Teaching speaking through discussion — страница 3

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provide students with the opportunities to develop the kind of critical evaluative skills a thorough writing assignment can. Robert Kellogg states " [Writing] is a vehicle for expanding and transforming one's own knowledge base. [It] not only demands thinking, it is also a means for thinking. By writing about a subject, one learns what one thinks about the subject. This property of transforming knowledge is a fundamental component of writing skill" [12, p.214]. Writing essays teaches students to research, plan, organize and structure their activities. 1.2 Basic principles of teaching writing essays: writing techniques and stages Writing is an exercise of mind requiring the mastery of techniques anyone can learn. While one system may work better for some and worse for

others; there are several general rules to stick to. There are many aspects that a student will have to keep in mind. The first important thing to do is to examine the title of the topic. It can be assigned or not. Sometimes it is easier to have the topic given by the teacher. On the other hand, it may be an advantage to take the topic you want. Both have their pros and cons because there are so many things to write about that you may get lost. When the topic has been assigned, you have some definite sphere to work on. Each topic can be seen from various viewpoints. The student, however, should choose the one which is neither too narrow (it will not have enough ideas to write about) nor too broad. Medecine is too general. You can take only one aspect to discuss - Euthanasia in

medical practice. Then you must think about the purpose and the audience of the essay. The writer should understand the key words which will help to gather thoughts, to decide on the writing style and give some hints. It is a good rule always to write the title of the essay across the top of the opening page. It reminds you what you are supposed to be doing. An essay can be good in almost every other way and may be judged poor because it ignores the issues presented in the title. You are never just asked to write all you know about a subject, or simply describe something. You are set a specific problem to reflect upon in the light of what you have been studying. Everything you say in the essay should be relevant to that task. You have to convince your readers that the point has

some bearing on the title. Successful academic writing takes much more than just excellent writing skills and understanding of the topic. The whole secret lies in proper organization of an essay and following a certain writing procedures. The essay goal is to convey information, including the fact that you can write well. But it will not be achieved if the readers do not understand the first few sentences or paragraphs, and stop reading, or if they finish reading but fail to grasp the message. Learning how to be a clear and accurate writer will help to make your essay readable and understandable. There are some guidelines which show how to clarify writing. Moreover, it is important to recognize that you must commit yourself to a process. A finished paper is the result of the

complex interaction of activities that include several stages of development (see Table1), but some of them can be omitted. Nevertheless, these stages are believed to reflect generally how successful writing develops. Stages of writing Writing process Definition Description Prewriting Generating ideas, strategies, and information for a given writing task. Prewriting activities take place before starting on the first draft of a paper. They include discussion, outlining, freewriting, journals, talk-write, metaphor etc. Planning Reflecting on the material produced during prewriting to develop a plan to achieve the aim of the paper. Planning involves considering your rhetorical stance, rhetorical purpose, the principal aim of the text, how these factors are interrelated, and how they

are connected to the information generated during prewriting. Planning also involves selecting support for your claim and blocking out at least a rough organizational structure. Drafting Producing words on a computer or on paper that match (more or less) the initial plan for the work. Drafting occurs over time. Successful writers seldom try to produce an entire text in one sitting or even in one day. Pausing Moments when you aren’t writing but instead are reflecting on what you have produced and how well it matches your plan. Usually includes reading. Pausing occurs among successful and unsuccessful writers, but they use it in different ways. Successful writers consider “global" factors: how well the text matches the plan, how well it is meeting audience needs, and