University Ahmed Draia, Adrar FacultyofLetters and

University Ahmed Draia, Adrar

FacultyofLetters and Languages

Department of English

Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment for the Requirement of a

Master Degree in Linguistics and Didactics

Presented by: Supervised by: Fatima Zohra Belalem Mr. Lahcen Boubekeur

Academic Year: 2016/2017

Evaluating the Writing Skill of the LMD and Classic Systems BA Students in the Department of English (A Comparative Study at Adrar University)

ii

Dedication

This work is dedicated

To my“beloved parents” who supported me morally and financially

To my respected teacher Mr. Boubekeur who supported me and help me in achieving

my goal

To my friends who motivated me step by step and encouraged me

To all the members of my family

iii

Acknowledgments

First, I would like to thank Allah, who gave me the patience, strength, and determination to

complete this work.

Secondly, I am very much thankful to my teacher Mr. Lahcen Boubekeur who helped me

in my thesis, settled the problems that I faced while making this work and gave his

valuable time and guidance

In addition, special thanks go to my friends Mihoubi Assala, Okbaoui Baba, and Mesbahi

Abess for their support and help. Really, this work would not have been done without

them.

I would like to acknowledge my family who strengthened their undying support towards

me, finally, all those people, who involved directly or indirectly to accomplish this task

and in making my efforts fruitful.

iv

Abstract

This subject is mainly about evaluating the English language competence of graduates

students, LMD and Classic systems, in the writing skill. In this topic, we compare between

the students’ competence by assessing them in the writing skill; every student has to write a

paragraph on their experiences at the university, and then identify their mistakes in some

standards as vocabulary, style, grammar, structure, and punctuation. For the investigation of

this topic, questionnaire was conducted, in which the students are asked some questions

about their program in written expression. The main purpose behind the use of such a

questionnaire is to answer the question of why the students do mistake in their writing. After

analyzing the data, we found that the students of LMD system did more mistakes more in

their paragraph than the classic system students, because they were studying written

expression in three years, while the others of LMD system studied it in a couple of years,

this helped them in practicing their writing ability and improve it.

v

List of Abbreviations

LMD: License Master Doctorate

TEFL: Teaching English as Foreign Language

CBA: Competency- Based Approach

ELT: English Language Teaching

CBLT: Competency- Based Language Teaching

EFL: English as a foreign language

AA: Algerian Arabic

MS: Middle school

UA: Educational Units

BMD: Bachelor Master Doctorate

vi

List of Tables

Table1.1 Improving the English language .......................................................................... 6

Table1.2 The comparison between the LMD and Classical systems ................................. 18

Table1.3 LMD Vs Classical EFL Classroom .................................................................... 22

Table2.1 word of Transition Words and Phrases for Expressing Time .............................. 34

Table3.1 Participant number 1 mistakes ........................................................................... 46




Table3.5 Participant number 5 mistake ............................................................................. 48





Table3.10 Participant number 10 mistakes ....................................................................... 52




Table 3.14 Participant number 14 mistakes ...................................................................... 54



vii

List of Figures

Figure 1.1 LMD Vs Classic in the first year ..................................................................... 23

Figure3.1 Bar Graph represents the number of written expression sessions for the LMD

students ............................................................................................................................ 57

Figure3.2 Bar Graph represents the number of written expression sessions for the Classic

system .............................................................................................................................. 58

Figure 3.3 Pie chart represents the extent to which LMD students are interested in written

expression ........................................................................................................................ 59

Figure 3.4 Pie chart represents the extent to which Classic students are interested in written

expression ........................................................................................................................ 60

Figure3.5 Pie chart represents the answers of fourth question .......................................... 60

Figure3.6 Pie chart represents the answers of fourth question ........................................... 61

Figure3.7 Pie chart represents the answers of fifth question ............................................. 62

Figure3.8 Pie chart represents the answers of fifth question ............................................. 62

Figure3.9 Pie chart represents the answers of question number 6 ..................................... 63

Figure3.10 Pie chart represents the answers of question number 6 ................................... 64



viii

Table of contents

Dedication........................................................................................................................ ii

Acknowledgment ............................................................................................................ iii

Abstract ........................................................................................................................... iv

List of Abbreviation ......................................................................................................... v

List of Tables ................................................................................................................... vi

List of Figures ................................................................................................................vii

Table of Contents ......................................................................................................... viii

General Introduction ....................................................................................................... 1

Literature Review

Chapter one: The Status of English in Algeria.

1.1 Introduction ................................................................................................................ 3

1.2 The Initiation of English as a Second Foriegn language in Algeria ............................... 3

1.3English in the Algerian Middle school ........................................................................... 7

1.3.1 Objectives of English teaching in the Middle school .............................................. 7

1.3.2 The Competency-Based Approach ......................................................................... 7

1.3.3 Methodological Hints ............................................................................................ 9

1.3.4 Textbook Description .......................................................................................... 10

1.4 English in the Algerian Secondary school................................................................... 11

1.4.1 Objectives of Teaching English in the Secondary school ...................................... 12

1.4.2 Teaching Approach .............................................................................................. 13

1.4.3English in the Curriculum ..................................................................................... 14

1.4.4 Description of the Textbook ................................................................................. 15

1.5 Status of English in Higher Education ........................................................................ 16

1.5.1 The nature of LMD System .................................................................................. 17

ix

1.5.2Comparison between the English Department within the Classic and the LMD

Systems ........................................................................................................................ 21

Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 24

Chapter Two: General Overview about Writing Skill.

2.1 Introduction .............................................................................................................. 25

2.2 Definition of Writing skill .......................................................................................... 25

2.3 The Importance of Writing Skill ................................................................................. 27

2.4 The Major Types of Writing Skill............................................................................... 30

2.4.1 Expository Writing ......................................................................................... 30

2.4.2 Descriptive Writing ........................................................................................ 31

2.4.3 Narrative writing ............................................................................................ 33

2.5 The Approaches to Teaching Writing ......................................................................... 35

2.5.1 The Controlled-to Free Approaches ................................................................ 35

2.5.2 Free Writing Approach ................................................................................... 36

2.5.3 The Product-Oriented Approach ..................................................................... 37

2.5.4 The Process-Oriented Approach ..................................................................... 38

2.5.5 The Genre Approach ...................................................................................... 39

2.6 The Stages of Writing Process .................................................................................... 40

2.6.1 Prewriting Stage ............................................................................................. 40

2.6.2 Organizing Stage ............................................................................................ 41

2.6.3 Drafting Stage ................................................................................................ 41

2.6.4 Revising Stage................................................................................................ 41

2.6.5 Editing Stage .................................................................................................. 42

2.7 Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 43

Practical Part

Chapter Three: Fieldwork and Data Analysis.

3.1 Introduction .............................................................................................................. 44

x

3.2 The Research Design .................................................................................................. 44

3.3 The Research Instruments .......................................................................................... 44

3.4 The Sample ................................................................................................................ 45

3.5 The Students’ Assessment .......................................................................................... 45

3.5.1 Analysis of the Assessment ............................................................................ 46

3.5.2 Findings and Discussion ................................................................................. 56

3.6 The Students’ Questionnaire....................................................................................... 57

3.6.1 Analysis of the Questionnaire ......................................................................... 57

3.6.2 Findings and Discussion ................................................................................. 66

3.7 Conclusion ................................................................................................................ 68

General Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 69

References ....................................................................................................................... 71

Appendices ...................................................................................................................... 76

Appendix 1 Students’ Assessment ................................................................................ 76

Appendix 2 Students ‘Questionnaire ............................................................................. 77

Appendix 3 A Paragraph of Classic Student ................................................................. 79

Appendix 4 A Paragraph of LMD Student .................................................................... 81

1

General Introduction

Learning a foreign Language mainly aims to enable the student to communicate fluently

in that language. The communication of any language is based on the four primary skills,

which are: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. For most of the learners, writing is

determined as the most difficult skill; it is the most challenging ability. Improving the writing

skill is the most complicated compared to the other skills.

After implementing the LMD three years’ system in the Algerian universities, in 2004,

the syllabus has been changed in most of the fields. Especially the written expression

module, in department of English, that is taught, in LMD system, in the first and second

years, while in the four classical years, it was taught in the first, second, and third years. In

first year, they begin with an introduction to some basic concepts in grammar, punctuation,

and the structure of sentences….and so on. After that, they develop it to the various elements

and techniques for writing an essay..

The purpose of this study is to compare between the competencies of the LMD English

language license graduates and Classic system ones and evaluate them in the writing skill.

Also, it aims to discover the reasons that led to such weakness or strength in their competence

to write appropriately, through the program of written expression session that is used in the

Department of English. Besides, this comparative study will seek to answer the following

questions:

What is the difference between the classical System and the LMD system in

general, and in the English Department in special and how do they work?

2

Is it true that those who have a classical license are better than who have LMD one

in their writing skill competence?

What are the reasons that lead to such weakness and strength?

3

1.1 Introduction

In Algeria, four different languages take their place within its society, Arabic, Tamazight,

French and English. Arabic is the official language of the country, and it is spoken by the

majority of the population as their mother tongue. Tamazight, on the other hand, as it was

stated in Chemami (2011), is used by 20%_30% of the population; it is taught in sixteen

provinces. Besides, it has some technical problems related to its writing.

Also, English and French have a prominent place at the linguistic level. French is not an

official language in Algeria, but it has its place in the Algeria society as well as the

educational system. So many Algerian people speak French in their daily life. In this context,

Benrabeh (2007) said: "It is quite ironic that independent Algeria has done more to assist the

spread of this language than the colonial authorities did throughout the 132 years of French

presence” (p. 193). In the other hand, English is considered as the second foreign language,

after French. Despite the fact that English is the most influential in the whole world, but it is

still taught until the first grade level in the middle school.

This chapter is going to be about the status of English in Algeria. First, it will determine

the English language as a foreign language. Second, it will present English in Algerian

school, both at the middle school and the secondary school. At the end; it will speak about

English at university, in the Classical system and the LMD system.

