The purpose of this study is to analyze the writing activities of the reformed middle school English textbooks based on the 2009 revised national English curriculum in order to find out whether the activities are appropriate for school writing classes.
This study analyzes the writing activities in specific writing section of all graders’ volumes of the eight kinds of English textbooks to get three results: the proportions of the types of writing activities and of the writing achievement standards in the English textbooks of ‘Middle School 1∼3 Grades Cluster’, and the differences of each grade’s textbooks based on the two kinds of proportions mentioned.
This study can summarize as follows:
First, the types of writing activities are examined based on the criterion combining Rivers''(1981), Raimes''(1983) and Tomlinson''s(1983) writing steps into. Although the eight kinds of textbooks differ a lot in proportions of each writing type, the average proportion of controlled writing is 45.5%, of guided writing is 49.0%, of free writing is 5.4%.
Next, the writing activities of the textbooks are analyzed in terms of the six writing achievement standards to identify how those standards are reflected in English textbooks. In short, the textbooks fail to evenly distribute the six achievement standards at writing sections: the 1st achievement standard averaged in twenty-four English textbooks is 47.9%, the 2nd one is 15.5%, the 3rd one is 0.9%, 4th one is 13.0%, 5th one is 10.1%, 6th one is 12.6%.
Finally, the differences of writing section in each grade’s textbooks are examined in terms of the types of writing and the achievement standards for writing. As a result, the percentage of controlled writing decreases and that of guided and free writing increases gradually in the upper grader’s. Similarly, the 1st achievement standard tends downward at the textbooks of the higher grader’s because the 1st achievement standard is closely related to controlled writing. Though the writing sections in middle school English textbooks still consist of about half controlled activities, an increasing number of activities which are guiding writing steps show up and the complexity of writing activities also increases as the grade goes up.
Based on the above findings, this study suggests the followings.
First, teachers should organize and edit the writing materials on the textbooks as ‘pre-writing’, ‘during-writing’, ‘post-writing’ steps to foster students’ understanding of writing process as well as writing skills. Then, teacher can add some activities for the short achievement standards if needed.
Second, a peer-editing and a self-check list should be used positively to teach how to revise first-drafts so that students can learn the significance of revising and editing in English writing.
Third, it is necessary to reflect the writing procedures as the frames at the writing section of English textbooks like reading sections such as ‘Before You Read’, ‘Enjoy Reading’, and ‘After You Read’.