Difficulties in teaching english writing skills to ethnic minority grade 9th students at đồng lương secondary school, lang chánh, thanh hóa province

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 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 ABBREVIATIONS CLT= Communicative Language Teaching ESL= English as a Second Language iv 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 2.5.2 Data analysis of direct interview between the researcher and two teachers Firstly, all teachers were asked about their beliefs on the importance of teaching writing skills in secondary They agreed that writing played a very important role in learning English The first teacher said that “among four skills teaching writing is considered as the most difficult and the students not like to learn it” However, without learning writing, students can not express their ideas, thoughts and they not get the standard level of the Vietnamese education system That is the reason why teaching writing skills becomes so important and essential for the students When being asked about purpose of teaching writing, all of the teachers said that they wanted to help the students to enhance their English “I want my students to have a positive attitude towards writing and that is why I try to teach English with the most useful methods to help my students have interests in learning English and they will find the best ways to learn this skill”, one of them said Both of them agree that teaching writing is the most difficulty among four ones and two teachers are finding the most useful ways to be suitable for the students in this remote area In each writing lesson, teachers seem to choose the following way: giving students about five minutes to warm up the atmosphere of the class by playing some games or gapping some pictures, after those giving students some suggested words to help them write easily, then asking students to write Two of the teachers often gave their comments in general and tended to use more positive feedback to raise students’ strength and rarely gave negative feedback to their students What they said are as follows: “I like to explain clearly and slowly to my students and guide them in the exciting atmosphere but I not have enough time for all of them.” “Students will be confused a lot if we write our comment in general at the end of the paper.” 29 “I often write such comments “Quite good, very good or try harder” in my students’ paper because I want to encourage them to write more and more” According to their opinions, most of the students not like to learn this subject because they are from the remote area and they are often busy with their housework and not focus on learning What they said are as follows: “They are not hard-working and not their homework if they have In each writing lesson, they are difficult to focus and write correctly.” “ It seems to be that students want to me to ignore this skill because in the final examination, the writing part has 3-4 points That is not much.” 30 CHAPTER THREE: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS This section presents the answers to the research questions proposed at the beginning of the thesis Research question 1: What difficulties ethnic minority grade 9th students encounter in writing English? With characteristics of a school in a remote area, ethnic minority grade students have to face a lot of difficulties in writing English The first one is that students cannot express ideas clearly The way they make a paragraph or letter can be confused between English and Vietnamese literature styles In English people often start each of paragraph in a direct point but in Vietnamese people it in a contrast way That makes students more difficult in writing English Students not have enough vocabulary and structures to express ideas they need Learning new words is a long process with much time but students not store up That why they always lack of knowledge to talk and write and they are not confident when learning writing skills In addition, students not have good conditions to learn like other ones because they lack of facilities that support their learning like computer, radio, internet, etc… This leads they can not have good ability to access or use facilities like other ones In fact, their background and social knowledge is not much so that English is always new for them These are main difficulties that ethnic minority grade 9th students encounter in writing English The next part will mention about the reasons why students have these difficulties Research question 2: Why they have those difficulties? Students learnt English as a main subject at school from 6th grade but they can not use it to communicate in daily activities or talk to foreign people when necessary 31 The first obstacle is that students lack of motivation in learning English All of the students are Muong ethnic group and the standard of learning is not high Some of them not have any motivation to learn subjects in general and English in particular Although English is not new for them, they not learn it well As the result their English has not been improved for ages and they are not confident enough as well as enough vocabulary and structures to express their ideas and thoughts by English Another reason is from their school Although Dong Luong secondary school has been invested many educational facilities, they are not still applied in the right ways In the library there are not many referenced books for both students and teachers Pictures and games are not used much in each lesson because using these things often waste time and teachers have to focus on the grammar and new structures This school does not have many activities that are helpful for learning English The findings of this study suggest that: Teachers cannot follow any methods of teaching writing English that have been published Instead, teachers need to develop a more context-based method taking into account the students’ variables as indicated in this study It seems that to this group of students, a product-oriented approach can be more appropriate and effective than a process-oriented approach All the writing tasks in the current textbooks need to be substantially adapted or even redesigned to suit the students’ level of English proficiency, which is very limted, and their writing experience in Vietnamese This is not only to help the students to write more effectively but also more confidently Teachers also need to find ways to motivate these students to write English This can be achieved by providing writing tasks that can give them more freedom in writing, rather than following strictly the requirements of the textbook For example, students can be asked to write an informal letter to their friends or relatively, to describe what they experienced in their life, etc These 32 tasks should be emphasized more than those in the textbooks, which are too motivating to the students Summary In summary, this chapter has focused much on the main parts of the study It has concerned about the context of the study that has a great influence on the teaching and learning English Methodology including information about the subject, the instruments, data collection and data analysis has been discussed in particular The chapter also pointed out major findings and discussion The following chapter will focus on the conclusion under the light of the results above 33 PART THREE - CONCLUSION 3.1 Summary The findings of the study have mentioned about the difficulties in learning writing skills of the students in Dong Luong secondary school and some suggested solutions to overcome these obstacles There are some special difficulties which have just been discussed such as: content, forms, morphology, vocabulary and syntax Only in a period (45 minutes), teachers can not correct all students’ written works and this is why some of the students are lazier Some of other ones think that they are trying to make a “perfect product” without any false and this makes them afraid when standing front of the class and read aloud their written works Some solutions were given for both of the students and teachers In this school, teachers often help students by giving some suggested words and asking them to write down completed sentences Of course, this is only good for some students and teachers can not check all members in the class It is easy for students to write a short paragraph and they not feel excited about other forms like stories or letters In fact, teachers can not give easier topics that are out of the textbook because they have to follow the content of grade with being checked by the headmaster All of the students in Dong Luong secondary school are Muong ethnic group with lower standard of learning English Their starting point is not high so they find very difficult in learning English in general and in writing English in particular Teachers’ responsibility is big and ways of finding the best solutions for these problems needs lots of time During teaching process, teachers should always find and enhance their own knowledge with the hope that they will help these students like English and their four skills are better and better 3.2 Suggestions of the study The results of the study revealed some gaps between teachers’ and students’ beliefs towards difficulties in learning writing skills Obviously, 34 teachers in this study tend to guide students to write according to suggested structures without thinking much This means students not have many opportunities to practice themselves writing In fact, teachers not have enough time to guide one by one and check all their written works The following suggested solutions are drawn for the teachers of English at the school to solve the problems Firstly, teachers should invest a lot of time to plan each lesson carefully This is necessary because teachers want to teach writing skills well, they should know what activities are suitable for their students’ level From this they will know the best methods to their learners in learning writing That why teachers should make theirs lesson plans well Secondly, teachers should correct the mistakes in students’ written works with positive opinions However, teachers should not mention all errors at the same time In other words, teacher should be as a reader in the early drafts, then a reader and a writing consultant to offer advice about structure and organization and finally, as an editor and error analyst, focusing on the grammar and mechanic in the papers Finally, teachers should combine teaching with playing games or watching videos or drawing pictures It can be concluded that when the teachers give students many chances to play in learning, the spirit of the students will be higher and learning results will also be better To this, teacher should invest a lot of time to prepare their lesson plans and make toys or games to support for each period in the class 3.3 Limitation of the study The greatest weakness of this study is it studies the difficulties in teaching writing to a group of ethnic minority school students of grade through the information provided by the students themselves about the difficulties they encountered with in learning to write This is because it was not easy for me to interview or observe teachers while writing was taught just one hour in every 35 lesson of the 10 lesson of the textbook However, this weakness may turn out to be strength of the study in the sense that these difficulties were interpreted through students self-reports of the difficulties they had in learning to write In other words, the teaching difficulties in this study were viewed from the perspective of the students’ difficulties Therefore, the study provides a new perspective on the difficulties teachers are faced with in teaching writing to this group of students In the future, it is necessary to investigate the issue by exploring the teachers’ opinions of the difficulties they meet in teaching writing to ethnic minority students of the same English language learning experience (Grade 9) Results of that research can be compared with what was found in this study so as to have more comprehensive insights into the challenges of teaching writing to this group of students The result of such a comparison will help teachers in the school to find more effective ways to help these students write English better 36 REFERENCES Websites http://www.billstifler.org/cstcc/writwell.html http://www.really-learn-english.com/learn-to-write-in-english.html