1.2 The Introduction of English as a Second Foreign Language

in Algeria

In Algeria, the English language has a high power, and it spreads in the whole country;

this is clearly noticeable. At the matter of importance, it came after French as the most

important foreign language, in which it is identified as a second language spreading in all

the parts of the society as a whole. In this context, Harmer (2001, cited in Hamzaoui, 2017)

4

explained that English is “a language widely adopted for communication between speakers

whose native languages are different from each other's and where one or both speakers are

using it as a second language." (p.1)

From the end of the 1970's to the beginning of the 1990's, English was the second foreign

language presented in the middle school. In 1993, it started to compete with French in the

ministry of education. The pupils of the fourth grade were obligated to choose between

French and English as the first mandatory foreign language, unexpectedly, the competition

goes to the favor of French. Nowadays, English is taught as the second foreign language till

the first year of the middle school (Hamzaoui, 2017). In Algerian universities, 95% of

undergraduate and post-graduate lectures of science and medicine are still done in French

(Milliani, 2000). In addition to that, Derni(2009) stated that:

“English has not only been acknowledged in the Algerian educational

system, but it is seemingly developing as an integral part of AA itself,

especially among young people and that has often been introduced

through French via forms like ‘taxi phone’, ‘fast-food’, ‘week-end’,

‘chat’, ‘internet’, ‘windows’, ‘surfing’, ‘web’, ‘foot’, ‘penalty’ and so

on”(p 284)

In the new Algerian curriculum, teaching and learning foreign languages have taken a

great importance; consequently, the English language has achieved more attention in the

educational field, as well as the production fields. (Hamzaoui, 2017)

By the middle of 2000, the Algerian curriculum started to witness various changes aiming

to make the structure of the educational system better than it was before, and because of the

past traumatic events, in which the administration has become confused in some areas where

5

many schools demanded better organization and teachers. Since the introduction of English

into schools, it has become part of the new curriculum as well as it is required in all levels

of education. Various TEFL schools started to appear throughout the country. Despite the

fact of the motive of the extended use of the French grammar, the current view of the place

of the English language in language learning is also filled with political scenes with the aim

of neglecting one language. (Mami, 2013)

As a matter of this fact, Mami (2013) stated that “I explain: “adjusting” a person to a

culture has connotations of cultural chauvinism, applying that the new comer should

abandon the culture oforigin in favor of embracing the values and customs of the host

society” (p 911). This was the case of the French language. The English language, In the

Algerian case came to satisfy some needs, in which the students have to learn the culture of

the foreign language; he doesn’t have to accept it then he can neglect the customs. This has

no relation with the ethnocentric overtones . In this context, Millian (2000) has said that:

"In a situation where the French language has lost much of its ground

in the sociocultural and educational environments of the country; the

introduction of English is being heralded as the magic solution to all

possible ills including economic, technological and education ones."

(p.13)

In the world, English language and its role is a controversial case; this leaves little space

to determine the positive elements of a common international language in a democratic way.

In Algeria, technically, speaking in the English language is seen as the second foreign

language after the French language. The cooperation with the United States and Canada,

who are actively supporting and stand with this educational reform policy in Algeria, is the

6

main reason to the desire to promote English language in Algeria. This leads to preparing

textbooks, the training of English teachers and the introduction of new technology. The next

table will summarize the suggestions, which are made by the Algerian school children to

improve their English. (Chemami, 2011)

Table1.1 Improving the English language (Chemami, 2011)

As this table shows, in the College student surveyed, it was seen that the students have

an emotional consciousness in their choices; this is explained bellow in brackets: the

diversification of writing activities is a way to improve the student level in the English

language (34.5%); the same thing with reading activities. Enrich the school library and

provide it with current documentation (2.9%). Letting the student choose their subject of

study freely (3.7%) and evaluating them through serious examinations (22.5%) are one of

the popular suggestions. Also, affiliating local college with international schools is

demanded. (Chemami, 2011)

7

1.3 English in The Algerian Middle School

This part tries to explain Englishin the Algerian middle school syllabuses. Even if there

are some differences in the four years’ middle school programs, but they share the same

organizational framework. So it will not be dealt with each one of them in isolation, but

rather, it is going to be the general overview of the organizational framework. They are

organized in the same four main subsections:

1.3.1 Objectives of English Teaching in The Middle School

In this part of English syllabus, the teachers, who design the program, put more emphasis

on the importance of the English language for the future professional career of the Algerian

learners. The syllabus designers agreed that because of globalization, the English language

had achieved the status of "the world's lingua franca." In other words, the English language

has turned into the vehicle of civilization and modernity. Moreover, mastering the English

language is not just a necessity for the Algerian citizen, it is one way of helping the Algerian

citizens to incorporate with others and integrate into universality. (Ammour, 2006)

There are three primary objectives are included in teaching English in the middle school:

Methodological, linguistics, and cultural objectives. The methodological aims are related to

the development of the strategies and skills. The linguistic aims are linked to the mastery of

the language elements. At the end, the cultural objectives, are included in the development

of the learners' cultural awareness and understanding of the other‘cultures. (Ammour, 2006)

1.3.2 The Competency- Based Approach

The Competency-Based Approach is seen as the most appropriate teaching approach that

goes hand in hand with the objectives mentioned above. There are various models of

curriculum development, some of them emphasis on transmission and assessment of

knowledge, and the other emphasis on skills and personal development. On the other hand,

the CBA is the most popular one which emphasizes on measurable and usable knowledge,

8

abilities and skills. It involves teachers who include focusing their instructions on concepts

expecting to foster deeper and broader understanding. This approach contains the

organization of the content of the curriculum regarding the development of competencies

with the use of some pedagogical practices. (Chelli, 2010)

Dealing with the challenges in a successful way makes the CBA a privileged topic in

curriculum discourses, in which the learners should work with their skills, attitudes, values,

knowledge, and behaviors. The present approach focuses on the outcomes rather than the

input of the learning process. Abilities are not just skills are used only for examination and

assessment, but also to determine a complex articulation of knowledge, attitudes, and skills.

Also, CBA can create a change from sheer memorization to life skills, including social,

emotional, communication, and other relevant skills (Cheli, 2010).

In this section that explains the teaching proper of the English subject; three

competencies are included in the syllabus:

1. Interact orally in English: by the end of the year, learners must have the ability to

use the functional language that is acquired inside the classroom, and also the verbal

and nonverbal means to contact their schoolmates (with pairs or groups) and their

teachers.

2. Interpreting oral and written texts: by the end of the school year, the learners have

to be able to show their comprehension and non- understanding of simple texts (short

stories, fables, legends, games, songs), either descriptive or narrative, that link their

cognitive level, either verbally or non- verbally, with the help of their teacher, and

the use of adequate visual and linguistic support

3. Producing simple messages, oral or written: At the end of school year, the pupils

have to be able express their ideas and beliefs and put them in logical and

9

chronological order, without forgetting to follow some syntactic rules, punctuation,

and spelling, either for describing or narrating. (Bounab, 2015)

The competency-based approach emphasizes more on the outcomes of the learning

process. It takes into consideration what the learner is considered to do more than what

he/she is supposed to grasp. It mentions to an educational movement that supports

identifying educational objectives regarding precision commensurable descriptions of

information, behavior, and skills that the student have to own at the end of study course

(Richards& Rodgers, 2001)

1.3.3 Methodological Hints

The syllabus designers determine that the methodology, in this part, based on objectives,

contents, organization of the content, and evaluation. First, the competencies and the

objectives are mentioned according to the strategies that are related to each language skill.

For instance: “1.4 strategies propres aux activités de lecture” (strategies that are related to

reading activities) (MS 3 Syllabus: 54). Then, a list of appropriate content, which goes with

particular objectives, is given. In this content, the list includes life-coping skills identified in

the syllabus as "savoir- faire" (know-how), socio-cultural subjects such as "forms de

politesses interculturelles, mode de vie" (intercultural polite forms, lifestyle) (MS 3

Syllabus: 56), in addition to that, language elements such as, vocabulary, syntax, phonology

etc. the last item of this part is particularized to evaluation and assessment to see how well

the learners have reached the objectives. (Ammour, 2006)

10

1.3.4 Textbook Description

In Ammor (2006), the book is made up of seven didactic files; each file tackles with a

general them. Each one of them includes the following elements:

‾ learn the language

‾ learn about the culture

‾ Reminder

‾ Check

‾ Project

Learn the language: the emphasis on this section is on teaching the language as a

means of communication, spelling, lexis, grammar, and pronunciation. It is based on

the four skills activities (listening and speaking then reading and writing). Each

sequence contains three main elements: first “listen and speak” that aims to

familiarize the learners with new words and structure. The second one is “practice”

in which the students practice the different items of language through some activities.

The last one is “produce”, to involve them in written production through some

written activities.

Learn about the culture: the text book emphasis on some elements of the culture

of some countries that speak the English language, as the United States and Great

Britain. The main aim is to make the learners able to differentiate between their

culture and the other English culture through some activities.

Reminder: all the new elements and language functions are included in this file in

order to see the amount of information and knowledge that acquired to cover all over

the file.

11

Check: this section emphasizes on evaluating and assessing the learners’

performance in order to see the improvement of the quality of the learning process,

also to confirm that the elements of the file were properly acquired.

Project: in this part, the learners are given tasks and activities regularly to provide

them with some important steps and tips.

1.4 English in the Algerian Secondary School

This section attempts to explain the way of teaching English in the Algerian high school

syllabus. It aims to develop the mastery of the student of the linguistic functions and to

enhance the discourse patterns for the sake of processing content that is related to their lives

and backgrounds as well as to develop their fluency and accuracy. (Bouaricha, 2015)

1.4.1 Objectives of Teaching English in the Secondary School.

In the introduction to the English Syllabus of secondary school that was proposed by the

ministry of education (2006), the reform introduces a group of goals, in which can help to

achieve them in the three years’ period. The following statement explains that the narrow

conception of language learning, which naturally contains the acquisition of linguistic

elements, is identified to include methodological and cultural objectives. In this context, it

was claimed:

“The aim of teaching English is to help our society to get

harmoniously integrated in modernity through a fully complete

participation within a community of people who use English in all types

of interactions - this participation should be based on sharing and

exchanging ideas as well as experiences beingscientific, cultural,or

civilisational – this participation will help for better understanding for

oneself and the other” ( p88. Cited in Messerehi, 2008)

12

English teaching is also aiming to:

‾ Help the student to enhance self-learning and critical thinking.

‾ Advance the students' intellectual ability to analyze evaluating and synthesizing.

‾ Let the student use the documents of English, in the new situation at work.

‾ Convince the students to accept other culture, to start the spirit of tolerance and

broad-mind ness.

It is important to see that these objectives were approved by the Education Ministry,

which gives opportunities to the teachers who want to exploit the intercultural study as well

as to encourage tolerant attitudes among the learners. To sum up, English teaching at the

Algerian secondary school is not just acquired to achieve the general goals of education but

also human, national, universal values are demanded. The learners have to learn how to

introduce their country and their cultural values in the English language, and also they have

to be open to English human and universal values that are essential elements of modernity

and globalization. (Messerehi, 2008)

1.4.2 Teaching Approach

Teaching English, either in secondary or middle school, both of them follow the same

teaching approach, which is Competency-Based Approach. During 2005, the competency-

based approach was presented in Algeria within the educational reform, which could be, to

some extent, related to globalization, after that, it was adjusted to the ELT (English Language

Teaching) field. It is seen as the CBLT approach (Competency- Based Language Teaching

Approach), which preserves the language teaching of the learner-centered pedagogy that its

primary objective is to promote learning autonomy. Besides, The CBLT approach is mainly

identified for the sake of developing the competencies of the students by virtue of a group

of pedagogical strategies, which may ameliorate their skills and enhance their performance,

13

in which “The focus moves from what students know about language to what they can do

with it. The focus on competencies or learning outcomes underpins the curriculum

framework and syllabus specification, teaching strategies and assessment.” (Docking, 1994,

p.16. Cited inBouaricha, 2015)

According to that, there are three essential steps that the English teacher should follow.

