teaching writing

1. Lecture 3
Teaching Writing

2. Questions to be discussed
• 1. The definition of writing
• 2. Written discourse versus spoken discourse
• 3. Writing as a means and as an end
• 4. Approaches to teaching writing
• 5. Problems with and strategies of giving feedback

3. What is writing?
• Writing is the process of using symbols (letters, punctuation and spaces) to
communicate thoughts and ideas in a readable form (englishclub.com)
• Writing is a type of speech activity as a communicative skill to encode, store
and send messages with the help of written symbols. The product of this
speech activity is a text for reading.

4. Spoken versus Written Discourse
• Permanence
• Explicitness
• Density
• Detachment
• Organisation
• Speed of reception
• Standard language
• A learnt skill
• Sheer amount & importance

5. Writing as a means and as an end

6. Approaches to teaching writing
• Text/product based
• Task / process based

7. Problems with and strategies of giving
feedback
• What should feedback be mainly on: language /content/organization?
• Should all mistakes be corrected?
• Should learners rewrite, incorporating corrections?
• Should we let students correct or give feedback on each other`s work?