Profile Issues in Teachers' Professional

Development
ISSN: 1657-0790
[email protected]
Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Colombia

Ariza Martínez, Ana Virginia

The Process-Writing Approach: An Alternative to Guide the Students´ Compositions
Profile Issues in Teachers' Professional Development, núm. 6, 2005, pp. 37-46
Universidad Nacional de Colombia
Bogotá, Colombia

Available in: http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=169213801004

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 PROFILE 6 (2005): 37-46
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Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Facultad de Ciencias Humanas, Departamento de Lenguas Extranjeras

The Process-Writing Approach:

An Alternative to Guide the Students’ Compositions

El enfoque de escritura como proceso:

Una alternativa para guiar las composiciones de los estudiantes

Ana Virginia Ariza Martínez

[email protected]
Institución Educativa Distrital República del Ecuador

With this report I intend to share an experience about the use of some strategies of the
process oriented approach with which I guided 9th graders at República del Ecuador school in
2004. This was a group of low-achieving teenagers whose writing was the least developed of
the skills. Connecting ideas and getting coherence in a text was a daunting task for them. It was
not really very difficult to guide the learners to write. The best products were those in which
pictures were involved. In general they showed great interest and better outcomes resulted from
pictures than from words. The simpler the task given, the better the written results. The teacher’s
role was essentially that of a model and facilitator.

Key words
words
ds: Process writing approach, writing skills, writing tasks

Con este informe pretendo compartir una experiencia acerca del uso de algunas estrategias
de la escritura orientada como proceso, con la cual guié a estudiantes de noveno grado de la
I.E.D. República del Ecuador en 2004. Se trata de grupo de adolescentes con bajo nivel de
inglés cuya habilidad de producción escrita era la menos desarrollada de todas. Conectar ideas
y dar coherencia a un texto era para ellos una tarea titánica. Realmente no fue difícil guiar a los
estudiantes hacia la escritura. En general, los estudiantes mostraron gran interés; hubo mejores
producciones a partir de imágenes que de palabras. Cuanto más simple se mostrara la actividad,
mejores resultados se obtuvieron. El papel del profesor fue esencialmente el de modelo y facilitador.

Palabras claves
claves: Enfoque de escritura por procesos, habilidades de escritura, tareas de
escritura

This article was received on April 15th, 2005 and accepted on August 12th, 2005.
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INTRODUCTION as teamwork, motivation, vocabulary and the

Writing for EFL (English as a Foreign Language) practice of writing down ideas before speaking.
students is not an easy matter, especially when the Their project is proof that listening, speaking,
students’ English competence is not very well reading and writing must work in an integrated way.
developed. On the other hand, there is reading, They got interesting results in interaction, motivation
which entails out a big problem in comprehension. and oral and written production from reading.
Students are not used to “thinking” in English, they I found some other interesting proposals such
are not used to inferring meanings from context as Ortega and Rodriguez’s (2000) titled
and they forget vocabulary, structures or chunks “Improvement of writing proficiency through
which had supposedly been learned. As reading creation of homogeneous groups in the
and writing are two hand-in-hand processes, it classroom”, where they state that there is a lot of
makes the writing process even more difficult. theory about writing skills, but these do not bear
However, since the human being has the capability in mind the learners’ likes, interests, problems, age,
to think, the possibility to write exists. attitude, etc., and I agree with them. It was
The purpose of this project was to show how interesting to create different working groups to
teachers of English can guide their students to establish the kind of work that functions better.
develop this written communicative competence. However, it is noticeable that all the activities carried
I found White and Arndt’s proposal (1991) an out based on a controlled writing situation provided
interesting, relevant and not difficult alternative good results, while freer compositions did not.
which is not a linear but a cyclical process, and Silva (2003: 28) presents an overview of ESL
which offers a great variety of activities for each of (English as a Second Language) writing throughout
the stages proposed. time in his article, “ESL Writing: Past, Present, and
Future”. He focuses on the four most influential
REVIEW OF THE LITERA TURE
LITERATURE approaches, controlled composition, current-
Although I was conscious that the most traditional rhetoric, the process approach, and English
important principle of process pedagogy is that for academic purposes. In his article he refers to the
writing is the result of a very complex, highly process approach as a “non-linear, exploratory and
individualized process, the need to investigate or generative process whereby writers discover and
innovate regarding this topic was significant because reformulate their ideas as they attempt to approximate
the more time passed, the poorer the EFL students’ meaning” according to Zamel (1983: 165).
production at school was. Precisely this research was based on this
Santoyo and Morales (2000) connected written approach, the process-oriented one. White and
production to their project on reading. They stated Arndt (1991) propose this framework in which
relevant aspects to count on in the process such there is a brief explanation about each stage.