The first step is that the teacher would determine the needs of the learners. The second one

is, basically to these requirements; the teacher should select the appropriate competencies,

which are followed by proper instructions. In the end, the teachers evaluate the performance

of the students in those skills (Lobanova and Shunin, 2008).

Thus, there are many lacks detected in this approach. One of them is that this approach

is too bored and colossal to be followed in the field of ELT. Moreover, the evaluation process

is usually subjective. So, the complete preparation is demanded in the field of the ELT that

goes hand in hand with continuous adaptation and refinement. (Bouaricha, 2015)

1.4.3 English in The Curriculum

English is mainly identified as the dominant foreign language in the syllabus of various

educational systems in all over the world. According to its central role, it gives more

importance to EFL teaching in the Algerian Middle and secondary schools, so the English

language has become a compulsory subject-matter in the syllabus in all the schools in the

whole country with a little difference in the coefficient and the time load of teaching. In the

last few years, with the new educational reforms that the Algerian educational system has

followed, the English language was seen, on a larger scale, as the improvement target

(Senoussi, 2012). Thus the teachers who design the syllabus see that:

“The study of English must imperatively be conceived with the

objective of helping our society to get harmoniously integrated into

14

modernity. This means an entirely full participation in a growing

linguistic community of people who use English in all types of transaction.

This involvement must be based on sharing and exchanging ideas as well

as experiences in the fields of science, culture, and civilization. This will

make it possible to know oneself and the other”(Programme of English as

a Second Foreign Language, 2003:2, cited in Senoussi, 2012)

In this context, the appropriate command of English language is advised to fix the needs

of our community, and also to achieve a total participation in various fields, for example,

culture, science, economy, civilization……. and so on. (Senoussi, 2012)

1.4.4 Description of The Textbook

The book of the three years of the secondary school adapts with the syllabus that is

designed and agreed by the Ministry of National Education. It is based on the Competency-

Based Approach, which is mainly about learner-centered and project oriented. The

textbookincludes eight units; the teacher has to complete each unit in a maximum of 15

hours. Each unit involves five main sections, in which the author describes and entitles

them:

1. Discovering the language: the learner, in this part, should recognize the essential

elements of the language, such as vocabulary, pronunciation, grammar, and spelling,

which have to be dealt in each unit.

2. Developing skills: in this part, the learners have to establish the primary language

skills and also the intellectual skills, such as thinking, and guessing, making,

anticipating, synthesizing, analyzing, planning, etc. These skills are demanded to

start working on projects and presentations of class that is based on these projects.

15

This activity is involved in the three mentioned competencies in the syllabus:

interacting orally, interpreting messages, and producing messages.

3. Putting thing together: the learners, here, bring the project itself; as a result, the

language elements as well as the skills that are acquired in every unit. The learners

have to find guidance on how the project becomes materialized. They own the

opportunity to combine first and social skills and then, display their individual

achievements.

4. Where do we go from here? This section is mainly about the learners' self-

assessment; they have to check their performance and progress through different

means, such as: keeping portfolios and filling grids.

5. Exploring matters further: in this section, the learner will have the opportunity to

learn more about the topic that is dealt with through the broad and deep reading. The

students will learn more new words and ameliorate their grammar knowledge. Also,

they will become aware of spoken and written language registers. (Messerehi, 2008)

16

1.5 Status of English in The Higher Education

In 2004, the Algerian decision makers were obliged to implement another higher

education system, from the classical system to the LMD (License- Master- Doctorate)

system. This shift is an ambitious project for the Algerian universities. The LMD system

witnesses a change mostly in all the specialists, especially in the field of English as a foreign

language, as well as, a great importance in the communication and teaching process. This

new system presents new courses, compared to the same field in the classical system. The

Algerian universities have shifted from the classic system to the LMD system, to be updated

with other universities of the world. Each system has its objects and characteristics.

Besides, the LMD system was implemented, in parallel, with the classical system; the

later started gradually fading. Many of problems began to appear, in which the students begin

to transfer from the LMD system to the classic one, and this, the Algerian higher education

researchers considered it as an ambiguity, in the administration, about the rules of this new

system, and also the students are the principle concerned in this change. As a result, this led

to a struggle between the classical system student and the student of the LMD system. Then

the Ministry took a number of procedures that aim to apply the new system and develop it,

especially after the appearance of the presidential act that provides for the equality between

Magister and Master degree in the grade, coefficient, and also in employment, this has lead

to the emergence of protest between the students of the classical system; Then, the

administration moves back about the most significant repairs in the new system, under the

pressure of the students. (Kahi, 2016)

17

1.5.1 The Nature of The LMD System

The establishment of the LMD system gets back to the "Sorbonne-Bologna process," in

which 45 European countries were included. This new system, first, includes the European

higher education; it took the name of LMD or BMD (License- Master-Doctorate or

Bachelor's- Master's- Doctorate) from France, in which all its universities adopted this new

educational system for the universities courses, and now, it is implemented in all European

universities. Continuously, this implementation started to spread to other countries out of the

European countries, such as Algeria. (Rabehi, 2011)

The LMD system or (License- Master-Doctorate) is a higher educational system; it

started progressively working in Algeria in 2004. It allows the student to prepare sequentially

for three certifications:

License:is the first certification; it is obtained after three years of study or six semesters.

Master: is achieved after two years (four semesters); It is the step of deepening knowledge

in the chosen field.

Doctorate: is the last dedicated certification for the student who wishes to go deeper and

deeper in the field knowledge; it is prepared in a laboratory or a research center for at least

three years.

18

Table1.2 The comparison between the LMD and Classical systems (Lakehal-Ayat-Benmati,

2008)

LMD System Former System

Name of the

degree

Number of

Years

Name of the

degree

Number of

Years

Doctorate 3 years Doctorate 4 years or more

Master 2 years Master 2 years or more

Bachelor 3 years Bachelor 4 years

The new educational system aims at one hand to overcome the problems that

characterized the classical system, and on the other hand, to improve performance within the

university community; it can check the other objects of this system in the following points:

‾ This system aims to lay a flexible training and prepare the project of the university

of national and global concerns at the economic, scientific, cultural and social levels.

‾ Upgrading the university independence pedagogy and undertaking its continuous

evaluation and also for its programs

‾ It aims to give energy and effectiveness to the university training by updating the

training programs through the reviewing of the programs and to diversify and modify

tract during the study in the areas of training.

19

‾ It aims and focuses on the academic output in accordance with the requirements of

the labor market, and through cooperation with the social and economic partners of

the University within the framework of supporting national development plans.

‾ Allowing the university to open up opportunities in the global space for the

development of scientific research and the development of the scientific spirit.

‾ Encouraging and diversification of international cooperation in the pedagogical and

technical fields.

‾ Facilitate the equivalence of diplomas to smooth the mobility of students inside the

country and outside it.

‾ Focusing on the mechanics of the reception, guidance, and the pedagogical support

of the students.

‾ It enables students to choose appropriate courses to go with their abilities and

according to their wishes.

‾ Discovering as much as possible from the scientific and technical knowledge. ( Kahi,

2016)

In the LMD system, there are three phases:

1. License (baccalaureate exam + 3 years): this stage sorts two degrees: essential

multidisciplinary formation includes the first two semesters or the four semesters

devoted to acquiring the basic principles of the disciplines associated with the

certificate, as well as to teach the academic methodology and work on discovering

it. This stage follows with formation, and has two choices:

Academic Choice (academic license): Awarded at the end of its career BA allows

direct attend university studies of longer duration and more precise specialization

20

where this capacity is granted according to the qualifications and the preparations

required for the results obtained, and according to the enrollment standards.

Professional Choice (professional license): Awarded at the end of its BA Career

enables to integrate directly into the world of work and determine its programs in

consultation with the user sectorin order this choice to be a good performance, it

requires a multiplicity in the presentation of professional bachelor certification that

is compatible with the demands of the market. It should also have a double effect.

On the one hand, it values license level in the market; on the other hand, it opens up

chances for the student who did not take it.

2. Master (baccalaureate exam + 5 years): This formative stage takes place within

two years (4 semesters), which is the right of every student, who gets Bachelor

Academy and have the enrollment conditions. This formation does not include those

who obtain a professional license and wish to return to university. It brings the

student to different rehabilitation:

Professional rehabilitation: is characterized by the acquisition of high competence

of the student’s field, as well as, the student can attain high levels of performance

and efficiency. This formation always remains professional (professional master).

Rehabilitation Research: is characterized by preparing for the scientific research

and advanced preparation for the research activity in the economic sector and in the

sector of the university (master research), where the master is essential for the

performance of any institution.

3. Doctorate (baccalaureate exam + 8years): it takes 3years after the master degree

as the minimum period for the fundamental structure, because of the knowledge

development, disciplines that become more and more accurate, and the practical

nature of the research. This formation includes:

21

Deepening the knowledge within the field.

Formation of the research and answering the problematic of the study.

At the end of this formation, and after the discussing the thesis, doctorate awards to

the candidate for the higher education stage. ("definition of LMD", n.d.)

1.5.2 Comparison between the English Department within The Classical

and the LMD systems

The EFL- LMD classroom does not differ from the Classical one that much. The essential

distinction bases mainly on the system itself and not the number of courses. At the level of

the English Department, it was noticed that the teachers of both systems, LMD and Classic,

nearly rely on the same methodology to achieve somehow the same objectives, which are:

to make the students read with total comprehension, and get good scores in the examinations

(Benettayeb Ouahini 2015). The following Table summarizes the main points of similarity

and difference:

22

Table1.3 LMD Vs Classical EFL Classroom (Benettayeb–Ouahini 2015)

Classic System LMD System

Program

( Content)

Elaborated by the teacher or

group of teachers to fit the

designed objectives of the EFL

courses.

Elaborated by the teacher or

group of teachers to fit the

designed objectives of the nature

of license opted for (academic or

professional).

Methodology More teachers centered. More students centered.

Examination Annual (two exams a year

+make up) no units (separated

modules).

Semester (two semesters a year)

units (made of two to three

modules).

Grades Compensation (no credits). Credits.

Teachers Role Prepare students for teaching. Prepare students for master

mainly.

Students Roles. Guided by the teacher in the

learning process.

‾ Active practitioners.

‾ Centered in the learning

process.

‾ More autonomous.

