Teaching English as a Second

Language Certificate

Student Manual for Video Lesson 12

Teaching Writing

O k a n a g a n C o l l e g e : S t u d e n t M a n u a l : O n l i n e V e r s i o n

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Table of Contents

Introduction 3 Course Syllabus Information 3

Recommended Reading 4

Teaching Writing 5 Theory and Methodology 5

Genre 5 Types of Writing 6 Writing Skills 7

Student Considerations 8 Writing Obstacles 8 Writer’s Block 8

Practice 9 Writing Activities 9 Process Writing & Lesson Flow 10

Assessment and Error Correction 11 Assessing students’ writing: Tips from teachers 11 Responding to students’ writing 11

REQUIRED 12

Reading Worksheet 12 Reading Worksheet 12

Appendices 14 Appendix 1 – Solution Cards 15 Appendix 2 - Advertisements 17 Appendix 3 – Teacher Comments 19 Appendix 4 – Henny’s Story 20 Appendix 5 – Correction Symbols 21 Appendix 6 – Lesson Plan Template 22

References 29

PowerPoint Slides 29

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Introduction

Course Syllabus Information 20 CLASSROOM HOURS

Calendar Description This course focuses on teaching theory and methodology used to develop ESL students' writing skills in a second language classroom. It also offers practical application in teaching these skills, using various techniques for fostering motivation, targeting ESL student challenges, and directing ESL student progress in writing.

Course Goals and Objectives By the end of the course participants will be able to: 1. Explain the main differences between speaking and writing (both productive skills) 2. Discuss process writing, the stages of writing and writing genres 3. Analyze writing tasks in terms of aim, audience, level, and genre and describe some effective teaching strategies 4. Learn to develop a lesson plan and strategies for providing feedback, error correction and assessment.

Course Materials

Student Manual– includes course information, assignment descriptions and

evaluation criteria, related articles to supplement textbook readings, and sample

teaching handouts and lesson ideas.

Required Textbooks Harmer, J. (2007). The practice of English language teaching 4th Edition. Essex, England:

Pearson Education Ltd. (AKA: Big Harmer) Harmer, J. (2007). How to teach English. Essex, England: Pearson Education Ltd. (AKA: Little

Harmer)

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Recommended Reading

Grabe, William & Kaplan, Robert B. (1996). Theory and practice of writing. London: Addison Wesley Longman Ltd.

Heffernan, Lee. (2004). Critical literacy and writer’s workshop: bringing purpose and passion to student writing. Newark, DE: International Reading Association.

Hirvela, A. (2004). Connecting reading and writing in second language writing instruction. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.

Kung, Shiao-Chuan. (2004). Synchronous electronic discussions in an EFL reading class. ELT Journal 58(2), 164-173.

Myhill, D & Jones, S.(2007). More than just error correction: Student's perspectives on their revision process during writing, Written Communication, October 24(4), pp 323-343.

Raimes, Ann. (1983). Techniques in teaching writing. Oxford: OUP.

Tribble, Christopher. (1996). Writing. Oxford: OUP

Weissberg, Robert. (2006). Connecting speaking and writing in second language writing instruction. Michigan: Michigan University Press.

Course Requirements

To receive a TESL certificate, students are required to complete all given assignments (read the assigned textbook chapters and answer the questions in the student manual, read the assigned section of the student manual, watch the video lessons and read the lecture notes. There are three versions of exams after each video lesson and you will have three chances to pass the exam. You cannot move on to the next lesson until you have passed the exam.

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Teaching Writing

GOAL

In this section we will discuss approaches and techniques, staging of the lesson, materials, writing sources, sample writing lessons, and assessment of writing.

LEARNING OUTCOMES At the end of this section you will be able to: 1. Explain the main differences between speaking and writing (both productive skills) 2. Discuss process writing, the stages of writing and writing genres 3. Analyze writing tasks in terms of aim, audience, level, and genre and describe some effective teaching strategies 4. Learn to develop a lesson plan and strategies for providing feedback, error correction and assessment.

Theory and Methodology

Genre

DEFINITION The category a story or script falls into - such as: thriller, romantic comedy, action,

comedy.

