English seminar

Welcome to our English class . Today we are going to tell you about a teaching writing in Trung nguyen school .
Most of our students said that it was very difficult for them to write a paragrap or an essay in English .They had lots of difficulties:
-The difference between English and Viet Namese
- Don’t have enough vocabulary to write
- Shortage of knowledge about society
- Make a lot of mistakes about spelling and grammar
- Less time to write
When we teach writing skill we have lots of difficulties, too. So we decide to make the seminar. Please tell us about your opinion and share your experience . Thank you very much.
ENGLISH SEMINAR
“ THE METHODS IN A TEACHING WRITING ”
A. INTRODUCTION
As we know that the purpose of teaching writing skill is to help students to develop writing skill. Though this, student can improve their English level and have more knowledge about society. In a writing teaching we need to help students develop their writing ability.It means that we help students get main ideas to write an essay or a paragraph.
If we think only of long term needs, writing is probably the least important of four skills for many students, they are more likely to need to listen to , read and speak English than to write it.Their need for writing is most likely to be for study purpose and also as an examination skill.
This seminar shows techniques for writing activities and focusses on writing skill at elementary to intermediate level including techniques for writing sentences and short paragraphs on general topics.
B.CONTENT
Firstly, we talk about the value of writing at the lower levels of learning English:
- The main importance of writing at this level is that it helps students to learn writing new words and structures help students to remember them , and as writing is done more slowly and carefully than speaking, written practice helps focus students’ attention on what they are learning.
- If the students’ own language uses a different writing system to English , the first
task will be to master English handwriting. So the earliest activities will be
copying letters, words and simple sentences.
- As soon as possible , we should encourage students to go to beyond mechanical
copying and give them exercises which require them to think and add
something of their own, but exercises at this level should still be controlled,
so that students don’t make too many mistakes.
Secondly, we talk about the value of writing at the intermediate levels of learning English :
- Many students would probably find it quite difficult and make many mistakes.If so , they would find the task frustrating and probably not learn very much from it.
- Students would probably approach the task in different ways and produce a wide varienty of different paragraphs. So the only way to correct their work would be individually, book by book, this would be very time – consuming for the teachers.
- As soon as they have masterred basic skills of sentences writing, students need to progress beyond very controlled writing exercises to freer paragraph writing.
However, students will make this transition more easily and learn more if we can guide their writing. There are two main ways of doing this :
+ By giving a short text as a model.
+ By doing oral preparation for the writing.
Writing based on a text
Students read a short text and perhap study particular features of it ( eg :the way sentences are joined, the use of verb tenses, the way of the passive ) Then they write a paragraph which is similar but involve some changes.
Examples of texts that could be used : Students read a description of somebody , then write description of other people shown in the picture.
Oral preparation
Another way of guiding paragraph writing is to do oral preparation beforehand with the whole class; the students make suggestions, and the teacher builds up an outline or a list of key expressions on the board.Then the students use this as a basic for their writing. This approach has several adventages:
- It is flexible, it can be done in different ways according to the interests and ability of the class.
- Ideas about what to write come from the students themselves,this makes the ability much more interesting and involves the class more.
- It doesn’t require specially-prepared text on other material.
C. SOME WRITING EXERCISES FROM CONTROLLED TO FREE – WRITING
1.TRANSFORMATION
Change the underlined information in the text so that it is true about your ideas. Copy the changed text into book
Eg: I think parents’ day should be celebrated on first Sunday of April. Sunday is day off so everybody is free from work or study.April is in late Spring and early summer, the weather is fine at this time of the year, many activities can happen outdoors. In parents’ day we should give our parents: flowers, cards, souvenirs or bring them a special cake.
2. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Answer each question with a complete sentense as an anwer.Put your answers together in to a paragraph:
Why do we celebrate Parents’day ?
When do we celebrate Parents’day ? ( in what season or what month /
What date of the month or day of week ? why ? )
How do we celebrate ?
What special gift do we give our parents ?
What special food do we offer ?
3.GAP-FILL
Fill in the gaps next to the numbers.Then copy out the whole paragraph in to your book.
Eg: I think parents’ day should be celebrated on first Sunday of …( 1 )…... Sunday is day off so everybody is free from work or study…( 2 ) … is in late … ( 3 )……and early …..( 4 )….., the weather is fine at this time of the year, many activities can happen outdoors. In parents’ day we should give our parents: ………(5 )………., cards, souvenirs or bring them ……….( 6 )………...
4. WRITE IT UP
Interview three friends about their idea about Perents’ day. Fill in the questionnaire from the NOTE . Choose one of their ideas. Write one sentence for each category in the questionnaire. Put your sentences together in a paragraph.
5.SUBSTITUTION BOXES
Make as many sentences as you can from the words in the box about your mother.You can use the same word as the many times as you like. Now order your sentences and copy them out as a paragraph in your book.
6. COMPOSITION
Teacher should help students make outline base on students’ ideas or outline given in the book to write.
In Viet Nam people don’t celebrate mothers’ day or Fathers’ day .You think it is necessary to have a day to celebrate for your mom and another for your dad .Write to a friend to share this idea .
First paragraph : Tell your friends the reason(s) for celebrating this day (for
children to express their fellings, memories , and love for their
parents, to enchance family traditions , to bring family member
closer…)
Second paragraph : Give details about :
- When to celebrate : in what season , or what month, on what
date of the month or day of week… ( Why ? )
- How to celebrate : having parties ,sending cards , go on
picnics…….
- What special gifts to give : gift to moms , gift to dads
- What special food to offer
Third paragraph : State whether or not you think your idea will be supported and
You hope the day will be celebrated nationwide.
D. ACTIVITIES AND TECHNIQUES FOR TEACHING WRITING SKILL
A writing lesson has five stages :
Thanks for your attention