Teaching ESL Adolescent University Writers: Product vs. Process Writing Approach

As a parent and educator, I do indulge in several discussions and debates in relation to teaching. One of the topics mostly discussed in parents’ gatherings in Lebanon is the new methodologies of teaching writing and the influence of the technology and its several tools on this skill. However, a recent discussion with one of the fathers has made me more assertive in the teaching writing approach I apply during writing classes. His son is a student in one of the top notch American schools in Lebanon. As a grade 7 student, he is required to produce several texts in different writing genres. The father was really worried about the way writing is being taught and approached. He complained that the only aim of these writings is for his son to reflect and express his attitudes towards a certain prompt or literary work as his son’s English teacher always clarifies. However, the father feels that his son’s writing skills are not improving due to lack of process, dependence on word processors and internet, and mostly the emphasis on product. This incident was an eye opener for me as an English teacher. Truly, it was a coincidence where I could interject and relate more than my experience as a mother playing the role of tutor at home; it was an opportunity to reinvestigate and encapsulate my approach in teaching writing for ESL freshman/sophomore students. In the light of such situation, it is worth exploring the process writing vs. product writing approach. Such an issue is unavoidable when discussing teaching writing approaches in ESL classes. 

In an age of rapidly increasing knowledge and information, the world is becoming more and more complex. In order to survive and thrive, young people must become proficient in their ability to think clearly and express their thinking. Thus, writing instruction should play a central role in high school curricula. Hence, as an advocate of process writing approach, it is worth highlighting its benefits in improving the students’ products and using an eclectic approach to cater for students’ writing skills needs. 

 “Instead of teaching finished writing, we should teach unfinished writing, and glory in its unfinishedness” (Murray, 1972, p.11). In describing their roles, qualified English teachers usually agree that the most difficult skill to teach is writing, whether with native or non native speakers of the language. Writing, no matter what the genre of the writing piece, is a complicated process that involves the usage of many essentials related to the language. Through writing, the student writer expresses his/her ideas, uses previously learned vocabulary, implements structural, grammatical, and phonological rules, and finally connects among the three elements in the composition triangle described by Huff and Kline (1987): the subject, the text, the writer, and the audience (Appendix A). However, how is this related to and applied in Lebanon?

The New Lebanese Curriculum in the Teaching of English Writing

“In the area of foreign language education, there was emphasis on creating a citizen who is proficient in at least one foreign language in order to promote openness to and interaction with other cultures” (The English Language Curriculum, p. 4).   

The curriculum for English as a first foreign language, which was formed through The Plan for Educational Reform (1994) and The New Framework for Education in Lebanon (1995), established principles and guidelines that emphasize that “listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills are not thought of as independent skills; they are rather perceived as interdependent where one skill often activates the other skills as well as the paralinguistic skills for the achievement of effective communication” (The English Language Curriculum,n.d., p.5). The teaching of writing as one of the four interdependent skills is divided into three broad “written communication objectives” which are the following:

1. Communicate Using Different Genres

2. Demonstrate Competence in Creative/Academic Writing

3. Develop Competence in Organizational Strategies (The English Language Curriculum,n.d’ pp.60 – 61).

Under each objective are a set of objectives assigned for each grade ranging from grade 1 to grade 12. However, the following objective “edit and revise a draft” is assigned only to Grade 8. This is the case even though different kinds of writing need editing and revising in order for the writing piece to be a completed one and for the student to grasp and apply the concepts taught and practice on his/her different writing skills. On hearing this, most teachers might point out that not much time is given to focus on one writing genre through proofreading and rewriting since there are other goals and objectives in the curriculum that need to be covered before the academic year is over. In this case, teachers cannot be blamed because a set curriculum certainly is imposed on them, not only by the school they are teaching in, but by the Ministry of Education, that is by the Lebanese government itself.

Accordingly, after graduating from school, a student attends a university where the subject matter or courses in the chosen field are taught in either the country’s native language, which is Arabic, or in one of the two adopted languages, French and English. 

As a result, teachers as facilitators should improve the pedagogy in second language writing classrooms. The question is “HOW”.

Approaches to Writing: Product and Process

Product Writing

As cited in Hasan & Akhand (2010) , a product approach is “a traditional approach in which students are encouraged to mimic a model text, usually is presented and analyzed at an early stage” (Gabrielatos, 2002, p.5). It emphasizes the accuracy of the final product but ignores the process, which the students go through to reach the final goal. If the students fail to produce something satisfactory, they are required to rewrite. Hence, in a typical product approach-oriented classroom, students are supplied with a standard sample of text where they are expected to follow the standard to mimic a new piece of writing.

