and sometimes explicit teaching, and part of the work in a writing course involves teaching students to be sensitive to the rules of
discourse in English.
Clearly it is not possible to teach explicitly everything a writer needs to know about English, but fortunately for teachers
the learning of language takes place to a great extent unconsciously. A successful writing course must select the
conventions and styles which are most likely to be useful to the students, but a great deal of the sensitivity which the students
need in the use of language will develop unconsciously from spin-off from their reading and talking in the rest of the English
course, so writing cannot be seen as something completely separated from the other activities.
In addition, Clark asserted that because students do not learn to write by having knowledge poured into their heads, one of the
most important goals of a writing class is to enable students to develop an effective writing “process,” so that they can continue
to learn after the class has ended.
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9. Strategies in Teaching Writing
Ried as cited in Murcia, on her book entitled „Teaching English as a Second or Foreign Language‟ states that there are some
techniques can be used in teaching writing they are; 1
Brainstorming This is often a group exercise in which students in the
class are encouraged to participate by sharing their collective knowledge about a particular subject. Students
can then utilize any or all of the information when turning to the preparation of their first draft.
2 Listing
Unlike brainstorming, listing can be a quiet and essentially individual activity. As a first step, student is
encouraged to produce as lengthy a list as possible off all the main ideas and subcategories that come to mind as he or she
thinks about the topic at hand.
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Irene L. Clark et al., Concepts in Composition Theory and Practice
in the Teaching of Writing New Jersey: Taylor Francis, 2008, p. 2.
3 Clustering
Clustering begins with a key word or central idea place in the center of a page or on the blackboard around which he
student or teacher using student-generated suggestions Unlike listing, the words or phrase generated are put on the
page or board in a pattern which takes shape from the connections the writer sees as each new thought emerges.
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4 Free writing
Suggested by Elbow 1973 for helping native speakers break through the difficulty of getting started, free writing is
also known by various terms such as “wet ink” writing, “quick writing”, and “speed writing”. The main idea of this
technique is for students to write for a specified period of time without taking their pen from the page usually about
three minutes for a first attempt and then typically for about five to eight minutes
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10. Six Guidelines for Successful Writing Assignments
The assignment of writing must be carefully constructed to assure their success and their contribution to promoting their
goals of the course. 1
A writing assignment should be presented with its context clearly delineated such that the students understand the reason
for the assignment. 2
The content of the tasktopic should be accessible to the writers and allow for multiple approaches.
3 The language of the prompt or task and the instruction it is
embedded in should be un-ambiguous, comprehensible, and transparent. The task should be focused enough to allow for
competition in the time or length constraints given and should furt
her student‟s knowledge of classroom content and skills. 4
The rhetorical specification cues should provide a clear direction of likely shape and format of the finished assignment,
including appropriate references to an anticipated audience.
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Celce Murcia, Teaching English as a Second and Foreign Language London: Heinle and Heinle, 2001, p. 224.
41
Ibid., p. 224.
5 The evaluation criteria should be identified so that the
students will know in advance how their output will be judged.
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11. Giving Feedback in Teaching Writing