http://www.ehow.com/info_8449763_common-problems-english-esl- students.html http://my.ilstu.edu/~jhkahn/writing.html http://oxforddictionaries.com/words/common-misspellings Authors Digest 1996,p3 Hedge, T (1988) Writing Oxford: Oxford University Press Hedge, T (2000) Teaching and learning in the Language classroom Oxford University Press Jordanian Secondary Students 2010-2011 p93 Neville, 1988, p43 Nunan, D (1991) Language Teaching Methodology London: Prentice Hall Pinsent 1992 p99 Raimes, A (1983) Techniques in Teaching Writing Oxford: Oxford University Press Raimes, A (1983) Techniques in teaching writing Oxford University Press, p139-153 10 Richard Neville (1988) English heraldry, p43 11 Sassoon, R (1995) The Acquisition Of A Second Writing System Oxford: Intellect 37 12 Seow, A (2002) The writing process and process writing In Richards, J C., & Renandya, W.a (Eds), Methodology in Language Teaching – An Anthology of Current Practice Cambridge Univesity Press 13 Some issues on renew the teaching methods in English textbooks in the secondary school- Page 5-2008) 14 William Stafford A Way of Writing, p17 15 Zamel, V (1987) Writing: the process of discovering meaning In Long, M.H and Richards, J.C (Eds.) Methodology in TESOL: A Book of Readings New York: Newbury House 38 APPENDICES Appendix Survey Questionnaires for Students This survey questionnaire is designed for my research into the difficulties in teaching writing skills in Dong Luong secondary schools Your effort in completing the survey is highly appreciated All the information provided is reserved for the study purpose, and you can be confident that you will not be identified in any discussion of the data Thank you very much for your cooperation! I Personal information: *Your gender: Male: Female: *Your age: ………………… *How long have been learning English?: ………….year(s) *How long have you been learning writing?: ……….year(s) II Your opinions on teaching English writing skills you received Below are some beliefs that some students have about teaching English writing Please put a tick in the appropriate box or give short answers in the space provided How much you like the writing skill? a hate b not like c like d like it very much How many times does your teacher respond to each of your written works? a never b almost never c sometimes d often e very often I d other (please specify):………………………………………… Do you find it is easy to learn the English writing skill? YES NO If NO, can you give the reason(s) why? a You not have enough vocabulary to express the ideas b teachers’ writing methods are not suitable c you are not confident when writing d other (please specify):………………………………………… What strategies you use to solve your problems? a asking the teacher or peers for help b consulting a grammar book or dictionary c doing nothing d others (please specify):…………………………………………… What kind of writing form you like most? a a complaint letter b a paragraph c a story When teaching writing, the teacher should always use: Read each statement and then decide if you: (1) agree, (2) disagree Please write the number of your response in the space provided items a give at least an example and then ask you to write a similar one b give some pictures and games to make you excited before writing c give some words and ask you to make complete sentences d give students opportunities to talk about their writing II e view the improvement of students’ writing as your responsibility f provide guidance throughout the writing process g use computers to help students write better h explain the importance of grammar and sentence structure, as well as content Appendix List of semi-structured interview questions Do you think teacher have used the best ways to teach the writing skills in secondary schools? Why or Why not? How often you apply the methods in the teacher’s books to your students in writing lessons? What features of writing (e.g grammar, spelling, punctuation, vocabulary choice, organization of the paper, the ideas expressed…) you often focus your on? Why? How you judge the students’ writings? How often you find the best ways to improve your teaching? Which ways are the most suitable for your students in the remote areas? III Appendix Table : General objectives to achieve in the writing section in Grade Grade - Recognizing that writing is an important tool for communicating, for clarifying thinking, and for learning - Using writing to explore ideas and expressing understanding - Using and value writing to express and share experiences, feelings, ideas, and opinions with a range of audiences (e.g., peers, teacher, and other audiences in school and community) - Writing to describe (e.g., multi-paragraph profile of a character or a description of scene) - Writing to create personal and fictional narratives (e.g., multi-paragraph story, personal essay) - Writing to explain, report, and inform (e.g., multi-paragraph report, essay, instructions, biography) - Writing to convince and persuade (e.g., multi-paragraph critique or letter to the editor) - Writing to experiment with a variety of forms (e.g., poems, letters, scripts) and techniques (e.g., imagery, dialogue, figurative language) IV Table 2: Specific objectives to achieve in the writing section in Grade Units Grade Writing a personal letter Writing an exposition, presenting one side of an argument Writing a short paragraph describing a story happened in the past: a picnic in the countryside Writing a personal letter of inquiry to the institution requesting for more information about the courses and fees Writing a passage about the benefits of the Internet Writing a letter with the right format and language Writing a short, simple speech with clear organization present it in front of the whole class Writing a letter to a friend to share their ideas about a particular issue Writing a short story by using guided information and pictures 10 Writing an argumentative exposition using the right format and language structures V ... teaching writing to this group of students In the future, it is necessary to investigate the issue by exploring the teachers’ opinions of the difficulties they meet in teaching writing to ethnic minority. .. 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. .. 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