23

According to some teachers who experienced the two systems, the differences could be

noticed in the number of courses, the syllabi content, the time allotted, the evaluation tools,

especially workload of the students which is the center of the new system. In the first year

classic system, there are seven modules; however, those who study with LMD system have

eleven modules 1h30 for each one, but the oral expression, written expression, grammar are

studied in 3h. The LMD system enables the teacher to design the syllabus that fits the needs

and the interests of the students. Also, it excessively focuses on the personal work of the

student, in which can get their UE (Educational Units) and succeed. The primary distinction

between LMD and classic is the percentage that is specified to the workload of the student

which controls their success and their failure since the mark is credited, no one can change

it (Rabhi, 2011). The figure below represents the differences between the two systems in the

English department, during the student first year.

LMD System Courses Classic System courses

First Year Student

Figure 1.1 LMD Vs Classic in the first year (Rabehi, 2011)

Oral expression Written expression First Year Students Linguistics Phonetics Grammar Culture of the language Literary texts Methodology E.S.P Computing Foreign Language

Oral expression Written expression Linguistics Phonetics Grammar General culture Arabic literature

24

1.6 Conclusion

As it is referred in this Chapter, In Algeria English is identified as a second foreign

language that comes after French, because of the French colonization that occupied Algeria

more than a century (132 years). In fact, students were taught English, at first, in the middle

school along the four years of school. After that, they pass to the secondary level and study

English for three years as a compulsory subject, both (Middle and high schools) follows the

same teaching approach, which is Competency - Based Approach. While at university,

English is studied as an obligatory module in all the fields of the study, like, Physics, Math,

Biology, Economics, and Human Sciences, etc.; or as a field of study itself, in which the

students get their license degree in English.

25

2.1 Introduction

Writing can be known as a productive skill that has to be learnt and mastered by the English

student that include the method of thinking, drafting, revising. Writing is considered as a

means of communication that allows the student to synthesize the information that they have

into a suitable text that is applicable with English writing conventions, like using good

content, format, sentence structure, vocabulary, punctuation, spelling, and letter

information…... etc.

This chapter will give a general overview of writing skill. First, it will define writing

ability. It also aims to highlight the importance of writing ability and the four main types of

writing skill. It will try to present different approaches to teaching writing and then it will be

concluded by the process to have a good piece of writing.

2.2 The Definition of the Writing Skill

Writing is identified on different meanings for different groups of people to suit their

various needs and purposes for writing.

“When we write we use graphic symbols that are letters or combinations of letters which

relate to the sounds we make when we speak." (Byrne, 1979)Writing can be defined as the

symbolic representation of a language by using some graphic notes. It varies from the spoken

language; writing is a framework that is not just acquired, but rather must be learned through

sustained conscious effort. (Yule, 1985)

It also can be defined as means of converting the message; that is to say, we translate our

feelings and ideas into a written language i.e. written language describes our thoughts and

ideas. What the person thinks leads to a written language in the form of text, in which the

sentence is organized cohesively, and the writer can successfully communicate with the

reader. (Bachani,n.d.)

26

From its purpose, writing is seen as a means of communication; it is regularly used to

express and impress, which say that when the writers do their written work, they generally

focus on two fundamental purposes. The first purpose is the intention or desires to express

the thoughts and the emotions which they are thinking about it; in other words, the written

content is done to convey a particular message. The second purpose, the writer composes

her/ his written work to communicate the ideas to the readers or the audience. So that's why

the writer should have the capacity to communicate and express the ideas in particular ways.

(Nunan, 2004)

Writing can likewise be characterized as both physical and mental skill (Nunan, 2004).

It is defined as a physical skill because the writer is required to be capable of writing words

and ideas. In other handwriting is a mental skill because its activities based more on creating

ideas, thinking about how to express and order them into simple sentences and passages in

which the reader can comprehend the concepts of the written work.

Writing is also defined as a cognitive activity. It was proposed that the process of writing

include three primarily cognitive activities, which are text interpretation, reflection and text

production. The three cognitive are connected to the drafting process as well as in the

revising process. The text description is the first cognitive activity which is the way of

making internal representation retrieved from linguistics and graphics input. The second one

is reflection; it is the process of making new representation thoughts from the current

representation ideas in the activity of text interpretation. The last process is text production

in which the production of new written linguistics forms is done. (Weigle, 2002)

Grape and Kaplain (1996) set the meaning of writing in temps of the rhetorical triangle

in writing. Each triangle contains the reader, the recipient of the final results of the written

work, the writer, the originator of the message, and the subject matter and the text itself. The

writer and the reader need to put into consideration all these aspects when he is writing and

27

reading, particularly to each one plays an important role towards the meaning. (Cited in Huy,

2015) “Writing is the creative process because it is a process of reaching out for one’s

thought and discovering them. Writing, as such is a process of meaning making” (3rd-year

student, 1994, cited in Huy, 2015)

2.3 The Importance of Writing Skill

Writing is essential communicative skills; this was brought from the fact that writing is

the primary basis; it was started before history, communication, art, and records keeping

appear. Writing is determined as the framework of the human communication. The person

always faces writing in his/ her daily life, whether in an office, restaurant menu, letters, and

schools. Writing has various functions; it can be used to give information or a point of view,

to ask a question, to write poetry….so on. Words possibly take a numerous of forms in

writing. The words and phrases that the writer use can appear his personality and the way he

thinks. Writing is seriously important in our society today. Communication is spread and

transmitted more through writing rather than any other kind of media. Biding contrast and

agreements are generally written and signed. Writing can be defined as a part of a creative

project, whether the project is a film or, a piece of literature or a building…. So on. If there

is not writing, the continuous of the ideas will disappear, in short time, beyond the source

(Gustafson, Tran, & Buck, n.d)

Many people have never considered the writing process as a complex and challenging

task, but, compared to the other academic skills; it is considered as the most basic activity.

In fact, in the earliest time of handwriting activities, children have to work on both processes,

physical and cognitive to present a good and precise piece of writing later on. In addition to

that, the studentshould remain in contact on a large scale with the other skills, not only for

the sake of writing in organized, legible, and logical way, but also to maintain rules of

28

grammar and syntax. Writing is more complicated and difficult rather than any use of

language, because of this combination of rules. ("The Importance of Writing", 2017)

Every student in college is demanded to write different essays on various subjects during

his/her career. These requirements have different goals and purposes. Mostly, the students

are asked to write essays as homework. Some of these essays are possibly written using

personal experiences or previous knowledge, while other articles need some research and

use other sources. Sometimes, we find some teachers ask the student to write essay inside

the classroom within a short time. These requirements and the proper techniques that are

used in college can lead to well-prepared writing in a short period. Some students move to

university to have their bachelor degree; for those students, personal writing essays are

needed for the application process. Besides, graduates’ students are asked to write in

appropriate language and grammar to prepare their research paper. Furthermore,

scholarships are based on the student ability of writing. So every student aims to improve

their academic level, he/ she have to write well.("Writing Overview - Why Writing is

Important - Aims Community College", 2017)

Writing is important in any career field not only at the academic level. Most of the

professions need writing in their jobs such as doctors and nurses write a prescription to the

patient, accountants, and business managers write financial reports…. And so on. So every

student and every worker needs writing and should improve it. ("Writing Overview - Why

Writing is Important - Aims Community College", 2017)

Most of the people do not give much importance to the written work; they think that no

one will read it and cares about it. When they see the big volume of the document that results

from the desk of the decision maker, they conclude that the written work does not have much

impact. In a study of chief executives, in the most of U.S Corporation, it resulted that 50%

read the body of the material that came across their desks. The majority read selected titles

29

such as Introduction, the section of background, and conclusion. The huge volume of written

work may minimize the importance of effective writing. (Farrell, n. d)

Insisting on producing a report, letter, or any written work by you, it can control self-

communication. To reinforce the importance and the power of writing, Farrell (n.d)

concluded with the following:

“I would like to conclude my remarks on the power of writing with one

find observation. Did you ever notice that, when people become serious

about communication, they want it in writing? For example, New

Hampshire voters are normally willing to listen to the oral comments of

presidential hopefuls. This year, in the midst of a recession, off-the-cuff

remarks were not enough. The voters wanted written plans on how the

candidates would improve the economy. Clearly, for all its intrusiveness

and power, television has not supplanted the written report when dialogue

is truly serious. Writing is still mightier than the screen.” (p.3)

Not only is a good writing important, also bad writing is important for one’s language.

In this context, Ballenger (2004) said:

“The greatest reward in allowing students to write badly is that they

learn that language can lead them to meaning, that words can be a means

for finding out what they didn’t know they knew. It usually happens when

they word rush to the page, however, awkwardly. I don’t mean to excuse

bad grammar. But I cringe at cringe at conservative educational reforms

who writing instruction should return to primarily teaching how to

30

punctuate a sentence and use Roget’s Thesaurus. If policing student

papers for mistakes means alienating young writers from the language we

expect them to master, then the exercise is self-defeating.” (p. 33_34)

2.4 The Major Types of Writing Skill

Paragraphs and essays are written in different types and styles, and for different reasons

and purposes; every writer follows a certain type according to what he/she wants to talk, and

achieve and also the material to be discussed. In general, there are three main types of

writing, which are: expository, descriptive, and narrative.

2.4.1 Expository Writing

This kind of writing exposes or explains information about the topic. Expository writing

is sometimes called “information writing”, because it provides with information about an

idea, place, or person. It is well developed by giving facts, causes and effect relationships,

examples, clear reasons or statistical data. Expository writing is written without expressing

the person's feelings and emotions; it is usually written in the third person pronoun, because

this kind of texts is factual. The use of "I" is rarely found, if the emphasis is on the external

and neutral descriptions and explanations more than the personal feelings. In fact, these kinds

of texts and paragraphs cannot sometimes be separated from the description writing, because

both of those types use description mode a lot. But there is a big difference between them, in

which the expository paragraphs give more focus to the external objects, situations, and

processes; it emphasis on explaining things in a neutral way; it is a matter of fact manner. In

the other hand, Descriptive texts emphasize on the emotional answers. (“Types of writing”,

2017)

The purpose of the expository paragraphs may vary according to the situation of the

writer, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating the environment surrounding us. The writer

31

may also persuade and explain the manner “how” and the reason in his/ her expository text.

In this kind of text, the writer can convey the reader or the audience to a particular opinion or

idea and also can persuade someone to do something in a certain way or to justify an action.

