Abstract

Learning to master essay writing skills is a problem that has been consistently shown by the
CSEC Examiners’ Report results for English for Jamaican students; this became more evident
while I was on my fourth year Practicum. Consequently, I designed a research study to
investigate the effectiveness of the Process Writing Approach in improving the essay writing
skills of a group of grade nine students. The main reason for doing so was attributed to the
benefits that the research would possibly have for the various stakeholders involved
(students, teachers, policymakers and myself, the student researcher). Data was collected by
the use of observation notes, questionnaire for students, interview schedule for the teacher
and a pre and post essay writing test for students to study the problem. The research findings
indicated that common methods teachers used in teaching essay writing skills were lecture,
question and answer and oral presentation. However, collaboration, peer tutoring and
illustration, which have been proven to enhance learning of writing skills among other
methods, were the least used. The results also showed that most of the students felt
comfortable writing essays on their own after the implementation of the Process Writing
strategy and there was improvement in their grades. Recommendations based on the study
were made to enable teachers to utilize the Process strategy in classrooms along with
organizational tools to maximize student success in writing and for future research to
incorporate an integration of more than one writing approach to evaluate effectiveness in
improving students’ writing skills.

Keywords: essay writing skills; English Language; Jamaica; Process Writing Approach;
secondary education