire and answer the questionnaires and the interview questions about difficulties that they have encountered in writing essays 16 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University 4.3 Instruments Questionnaire and interview are two main instruments of this research The questionnaire is used to find out difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University because it is quick to collect information, the data gathered is clear, so it is easy to analyze, and the researcher can collect a huge amount of information in as a short time Also, the interview is used to confirm the correspondence with the questionnaire and help with researching more details in the survey 4.3.1 Questionnaire The questionnaire is based on the Likert scale of levels from 1-Strongly disagree to 5-Strongly agree with a number of Yes or No questions and open-ended questions The questionnaire includes two parts Part one consists of questions about the student’s background The information is about hometown, year of studying English, attitude toward writing and frequency of practicing writing English In part two, there are 16 items listed in a table Items from to will focus on the grammatical problems, items from to is about problems of vocabulary, items from 10 to 12 will concentrate on problems of organizing ideas, items 13 and 14 are about punctuation problems and the rest are about causes of students’ difficulties in writing essays 4.3.2 Interview The interview paper includes questions which focus on the difficulties that English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University have faced when writing essays It includes questions about the general view of writing difficulties, writing practice and writing solutions to be good at writing 17 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University 4.4 Procedure This research is done within 12 weeks of the start of the second semester in the Tay Do academic year 2019-2020 There are steps as summarized in the following table: Time Activities - Selecting the topic - Designing framework of the research - Designing chapter 1, questionnaires and interview - Looking for reference From the 3rd week to the - Writing chapter 1, appendix A and B 7th week - Getting the teacher’s guidance - Editing chapter 1, appendix A and B - Writing chapter - Getting the teacher’s guidance - Editing chapter From the 8th week to the - Writing chapter 3,4 and 12th week - Getting the teacher’s guidance - Editing chapter 3,4,5 and temporary completion of The 1st and 2st week the main content in the research - The teacher checks the research and proposes some advices - Editing the whole research - Completing the study 18 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University CHAPTER EXPECTED OUTCOME Writing is one of the main subjects in the studying process of students because they have to learn this subject from the first to the last year Therefore, the research is conducted to help English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University recognize some difficulties in their writing essays Firstly, grammatical mistakes are the most popular challenge that students usually encounter in writing essays The usage of wrong grammar affects so much to students’ essays because the readers can misunderstand the writer’s meanings or cannot understand the whole paragraph Next, students sometimes have difficulties of vocabulary For most English learners, learning vocabulary is very boring and time-consuming Moreover, students cannot write a paragraph smoothly and full of ideas because of lacking vocabulary Also, organizing ideas is a quite important part that students have a lot of difficulties in writing essays When they have many ideas, they usually not know how to organize those ideas Furthermore, organizing ideas which does not follow the order will easily make paragraphs become long and make readers not understand what they actually mean Finally, punctuation probably causes some troubles for students Especially, full stop and comma are punctuations that most of students often put them in wrong positions for their writing essay In conclusion, through this research, the researcher is going to carry out this proposal with the hope that after the study carried out students can realize their difficulties in writing essays and they can look for some suitable methods to improve their writing skill 19 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University by reading a lot of news, books and stories that can provide some a few benefits for them such as grammar, vocabulary, organizing ideas and punctuations 20 Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University REFERENCES Al Fadda, H (2012) Difficulties in academic writing: From the perspective of King Saud University postgraduate students English Language Teaching, 5(3),123-130 Berninger, V., Vaughan, K., Abbott, R., Begay, K., Byrd, K., Curtin, G., Minnich, J., & Graham, S (2002) Teaching spelling and composition alone and together: Implications for the simple view of writing Journal of Educational Psychology, 94, 291-304 Brown, H (2004) Language assessment: Principles and Classroom Practices United states of Ametica: Pearson Education.Inc Byrne, D (1988) Teaching Writing Skills London: Longman Press Caroll, R.T (1990) Students Success Guide – Writing Skills [Accessed 18th March 2015] Available from World Wide Web: http://www.skepdic.com/refuge/writingskills.pdf Croll, J and E, Wilson (1995) Acts of Teaching How to Teach Writing Englewood: Teacher Idea Express Davies, J (1998) Creative Writing Forume, Volume 36, Number Grabe, W., & Kaplan, R (1996) Theory and Practice of Writing London: Addison Wesley Longman Graham, S (1997) It can be taught, but it does not develop naturally: Myths and realities in writing instruction School Psychology Review, 26, 414-424 10 Grami, G M A (2010) The Effects of Integrating Peer Feedback into University Level ESL Writing Curriculum: AComparative Study in a Saudi Context (Unpublisheddoctoral dissertation) Newcastle University, https://theses.ncl.ac.uk/dspace/bitstream/10443/933/1/grami_ VI Retrieved from Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University 11 Guntum and Chakraverty (2000) Dynamics of Writing Forume, volume 38, No 12 Harmer, J (2004) How to teach writing England: Pearson Educational limited 13 Hedge, T (1988) Writing Oxford: Oxford University Press 14 Italo Beriso (1999) “AComparison of the Effectiveness of