Expository written works can be personal and emotional in tone and explain selectively and

analyses actions; the writer, here, wants the audience to understand and share the same

emotion and reasons as well as to support the same action. In the expository texts, the writer

can change the attitude of the audience or their opinion by giving them arguments about a

particular issue. ("Exposition texts", 2017)

2.4.2 Descriptive Writing

“A description is an account that creates a vivid mental image. The

ability to describe people, places, or objects accurately is a useful life

skill. Whether you are talking with a stylist about the exact hairstyle you

want, sharing a funny or startling scene from your day with a friend in an

email, or reporting on the structure of a plant cell for a biology class, you

will use description to make your point”.("The descriptive paragraph",

2007 p. 2)

This kind of writing gives examples about people, places, situations, thoughts, events, and

feeling description using sensory details and information. This sensory information makes

the written work comes alive. It is an experience in which the reader is able to share by using

his/ her imagination. Description information helps to develop the general dominant

impression, which is the main idea or topic, in which the writer gives an expression from the

complexity of the story’s contraction. For example, the writer can describe a house as exciting

or scary; it depends on how the writer carefully chooses the words, or some subtly crafted

mood; using thesaurus can help to do this. A thesaurus puts, in lists, a numerous of words that

32

have the same meanings or connotations. It can also help to generate word bank of words

with similar meanings that can aid in developing "unity with variety." So the process of

writing is focused and interesting because it has a dominant impression. ("Descriptive

writing", 2010)

As a notice, the sentence, in which the writer tells, is direct and it is objective. The

sentence that tells gives variable facts like a scientist or journalist. In other hand, the sentence,

in which the writer shows, is subjective; it is influenced, on a side, by the personal experiences

of the writer. In the sentence that shows, the writer gives mental images and emotional

responses. ("Descriptive writing", 2010)

Using comparison in the descriptive paragraph, enables the writer to make his/her

description more vivid to the audience, the writer can use: similes, such as “His emotional

state was like a roller coaster”, personification, which is giving an object a human

characteristics, such as “The wind howled in my ears and beckoned me to walk further into

the forest”, metaphors, such as “Her smile was a ray of sunlight in the dark sea of unfamiliar

faces”, and analogies, which is brief stories that are related to the subject. The writer should

determine the method of organization that can work better for the written work:

Spatial: top to bottom, inside to outside, near to far.

Chronological: the order in which the events occurred.

Most to least or least to most. (McWhorter, n.d)

The writer can describe a topic focusing on one main idea, in which the writer generates

descriptive information that answers numerous of questions as where, when, what, and who.

In brainstorming, the process of thinking brings to the mind various sensory and spatial

information. The Evaluation of relevancy of each detail and its uses occurs only with those

that present the main idea. Some relevant details present the opinion of the author about the

33

topic. However, the other relevant information describes the appearance of a person, scene,

place, or object. A concept map or graphic organizer can help in some ways:

The graphic contributes to develop the thinking, memory, and the creativity of the

writer.

It enables to organize ideas as they happen to the writer.

A graphic organizer helps the writer to see the details and see if those details are

enough to make the point.

In the graphic organizer, the writer can use the revision process to double check

details for the relevancy process and delete the irrelevant details. (“The descriptive

paragraph”, 2007)

2.4.3 Narrative Writing

The narration is the storytelling art. Its aim is to narrate a story. A narrative writing has

two sides, either factual or fictional. First, the factual story in which the writer based on and

tries to be faithful, and the actual events are told as they happened in real life. However, the

fictional type is just a made-up and imagined. When the writer narrates a fictional story, he

can create unreal characters and events to fit the story well. (Crowther et al., 2016)

The main difference between factual and fictional narrative writings is identified by the

aim of the writer. In writing a factual story, the writer attempts to recount events as they

occurred, such as Biographies and memoires. Unlike, in the fictional story, the writer can start

with real characters and real event, because the purpose is not to retell a real-life event. This

kind of written work attempts to narrate a series of events in an emotion attractive way. The

writer wants the reader to be moved by his/ her story through laughter, anger, anger, fear,

sympathy and so on. The more the writer narrates the story clearly, the more the reader

became emotionally engaged. (Crowther et al., 2016)

34

Most of the narrative events are ordered in chronological arrangement. The events are

put from the first to the last. Any story generally has a beginning, middle, and an end; all

these events are usually ordered by time. Though it is possible to be effective and start with

exciting and interesting moment, from the essential part of the story, play, or movie, this is

called “flash-forward”, or from the pivotal event, which is called “flash-back”, before

returning to a chronological order. Some transitional words and phrases help the reader to

be oriented in the sequencing of a narration; some of these phrases and words are put in the

following table:

Table2.1 Transition Words and Phrases for Expressing Time(Crowther et al., 2016)

Every story or play has these basic components, which are:

Plot: a series of events that form the story in a novel, movie, etc.

Characters: the people of a story or a novel; they inhabit it and move it

forward.

Conflict: the problems and obstacles that happen in the events of the story.

35

Theme: the main subject, issue or message that has been described and

discussed I the story. (Meriam-webster, 2017)

When the writer narrates a story, he/ she try to give some examples and vivid details in

order to make each event of the story more realistic and specific to the audience. The writer

wants to share the same point of view the similar message in the story with the reader. He

attempts to give helpful information to the reader by adding more details, in which each

event is visualized and understood. (Anker, 2010)

2.5 The Approach to Teaching Writing Skill

Many of approaches and techniques have appeared in the early of eighties. Each approach

has its purpose or its focus, either in the process of writing or its product, or on developing

the students of writing.

2.5.1 The Controlled- to Free Approach

This approach was produced from the audio-lingual period; it has emphasis on step-by-

step learning and formal correctness. Such an approach was carefully thought out, and it is

not fashionable at all. Many useful ideas on how to guide writing were produced. (Byrne,

1988)

The Controlled- to free approach was created from the connection of structural

linguistics and the behaviorist learning theories of second language teaching that were

dominant in 1960s. (Cited in Hyland, 2003)

Mistakes that are done by the student in their written work are not regarded as a big

problem. It was assumed that the student could commit mistakes because they are free to

write what they want to write and they are permitted to do it. This approach has therefore

focused on the importance of control to neglect from the written work. Teachers teach the

36

student how to write and connect many types of sentences and manipulate to exercises. Step

by step, the teacher has to reduce the amount of his control and ask the student to exercise

meaningful choice. At the end of the stage, student can be provided by a good deal of

guidance with language and content, but they are allowed to have some opportunities to

write freely (Byrne, 1988)

According to Hyland (2003), this approach can be done in four stages:

1. Familiarization: teachers have to teach the learners certain rules of grammar and

vocabulary through a text.

2. Controlled writing: students often have to manipulate fixed patterns from

substitutions tables.

3. Guided writing: learners have to imitate model texts.

4. Free writing: learners have to use the aspects that they have developed to write their

piece of writing, such as paragraph, essay, letter…. etc

2.5.2 Free-Writing Approach

In this approach, the teacher motivates the student to write any topic or ideas that come

into their minds without any control or interference. This will develop their writing skill and

enhance their fluently.

The teacher asks the students to write freely without paying more attention to the

grammar and spelling. The short piece of free writing has not to be corrected by the teacher;

he has just to read them and comment on the ideas that the students have expressed. Some

students are asked to read their written work in loud voice to be involved in writing for an

audience. (Raimes, 1983). According to a teacher of writing in Japan:

“I try to challenge the student to be creative in expressing themselves.

Student learns to express their feelings and opinions so that others can

37

understand what they think and like to do. I’ve heard that prospective

employs sometimes ask students have showed them their opinion” (cited

in Hyland, 2003, p.9)

From his personal point of view, writing cannot be taught; it can be learned, so writing

instruction has to be nondirective and personal meanings and courses of writing focuses on

the power of the person to contract his/her perspective on a topic. The role of the teacher is

simply to let the student expresses their meanings in a positive and cooperative

environment. Teachers try not to impose their opinions, suggesting responses to topics,

offering models, because writing is a developmental process. In other hand, they look to

empower the writer’s ideas through prewriting tasks, such as journal writing and parallel

texts. (Hyland, 2003)

2.5.3 The Product- Oriented Approach

Comprehensively, a product-oriented approach, as the titles show, has to be with the last

result of the writing process. This approach gives priority to classroom exercises which let

the student to be engaged in imitating and transforming in model texts. The product

approach is originally in the traditions of the rhetoric and its study emphasis on model text

in order the student is aware of the text features. It also includes evaluating the student's

writing to determine and find out their strengths and weakness. In fact, it aims to let the

student to be familiarized with the conventions of writing through a model, before he/she

gets the final draft. (Nemochi, 2014)

White (1988) stated: “Such a model-based approach remains popular in EAP for one

very good reason much EAP writing is very product-oriented, since the conventions

governing the organization and expression of ideas are very tight.”(p.6). Thus the learners

need to be familiarized with these conventions and they have to learn to work within them.

38

Another oh this approach is stated by Pincas (1984) who describes writing as being

mainly about linguistic knowledge, it gives more attention to the appropriate use of

vocabulary, syntax, and cohesive devices. Pincas determines, in the product approach,

familiarization, controlled writing, guided writing and free writing. She clarifies that the

teacher needs to present a topic or use guides, which are provided by a textbook, explain

them and may provoke a little discussion in the class and then discuss how the student are

going to write a piece of writing based on them. After that, the student should be invited to

write them handing their writings to the teacher. The teacher evaluates the written work and

puts some comments on the paper; he should focus on the form more than the content. In

this approach, teachers control everything.

2.5.4 The Process- Oriented Approach

From 1969 till nowadays, writing research and the approaches to teaching writing

witness significant changes. At early times teaching of writing was focusing on the notion

of controlled composition started to not be enough for the teacher. In the 1970s, researchers

and studies of writing became to emphasis on the written product. After these 10years, the

study took another path; the focus changed from product to process to process. The teacher

became aware that each written work had its history and followed its development way; this

was the main reason for this shifting. Some teacher ad writers did not fully accept this

process approach, like Reid (1984); he stated that:

It did not address issues such as the requirements of particular writing

tasks. This led to a focus on examining what is expected of students in

academic and professional settings and the kinds of genres they need to

have control of to succeed in these settings." (p. 29)

39

After the shift from product approach to the process approach, teachers focused on that

writing is a process and neglecting that writing is a product. With the appearance of process

approach, the emphasis became on the steps that make the written work rather than the

finished text. The writing process goes through steps, which are: pre-writing, drafting,

revising, editing; those steps seem to be complex at first, but the student should baring in

mind that he must go through them in order to make a good written work. The aim of this

process is to let the student know about the cognitive strategies that are involved in written

work and gain control over it. It works at the student’s specific needs level. In this context,

Caudery (2003) set that:

“In the early seventies, communicative teaching methodology and work

on functional/notional syllabuses directed our attention more firmly

towards the specificneeds of the individual learner. These needs were

viewed not only in terms of particular language items but also of

particular types of communication, and the resultingrealization that

different learners had different requirements on language skills meant

that new attention was given to, among other things, the teaching of

writing. In this context, the process approach arrived on the scene at a

very opportune moment.”

