TEACHERS’ AND STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS OF STUDENTS’ PERFORMANCES IN WRITING SKILLS

Abstract

Writing well is not just an option for young people—it is a necessity. Along with reading comprehension, writing skill is a predictor of academic success and a basic requirement for participation in civic life and in the global economy. Writing skills are an important aspect of academic performance as well as subsequent work-related performance. The objectives of this study were to investigate teachers’ and students perceptions of students’ performance in writing skills in secondary schools of Arba-Minch town. To guide the study four research questions were posed. The questions examined the following three variables: (1) Planning; (2) Practice; and (3) Addressing feed-back for writing skills. A descriptive design with mixed approaches (quantitative and qualitative) was used for the study. A total of 291 secondary school grade ten students and 15 secondary school English language teachers participated in the study. A simple random sampling technique was used to select schools and students participants. Questionnaire that contained items on planning, practicing and addressing feed-back, variables was used by the researcher to collect information from both the students and teachers. A necessary data from 15 teachers were collected through close ended and open ended questionnaires and on the same issues data was collected from 252 students. Interview with 4 teachers and FGD with 39 students were also conducted to collect data. One sample t- test, and step wise multiple regression analysis were conducted to analyze the data. The findings indicate that teacher’s perception show that students didn’t use planning, practice, and giving /receiving feed-back for their writing performance. In the same way, students themselves perceived as they didn’t plan, practice, and give/receive feed-back for their better performance in writing. Findings from informants and discussants indicated as learning grammar, capitalization, punctuation, orienting/listening about writing rules enhance students’ performance in writing, whereas lake of interest, motivation, initiation, absenteeism, failure to listen to their teachers and failure to do writing assignments, mother tongue influence, pragmatic competence of learners material and unmanageable class size, strategies use, cohesions, and coherence stated that hinder their (students) performance in writing.