Sáng kiến kinh nghiệm Some suggested activities for teaching the writing lessons in the textbook “English 10”

B NGHE AN DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING 
 DIEN CHAU 2 HIGH SCHOOL 
 SOME SUGGESTED ACTIVITIES FOR 
 TEACHING WRITING SECTIONS IN THE 
 TEXTBOOK “ENGLISH 10” 
 (MỘT SỐ HOẠT ĐỘNG GỢI Ý CHO VIỆC DẠY KỸ NĂNG VIẾT TRONG 
 SÁCH GIÁO KHOA “TIẾNG ANH 10”) 
 Subject: English 
 Writers: LE THI NGAN 
 HO VAN TUAN 
 PHAM THI HUONG GIANG 
 Group: English 
 Phone number: 0918 020 229 
 School year: 2022-2023
 PART I: 
 INTRODUCTION 
1.1. Rationale 
 It is undeniable that the English language has gained more and more 
significance in every aspect of society in general and in education in particular. 
Realizing the importance of English in education, many policies and renovations 
have been promulgated in teaching and learning English during the recent years. In 
an attempt to innovate Vietnamese education to meet the demand of the society in 
the process of integration and development, the Vietnamese Ministry of Education 
and Training has reformed English textbooks concentrating on the four skills: 
speaking, listening, reading and writing for secondary school students since the 
school year 2006-2007. With this reform, both teachers and students have certain 
advantages and disadvantages in mastering the four skills in the process of 
teaching and learning English. 
 Of the four skills, writing, in general, is considered the most difficult one for 
not only students but teachers to master. In writing section in the textbook “English 
10”, students are asked to perform tasks of various kinds such as descriptions, 
narratives, letters, etc. However, it seems that some of the writing tasks in the new 
textbooks have not supported students’ language acquisition appropriately. 
Besides, teachers also face certain difficulties in teaching writing skills. 
 Being a teacher of English at upper-secondary school for years, the 
researcher has understood the reality of teaching writing in English. The researcher 
realizes that the upper-secondary school students in general and 10th form students 
in particular do not acquire writing skill efficiently. They seem to follow the 
requirements of writing tasks in each lesson in order without achieving the 
objectives of the lesson through completing the main tasks with appropriate skills. 
Because of the practicality in teaching English writing, this study was carried out, 
entitling “Some suggested activities for teaching the writing lessons in the 
textbook “English 10””. The study is intended to investigate types of activities 
teachers use in their writing classes and the efficiency of these activities as well. In 
addition, it also seeks to find out to what certain extent these activities have 
influence on students’ study achievements. Finally, through the study, some 
suggestions are offered so that teachers can adapt the writing tasks in the textbook 
appropriately to improve students’ writing skill. 
1.2. Purposes of the Study 
 The purposes of the study are: 
- to find out the challenges that teachers and 10th form students face with in 
teaching and learning writing skill 
 2 
 PART II: CONTENTS 
 CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW 
 1.1. Teaching Writing 
 1.1.1. Writing and the Roles of Writing 
 Writing has been defined in a variety of ways, which shows different 
viewpoints by authors. Traditionally, researchers focused mainly on form and the 
final product of writing while current researches stress on the writing process and 
strategies employed to attain the final product. 
 According to “Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary” (1989), writing is to 
“make letters or other symbols on a surface (usually paper), especially with a pen 
or pencil”. 
 Byrne (1988: 1) considers writing as the act of “forming graphic symbols”, 
that is, letters or combination of letters. He also discusses the importance of 
producing a coherent ‘text’ by arranging the graphic symbols to form words, which 
in turn are arranged to form sentences, which are then arranged in an appropriate 
sequence and linked to form a coherent whole. 
 Tribble (1996: 3) considers writing as language skill which involves not just a 
graphic representation of speech, but the development and presentation of though 
in a structured way and is difficult to acquire. He also emphasizes that writing 
“normally requires some forms of instruction” and that “it is not a skills that is 
readily picked up by exposure” (1996: 11). 
 In Ur’s point of view, “most people acquire the spoken language (at least their 
own mother tongue) intuitively, whereas the written form is in most cases 
deliberately taught and learned” (1996: 161). 
 In one word, writing involves many different aspects and “writing” itself 
may imply an act, a process or a skill, which needs practice and study to develop. 
It can also be understood as a way of presenting writers’ thoughts and ideas the 
form of sentences in a cohesive text where there is successful communication 
with the readers. 
 In the classroom, teaching and learning writing skill play an important role in 
the process of language teaching and learning. White (1981) points out a number 
of reasons why writing occupies a place in the language syllabus. First of all, 
writing is the commonest way of examining student performance in English. 
Therefore, students’ writing ability is a key to examination success. Second, from 
both parents and students’ views, ability to write may be associated with “evidence 
of having learnt the language”. In other words, parents and students can see what 
has been done and what has been achieved during the learning process. Moreover, 
 4 
 The students write the first draft from their notes or plan. They can refer to 
dictionaries, grammar reference books and model texts for some conventions; for 
example, the salutations and standard phrases used in formal letters. When the 
students finish their first drafts, they can correct and improve the drafts. Then the 
students can work in pairs or groups to get peer evaluation in terms of content, 
language accuracy, organization, style, etc. the teacher can participate in students’ 
discussion. After receiving comments from their peers and the teacher, they write 
out the final version. 
