Process Genre Writing for Korean High School Students

Abstract

The aim of this portfolio is to enhance Korean high school students’ English writing skills by using a combination of the process approach and the genre approach. In general, Korean high school students’ English writing skills are lower than the other language skills such as listening and reading. This is due to the fact that the main goal of most Korean high school students is to do well on the college entrance examination, which mostly focuses on listening and reading skills. However, in the age of globalization, the ability to write in English is becoming more and more important, and Korean students need to improve their writing skills as well. This portfolio has three main purposes. Firstly, students will develop critical thinking skills. Korean students are accustomed to taking a passive role in class and focusing on form more than meaning. This portfolio will lead them to think a lot about meaningful topics and to become “creators of original ideas” (Ferris & Hedgcock, 2005). The second purpose is to expose the students to authentic reading materials. Reppen (2002) mentioned that it is important to help learners to understand the various purposes of writing and to write in different ways. By working with authentic materials, students will learn about genre and learn how to write consciously by imitating and analyzing the texts (Badger & White, 2000). Lastly, learners will engage in interactive activities. Just as Brown (2007) emphasized the importance of interactive approaches such as group collaboration, this portfolio contains a lot of cooperative activities and students are expected to learn effectively from one another.