MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF UKRAINE
IVAN FRANKO NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF LVIV
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
Teaching speaking through discussion
COURSE PAPER
PRESENTED BY
Olga Baran
a fourth year student
of the English department
SUPERVISED BY
Larysa Viktorivna Lemeshchuk
an assistant professor
of the English department
LVIV 2009
Contents
Introduction
1. Chapter 1. Fundamental considerations in teaching writing essays
1.1 The importance of writing essays
1.2 Basic principles of teaching writing essays: writing techniques and stages
1.3.organization of the essays. Essay structure
2. Chapter 2
2.1 Types of essays. Essay samples
2.2 Punctuation. Word choice
2.3 Linking words and phrases
2.4 Plagiarism
Conclusion
References
Introduction Written communication has become extremely important for interaction in the modern world with the instant technological development. Recently writing assessments and essays have become a vital part of a formal education. Secondary students are taught to structure their compositions in order to improve their writing skills. Both in secondary and tertiary education, essays are used to judge the mastery and comprehension of material. Students are asked to explain, comment on or assess a topic of study in the form of an essay.
What is an essay? Essay is a short piece of writing on a particular subject which presents the author’s point of view. It is an organized set of ideas and reflections. This presentation of views must be done in a logical and factual manner with the use of the first person often discouraged. The leading essayist Aldous Huxley defines essay in the following way - “Like the novel, the essay is a literary device for saying almost everything about almost anything, usually on a certain topic. By tradition, almost by definition, the essay is a short piece, and it is therefore impossible to give all things full play within the limits of a single essay. But a collection of essays can cover almost as much ground, and cover it almost as thoroughly, as can a long novel”. The word "essay" originated from French word "essai" which means "effort, sketch". It reflects the essence of this notion. It is a personal attempt to give a challenging sketch on certain issues. Every attempt is different and presents versatile ideas, but people must not be afraid of writing even knowing that it is too complicated to express themselves in a proper way.
Essay should be structured in various sections that make it easy for the readers to read and follow the author’s thoughts clearly. To show your grasp of the ideas studied learners have to express them in their own words. Writing essays is not the easy task. Nevertheless, it is a good way to stimulate learning and critical thinking that makes writing a valuable part of any language course. It enables learners to display the skills and abilities which they possess and remaining an important method of assessment, helps to discriminate between students, to test their intellectual capabilities. Raimes points out “Writing helps students to learn. Firstly, it reinforces the grammatical structures, idioms, and vocabulary that teachers have been teaching their students. Secondly, when students write, they also have a chance to be adventurous with the language, to go beyond what they have just learned. Thirdly, when students write, they necessarily become very involved with the new language [14, p.58]
Professor Roy Wilkinson has identified a pyramid of skills which teachers try to test with the help of essay assignment.
Tarvers explains that “Writing is a powerful instrument of thought. In the act of composing, writers learn about themselves and their world and communicate their insights to others. Writing confers the power to grow personally and to effect change in the world" [18, p.45] Moreover, the skill of writing essays is an essential tool in achieving the desirable grade in the courses studied. The basic essay-writing skills are not that difficult to acquire. The reason why so many students fail to do this is that not enough attention has been paid to teaching them. It is inevitable that schools, colleges and universities spend most of their time teaching the core subject-matter of a course, but hardly any time in advising students how to put their ideas down on paper in the form of an essay. Hedge points out that writing has been a neglected area of English language teaching for some years [11, p.101]. However, when people write down an account of ideas for others to read, they have to explain themselves particularly carefully. The leaps made while talking are not allowed. This makes writing probably the most challenging aspect of studying. White and Amdt promote that “Writing is a form of problem-solving which involves such processes as generating ideas, discovering a voice with which to write, planning, goal-setting, monitoring and evaluating what is going to be written as well as what has been written and searching for language with which to express exact meanings” [20, p.92].
The difficulties in writing essays as well as the process of teaching writing essays show the object of this course paper. The subject lies in the set of skills and hints for teaching learners to write better compositions. This coursework comprises the following tasks:
· to specify the structure of the essay and stages in writing it;
· to clarify the skills and habits necessary for the learners to write properly, clearly and persuasively, and to present the viewpoint forcefully in writing;
· to show the importance of practicing writing topic and concluding sentences, organizing the paragraphs coherently, using appropriate vocabulary, transitional devices and grammar;
· to apply key writing structures to learners’ writing;
· to develop strategies for writing, revising, and editing texts that are based on audience and purpose;
· to make students aware of the impact of their choice of words, sentences and organizational techniques on the effectiveness of writing.
Learning solid essay writing skills while in school is the foundation for even the most basic education. ............