 In one word, at this stage, students start their writing after having ideas, 
necessary vocabulary and structures from the previous stage. 
 c. Post-writing 
 At this stage, students’ writings are given feedback in different ways with 
different techniques. Feedback plays an important role in learning process since it 
can help students identify what their strengths and weakness are. 
 1.1.3. Principles for Teaching Writing 
 According to Forseth et al. (cited in Khuong, 2006), there are 10 principles 
for teaching writing: 
 1. Writing should be considered as a means to communicate meaning about 
oneself and the real world, not just as a process of using grammatical structures 
correctly or writing with clear penmanship. 
 2. Start with controlled activities and later with freer communication. 
 3. Have students start writing about concrete subjects early in the course. 
 4. Also have students practice the use of basic action words (eat study) and 
the language functions (introducing, describing) early in the course. As the 
student’s ability of writing progresses, give them writing practice of more abstract 
things like ideas, opinions and feelings. 
 5. Whenever possible, relate the writing assignments to the speaking topics. 
 6. Expect the level of writing to be higher than the level of speaking, 
especially the standard of correctness. 
 7. Provide an audience broader than just the teacher. 
 8. State a purpose for the assignment. 
 9. Provide several kinds of feedback which should not be overly negative, but 
specific and related to what has been taught. 
 10. As in speaking, provide topics of interest for the students to write about. 
 6 
 materials in context, by changing some of the internal characteristics of a 
coursebook to better suit our particular circumstances” (McDonough and Shaw, 
1993: 85). 
 1.2.1. Adapting Techniques 
 McDonough and Shaw (1993) suggest five techniques for adapting textbooks, 
including Adding, Deleting, Modifying, Simplifying, and Re-ordering. 
 1) Adding 
 The notion of addition implies supplementing materials by putting more into 
them, while taking into account the practical effect on time allocation. Adding 
includes the techniques of expanding and extending, which are applied in different 
situations of teaching. Adding by extension is carried out on an aspect of content 
within the framework of the existing materials, that is, the model itself is not 
changed. Unlike extending, expanding adds to materials by moving outside them 
and developing them in new directions. In other words, this change can be created 
in the overall system. 
 2) Deleting or Omitting 
 Contrary to the process of addition, deletion means materials are taken out. 
Deletion can be done through the techniques of subtracting and abridging. Deletion 
by subtracting implies the act of reducing the length of material and does not 
impact on the overall methodology. However, the changes are greater if deletion 
by abridging is used. This is applied in such situations as materials are 
inappropriate for learners’ levels. 
 3) Modifying 
 Modification is a general term that can be applied to any kind of change. It 
can be sub-divided under two headings. The first one is re-writing, which is used 
when some of the linguistic content needs modification. The second is re-
structuring, which applies to classroom management. Re-writing involves 
activities related to learners’ background and interests and introduces models of 
authentic language, or set more purposeful, problem-solving tasks. Re-structuring 
deals with the rearrangement of the class to make it suitable for particular 
activities, for example, dividing the class into groups of a certain size for role-
play activities. In short, modifying materials is a technique that has a wide range 
of applications. It may refer to a change in the nature of an exercise, or text, or 
even classroom activity. 
 4) Simplifying 
 It can be said that simplification is the most favorite technique by teachers in 
adaptation because of its effectiveness. It can be done at many elements of a 
 8 
 activities. Most ESL students will want to choose first the activity that they feel 
they can comfortably do before deciding if the topic is motivating enough. Again, 
adapt the language of the activity and the instructions of the activity itself to suit 
the level of the student's linguistic ability. 
 5. Decide how you want to engage your students. If you are working with 
groups, then maybe you should adapt a few textbook activities to engage students 
in group or pair work. Once you've decided how you want to actively engage your 
students, you'll need to make sure students understand the procedures of group and 
pair work you intend to use. Leave enough time in the lesson to do both or you'll 
find yourself struggling with time. 
 (Retrieved from 
activities-ESL-class.html) 
 Summary 
 This chapter has so far presented theoretical issues relating to the topic of the 
study. It has discussed issues concerning writing: writing and the roles of writing, , 
stages of teaching writing, principles for teaching writing, and writing activities. 
Although writing in terms of definition can be seen differently, its roles cannot be 
denied. Because of its necessity, teaching and learning writing skills at schools is 
obvious. However, in order to have a successful process of teaching writing, such 
related issues to writing as approaches to teaching writing, stages of teaching 
writing, principles for teaching writing, and its microskills should be taken into 
consideration by teachers. Choosing suitable writing activities plays an important 
part in a writing lesson; therefore, theories on writing activities are also mentioned. 
Beside issues related to writing, theories on textbook adaptation are presented. 
Adapting techniques and instructions for adapting textbook are discussed because 
of their importance in designing activities for teaching writing from the textbook, 
which will be discussed in the part. 
 10