LITERARY GENRES Fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and drama TRANSACTIONAL WRITING Greetings, invitations, emails, questionnaires

PROCEDURAL Messages, recipes, instructions, reports, expository, persuasive, narrative, non narrative

Required Activity: Complete the chart. Step One: Check off in which situation you would teach the genre. Step Two: What writing would be the most relevant to EFL classes and student goals?

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Genre Business class

University ESL

class Tourism class

Children's

class

1 Letter

2 Email

3 Memo

4 Report

5 Questionnaire

6 Form

7 Resume

8 Narrative

9 Play

10 Manual

Types of Writing

As educators, we must ensure students are exposed to a variety of writing tasks in the English language classroom. ACADEMIC WRITING Note-taking Paragraphs (reader response) Essays (descriptive, comparison, persuasive) Research papers CREATIVE WRITING Stories, comics, cartoons - *** see Makebeliefscomix.com Poems Journaling Letters FUNCTIONAL WRITING Applications Business letters Proposals presentations Brochures, advertisements ONLINE Email Blog Forum Wiki Googledocs and webpages

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Writing Skills

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Student Considerations In this section, we will look at reasons why some students may have more difficulty than others during writing activities.

Writing Obstacles

Lack of experience

Nothing to say!

Perfectionism (turn off your editor!)

Limited vocabulary

Limited grammatical structures

Translation (SVO vs. VSO)

Motivation

Washback (teaching to the test)

Literacy

Writer’s Block

At times, students may have other obstacles that may prevent them from writing. In the

following activity, many of these issues will be discussed.

Required Activity: Appendix 1 Read the problem cards and try to match it with a solution card. NOTE: Wild card – invent own solution!

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Practice In this section we will look at the considerations and steps of a writing lesson.

Writing Activities

Required Activity: Appendix 2

Look at the writing activities and identify aim, audience, genre and level.

HARMER ACTIVITY IDEAS

From pages 331 to 340, Harmer #1 discusses and illustrates examples of writing activities.

Some of the activities are about the nuts and bolts of writing, some are designed to build the

writing habit, and others are designed to practice the skill of writing (Harmer, 2007).

Required Activity: IDEA SWAP

Choose one example from Harmer #1 to study and assess.

Fill out the following chart:

Activity Name, Level, & Age

Identify the kind of writing activity (nuts & bolts; building the writing habit; practicing the skill of writing)

Language Focus (spelling/grammar/punctuation/etc.)

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Activity Summary

Opinion? Comments? Possible challenges?

Process Writing & Lesson Flow

This lesson flow can take up to a couple of weeks to complete (depending on the length of writing and the level of the students). As discussed in your reading worksheets, process writing aims to get to the “heart of the various that most writers employ” (Harmer #1, 2007, p. 326).

Step One: Brainstorming

Step Two: Free-Write & Mapping (organizing your brainstorm into workable categories)

Step Three: Outline Flow

Step Four: Thesis Statement (essay) and/or topic sentences

Step Five: Detailed Outline

Step Five: 1st draft

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Step Six: Proofread/Peer edit – content/flow/organization/ discourse/structure

Step Seven: 2nd draft

Step Eight: Edit for grammar/spelling/cohesion

Step Nine: FINAL DRAFT

Assessment and Error Correction When we look at assessment, we always need to consider feedback and error correction, criteria for assessment, and types of assessment.

Assessing students’ writing: Tips from teachers

Required Activity: Appendix 3 This activity allows you to read about and reflect on teachers’ ideas about responding to errors in learners’ writing. Read the opinions and think about whether you agree or disagree.

Responding to students’ writing

REQUIRED Activity: Appendix 4 Step One: Henny is a 13-year old boy, in his 3rd year of English/ his class is 50 minutes, 3 times a week/ his class has recently reviewed past tense and present perfect tense/ he has not studied passive voice. Henny’s task: Write your own conclusion to the story we read in class. Use your imagination! Read Henny’s story and think about how you would respond to his writing (comments/ ink colour/ correction symbols/ marks?)

Step Two: Look at Henny’s story again. Using the writing symbols in Appendix 5, correct Henny’s writing as if you were his teacher.