2.5.5 The Genre Approach

From the 1980, this genre approach has appeared in different form and in various regions

of the world. It has many goals and emphasis on different teaching situation. For example,

in Great Britain and the United States, teachers have most of the time worked with genre

approach in ESL classes. (Nemoushi, 2014)

40

Writing is considered as a social and cultural skill in the gender approach. In some cases,

this approach is identified as link to the linguistics aspects of the writing, in one hand, and it

focuses on the social context in which the writing is mode, on the contrary. It was identified

that there are different kinds of writing, such as: letters, research articles, reports, have a link

with various situations. (Flowerder, 1993). Paltridge (2001) stated that the genre approach

mainly includes the teaching of specific genres to the student that need it for particular

situations, such as social communication. I.e. it focuses on the genre approach as “means of

success in the social communication”. At first, the language and discourse features of any

text or paragraph should be focused. In this approach, teachers should also make the student

aware of the various factors: such as the audience, the purpose of the written text and its

context; it focuses on how a particular genre will achieve certain functions and goals. The

aim of applying such an approach is to allow the student to use applicable registers in order

to achieve the communication.

In the Rutledge Encyclopedia of language teaching and learning, the genre approach is

defined as "frame work for language instruction." To reinforce the definition, Byram (2004,

cited in Nemouchi, 2014) said: “It is based on examples of a particular genre. By framework

is meant guiding students. The genre framework supports students’ writing with guiding

principles about how to produce meaningful passages.” (p. 234)

2.6 Stages of Writing Process

In writing text or essay, the writer should go through some steps to get his final job, but

there is not an agreement about the numbers of those stages.

2.6.1 Prewriting Stage

The stage of pre-writing is the first stage in writing process which let the writer collect

and generate some ideas and information about the subject. The writer should writers down

any ideas come to his or her mind. The essential goal, in this stage, is to let the thoughts and

41

ideas come freely and smoothly without paying attention to the structure, spelling, grammar,

appropriateness, because the writer should focus more on the quantity rather than the quality.

This step is too productive; it allows gathering and writing several of ideas and information

in brief time. The activities of pre-writing involve many aspects, such as drawing, talking,

thinking, reading, listening to records, interviews, using the internet. This stage can be

individually or with a group of people. (Chaouch, 2012)

2.6.2 Organizing Stage

In this stage the writer should put the ideas and information in a logical order. The

organizing process came in various forms like: vertical outline, maps, diagrams,

haircky…etc. The primary purpose of this stage is to let the writer "on target" and help the

reader follow in easy way. (Chaouch, 2012)

This step in the writing process allows the writer to organize the work into a simple form.

The writer writes down sentence that named the topic, usually the title of the subject, and

the main ideas (Hogue& Oshima, 2008)

2.6.3 Drafting Stage

The next step is drafting in which the writer should writethe rough draft. The writer

should focus on the content rather than the language and mechanical aspect (grammar,

spelling, and punctuation). The writer may probably find a lot of mistakes in his paper; he

does not to have to worry about that; it is acceptable; after finishing, he can fix them. Harris

(1993, cited in Tribble, 1996) set te definition of this stage as a step which allows the writer

to translate plans and ideas into provisional text.

2.6.4 Revising Stage

The writer should not publish or present his paper until he/ she read and come over it

once or twice minimum at least. The writer should revise reread every small detail to avoid

any embarrassing mistakes. When the writer revises his work, it means, he is going to

42

evaluate his/ her text's content and confirm that he/ she actually wrote what it was intended

in the organizing stage. This stage should take time more than the drafting (white smoke,

n.d)

2.6.5 Editing Stage

Some consider the editing stage as a part of revising stage; they are put under one title,

which is polishing step (Hogue, 2008). This step completes the previous step of revising;

the writer should just work some small issues of grammar, punctuation, capitalization, and

hand writing (Chaouch, 2012)

Here are some aspects the writer should keep them in mind while editing a text:

The writer bears in mind that the sentences should stick to legitimate word order

rules, each sentence includes subject and predicate.

When the writer is not sure the spelling of some words he should use a dictionary or

spell checker, and try to read his/ her text again and again for problematic homonyms

The variety of punctuation marks should be accurately used and to check a style

guide when mixing between a comma, colon, or semi-colon.

The writer should check the text mechanics, such as Capitalization, numbering,

italics, and abbreviations.

43

2.7 Conclusion

To conclude, this chapter was a general overview of writing. The first part has explored

the definition and nature of writing as a complex cognitive activity, a social act, and as a

language skill. It also has included the purpose, and the characteristics of the main four types

of writing skill. Besides, the chapter shed light on the importance of writing, either was good

writing or bad writing. It was discussed the five agreed stages of the writing process in order

to write a good and appropriate paragraph.

44

3.1 Introduction

The present Chapter is mainly about the practical side of the research. It sheds light on

the research design, research instruments, and the sample. This Chapter contains two parts.

The first section is about the students ‘assessment; it will also analyze the data and discuss

the findings and the results. The second section analysis students ‘questionnaire, the LMD

system student and the classical one; at the end, there will be discussion about the findings

and results.

3.2 The research design

The research design is important because it helps getting the necessary evidences that are

needed in the research study, and to answer the research questions in accurate, clear, and

unequivocal way, as possible as it has to be. It is the framework in which the good side of

quality research is created.

The aim of this study is to evaluate the competencies of the LMD English language

license graduates and Classic system ones in the writing skill then to compare between them.

Also, it seeks to discover the reasons behind such weakness or strength in their competence

to write appropriately, through the program of written expression sessions that are

programmed in the English department.

The descriptive research design is seen as the most appropriate to be followed in this

study. The descriptive is used to answer the questions “what”, “why”, “when”, “how”. Also,

its characteristics are used to describe the situation and the population that are used in clear

and unambiguous way.

3.3 The Research instruments

For this work, there are two parts. The first part is an assessment. The students wrote a

paragraph, in which their writing competencies can be assessed. The main purpose behind

45

this paragraph is to evaluate the students’ English language in the writing skill. The second

part is a questionnaire used as a tool to get data, in which the students were asked to answer

7 questions, that basically focuses on the written expression sessions, the followed program

and its main points, and also the practice of writing. It enables the students to give more

valid and honest data.

3.4 The sample

In this study, there are 16 questionnaires distributed, 8 for the students of the Classic

system and 8 for the students of LMD system. It was intended to collect 20 questionnaires,

in order to make the study more valid, 10 for each system, but only 16 questionnaires

available, because it was hard to find graduate students from the classic system, though it

does not take too much time, 2 or 3 minutes maximum. All the students studied at Ahmed-

Draia University.

3.5 The students’ Assessment.

In order to evaluate the competence of the students, they were asked to write a paragraph

about their experience at university. Then, it was corrected with the help of Grammarly

application. The standards that were used to assess the paragraphs are: Grammar,

Punctuation, Sentence structure, Style, Vocabulary Enhancement, and Contextual spelling.

46

3.5.1 Analysis of The Assessment 1. The LMD Students

Participant1.

Table3.1Participant number 1 mistakes

Standards Number of mistakes

Contextual spelling 6

Grammar 1

Punctuation 0

Sentence Structure 0

Style 2

Vocabulary Enhancement 0

The first participant wrote about seven lines. After the correction of paragraph, it was

found that there are 9 mistakes. The student had six mistakes in contextual spelling: four

misspelled words, one confused word, and one commonly confused word. Also, he had one

mistake in grammar, exactly in determiner use. Besides, in the style level, there were two

mistakes, improper formatting. At the end, it was shown that there was no mistake at the

Punctuation, sentence structure, and vocabulary enhancement levels.

Participant2.

Table3.2 Participant number 2 mistakes



Grammar 1

47

Punctuation 2


Style 0


The student wrote 4 lines. In this paragraph, the total number of mistakes was three. The

student didn’t make mistakes in contextual spelling, sentence structure, style, and vocabulary

enhancement, but he made two mistakes in punctuation, comma misuse in clauses and

misuse in semicolons. Besides, he had one mistake in grammar, Faulty Subject-Verb

Agreement.

Participant3.




Grammar 0

Punctuation 1


Style 0


The student’s paragraph contains 5 lines, in which he made 2 mistakes, one in

punctuation, comma misuse, and the other in sentence structure, incomplete sentence.

Worthily, he didn’t make any mistake in the other standards, Contextual Spelling, grammar,

style, and vocabulary enhancement.

48

Participant4. Table 3. 4 Participant number 4 mistakes



Grammar 0

Punctuation 1


Style 0


Here, the student wrote 7 lines. He made just 2 mistakes. The first one was in contextual

spelling, misspelled words. The second fault was in punctuating compound/ complex

sentences. But in grammar, sentence structure, style, and vocabulary enhancement we didn’t

notice mistake.

Participant5.

Table3.5Participant number 5 mistake



Grammar 1

Punctuation 2


Style 0


49

This candidate wrote 5 lines. He committed 3 mistakes. He had one in contextual

spelling, misspelled word. Also, he made one mistake in grammar, conjunction use. The

other mistake was in punctuation, the misuse of comma in clauses. The last mistake was in

style. But he didn’t commit any mistakes in vocabulary enhancement and in sentence

structure.

Participant 6.

Table3.6Participant number 6 mistakes’



Grammar 1

Punctuation 1


Style 1


The present student composed 9 lines, and made 5 faults. Two mistakes were in

contextual spelling, two misspelled words. The second was in grammar, wrong preposition.

The third was in punctuating compound/complex sentences. The last one was in style, wordy

sentences. But in sentence structure and vocabulary enhancement, it was not noticed any

mistakes.

50

Participants7.




Grammar 1

Punctuation 0


Style 1


This student composed 6 lines, which there were 6 mistakes. 4 mistakes were in

contextual spelling, 3 confused words and 1 misspelled word. Also, there was a mistake in

grammar, faulty subject- verb agreement. The last one was in style, improper formatting. In

the vocabulary enhancement, punctuation, and sentence structure, there were no mistake.

Participant8.




Grammar 1

Punctuation 3


Style 3


51

In this participant’s paragraph, there were 7 lines, in which contains 14 mistakes. At the

contextual spelling level, the students made 6 mistakes, 4 misspelled words, 1 confused

word, and 1 in mixed dialects English. In grammar, there was 1 mistake in the determiner

use. Besides, the student committed 3 mistakes in punctuation, 2 mistakes in comma misuse

and a mistake the punctuation of in compound/complex sentences. There was a mistake in

sentence structure, faulty parallelism. The final mistakes were about style; the student made

3 mistakes, improper formatting. At the end and as always, there was no mistake at the

vocabulary enhancement level.

2. The Classic System Students

Participant9.




Grammar 1

Punctuation 0


Style 2


In this case the student wrote8 lines, and made 4 mistakes. There were 2 mistakes in

style, inappropriate colloquialism and wordy sentence. The second mistake was in sentence

structure, incomplete sentence. The last one was in grammar, determiner use. There were no

mistakes in contextual spelling, punctuation, and the vocabulary enhancement.

52

Participant10.