Diagram 1
1. A model of writing (White and Arndt, 1991, p.11).
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The focusing stage has to do with the purpose interests, abilities and attitudes, which are aspects
for writing, the real reasons for writing. Structuring to take advantage of.
deals with the organization of ideas in an acceptable Task-Based Instruction (TBI) has also a lot to
way for the reader. Drafting shows the transition do with the development of my project since my
from writer-based into reader-based text because work is focused on tasks, where learners interact
multiple drafts are produced and each one has and cooperate continuously to learn by doing.
feedback from the teacher or from peers. Re- I found a reflection and proposal for L2 writing
viewing means standing back from the text and in Ortiz (2003), where she demonstrates that
looking at it with fresh eyes and asking oneself: “Is questions can be used in writing activities to
it right?” Evaluation is given during the process to generate ideas. The topic and the kind of texts will
assist students permanently and not merely at the depend on the students’ ages, interests and levels.
end. Finally, it should be pointed out that generating She probably based her innovation on White and
ideas is the most important stage when the process Arndt’s (1991) suggestion in order to focus on
is starting. Here the writer looks for a topic and the concept of “shared knowledge” between
considers a purpose to initiate the writing task. reader and writer. She asked questions related to
To summarize, I will mention the following friends, families, relatives, teachers, etc. in order
advantages offered by this approach: to generate short texts about these specific topics.
• It focuses on the process (not on the final I think her proposal is interesting, but I would like
product). to go further than merely writing as a “response”
• It is reader-based (not writer-based). product.
• It finds a real audience. Holmes (2004) in his article, “The use of a
• It offers a variety of techniques. process-oriented approach to facilitate the planning
• The teacher plays the role of guide, facilitator, and production stages of writing for adult students
and reader. of English as a Foreign or Second Language”
• The student’s role is one of sharing and identifies some features of this approach and
collaborating. provides some suggestions to develop activities
• Grammar is a tool (a means, not an end). in order to humanize and make a more positive
• Meaning is essential (not form). and effective experience from writing. He also
• It is a creative process. brings up White and Arndt’s (1991: 5) remark that
• Evaluation and feedback are given “activities include pair and group work, not to
permanently (not only at the end). mention discussion and collaboration, so that the
Some of the literature found deals with the writing class becomes, in a very genuine sense, a
process approach itself. Now I will report some communicative experience in which much more
findings about works based on it. than skill in writing is practiced and developed.”
As the current teaching practice at my work We can find lots of information about the writing
place is based on the communicative approach, I process and specifically the process writing
will mention Calvache (2003), who explains approach. I have found different aspects which I
important aspects of the communicative approach, think would work based on the characteristics of
the task-based approach and the development of my students and there are some others that would
competence in foreign languages. I liked Calvache’s work with higher-level students or with students
article and agreed with the point of view that the from a different culture. I have found that process
learner is the center of the process, so, for any writing offers a positive, motivating and
educational action, we must keep in mind his/her collaborative atmosphere for students to write in.
previous knowledge, daily struggle, needs and It focuses on reader-based texts instead of writer-
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based texts. Besides, this approach gives extreme September to October. Some activities to guide
importance to the learners’ needs, interests, the students to write were systematically presented
problems, ages, motivation, and so on, which and strategies were applied, beginning with the ones
makes the student the center of the process. It White and Arndt (1991) suggest to generate ideas
requires real or authentic context and real readers. such as brainstorming, using pictures and cartoons,
etc. During the process I was expected to be
METHODOLOGY circulating among, focusing, structuring, drafting,
This action research study involves the use of a re-viewing and evaluating permanently. However, I
series of activities related to the generation of ideas only tested the generation and focusing stages
