AN EVALUATION OF PROCESS WRITING AS A TEACHING STRATEGY FOR COMPOSITION

Abstract

Writing is a complex and highly intense mental, physical and emotional activity which has frustrated many budding writers. In order to write well, one has to organise one's thoughts and consider the intended audience and the purpose of writing before deciding how to put all the ideas in a coherent manner on paper. Traditionally, writing has been taught focusing mainly on the product rather than on the process of producing the text. A very simple method was adopted, with the teacher providing the input of content and pupils eventually writing out the essay. More recently, schools have adopted the 'process' model of writing, which emphasises writing 'which promotes cognitive/psychological growth'. It is the aim of this dissertation to critically examine the attitudes of pupils and teachers towards Process Writing and also the extent of peer-editing carried out by students. The first aim offers us some basis for comparing the fit between teachers' or students' attitudes to Process Writing. The second offers us a textual basis for assessing the quality of writing (skills) resulting from the process approach. This dissertation comprises seven Chapter One offers a brief overview chapters in all. of the aims and objectives of the thesis. Chapter Two discusses the process approach, its assumptions and implications for the teaching of writing. Chapter Three provides a brief outline of the methodology used in carrying out the evaluation of process writing in this thesis. Chapters Four and Five analyze the attitudes of teachers and students respectively as revealed in questionnaires administered by the researcher. Chapter Six deals with the analysis of sixteen composition texts written by eight pupils, focusing on the type(s) or extent of peer-editing done by pupils. Chapter Seven concludes the thesis by discussing the limitations in the current study and providing recommendations for further research.