Table 3.10 Participant number 10 mistakes



Grammar 0

Punctuation 0


Style 0


In this paragraph, the student wrote 4 lines. He committed just one mistake in contextual

spelling, misspelled word. There were no mistakes at the other standards, grammar,

Punctuation, sentence structure, style, and the vocabulary enhancement.

Participant11.




Grammar 0

Punctuation 5


Style 0


53

In this paragraph, the student wrote nearly 19 lines. There were 6 mistakes. There were

5 mistakes in punctuation, 3 in the punctuation of compound/ complex sentences and 2 in

comma misuse in the clauses. The last fault was in sentence structure, misplaced word. It

was noticed that there was no mistake in the other elements.

Participant12.

Table3.12 Participant number 12 mistakes’



Grammar 0

Punctuation 3


Style 0


This student composed 4 lines, in which there were just 4 issues. The first issue was in

contextual spelling, misspelled word. The second one was in punctuation, 2 mistakes in the

punctuation of compound/ complex sentences and a comma misuse mistake. The other

standards didn’t witness any mistakes.

Participant 13. Table 3.13 Participant number 13 mistakes



Grammar 1

54

Punctuation 1


Style 2


In this paragraph, there were 6 lines. Those six lines had no mistakes in contextual

spelling and vocabulary enhancement. But there was one issue in grammar, determiner use.

Also, there was a mistake in punctuating compound/complex sentence. The other mistake

was in sentence structure, incomplete sentence. The last issue was in style, in which there

were two mistakes, improper formatting.

Participant14.

Table 3.14 Participant number 14 mistakes’



Grammar 2

Punctuation 0


Style 0


The paragraph of this participant includes 4 lines. It contains 4 mistakes in total. There

were 2 mistakes in contextual spelling, confused word and misspelled word. The other 2

issues were in grammar, Faulty subject-verb agreement and incorrect verb forms. But in

punctuation, sentence structure, style, and vocabulary enhancement, they were totally right.

55

Participant15. Table 3.15 Participant number 15 mistakes



Grammar 0

Punctuation 1


Style 0


In this paragraph, the student had just two issues. The first one was on contextual

spelling, mixed dialects of language. The second one was in punctuating compound/

complex sentences. For the other standards, grammar, sentence structure, style, and

vocabulary enhancement, there were no mistakes.

Participant16.

Table 3.16 Participant number 16 mistakes’



Grammar 0

Punctuation 0


Style 0


56

For the last paragraph, the students wrote 4 lines. It was a perfect paragraph. It did not

contain any mistake neither in spelling, grammar, punctuation, sentence structure style, nor

in vocabulary enhancement.

3.5.2 Findings and Discussion

The analysis of this assessment exposes many facts. Concerning the issues of contextual

spelling, 5 LMD students committed the same subject; the other three ones didn’t have this

issue. For the classic system students, only 4 of the entire students made this mistake, and

the other four students were not enrolled. The errors were identified as misspelled words,

confused words or mixed dialect of a language.

For the grammar level, it is noticed that six students from the LMD system had this issue,

and two students didn’t mistake, the mistakes were either in determiner use, Faulty subject-

verb agreement, wrong preposition or conjunction use. While the classical system students,

only 3 of them made this mistake, exactly in determine use, faulty subject –verb agreement,

or incorrect verb form; the other five students didn’t drop in this issue.

When it comes to Punctuation standard, it was seen that there are six students of the new

system who made this mistake, while the two other didn’t err. The mistakes were in comma

misuse in the clauses, misuse in the semi-colon, and the punctuation of compound/complex

sentences. In the other hand, there were four students of the classic system who made the

error of punctuation, exactly in the punctuation of compound/ complex sentences and misuse

of the comma.

For the standard of sentence structure, there were just 2 of 8 students in the LMD system

that made this mistake either they didn’t complete the sentence, or they had faulty

parallelism. For the students of the previous system, there were 3 of them in which they

made this mistake. Those mistakes were either an incomplete sentence or misplaced word.

57

In style, 4 of the LMD students erred in this issue, and the other four students didn’t

mistake; the faults were in improper formatting or wordy sentence. For the students of the

classic system, only 2 of the whole number of the students made this mistakes, either

inappropriate colloquialism, wordy sentence or improper formatting. The last standard was

vocabulary enhancement, in which it wasn’t noticed any errors for both LMD andClassic

students.

3.6 The Students’ questionnaire.

The student’s questionnaire includes 7 questions, in which there are yes/no

questions and the students are asked to justify their answers. The other questions are open-

ended questions; the students, here, are free to answer according to their experiences. The

same questionnaire was given to both LMD and Classical students.

3.6.1 The Analysis of the questionnaire

Question (1). How much did you have written expression session per week?

a. LMD Students

Figure3.1 Bar Graph representing the number of written expression sessions for the LMD students

58

It was indicated in this figure that the students were studying written expression twice

peer week in their first year, twice peer week in their second year, and no written expression

in third year.

b. Student of Classical system

Figure3.2 Bar Graph represents the number of written expression sessions for the Classic

system

In the figure3.2, 6 of the students stated that, in their first year, they studied written

expression 3 times per week, while the other 2 students said that they studied it only twice

per week. In the second year, all the students agreed that they had it twice. Besides, in third

year, 6 of the entire number of students claimed that they were studying it twice in a week,

and the other 2 students said that they didn’t study it. It the 4 year, they all have the same

respond which is”no written expression”.

Question (2). What were the main points that the teachers focus on during these

sessions?

The main purpose of this question is to identify the elements that were taught in

both systems. For the LMD students, all the students answered the question. The responses

varied according to the program; they were centered on the following:

Punctuation

Types of sentences

59

Linking words

Essay structure

Sentence structure

How to write a paragraph?

For the students of in the Classic system, the answers differ; each student gave

an answer. The following answers were centered on:

The teacher focused on effective writing

types of writing

How to write a sentence?

How to write a paragraph?

focus was on writing essays and the different types of them

Punctuation

Mainly sentences and paragraphs structures

Sentence and its types

Question (3). Did you find the session of written expression interesting?

a. LMD Students

Figure 3.3 Pie chart represents the extent to which LMD students are interested in written expression

60

In this figure, it was seen that 87.5% of the all the LMD students stated that the written

expression session is interested, and 12.5% of them see that this session is not important and

interested for them.

b. Classic Students

Figure 3.4 Pie chart represents the extent to which Classic students are interested in written expression

In the figure above, it was shown that 85.7% of the Classic students are interested in the

session of written expression, while the other 14.3% of the students stated that the written

expression session is no longer interested.

Question (4). Did you use to write a paragraph, as a kind of practice, in written

expression session?

a. LMD Students

Figure3.5 Pie chart represents the answers of the fourth question

61

It can be seen, in figure5, that the majority of the LMD students, with the percentage of

62.5%, said that they used to write paragraphs in the session of written expression. At

variance, 37.5% of the whole number of students claimed that they didn’t use to write

paragraph in written expression session.

b. Classic Students

Figure3.6 Pie chart represents the answers of the fourth question

For the classical system students, in the figure 6, it was shown the same results with the

LMD students. 62.5% of them used to practice writing paragraph inside the classroom,

while the rest, 37.5%, they didn’t use to do it.

Question (5). Did your teacher encourage you to write at home?

a. LMD Students

62

Figure3.7 Pie chart represents the answers of the fifth question

In the figure number 7, half of the whole number of students, represented in the

percentage of 50%, confirmed that their teacher of written expression used to support them

and encourage them to write at home, while the other half said that their teacher didn’t

encourage them. For the students who said “yes” they justify their answers as follows:

Applying what we have done in the classroom in sentences or paragraphs.

By giving us interesting topics to write about.

He told us that he is ready to check and correct any essay written by us. Our teacher

even told us to write about any topic that suits us.

b. Classic Students

Figure3.8 Pie chart represents the answers of the fifth question

63

This pie chart shows that the majority of the Classical system students, with the

percentage of 62.5%, claimed that their teacher didn’t use to encourage them to write

outside the classroom. In the other hand, 37.5% of the entire number of students asserted

that they encouraged by the teacher to write at home. The participants who answer with

“yes” were asked to justify their answers; here are the most repeated responses:

To write poems or articles.

Give us topics and ask us to write about it a small paragraph

ngExplaini a topic

Describing or narrating a story

Question (6). Did you write outside the classroom?

a. LMD Students

Figure3.9 Pie chart represents the answers of the question number 6

In the figure above, it was determined that the majority of the students, with the

percentage of 75%, claimed that they did practice writing outside their homes, while the

64

rest of the students, with percentage of 25% disclaimed that. The students who said “yes”

were asked about “what they write?” here the most repeated answers:

Essays

Paragraphs

Experiences in life

Posting or commenting on Facebook

b. Classic Students


Figure 10 reveals that, also, the majority of classic system students 75% said that

they wrote outside the classroom, whereas the other students 25% stated that they didn’t

write outside the classroom. 75% of the students who said “yes” were asked to determine

what kind of writing they write. This is the most repeated responses:

Poems

Essays

Stories

65

Paragraphs

Question (7). Did you write a memoire?

a. LMD Students


As illustrated in Figure11, we see that all the students of LMD system 100% wrote a

research paper. When they asked for the difficulties that they faced in writing a memoire,

the answers were as follows:

Referencing

Paraphrasing

Avoiding plagiarism

Finding sources

Problems in coherence and cohesion

66

Finding the best way to make a smooth transition

The use of prepositions, adjectives, Articles

b. Classic Students

Figure3.12 Pie chart represents the answers of question number 7

Figure 12 shows that the majority 87.5% of the classic system students wrote a

memoire. The rest 12.5% of the students didn’t write it. Those who said “yes” were asked

to identify the difficulties that they had during writing the memoire, the answers were as

follows:

Methodology

The real difficulties were related to resources

Citations and references

Paraphrasing

3.6.2 Findings and Discussion

The analysis of the students ‘questionnaire reveals that, in classic system, the students

were studying written expression within three years, 3 time per week in first year and twice

67

in second and third years. Whereas, we see that, in the LMD system, students have written

expression only in first and second years, twice a week.

In the second question, the majority of students, in Classic system, said that the teachers

were focusing on Punctuation, how to write an essay, how to write a paragraph……and so

on. The same for the LMD students, in addition, they said that the emphasis was on linking

words, types of sentences….etc. However, in the third question, the majority of the students

of both systems believe, 87.5% for LMD and 85.7% for Classic System, that written

expression is an interesting session.

For the question number4, the majority of LMD participants claimed that they used to

write paragraphs inside the classroom as a way of practicing what they did in the session,

also for the Students of Classic System, and with the same percentage 62.5%. The following

question was about if the teachers were encouraging them to write outside class room; half

the respondents of LMD System said “yes” and the other half denied. The majority of the

Classic System students confirmed that they weren’t encouraged by their teachers to write

at home. When they asked to justify how, the answers of the students of both systems were

centered on giving them interesting topics to write about.