and focusing stages from the process writing because of the lack of time. I selected them as the
approach. It was carried out with a group of 9th starting point because I think they are the basis of
graders from República del Ecuador school in this process mainly to help students to establish
2004. writing habits. I hope the other stages can be
About the participants, there were important progressively applied in the future.
aspects to bear in mind. First of all, we, as teachers, Data were gathered from the collection of drafts
are not used to writing, so we cannot expect so much and final products. The teacher played the role of
from students unless there is substantial change, mainly observer, guide and facilitator.
when we have not even adopted a systematic process
for writing lessons. With those former aspects and RESUL
RESULTS TS
the reality of large classes, so little interest in learning, Since getting started is the most difficult part
so few hours of English classes a week (2 or 3), the of any process, this research was just a starting
waste of time because of different activities, and point of the complex process of writing.
discouragement, among others, the result was Most of the activities presented here have to
obvious. Students were low-achievers in general, and do with the generation of ideas. Some of them are
the least-developed skill was writing. guided and some are not. There is one more
I selected a group of 36 students from 9th grade activity which has to do with the focusing stage.
(901) to work on the project. They were boys and Brainstorming (an unguided technique), first
girls aged 14 to 16. From this group I took a sample modeled by the teacher, then by the students, was
of five pupils who were average students but rarely useful to produce many individual ideas or words
missed classes, who worked in class, and made related to a specific topic quickly. I modeled this
big efforts to improve. Fortunately, this group was activity with the word “love” (because of the month
collaborative. The students accepted suggestions –September). The students gave many related
positively and worked in class as well as at home. ideas (most of them in Spanish) which were written
The other participant was just me. on the board, and emphasis on their spelling was
The process began to be carried out in June made. Later on, they were involved in a kind of
when I started to identify and formulate the snowball activity for brainstorming, then, it was
problem. Later I got information about the topic enlarged through cooperative work. The aim was
and started to read and select relevant information. to create a poster based on the most interesting
Once I had identified the process-writing as the topics for teenagers according to what they had
approach that would be the basis of the project, I brainstormed. This was the first part of the
introduced this to my students. They were asked following class with a more productive activity
to take an active part in the project development, based on reading. This time the objective was to
and a consent form was sent to their parents. The create charts on their topic of preference using
activities with the students were carried out from the newspaper “El Tiempo”. They had to read the
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text and produce a text on their own. Some of As it can be seen, errors in grammar, syntax
these productions were fantastic, but others were and coherence were frequently made (The last
just copy of parts of the news. For most of them, Monday Camilo wants to call at 2:00 pm to his
the cooperative work functioned. Some of them mother) but I did not focus on them, but on the
learned from others, they respected their roles and process itself. It was hard for me because I was
there was interaction. Students showed a positive always trying to correct mistakes at first sight.
attitude towards these activities. They had fun and Regarding the focusing activity, I could notice
showed great creativity. However, English language that the students really understood that everybody
was not used at all and there was difficulty in writes with a specific purpose. With the pool of
developing ideas. When students perceived that letters taken from “El Tiempo” newspaper, they
the task was getting complicated, most of them could observe the different purposes, the different
gave up and started getting bored, frustrated or writers’ attitudes, and the different language devices
unable. They did not make much effort. the writer uses to make his/her letters really effective.
On the other hand, the other activities, I mean, After analyzing the students’ written production
using picture sequences and cartoons, fostered and my observations, I could establish the following
personal expressions since each student perceived categories:
Diagram 2
2. Categories found when analyzing data on writing strategies.