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REQUIRED Reading Worksheet Please ensure that you have read all the readings in the textbook and answered the worksheets below. Questions from the worksheets will appear on the exams!

Reading Worksheet

(Harmer #1, Chapter 19) CHAPTER 19: WRITING Summary: First, Harmer frames writing in the literacy context in terms of handwriting, spelling, layout, and punctuation. Next, he outlines the different approaches to teaching writing including process versus product writing, genre, and creative writing. Last, he discusses the writing lesson sequence with activities for all levels. 1. Why is spelling difficult for students of English? (p. 324)

__________________________________________________________________

2. How can teachers help students improve their spelling? (p. 325)

__________________________________________________________________

3. Give 3 examples of different punctuation conventions. (p. 325)

__________________________________________________________________

4. Briefly describe the difference between the process writing approach and the product

writing approach. (p. 325)

__________________________________________________________________

5. Why do most educators prefer the process writing approach? (p. 326)

__________________________________________________________________

6. Harmer describes that the writing process is in fact more complex than just one approach.

Why? (p. 326)

__________________________________________________________________

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7. Describe the writing process wheel on page 326.

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

8. Give a disadvantage of the process writing approach. (p. 326)

__________________________________________________________________

9. Describe the genre approach and why is it useful for all types of ESL learners? (p. 327)

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

10. Give a clear definition of creative writing in your own words and how can teachers

bolster the ‘product pride’ of their students’ work? (p. 328)

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

11. How can the ESL teacher encourage their students to become habitual, confident, and

enthusiastic writers? (p. 329)

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

12. Describe the difference between writing- for- learning and writing- for- writing? (p. 330)

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

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Appendices Appendix 1 – Problem cards Appendix 2 – Magazine advertisements Appendix 3 – Teacher comments Appendix 4 – Henny’s Story Appendix 5 – Correction symbols Appendix 6 -Sample Lesson Plan

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Appendix 1 – Solution Cards

(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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Appendix 2 - Advertisements

(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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Appendix 3 – Teacher Comments

(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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Appendix 4 – Henny’s Story

(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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Appendix 5 – Correction Symbols

(Tanner and Green, 1998)

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Appendix 6 – Lesson Plan Template

LESSON PLAN TEMPLATENAME: KAREN RAUSER CLASS TESL 023 DATE AUGUST 16, 2011

GOAL OF LESSON: INTRODUCE RECIPE GENRE

Class Description:

Multiculturll split level 1/2 class. Students range in age and many are multilingual and highly educated, though they are at the beginner level. Essentials class is designed to improve their communicative skills in Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing as well as grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation subskills.

Skill focus: L S R W:

Listening to instructions and demo. Speaking with each other in partners and in the group. Reading recipe, and writing some words and directions.

Grammar point(s):

Imperative languagemaybe some count and non-count nouns comparatives and superlatives

Vocabulary:

lexical chunks: comfort food, from scratchnouns: hand mixer, wooden spoons, measuring cups/spoons, cookie sheets, cooling racks, brown sugar, flour, vanilla, baking soda, baking powder, lifter, spatulaverbs: mix, cream, add, bake, stir,

Pronunciation:

Stressed syllables: brown sugar (that’s nasty), ingredients (that’s dangerous), etc.vowels: esp in sugar (10), sheets (1y), spoons (11w), vanilla (2), baking powder (6w), mix (2), cream (1y), add (5), bake (3y)

Learning outcomes:

SWBAT1. write a list of ingredients and put them in categories

Before Class

measure out ingredients, set up table and put cloth over it,write learning outcomes on flip chart

Bring to class

Materials

cookies!!!bowls, spoons, measuring cups and spoons, table cloth, dish cloths, cookie sheets, cooling racks, ingredients for cookies (butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, bs, bp, salt, choco chips, oatmeal)

Handouts

vowel clock (on wall) Recipe format handout

2. write directions for a recipe using imperative language3. discuss comfort foods and recipes with classmates4. Review pronunciation techniques for new vocabulary words

Previous class work and homework: n/a

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Time

in minutes

3-4 minutes

8 minutes

ActivitiesPart 1 HOOK: Opening and warm up (includes objectives

and prior knowledge)

Draw on the board: [comfort food]“When I feel tired or sad, one thing that really helps is eating my “comfort food” (point to comfort food). Do you have a “comfort food”? What is your comfort food?Do you want to guess my comfort food? These are my comfort food: “

Hand out cookies.