Another question was about if they wrote outside the classroom. In LMD system, the

majority asserted with “yes” 75%; they identified what they wrote with paragraphs and

essays. The same results were found with the students of Classic system, and they justified

their answers with stories, essays, and poems.

The last question, in which the students were asked if they wrote a memoire or not, all

the LMD students said that they wrote it and they faced many problems such as, finding

sources, paraphrasing, finding the best way to make a smooth transition… And so on.

87.5% of the students of Classic system did write a memoire, but they had problem in

methodology, citation, sources.

68

3.7 Conclusion

At end, the analysis of the assessment shows many facts about the competence of

English language of the LMD System students and students of Classic system in their

writing skill. This Chapter also contained a questionnaire for the same student, who were

assessed, that identifies the difference between the programs of written expression in the

current system and in the previous one and how the teacher was supporter in his/her session.

69

General Conclusion

A long this study, it was done on one main issue, which is to compare the graduates of

both high educational systems competences in English language, exactly in writing skill.

The research contains three chapters. The first chapter was about the status of English in

Algeria. It shed light on how the students learn English in the middle and high school, and

at university. The second chapter was mainly about the writing skill. In this chapter, it was

intended to define the writing skill in general, and the techniques should follow to teach this

skill.

The third Chapter was the main part of the study, in which the research questions have

to be answered. The first section of the chapter was an assessment in order to compare the

student competence. We saw that the majority of the students, who were studying under the

Classic system, were better in their writing than those of the LMD system, nearly in all the

followed standards. The second section was a questionnaire. It was mainly to determine the

reasons behind these mistakes. After the analysis of the data, the responds were nearly the

same, but they differ in the number of years in which they studied written expression. The

students of Classic system studied it in three years, which the total numbers of the sessions

were eight; and in the LMD system, there were just four sessions. This helps the Classic

system students to improve their writing ability and practice it more than those of the LMD

system.

This study also reveals that the LMD students need more awareness of how to write a

good paragraph. Besides it was founded that the students were focusing on vocabulary more

than the other elements of writing good quality of essays, such us style, grammar……. ect.

From the obtained results, we suggest the following:

70

The teachers of the written expression module in LMD system should follow the

same program as in the classic system in order to achieve the same goal or better.

Teachers who are assigned to teach LMD students need to go through a training to

enhance their methods in teaching writing.

The student should be given the opportunities to practice their writing ability, either

in the classroom or outside it.

The teacher should give the students feedback to learn from their mistakes for the

next time.

The students should enroll all the aspects that help to create a good piece of writing,

such as punctuation, grammar, spelling ……etc.

71

References

Books

Anker, S. (2010). Real writing with readings (1st ed.). Boston.

Ballenger, B. (2004). The Curious writer (1st ed., p. 34). Pearson.

Byrne, D. (1988). Teaching writing skills. London & New York: Longman.

Byrne, D. 1979. Teaching Writing Skills, Longman Group Ltd.

Caudery, T. (2003). What the Process Approach Means.

Crowther, K., Curtright, L., Gilbert, N., Hall, B., Ravita, T., & Swenson, K. (2016).

Successful College Composition (1st ed.). Department of [email protected]

Farrell, W. Writing across the Curriculum (1st Ed.).

Flowerdew, J. (1993) An Educational or Process Approach to the Teaching of

Professional Genres. // ELT Journal 47/4, pp. 305- 316.

Hogue, A., & Oshima, A. (2008). First steps in academic writing (1st ed.). [New

York]: Longman.

Hyland, K. (2003). Second language writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

http://enl.Wikipedia.org /wiki/Awareness.

kaplain, R., & grape, w. (1996). Theory and practice of writing (1st ed.). New York:

Pearson Education Limited.

Lobanova,T and Shunin , Y. ( 2008) Competence-Based Education- aCommon

European Strategy.

Nunan, D. (2004). Task-based language teaching (7th Ed.). New York, NY:

Cambridge University Press.

Paltridge, B. (2001) Genre, Text Type and English for Academic Purposes (EAP). //

Genre in the Classroom. / Ed. by A.M. John. Mahwah: Erlbaum.

mailto:[email protected]

72

Pincas, A. (1984) Writing in English. London: Mac Millan

Raimes, A. (1983). Techniques in Teaching Writing. Oxford: Oxford University

Press.

Reid, J. (1984). The Radical Outliner and the Radical Brainstormer: A Perspective.

Richards, J C.and Rodgers,T.(2001). Approaches and Methods in Language

Teaching.Second Edition. New York: Cambridge University Press.

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

Weigle s. c. (2002). Assessing Writing. Cambridge: Cambridge university press.

White, R. V. (1988). Process and Product.In P. Robinson (Ed) Academic Writing.

ELT Document, 129:4-16

Yule, G. (1985). The study of language (1st ed.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge

University Press.

Articles

Benettayeb- Ouahiani, A. (2015). Issues in the EFL University Classroom: A Psycho-

Educational Overview. Psychological & Educational Studies, Laboratory of Psycho-

Educational Practices, 15, 2-3.

Benrabah, M, (2007), “Language in education planning in Algeria: historical

development and current issues”, Language Policy, Springer, 2007, pp. 225-252

Bounab, S. (2015). Teaching English in the Algerian Middle School.

Cheli, S. (2010). The competency-based Approach in Algeria: A Necessity in the Era

of globalization.

Chemami, M. (2011). Discussing Plurilingualism in Ageria: The Status of French

and English Languages through the Educational Policy. International Journal Of

Arts &Sciences, 4(18), 229-232.

73

Hamzaoui, C. (2017). Multilingualism : A Challenge to The Educational System in

Algeria International Journal Of Humanities, Arts, Medicine And Sciences (BEST:

IJHAMS), 5(1), 79.

Huy, N. (2015Problems Affecting Learning Writing Skill Grade 11 at Thong Linh

High School. Asian Journal of Educational Research, 3(2), 54.

Kahi, M. (2016). اصلاح التعلیم العالي في الدول المغاربیة وفق متطلبات سوق العمل (Reforming

higher education in Maghreb countries according to the requirements of the labor

market). Policy Books and Law, 15.

Mami, N. (2003). Teaching English under the LMD Reform: The Algerian

Experience. International Journal of Social, Behavioral, Educational, Economic,

Business and Industrial Engineering, 7(4).

Mc Worther, K. The Colleg Student’s Guide to Writing Five Types of Essays.

Successful College Student, 1-2.

Miliani, M., (2000), “Teaching English in a multilingual context: The Algerian

case”, Mediterranean Journalof Educational Studies, 6(1), pp. 13–29.

Rabehi, s. (2011). A Comparative Study of the Evaluation Strategies in the LMD and

Classic Systems. Revue Des Sciences Humaines, 22, 57-58.

Thesis

Ammour, K. (2006). Teaching Reading Strategies and Skills in The Algerian Middle

School: The case of Tizi-ouzou (Magister Degree). Mouloud Mammari university of

Tizi-Ouzou.

Bouarich, A. (2015). Impact of Globlization on EFL Students in Algeria: Case of

First-Year EFL Students at The University of Tlemcen (Master degree). University

of Tlemcen.

74

Chaouch, M. (2012). The student awareness of writing skillThe case study third year

students at Biskra University (Master degree). Mohamed khieder University. Biskra.

Derni, A. (2009). Ecolinguistic Implications in Language Change: Towards a New

Paradigmin the Study of Lexical Variation in Ghazaouet Spoken Arabic. A Doctorate

Thesis. Tlemcen University.

Messerhi, M. (2008). The Role of English Culture in Teaching English as a Foreign

Language to Second Year Literary Stream Classes at Kais Secondary Schools

(Master thesis). Mohamed Khider University.

Lakehal- Ayat-Benmati, K. (2008). Is the Algerian Educational System Weakening?

An Investigation of the High School Curricula and their Adequacy with the

University Curricula (Doctorate Degree). Mentouri University of Constantine.

Lectures and Presentations

Bachani, M. Teaching Writing. Lecture, Waymade College of Education.

Gustafson, B., Tran, L., & Buck, j. Why Writing is so important. Presentation.

Websites:

Definition of LMD. Retrieved from http://www.centre-univ

mila.dz/a/FR/pages/Le_centre/pdf/DefLMD.pdf

Descriptive writing. (2010). Retrieved from

http://www.bucks.edu/media/bcccmedialibrary/pdf/DescriptiveWriting_000.pdf

Exposition texts. (2017). Retrieved from http://assets.readingeggsassets.com

Merriam-webster. (2017). Retrieved from http://Merriam-Webster. Com

The descriptive paragraph. (2007) (1sted.). Retrieved from

http://www.ablongman.com/henry_rh/ch04.pdf

http://www.centre-univ/

http://www.bucks.edu/media/bcccmedialibrary/pdf/DescriptiveWriting_000.pdf

http://assets.readingeggsassets.com/

http://www.ablongman.com/henry_rh/ch04.pdf

75

The Importance of Writing. (2017). Education. Retrieved 2017, from

http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/learning-disabilities/types/writing/the-importance-

of-writing/

Types of writing. (2017). Learn.lexiconic.net. Retrieved from

http://www.learn.lexiconic.net

WhiteSmoke. The stages of writing - the writing process. Retrieved from

http://www.whitesmoke.com/the-stages-of-writing

Writing Overview - Why Writing is Important - Aims Community College. (2017).

Aims.edu. Retrieved 2017, from http://www.aims.edu/student/online-writing-

lab/overview/why

http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/learning-disabilities/types/writing/the-importance-of-writing/

http://www.learn.lexiconic.net/

http://www.whitesmoke.com/the-stages-of-writing

http://www.aims.edu/student/online-writing-lab/overview/why

76

Appendices Appendix 1

Students’ Assessement

Please Write a paragraph about your experience at university (feel free to express

yourself). ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

.................................................................................................................................

77

Appendix 2

Students’ Questionnaire

These set of questions try to uncover some pieces of information about teaching and learning

writing as an important skill in both L.M.D and Classical systems. Please take your time to answer

the following questions:

1. System of education: L.M.D Classical

2. How much time did you have written expression?

1st year: ………………………………………………………………………….

2nd year: ………………………………………………………………………….

3rdyear: ……………………………………………………………………………

4thyear for classical system: ……………………………………………

3. What were the main points that the teacher focused on during these sessions?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

……………………………………………………………………………………………………

4. Did you find the session of written expression interesting? Yes NO

5. Did you use to write a paragraph, as kind of practice, in written expression session?

Yes No

6. Did your teacher encourage you to write at home? Yes NO

‾ If yes, explain how: ………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………

7. Did you write outside the class room? Yes No

‾ If yes, what do you write? .......................................

78

8. Did you write a memoir? Yes No

‾ If yes, what are the difficulties that you faced?

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

79

Documents

University Ahmed Draia, Adrar FacultyofLetters and