As I reflect on my years as a student, it is alarming that the vast majority of my teachers employed the product approach in their venture to teach us "how to write". It is now apparent that the grades which I cherished as trophies of excellence were reflective of my ability to imitate and conform rather than create a unique piece of writing. Consequently, this stifled my creativity, and I have now understood why so many of my peers despised writing. In addition, my eight year old son, who is a grade 3 French Catholic school student, is given phrases and expressions to use in both his French and Arabic writing classes. In several occasions, I would encourage him to generate his own ideas and expressions rather than just combine studied phrases in a piece of writing. Moreover, the father of the 7th grader complained about the many structure, organization, and word choice of his son’s writings. 

Thus, Parson (1985) stresses that under these conditions; there isn't much of a sense of ownership or investment in the writing. Virtually all the various subparts of the traditional approach have been shown to be ineffective in producing capable writers. Parson identifies several reasons for the failure of this approach (p.9). As explained, it emphasizes form and mechanics before, and often at the expense of, ideas and meaning. Also, it focuses on the product rather than the process. In addition, it seriously neglects the earliest stages of the writing process. Moreover, it offers too many artificial contexts for writing. Besides that, it isolates mechanical skills from the context of writing. More importantly, rather than being an outgrowth of research and experimentation, the traditional approach is based on sheer historical momentum of outmoded theoretical assumptions (as cited in Cotton,1988, p.9) 

This led to the shift from product to process in writing instruction. This shift values learners’ creativity, content, and intrinsic motivation. John Swales (1990) states that the process approach emphasizes the cognitive relationship between the writer and the writer’s internal world (as cited in Bae, 2011). Thus, writing is creative and unpredictable. In short, in the process writing approach, writing is considered a “thinking process,” and a writer’s creativity is a crucial element(p.220).

Process Writing: Paradigm Shift

"Our job is to produce better writers, not better writing" (North, 1984, p.438). In the late 1970s, a gradual change started taking place in the field of teaching writing. This change can be depicted by the movement in focus on the written product to a focus on the writing process or the writing student. Focus on the writing process in the writing classroom can generate "in the learner a capacity for introspective evaluation of the writing process and of the quality of written work created through that process" (Law & Murphy, 1997, np). Moreover, A Position Statement through which it states that “in the classroom where writing is especially valued, students should be guided through the writing process; encouraged to write for themselves and for other students, as well as for the other teacher; and urged to make use of writing as a mode of learning, as well as a means of reporting on what has been learned”.

Murray (1972) describes writing as “a demanding, intellectual process” (p.11). He highlights that there is only one way in which teachers can help students improve their writing skills. This is as he emphasizes is by explaining that for a teacher to be able to convey the intended message and for a student to receive and apply what is learned, writing should be taught as a process and not as a product. That is, the focus should not be on the one draft that the student presents the teacher with, but on “how” the student’s writing evolves as he/she presents more than one draft. In their ‘Beliefs about the Teaching of Writing’, the National Council for Teachers of English states that “understanding what writers do involves thinking not just about what texts look like when they are finished but also about what strategies writers might employ to produce those texts. [Therefore], knowledge of writing is only complete with understanding the complexity of actions in which writers engage as they produce texts” (2004). It is not enough for this methodology in the teaching of writing to be solely implemented in the writing classroom, but it should also be reinforced elsewhere. This is where the role of the English instructors comes in. 

This approach improves the ESL writers’ experiences in different levels (as cited in Graham & Sandmel 2011). First, students are encouraged to plan, draft, and revise. Such cognitive activities involved in these writing processes account for close to 80% of the variance in the quality of papers produced by adolescent writers (Breetvelt, Van den Bergh & Rijlaarsdam, 1994, 1996; Rijlaarsdam & Van den Bergh, 2006; Van den Bergh & Rijlaarsdam, 1996). Second, instruction in writing through mini lessons, conferences, and teachable moments improve the quality of writing. Besides this, these teaching tools provide mechanisms for targeting the instructional needs of each student. Third, motivation for writing is enhanced as collaboration, personal responsibility, personal attention, and a positive learning environment are asserted. These types of activities are thought to facilitate the value that students place on specific academic tasks ((as cited in Graham & Sandmel 2011)). Hence, the process approach tends to focus more on varied classroom activities which promote the development of language use and different stages of writing, such as, brainstorming, group discussion and rewriting. What differentiate a process focused approach from the product centered one that the outcome of writing, the product, is not predetermined. As cited in (Graham & Sandmel 2011), Steele summarizes the differences between the two approaches. (Appendix B). 

