In addition, this finding may reflect the fact that many writing teachers may emphasize spelling and grammar a great deal when they teach writing and mark their pupils’ compositions.
– The Relationship between use of Writing Strategies and English Proficiency in Singapore Primary Schools
The eye, a term usually used in the connoisseurship of fine art, draws an interesting comparison between writing and painting …
– Sean Hemingway, Introduction to A Moveable Feast, The Restored Edition
In Writing Good Compositions, writing strategy use among primary school students in Hong Kong was discussed. Similar research has been undertaken in Singapore. The researchers compiled a list of questions on strategy use and invited 1618 primary 4-6 students from 2 primary schools to participate. Their findings reveal the most and least used strategies by students here.
They divided strategy use into the following groups.
- Self-initiation
- Planning
- Monitoring and Evaluating
- Revising
- Text-generating
- Resourcing
- Help-seeking and affect managing (managing difficult emotions)
The researchers were of the view that Planning strategies were heavily emphasised in Singapore classrooms. Accordingly, it was found that a majority of high and medium proficiency students engaged in planning before writing. Even so, it may be interesting to note that there are students who begin writing without planning. There are various ways students are taught to plan compositions.
It has been pointed out for example by Teng (2018) who was writing for the Singapore Examinations and Assessment Board (SEAB) that in theme-based writing such as that which is required in school, “students may then choose to compose a narrative or an exposition using the topic as a theme to serve a particular purpose in addressing their intended audience”. Teng (2018) explains that the Continuous Writing task aims to “elicit unique and personal responses” as opposed to a reliance on “formulaic templates”.
Cheong (2018) representing SEAB in an international conference highlighted how the “Contextualisation Propensity” and “Constraints on Interpretative Space” are “Very High” when students are asked to combine a theme with a picture, when writing. This is the case in Continuous Writing.
What this means is that a theme limits students to a very specific context. It is not difficult to “go out of point” or to write a very structured composition with advanced vocabulary and engaging expressions but which is not based squarely or even sufficiently on the theme.
Accordingly, at the Planning stage, more than the plot, the theme must be adequately addressed. This is what the 5 Keys System does.
Some other findings were as follows.
These students seldom used Self-initiation strategies. These include, asking for the opinion of others on their writing and writing English compositions at home to improve writing without being asked to do so. The researchers suggested that students in Singapore can be encouraged to self-initiate composition writing.
If children ask for feedback on their writing, we could give them feedback on their content by answering the following questions:
- Does the composition make sense?
- Is it something that happens or can happen in real life?
- Does the theme come across?
- Does the reader learn something about the theme?
Ideally, we should not be too focused on what the researchers term the “surface issues, i.e., spelling and grammar” because it has been established that doing so could “hinder writers’ writing process” (Krapels 1990 as cited in Bai, Hu & Gu, 2014).
These students seldom rewarded themselves after writing a composition. The researchers pointed out that this was also the case in another study with Hungarian secondary school children who “laughed” at the suggestion. Writing is a time-intensive and immersive process which is cognitively demanding. Until writing itself becomes rewarding, it may be great to reward children for self-initiating a composition and asking for feedback.
One Monitoring and Evaluating strategy which is very important is “Anticipating whether readers will like my composition or not when reading it”. For this question, students scored a mean of 2.86. This is the lower end of medium frequency of use. As mentioned earlier, “intended audience” is a critical consideration and so students should acquire the habit of imagining their reader response.
The Revising strategy employed most was to check spelling and punctuation. The researchers describe these as secondary or not as important as the quality of content. What students did very much less was to “change ideas in my composition” or “re-organize my composition”. Understandably, these would be easier when typing out compositions with the cut and paste functions.
Even so, Revision is a very important strategy. It will be useful to check the current state of the story against the ‘big picture’ or their plan after every paragraph. It will not be enough to ensure that the story is keeping with the plot they have in mind. It will be important to ensure alignment with the theme.
Text-generating strategies are needful for many students. These include, “Reading segments of my text to help think of new ideas when writing” and “Recalling ideas read elsewhere for use in my composition during writing”. It is worth adding, ideas watched elsewhere. Drama and movie scenes are in fact excellent sources for ideas. Very skilful writers are able to bring readers to a place or feel sensations not possible by watching television. However, it will not be too demanding to translate television scenes to words even for primary school students such that the reader is able to sufficiently imagine the scenes described.
Some students say, “I don’t know what to write next”. Reading what they already wrote would help them get back into the flow of ideas. Having a scene in mind would also help them generate sentences. This would work best in combination with the Monitoring and Evaluating strategy which involves anticipating reader reaction.
Help seeking and affect managing strategies include, asking family members or friends for “help when having difficulty in writing”, “telling myself to enjoy writing” and “telling myself not to worry when writing an English composition”. It was found that students who were struggling with writing used these strategies the most. This was the strategy used relatively little by the other two groups. Given that writing is a social activity – it is set in a particular society with its own culture, beliefs and value systems; it is written by someone to someone, it may be useful for students who find writing manageable to also rope in those around them for their views and suggestions.
Self-talk is a recognised and important strategy to manage emotions during writing. Telling ‘myself’ to enjoy writing can seem too simple to be of use. Enjoy means to lose oneself in a process without caring overly about initial outcomes. Students can learn to appreciate their writing by becoming readers of their own work and their own cheerleaders.
If a phrase, sentence or paragraph does not make them go ‘ah…’ in appreciation, there is always correction tape.
The Brain Dojo