“Go ahead and try it. Now, try to tell me what you think is in the cookies.”

Write ideas on the board as they guess the right ingredients.

Very good, you came up with some of the ingredients! – Now, today we are going to learn about recipes and how to write them.

Part 2 Presentation of Teaching Point

“Now the first part of the recipe is the ingredient list. I will tell you the rest of the ingredients and we will put them on this line of wet and dry.” [introduce comparatives and superlatives wetter, drier, wettest, driest]

Draw on board:wet ---------------------------------------------------------- dry

Other Notes

Seating Plans

Potential trouble spots

Contingencies

Comprehension Checks

Which ingredient is the wettest? Which ingredients are driest? Which one is wetter, butter or eggs?

Is oatmeal wet?

10-12 minutes

brown sugar (in the middle) eggs (wet)butter (wet...)vanilla (wet)

flour (dry)baking soda (dry) Baking powder (dry) chocolate chips oatmeal/quick oats

“Good! Now when we make a recipe, we usually put the ingredients in order. The first ingredients go at the top and the last ingredients go at the bottom. “

Draw Recipe form on board with rough template.

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Ingredients and then Directions

“After the ingredients come the Directions. The directions show us the steps in making the recipe. When I show you the Directions, you will notice that we make Directions in imperative form, which means we just use the base form of the verb and we don’t have to have the subject. For example: “

Write on board:- Mix the dry ingredients together

Hand out Recipe Form

Part 3 Activity 1For this activity, I want you to work with your partner to try to fill in the blanks on the recipe. I will demonstrate the recipe and you must fill in the recipe as I show you the steps.

What do you notice about the list of ingredients? The first parthas2c–What does c mean?–cups! Look at the notes at the bottom. c is an abbreviation (short form) of cups in a recipe. It is the same with tsp – what is tsp short for? Good!

The first thing I need is brown sugar and then eggs, butter

15 minutes

and vanilla. These are all the wet ingredients. See in the directions – it says “_______ brown sugar and wet ingredients together.” Put in “Cream” in the blank for #1 - -- just the verb. It is not using a subject – because “YOU” are the subject.

What does “Cream” mean? – I’ll set it on medium on the hand mixer.

[Cream ingredients together]

“Now I must mix the dry ingredients together. 2 cups of flour, and 1 tsp each of bs and bp. “

______ , can you mix those together for me with the spoon? Thank you.

etc.....finish recipe and check that partners have filled out their recipe form - go through Steps 3-6

Are you filling in your recipe sheet with the ingredients? Brown sugar, 2 eggs, 1 tsp of vanilla, 1 cup of butter.

Check blanks on HO

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and see how well they listen and write down.

After the demo – check their HOs and see how much they got. Best listeners get another cookie!

Hand out answer key.Part 4 Activity 2 – My Comfort Food

Ask students to ask their partner about their favourite comfort food and how they make it.

Hand out the blank recipe form for each student. Tell them they will be writing down the recipe for their favourite comfort food. Remind them to write the ingredients in order and to think of all the equipment they would need. Also remind them that the directions are in imperative mood, they start with a base verb and no subject.

Circulate around the class to give help where needed and see that students are on task.

Students who don’t finish in class should finish for homework.

10 minutes

Part 5 Outcomes Met? Assessment? Closing/ Homework

Before the end of class, review the outcomes for the day. Check them off with the students so that they see what they have learned. Also ask them if they learned any new words today – or something new about pronunciation or grammar that they didn’t know before.

Homework – they should bring in a copy of their comfort food recipe. The recipes can be collected and edited as a class (peer editing and teacher editing) and typed up and put into a class cookbook. A potluck would be a fun idea to feature the recipes from the class.

Teacher Notes: Reflection on what went well, what didn’t go so well... Future modification (how will you improve this lesson next time?)

