The document discusses the integration of reading and writing skills within a competence-based curriculum, highlighting the importance of background knowledge in letter recognition for writing. It outlines curriculum standards and assessment strategies that teachers should use to measure student progress in writing competences, emphasizing the need for objective outcomes rather than traditional grading methods. Additionally, the text critiques the artificial separation of language skills in teaching, suggesting a more integrated approach to enhance student learning.

1. Developing and Assessing Writing Skill
in a Competence Based Curriculum
Written by: H.O.D. Noura Al-Bedaiwi
noura_albudaiwi@yahoo.com

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Reading is integrated with writing, because it is associated with
recognizing, blending and segmenting letters, which present some
components of the reading skill. Such components are vital to
writing as well; students cannot write if they do not have
background knowledge of letters and how to combine them to
form words.
Many countries, which teach English as a foreign language, delay
developing the reading and the writing skills for young learners to
have them focus on developing their listening and speaking skills.
Also, to have students develop their skills in their mother tongue
language, students should not be exposed to reading and writing
at the primary stage.
In the New KNCS for grades one and two, students develop pre-
writing and simple writing strategies. For first grade, drawing a
zig-zag, drawing their families, writing one missing letter and
copying short words, entailed with second grade activities to
complete the integration of the skill, such as copying sentences,
writing two missing letters, re-ordering words to form a short
sentence and by the end of the school year, students should
develop their curriculum competence to write simple short
sentences using visual/audio materials.
Curriculum standards are used to measure the progress students
made in developing the specific competences in the KNCS
curriculum and competencies in general. Curriculum standards
describe what students should be able to perform to develop the
competences.
“The basic idea is to focus on objective and observable outcomes
which can be easily measured. CBE requires that students

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demonstrate value-added skills which are assessed by looking at
outcomes rather than process (Bowden, 2004; Guskey, 2005)”.1
Teachers should bear in mind the expected outcomes of their classes
when assessing the writing skill by asking themselves these
questions:
1. What are the expected outcomes a student would have by the
end of the lesson?
2. How are we as teachers going to measure the progress of
the writing competences?
3. What strategies and activities will help the student to
acquire the curriculum standards for writing?
4. Are the strategies suitable for my class and do they aid in
developing the writing competences?
5. Is my lesson plan aligned with the expected outcomes,
specific competences, and curriculum standards for the
writing skill?
6. Can students understand the purpose of the writing tasks
provided and what outcomes are expected?
Such questions help teachers be more efficient when planning,
instructing and assessing the writing skill.
Teachers need to understand assessment is not for grading
students. Norm-reference tests are not used in a competence
based curriculum; CRTs are more effective and reflect students
learning needs.
Formative and Summative are two types of assessment used in a
competence based curriculum. Formative assessment measures
how far and how well a student developed the specific
competences using the curriculum standards provided.
Summative assessment is usually conducted at the end of a

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learning unit to assess how far did the student master the specific
competences.
When teachers ask themselves the right questions, and assess
using the suitable tools, they will be able to provide students with
authentic tasks evolving cognitive, psychomotor, and affective
skills:
“Most language teaching programs, if they are subdivided into
components, divide up into the "four skills", speaking, listening,
reading, and writing. Evidence from a variety of sources indicates
that this may not be the optimal division. First, in every program I
have been associated with, teachers who are asked to focus on
just one of the four skills or even two (oral versus written),
complain that such divisions are artificial. They find it impossible
to focus on just one skill and ignore the others. Second, Oller, in a
series of studies, reports that "it is difficult to find any unique
meaningful variance in all of the diverse language tests that have
been studied and which can be attributed to any one of the
traditionally recognized four skills" (Oller, 1976a, p. 144; see also
Oller, 1976b; Oller and Hinofotis, 1976).”2
Written by,
H.O.D. Noura Al-Bedaiwi

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Abbreviations:
1. KNCS: Kuwait National Curriculum
2. CBE: competency-based education
3. Specific Competence: competence describes what people
can do; they integrate knowledge, skills and attitudes a
student develops.
4. Competency: focuses on how they can do it and how to
develop the competence.
5. Norm-reference test: report whether test takers performed
better or worse than a hypothetical average student, which
is determined by comparing scores against the performance
results of a statistically selected group of test takers,
typically of the same age or grade level, who have already
taken the exam. 3
6. CRTs: Criterion-referenced tests (CRTs) are intended to
measure how well a person has learned a specific body of
knowledge and skills. 4

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References:
1. http://www.mextesol.net/journal/index.php?page=journal&id_articl
e=519
2. Second Language Acquisition and Second Language
Learning. Stephen D Krashen. University of Southern
California. 1981.
3. http://edglossary.org
4. http://www.fairtest.org