Generation of ideas and focusing

Pictures Interaction
Tasks Letters

and interpreted these visual aids differently. There Within the application of two strategies to foster
was a great stimulus for vocabulary development. and focus on writing, I found the following four
Learners liked the activities where they did not important categories:
have to write so much. These were creative and Pictures Help More Than Words: For the
they could express their feelings and emotions generation of ideas, several activities were posed.
without having to write very much. They expressed From these, students showed much more interest,
ideas, but it was not easy to develop them. If they creativity and production of ideas when the starting
were not pressed, they did not make any effort, or point was a picture or a sequence of pictures or
simply avoided doing things. cartoons, than when the starting point was just
Some activities for the generation of ideas words.
provided more successful results than others. It was The Simpler the Task, the Better the Written
necessary to implement the ones where students had Outcomes: The students’ attention span is very
to exercise their creativity and imagination since it was short. About 15 minutes after starting an activity
quite difficult for them, although they were interested. is enough time for them to get tired if they have
They were used to following patterns and it was hard not finished. They get bored or frustrated or feel
for them to go beyond. In general they showed great unable and they simply give up. So, tasks must
interest and better outcomes from pictures than from be short, clear and simple, appropriate for their
words (see sample 1, in Appendix 1). proficiency. In this way the students will work with
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a positive attitude, they will feel confident and In spite of the short time I had to implement
encouraged to write their own ideas (see sample this study, I managed to try two of White and
2, in Appendix 2). Arndt’s proposed stages: generating ideas and
Letters: A Good Resort to Make Complaints: focusing.
When learners receive news about decisions that With these two strategies and other activities
can harm their life, they immediately react. Letters carried out, I could realize that it is not really very
help them to express their disagreement, and they difficult to guide the learners towards a good
know that most letters are effective when the output. For the generation of ideas, I applied
language is used properly. It was a good activity to several activities where I could notice that the best
enable the students to understand what focusing results were those in which pictures were involved
means (see sample 3, in Appendix 3). to help the students generate ideas. Students
Interaction: Teacher’s Role: The teacher must began to get bored or discouraged when the
essentially be a model and a facilitator. A model activities proved too long or when they had to write
because students need examples to be able to do a lot. So the activities for these types of groups
something for the first time, and it is the teacher should be short, visually aided and clear. For the
who must guide them with clear instructions; and a focusing stage, it was important to get students to
facilitator because students will need help either with realize that nobody writes without a specific
vocabulary or any other aspect of organizational purpose or for a specific audience. With the use
competence (cohesion, syntax, coherence, etc.) of community letters from a newspaper they
Working with White and Arndt’s proposal understood that the writer’s attitude and the
usually implies that the students are high achievers different tones of language he/she uses is very
and that they are competent in the English language. related to his/her purpose. The teacher’s role is
However, the group of students of this study are also an important one. We must be guides and
neither high achievers nor have a good English level. facilitators instead of judges or linguistic elements
In the end, things turned out positive. This proposal correctors. This type of correction should be left
can also function with low achievers. Obviously, it for subsequent studies.
would be nicer and better if things were different. In summary, everything is a matter of creativity
This study helped to create a willingness to learn and the assignment of motivating activities in a
in the students, most of them wished to be able to step-by-step pace. The students’ reactions in
deal with a great deal of vocabulary, structures and general were quite positive. They liked the activities
coherent elements. They, as well as I, noticed how and did their best even when giving ideas in
low their achievements had been so far, due to Spanish. Motivation was clear in some activities
lots of circumstances that had affected the learning in particular. I observed an increase of interest in
process. writing, and the idea of the work being for research
helped a lot.
CONCL USIONS
CONCLUSIONS
This was a project concerning how English LIMIT
LIMITA ATIONS
teachers can help or guide their students to write or I had some difficulties especially with material
to improve their compositions in this foreign because of little support from the principal. Another
language. As I have said, writing is the most neglected difficulty was the students’ low level of achievement.
of the language skills and I have wanted to return to I ended up with a very short time to apply all the
its practice. Consequently, I have planned the use activities I would have liked to. Data analysis is not
of different strategies and activities that White and an easy matter to work with, so I had some problems
Arndt pose in their work about the writing process. understanding how to analyze the data.
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POSSIBLE FUTURE ACTIONS OR Holmes, N. (2004). The use of a process-

RESEARCH oriented approach to facilitate the planning and
It would be nice to be able to try all of White production stages of writing for adult students of
and Arndt’s proposed strategies in a school year. English as a Foreign or Second Language. Retrieved
I mean, not only for generation of ideas or focusing August 02, 2004, from
but reviewing, structuring, drafting and evaluating. h t t p : / / w w w. d e v e l o p i n g t e a c h e r s . c o m /
An interesting aspect would be digging into the articles_tchtraining//processw2_nicola.htm
results of this proposal with high achievers and with Moreno, S. et al. (1999). Lenguaje significativo
students of other social levels. Another important 6. Bogotá: Editorial Libros y Libros.
aspect to study in the future would be the way of Ortega, L. and Rodríguez, V. (2000).
correcting and/or evaluating students’ written Improvement of writing proficiency through
compositions. creation of homogeneous groups in the classroom.
PROFILE. Issues in Teachers’ Professional
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Development, 1, 48-51.
Ana Virginia Ariza Martínez holds a B. Ed. in Ortiz, R. (2003). Question-based writing
philology and languages, English-Spanish, from the process: A reflection and a proposal to L2 writing.
Universidad Nacional de Colombia, 1987, and a HOW. A Colombian Journal for Teachers of English,
B.A. in pedagogy of language from the Universidad 10, 35-43.
El Bosque, 2001. Currently she works at I.E.D. Santoyo, B. and Morales, L. (2000). Reading: a
República del Ecuador, in Bogotá - Colombia. motivating and interactive process. PROFILE. Issues
in Teachers’ Professional Development, 1, 59-60.
REFERENCES Silva, T. (2003). ESL writing: Past, present, and
Calvache, E. (2003). Communicative approach, future. HOW. A Colombian Journal for Teachers
task-based approach and the development of of English, 10, 28-39.
competences in foreign languages. HOW. A Colombian White, R. and Arndt, V. (1991). Process writing.
Journal for Teachers of English, 10, 7- 16. Longman: London and New York.
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APPENDIX 1: SAMPLE 1

Activity: Generation of ideas through a sequence of pictures.

1. Order the pictures in a logical sequence.
2. Explain what happens in each picture.
3. Write a story based on the pictures.

Name: Jhon Erick Cabra H. Grade: 901

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APPENDIX 2: SAMPLE 2

Name: Name: Jhon Erick Cabra H. Date: 20-10 -04

Use your imagination to complete the speech bubbles.

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APPENDIX 3: SAMPLE 3