Handouts on following pages

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ELSE 02 Recipe Format Ingredients: __________________________________________ [title of the recipe]

Equipment needed: - 2 bowls

- a hand mixer

- _____________ spoons

- measuring cups and spoons

- small spoons

- cookie __________

- cooling __________ -

2 c ______ 2 c______ 1 tsp_____ 1 tsp _____ _______ _____________________________

_____________________________

vanilla ___________________________ baking _________ baking __________ _______chocolate chips 1. ________________ brown sugar and wet ingredients together using hand mixer. 2. _______________ flour, baking powder and baking soda together in another bowl. 3._____________________________________________________________ 4._____________________________________________________________5._____________________________________________________________6._____________________________________________________________

Directions:

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ELSE 02 Recipe Format Ingredients: Mom’s Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Comfort Cookies

2 c 2 1 c 1 tsp

2 c

1 tsp 1 tsp

2 c

1 c brown sugar eggsbutter vanilla flour baking soda baking powder quick oats chocolate chips Directions: 1. Cream brown sugar and wet ingredients together using hand mixer. 2. Mix flour, baking powder and baking soda together in another bowl. 3. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients.4. Add oatmeal and chocolate chips. 5. Roll into small balls and place on cookie sheet. 6. Bake at 350 degrees (Farenheit) for 8 minutes. Notes: c = cups (250 mL)tsp = teaspoon (15 mL) Karen Rauser Equipment needed: - 2 bowls

- a hand mixer

- wooden spoons

- measuring cups and spoons

- small spoons

- cookie sheets

- cookie racks

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ELSE 02Name: ____________________________ __________________________________________

[title of the recipe] Equipment needed: Ingredients [in order of use]: Directions [Write in imperative]: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Notes: c = cups (250 mL)tsp = teaspoon (15 mL)

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References Harmer, J. (2007). The practice of English language teaching 4th Edition. Essex, England:

Pearson Education Ltd. (AKA: Big Harmer) Harmer, J. (2007). How to teach English. Essex, England: Pearson Education Ltd. (AKA: Little

Harmer) Tanner, R., & Green, C. (1998). Tasks for teacher education: A reflective approach. Essex,

England: Pearson Education Ltd.

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Video Twelve Teaching Writing

• Compare speaking and writing

• Process writing

• Genres

• Strategies

• Lesson plan

1

Learning Outcomes

1. Explain the main differences between speaking and writing (both productive skills)

2. Discuss process writing, the stages of writing and writing genres

3. Analyze writing tasks in terms of aim, audience, level, and genre and describe some effective teaching strategies

4. Learn to develop a lesson plan and strategies for providing feedback, error correction and assessment.

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Differences between Speaking and Writing

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Writing Skills to Consider:

• Alphabet & Spelling

• Alphabet and Spelling

• Sentence Structure (SVO)

• Semantics and Lexis

• Organization and Discourse

4

Genres

• [CH insert genres clip here]

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Types of Writing Academic Writing

• Note-taking • Paragraphs • Essays • Research Papers Creative Writing • Stories, comics, cartoons • Poems • Journaling • Letters

Functional Writing • Applications • Business Letters • Proposals • Presentations • Brochures • Advertisements Online • Email • Blogs • Forums • Wiki • Googledocs • Web pages

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Teaching Writing

Make students aware of the following in their writing: • Aim-what is the purpose for writing? • Audience-who is this writing for? • Genre-type of writing • Level-think about student ability

Process Writing

• Step One: Brainstorming

• Step Two: Free-Write & Mapping (organizing your brainstorm into workable categories)

• Step Three: Outline Flow

• Step Four: Thesis Statement (essay) and/or topic sentences

• Step Five: Detailed Outline

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Process Writing cont.

• Step Five: 1st draft

• Step Six: Proofread/Peer edit – content/flow/organization/

• discourse/structure

• Step Seven: 2nd draft

• Step Eight: Edit for grammar/spelling/cohesion

• Step Nine: FINAL DRAFT

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Scoring

How will you determine a value for the writing? • Analytic • Holistic • Rubrics

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Exam Questions Based on

• Harmer #1 chapter 19

• Harmer # 2 chapter 8

• Student Manual

• Video Lecture and PowerPoint slides

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