1. Background Information

In the past, teachers usually set aside two periods for students to do writing in class. Students were given a writing task sheet with the writing topic, in addition to reminders of what to include.  A writing framework was also provided for students to write the essay.  Further support might or might not be given, depending on the level of difficulty of the task, taking the form of either a word bank or a list of guided questions. 

In fact teachers produced two writing handbooks and tabled them in the first meeting with the officer: one aiming to build up students’ writing abilities from the basics (moving from sentence writing to paragraph writing) and the other containing some writing and pre-writing tasks to give students the necessary practice.  However, they were not being adopted at the end because teachers should not single out writing and teach it in isolation.  It is more effective to use a task-based approach and integrate the teaching of writing with other language skills.

2. Identification of Concerns

Even though topics students had to write originated mostly from the textbook units covered in English lessons, teachers were unsure how much and how well students could draw on their learning from textbooks.  It was unclear how the design of the writing tasks could help students capitalize on their textbook learning.    

Another concern teachers had was time.  Given a packed curriculum to cover, teachers felt they could not afford to allow more than two periods for students to complete one single writing task.  In reality students learn and forget, so they need a lot of practice and opportunities to recycle what they learned so they can internalize what is taught.  Competition for time was one of the challenges teachers faced in doing this project.