Teacher Research Programme 2015, Cambridge University Press IATEFL 2016, Birmingham, United Kingdom

1. Cambridge English Learning Services
TEACHER RESEARCH
PROGRAMME 2015
Improving Children’s Writing Skills through
Digital Story Prompts and Feedback
CYNTHIA C. JAMES

2. PRACTICAL CONTEXT
• Gudon National Primary School
• Suburban area – 10 km from Kota Kinabalu, the
capital city of Sabah
• 500 students, 35 teachers
• Research participants: 31 Year 6 students, age 11-
12 years old
• Middle to low-income families
• Level: Upper Elementary

3. PRACTICAL CONTEXT
• Compulsory national test in September
• English is one of the five subjects
• Section C: writing test
• Maximum score: 15 marks
• My students’ average score: 2 – 3 marks

5. MARKING SCHEME FOR SECTION C
• EXCELLENT: 13 – 15 marks
• CREDIT: 9 – 12 marks
• ACHIEVEMENT: 5 – 8 marks
• LOW ACHIEVEMENT: 1 – 4 marks

6. OVERALL AIMS
• To explore ways of making writing a positive
experience for my students
• To utilise my students’ interest in technology to
make writing activities more engaging, personal
and meaningful

8. BACKGROUND READING
• Reluctant writers:
– tend to avoid the task (Mather & Lachowicz, 1992)
– lack of self-confidence (Carignan-Belleville, 1989)
• Using stories:
– create a happy and enjoyable learning environment (Mart,
2012)
– great way of introducing, practising and improving language
skills (Martinez, 2007)

9. BACKGROUND READING
• Technology in teaching writing:
– Develop confidence among children (Clark & Dugdale, 2009)
– Platform for synchronous and asynchronous feedback
(Scott, 2009)
– Digital technologies encourage greater collaboration, student
creativity and personal expression (Purcell, Buchanan &
Friedrich, 2013)
– Use of social media in education can enhance collaboration,
participation and creativity (Pastor & Quiros, 2015)

10. METHODOLOGY

11. INTERVENTIONS (SAMPLE
ACTIVITIES)
• STAGE 1: INTRODUCTION TO STORY
PROMPTS
• STAGE 2: CREATING STORY PROMPTS
• STAGE 3: CREATING AND SHARING STORIES

14. There were three friends. They were sitting
together on one bench. They had long hair. They
wore red dress. They were beautiful, but plain.
They wanted more colours. They were bored
because they were green. They wanted to sit on
grasses. Yes, they were sitting on grasses now
but the grasses were not real! They wanted to
run away but they had no legs. They had no
arms, too. They had nothing.
Fiqah, Fatin and Nadira

17. FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
• Students’ attitudes towards writing
• Pre-test and post-test
• January test and UPSR result

18. 39%
26%
19%
16%
How do you feel about writing?
Difficult
Don't like writing
Related to exam
Others

19. 43%
33%
14%
10%
How do you feel about today’s
writing activity?
Positive feelings:
enjoy, funny, creative
What I learned today
about story writing
I like/dislike this story
because...
Others

20. 32%
32%
23%
13%
How do you feel about this
writing project?
Positive experience -
awesome, happy etc
Can describe story-
writing process
Section C (UPSR) is
no longer hard
Others

21. Pre-test Post-test
Average Score 2.90 6.65
0.00
1.00
2.00
3.00
4.00
5.00
6.00
7.00
Average Score in Pre-test and Post-test

22. January test UPSR result
Number of A’s 0 4
Number of B’s 3 10
Number of C’s 23 14
Number of D’s 5 3
Number of E’s 0 0
Percentage of
passes
83.9% 93.3%
Percentage of
failures
16.1% 9.7%
January test scores and UPSR result

23. CONCLUSIONS
• Students become more confident writers and
no longer avoid the tasks
• The use of stories motivate students and
encourages them to be creative
• Technology provides platform for
collaborative work and helps improve
students’ competency

24. RECOMMENDATIONS
• Future research may explore the many
different ways technology can be utilised to
help improve primary school students’
creativity and interest in writing.

25. Cynthia C. James
ccindyjames@gmail.com