1. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
1
ComparativeEssay: TeachingWriting
Dannae Del Campo Méndez y Gabriela Quezada Cabezas
Universidad Católica de La Santísima Concepción

2. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
2
The psycholinguistic Lenneberg (1967)once mentioned that human beings
universally learn to walk and to talk, but that swimming and writing are culturally specific,
learned behaviours. This quotation highlights the importance of teaching writing in an
effective manner, teaching students the necessary strategies that will help them to develop
and improve their writing skills. In the following paragraphs will be develop the most
relevant characteristics of teaching writing skill from different points of view according to
three different authors Nunan, Brown and Hyland, (2003).....(Dannae Del Campo y
Gabriela Quezada)
Firstly, according to Brown, (2001) there are 6 main issues existing at the moment
of learning second language writing. We are going to name a few of them that we consider
the most important ones. The first of these issues is composing vs. writing; the author
explains that writing is the result of thinking processes such as, drafting and revising
procedures which lead to focus on the students and how they generate ideas, how to be
coherent, how to use discourse markers and how to use appropriate grammar to get the final
product. The second issue is called by the author process vs. product; he explains how a
half century ago teachers were focused on the final product of writing instead of the process
to get to that product which it is what concerns teachers today. In the same
chapter,according to Shih, (1986), it can be noticed that process approach focuses on the
process of writing instead of the written product, it helps students to understand the process
of writing, it also gives importance to the process of revision, it gives students time to write
and rewrite and it gives them feedback during the entire process and not just in the final
product. The third issue is called contrastive rhetoric and it is based in an article written
byKaplan(1966),in which he argued that all types of language have different patterns of

3. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
3
written discourse. Consequently learners of English bring predispositions because of their
native language; this means that everyone’s native culture has an effect on the process of
learning writing. The fourth issue are the differences between L1 and L2 writing;Silva
(1993) explained that there are many differences between the process of learning writing in
L1 and L2, some of the differences mentioned by this author are that L2 writers did less
planning, they were less fluent, less accurate, less effective in starting goals and that they
did not use appropriate grammatical and rhetorical conventions. Thus, Silva (1993) also
gave the solution of using the appropriate approaches to writing instruction, to deal
effectively with the sociocultural and linguistic differences of L2 students and also that the
assessment of L2 has to take into account the main differences between L1 and L2 writing.
On the other hand Brown (2001) focused his analysis also in the principles for
designing writing technique. The first of these is to incorporate practices of good writers,
for instance, planning what to write, focusing on a main idea and following an
organizational plan. The second principle is to balance process and product, this means to
create a balance between the process of the writing in the students’ drafts and the final
product they are leading up. The third one is to account for cultural and literary
backgrounds, which refers that the teacher must not assume that students know English
rhetorical conventions, so teachers have to help them to understand it. The fourth principle
is to connect reading with writing because by reading they learn important insights of how
they should write. Moreover is to provide as much authentic writing as possible, which is
also mention previously on this author’s chapter so the purposes of writing are clear for
students. (Dannae Del Campo)

4. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
4
Secondly Teaching Writing according to Nunan (1999) is based on methodology
of task-based language instruction. In his book the nature of the writing is focus on product
and process approaches, the first of them is defined as an approach which is focusedon the
final product; furthermore, the second of them is focuses on the steps involved in drafting
and redrafting a piece of writing. Nunan’s text focused special attention on the process
approach and some critics about it such as the development of the necessary critical
thinking skill to produce a factual writing in which they need to succeed in school;
moreover, the type of text that students are required to produce. Finally in terms of nature
Nunan concludes that what students need in the writing classrooms are both approaches and
appropriate procedures, in contrast toBrown (2001) who also mentioned that it is important
to find a balance between process and product but that the product is, after all, the ultimate
goal and that the process is not the end; it is the means to the end . In the aspect of genre
theory Nunan in contrast to Brown (2001),who did not mentioned any of them, is focused
on two research, the first of them is the Disadvantaged Schools Projects (DSP) which one is
focused on the improvement of the academic writing skills in children, in this projects
teachers should show to the students the grammatical resources that would help them to
produce successful texts. As result of this project Nunan mentioned that students who
participated in the innovation schools produced a greater range of factual texts, and
produced the texts more successfully. The second project is The SNAP project (South
Australian Needs Assessment Procedures)Nunan(1999)mentioned that this project was
implemented with the intention of the development of a systematic procedure for
diagnosing the strengths and weaknesses of students in their control over the spoken and
written genres that they would need in order to succeed in school. In this kind of project is
necessary that teachers would be explicit about what learners are supposed to do and why.

5. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
5
Another important point mentioned by Nunan (1999) is the discourse-based
approach that argued that discourse and grammar should be seen together; furthermore an
interesting way in which it can be done is by discourse processes, and in this type of
processes some specialists have suggested that topical structure analysis is a promising
technique for improving the coherence of written work. Finally in terms of the issue of
contrastive rhetoric Nunan (1999) mentioned Robert Kaplan’s work as well as Brown,
(2001) did; thestudy has relationships between cultural thought patterns and discourse. The
main argument of the research in contrastive rhetoric as it was mentioned above is based
on that certain culturally determined ways of thinking and communicating will transfer
themselves to second language texts. (Gabriela Quezada Cabezas)
Thirdly, according toHyland, (2003) the main focused on teaching writing is the
cultural aspect. In contrast to the authors mentioned above, he mentioned in his book that
L2 writing instruction should be seen as an expression of culture; moreover, that it is
necessary to put special attention to previous learning experiences, due to it is going to
prepare them for the future tasks and assignments in their classrooms; Furthermore,Hyland,
(2003)mentioned that one of the most important issues related to cultural aspect is the
writing topic, because some cultures are especially sensitive and some topics may be seen
as an offense to the society. (Gabriela Quezada)
Moreover, Hyland, (2003)also argued that teachers have to be concern about the
different learning styles of their students previously shaped by their cultural backgrounds
and experiences. This author mainly focused in three types of styles, the cognitive
dimension which is for learners that are more analytic, the affective dimension which is for
students who depend on social and emotional factors and the perceptual learning style

6. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
6
which is the most important in the ESL/EFL class because it is oriented for visual, auditory
and kinaesthetic learners. (Dannae Del Campo)
To sum up, Brown’s text (2001) it is focus on weaknesses and advices specially
directed to teachers while Numan (1999) is focus on approaches and techniques for
students who have different ways of learning. To support Numan’s ideas is Hyland,
(2003)who argued that cultural aspects are also important because it sets on students
different styles to acquire new information. Thus, Hyland (2003)focuses on culture and
learning styles. (Dannae Del Campo y Gabriela Quezada).

7. COMPARATIVE ESSAY: TEACHING WRITING
7
References
Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by principles: an interactive approach to language
pedagogy. Longman.
Hyland, K. (2003). Second Language Writing.Cambridge University Press.
Kaplan, R. B. (1966). Cultural Thought Patterns in Inter-Cultural Education.Language
Learning, 16(1-2), 1–20.
Lenneberg, E. H. (1967). Biological foundations of language.Wiley.
Nunan, D. (1999). Second language teaching & learning.Heinle&Heinle Publishers.
Shih, M. (1986).Content-Based Approaches to Teaching Academic Writing.Tesol
Quarterly, 20(4), 617–648.
Silva, T. (1993).Toward an understanding of the distinct nature of L2 writing: The ESL
research and its implications. Tesol Quarterly, 27(4), 657–677.