Furthermore, many studies shows that effectiveness of process approach in ESL writing classes, in one meta analysis study , the process approach to writing instruction improved the overall quality of writing produced by students in general education classes. Eighty-three percent of the comparisons resulted in a positive effect for the process writing approach. Although the process approach improves the writing of typical students, it is not a chiefly powerful approach relative to other writing treatments, and its impact with those that are most vulnerable educationally, children with learning disabilities (Graham & Sandmel 2011). Consequently, an eclectic approach to teach writing is highly recommended. This is not to discard that I am an advocate of process approach, yet other teaching strategies and tool can empower this approach to cater for the ESL writers’ skills’ development.

As suggested by Bahous et.al (2010), through computer assisted language learning (CALL) students improved their writings. The computer-based writing activities revealed that students as well as teachers had positive attitudes toward the use of CALL in the writing classroom. Most considered IT (integration of technology) as motivating by enabling them to enjoy the writing session while at the same time producing creative, neat, organized, error-free written products. As described in their study, IT empowered their self expression and fulfilled the requirements of their writing tasks. It also facilitated the students’ research skills to a certain degree and promoted student–teacher and student–student relationships. Thus, instead of using technology in a haphazard way as my son’s father’s friends worried, CALL can boost the process writing approach.

Another method I incorporate in teaching writing is conferencing (verbal student-teacher conferencing) between the teachers and learners. This provides input in the form of feedback that enables ESL writers directly learn where they have not given enough information or if there is an illogical organization or a failure to develop ideas adequately. Moreover, teacher’s written comments represent another technique by which a teacher can provide feedback to learners in the drafts submitted to the teacher. This is a way where the student would have the opportunity to be more caution and focused in rewriting and improving his/her draft. Corrective feedback highlights the different flaws for the writer to reconsider, revise, and edit.

An interesting way to collaborate among students and save time for teachers is peer feedback. Learners do value their peers’ comments when revising their drafts. I usually scan or type a number of essays and display it without showing the writer’s name. The students would be guided through a peer evaluation and specific essay rubric to evaluate the work. This not only gives a chance to highlight common writing flaws, but also gives them a chance to boost their self-esteem, critical thinking, and fluency.

Writing workshops has proven to be effective. As cited in Bahous et. al(2008), Fletcher and Portalupi (2001) assert that the structure of the workshop facilitates young writers need because of its three crucial elements: (1) a mini-lesson or time for whole group; (2) time for independent writing or small group instruction; and (3) share time, which allows for response and feedback as a whole class. Such an approach proved to aid students to internalize the writing process (as cited in Bahous et. al, 2008). 

In summary, I am an advocate of process approach. It is my belief that utilizing it, not only would attitudes improve, but also the ability of students to express their creativity and maybe even a passion for expressing themselves. The process approach focuses more on the "journey" towards the product as oppose to "just" the product. This emphasis on the process towards achieving the product is evident in the strategies such as brainstorming, exploration of ideas, peer editing and rewriting geared towards simplifying and assisting when creating the final product. The process approach allows the writer to become self-directed and regulated learners where the individual can witness his/ her personal growth be able to identify strengths and weaknesses while enjoying what is being produced. The process approach, I believe despite how tedious it may be and time consuming, I believe it is a more efficient approach to writing as focuses on producing more than just a piece of writing but allows for exploration of a person's mind and creativity. All this as I confirm would be improved by the integration of other beneficial teaching strategies to ensure that the process would become a less stressful and enjoyable journey towards excellence and achieving the targeted learning outcome relevant to writing. Briefly, good product does depend on good process.

References

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Bae, J. (2011). Teaching process writing for intermediate/advanced learners in South Korea (Doctoral dissertation, University of Wisconsin).

Cotton, K. (1988). Teaching composition: Research on effective practices. Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory.

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Graham, S., & Sandmel, K. (2011). The process writing approach: A meta-analysis. The Journal of Educational Research, 104(6), 396-407. DOI: 10.1080/00220671.2010.488703

Hachem, A., Nabhani, M., & Bahous, R. (2008). ‘We can write!’The writing workshop for young learners. Education 3–13, 36(4), 325-337. DOI: 10.1080/03004270701651761

Hasan, M. K., & Akhand, M. M. (2010). Approaches to writing in EFL/ESL context: Balancing product and process in writing class at tertiary level. Journal of NELTA, 15(1-2), 77-88.

Huff, R. & Kline, C. (1987). Predrafting: The wellspring of composing. The contemporary writing curriculum. (57 – 88). New York: Teachers College Press.

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Murray, D. (1972). Teach writing as a process not product. The Leaflet, 71(3), 11-14.

Murray, R., Thow, M., Moore, S., & Murphy, M. (2008). The writing consultation: developing academic writing practices. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 32(2), 119-128. DOI: 10.1080/03098770701851854

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writing. https://www.ncte.org/about/over/positions/category/write/118876 .htm  

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