Improvement of academic writing in APA style of the second year student at SOFL of HUST

1. Introduction: The reason for choosing this topic It is common knowledge that writing well is necessity. Along with reading comprehension, writing skill has an important role to play in the real life and the global economy. One more thing, writing is one of the most powerful tools we have for learning and for demonstrating what we know. Therefore, difficulties in writing create significant barriers in education, employment and other life pursuits. Moreover, quoted from ducation !ewspaper" #many employers think that most of graduated students do not have writing skills in normal te$t such as invitation, thanks letter, % most of whom are made redundant although they are highly qualified&. In other words, it is difficult for 'ietnamese student not only to write in mother tongue but also in foreign language, especially nglish. In this research, I offer the situation of writing skills of the second year student at (O)* of +,(T and give some suggested improvement for the second-year student to improve their skills. .esearch questions /. 0hat is the difficulties second year student at (O)* of +,(T need to deal with when they are studying academic writing in A1A style 2. +ow could student at (O)* of +,(T improve their writing skills in A1A style3 .esearch methods" /. $isting information 2. 4uestionnaire surveys 5. In-depth Interview 2. Body: *iterature review" ,seful information will be collected as much as possible with the aim to give the background materials that will help to understand topic area. This information mainly answers questions as follows" - 0hat is A1A style3 - 0hat is academic writing in A1A style3 .esearch methodology" The method of using information is aimed at collecting definition as well as getting the comprehensive view about academic writing in A1A style. I will also do a questionnaire survey to find out what are the difficulties student have to deal with when they are studying academic writing. In addition, I will interview the )o)*6s teacher to collect the assessment from teachers before and after their student study academic writing skills. 1rocedures" There are 5 research methods that will be used to support my paper, including using e$isting information, questionnaire survey and interview. / ,sing e$isting information" I might look in encyclopaedias, specific books which is likely to contain information that may be useful. e.$" (antangelo, T. 72889:, ffective writing instruction for students who have writing difficulties

;urke, . 7/99<:, Academic and !on"academic difficulties# Perceptions of $raduate !on" nglish Spea%ing &ac%ground Students 2 4uestionaire survey" At first, 0e design the questionnaire for the second-year student including pre-coded questions in form of yes=no questions and multiple choice questions or even open-ended questions. (tudents are required to circle and write down their answers. !e$t, I test it out on five )O)*6s students in one class of )O)*. After the pilot survey, I check the results and improve my questionnaire if necessary. ;ecause I use random sampling of /88 students, I print /88 copies and deliver them to /88 )O)*6s students at >? building. Then I collect all the questionnaires, summari@e the results by making analysis table and present the data in diagrams. )inally, we write e$planations for statistics from the survey. 5 Interview. Aonducting interview is the method that I chose to gather information from )o)*6s teacher. The number of interviewees in this research will be three. )or interviewing teacher, we hope to get knowledge about their assessment about student performance before and after they study academic writing skills in A1A styles. )irstly, we design an interview checklist which is relevant to the group of interviewees. The checklist includes introductory questions and follow-up questions. Then, we prepare an interview profile sheet and tapes for each interview. *ater, we contact the teachers whom we would like to interview to arrange reasonable date, time, place for carrying out the interviews. After finishing the interviews, we transcribe them from the tapes, create a master sheet and then analy@e the collected information in the report. .eferences" /. (antangelo, T. 72889:, ffective writing instruction for students who have writing difficulties 2. ;urke, . 7/99<:, Academic and !on"academic difficulties# Perceptions of $raduate !on" nglish Spea%ing &ac%ground Students 5. Academic writing skills B available in http"==grammar.yourdictionary.com=style-andusage=academic-writing-skills.html C ?. Academic writing tips B available in http"==academicwritingtips.org= C D. *eki, I. 7288/:, Academic writing program