Teacher Versus Peer Feedback on Addis Ababa University Students' Writing Revision.” (Unpublished) PhD Dissertation Addis Ababa University 15 Kharma, N (1986) Composition problems: Diagnosis and remedy, Forum, 24(3) 16 Kroll, B (1990) Second Language Writing: Research Insights for Classroom Cambridge: CUP 17 Langan, J (2004) College Writing Skills Sixth Edition New York: MCGrawHill Companies 18 Melese Mitiku (2007) An Assessment of English Language Writing Test Anxiety (Unpublished) MA Thesis, AAU 19 Norish, J (1983) Language Learner and their Errors London Mac Milan Publishers 20 Nunan, D (2003) Practical English Language Singapore: Mc Graw Hill 21 Oshima, A., & Hogue, A (1981) Writing Academic English (4th ed.) New York: Pearson Education Inc 22 Pincas, A (1982) Teaching English Writing London: MacMillan 23 Purdue OWL (2013) Type of essays Retrieved from https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/ 2013-03-01 24 Raimes, A (1983) Techniques in Teaching Writing Oxford: OUP 25 Rass, H (2001) Difficulties in Teaching and Learning Grammar in an EFL Context International Journal of Instruction July 2001 Vol No P- ISSN: 1694-609X 26 Reid, M (1983) Teaching ESL Writing New Jersey: Prentice Hall VII Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University 27 Tsegaye Mekonen (2006) Writing Problems with Reference to Preparatory Students (Unpublished) MA Thesis, AAU 28 Tyner, E (1987) College Writing Basics: A Progressive Approach Belmont Wands worth Publishing Company 29 Warburton, N (2004) The basics of essay writing (London & New York: Routledge) 30 White, R (1980) Teaching Writing English London: George Allen and Unwin 31 White, R and V Arndt (1991) Process Writing London Longman 32 Zamel, V (1983) "The Composing Process of Advanced ESL Students: Six Case Studies." TESOL Quarterly Volume 17 No.2 VIII Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University APPENDIX A QUESTIONNAIRE FOR STUDENTS Dear students, My name is Tran Quoc Man and I am currently a senior of English Bachelor 11A I am going to conduct a research entitled “Some difficulties in writing essays of Englishmajored sophomores at Tay Do University” Your ideas are important information to my study Please take your time to answer the following questions Thanks for your help Student’s name:…………………………………………………………… Gender: male female Age: Class:……………………………………………………………………… Part 1: Your background knowledge Please read the following questions and circle the appropriate answer to your opinion Give the specific answer if need How long have you studied English? A years B years C 10 years D Over 10 years Others:………………………………………………………………………… Where you come from? A Urban area/city IX Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University B Rural area/countryside What are your purposes of learning English? A Studying abroad B Communicating with foreigners C Finding a good job D Overseas residence Others:……………………………………………………………………… Do you like writing? A Yes B No What you think about writing subject? A Very important B Important C Normal D Not important How is your writing skill? A Very good B Good C Normal D Bad How often you practice writing skill? A Everyday B Twice a week C Once a week D Rarely Others:………………………………………………………………………… X Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University Part 2: this below table is about your difficulties in writing essays Please read the following statements and mark () in suitable column to express your opinions Statements It is difficult to use accurate tenses for each situation in writing especially essays When you write, you always use Google translations due to a lack of grammatical knowledge In writing, you are still using word-byword translation, so you often make A Grammatical grammatical mistakes problems In writing, it is difficult to use compound sentences because you not know how to use conjunctions Because of lacking grammatical knowledge, you not know how to use exactly the structures of some types of essays when you write an essay In English, there are a variety of synonyms, so you often have difficulties XI SA A NI D SD Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University in finding the right words when you write You not know how to use words correctly in the context when you write B Vocabulary You not use academic words, problems which affects the quality of your writing Poor vocabulary limits your writing ability 10 You not know how to make an outline for all types of essays 11 You find it difficult to brainstorm C Organizing ideas for your writing idea problems 12 Your writing is boring because there are very few examples and supporting ideas 13 You not understand the usage of D Punctuation punctuation problems 14 You often make mistakes for punctuation in your essays E Causes Students’ of 15 You don’t have enough time to write for all steps like reading the instructions, XII Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University difficulties writing essays in writing outlines and brain storming etc when writing essays 16 You don’t have a lot of opportunities to practice much your writing essays Notes: SA = Strongly Agree; A = Agree; NI= No idea; D= Disagree; SD= Strongly Disagree Thanks a lot for your assistance! XIII Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University APPENDIX B STUDENTS’ INTERVIEW Dear students, My name is Tran Quoc Man and I am currently a senior of English major I would like to thank you for spending time to help me with the interview questions This interview is used to collect the information from you, please take your time to fulfill these below questions carefully to help my research be able to be completed Thank you very much Student’s name:…………………………………………………………… Gender: male female Age: Class:……………………………………………………………………… Do you think writing essays is difficult? Why? ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… What are some difficulties in learning writing essays (grammar, vocabulary, organizing ideas, punctuation, etc.)? ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… XIV Some difficulties in writing essays of English-majored sophomores at Tay Do University ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… How often you practice your writing essays? ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… In your opinion, what should you to improve your writing essays better? ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………… THE END THANKS FOR YOUR HELP! XV