Writing

Writing is one of the key aspects of Functional Skills English, and the element that the learners often have the most difficulty with. The current pass rates for writing at Level 1 and 2 show that for some this is a struggle. 

What these figures do show is that for some learners, improving their skills is the difficult part. If a learner fails their writing assessment, they are more likely to do so again. This blog will look at what we can do to support our learners to give them the best opportunity for success.

Knowing what they need to know 

Feedback from examiners show that learners sometimes do not fully understand what is expected from them in the assessments. It is good to spend time in class going through example questions and planning answers. In fact, when I was teaching, I moved away from doing writing exercises in the classrooms as it often left me feeling redundant and created a lot of marking. Instead, I would focus on planning. Learners would be given an example question and then asked to plan their answers, plan them thoroughly. They would produce a paragraph by paragraph guide to content, list high level vocabulary they could use and give examples of complex sentences (at level 1 and 2 – compound at entry level) that they would write. This would then be used to gauge how assessment ready they would be. Our examiners say that even something as simple as planning their answers in the assessment for two minutes could dramatically improve everyone’s responses. 

When it comes to language features the learners could use, it is always good to look at this in conjunction with the requirements of the reading assessment. Reading is an input skill where we take in information. Writing is the natural output skill for this. Encourage the learners to use the language features they learn to improve their writing. There is a document on our website (available here) that highlights the language features in two texts from a level 2 reading assessment and there is a table below that shows the level 1 language features we use for each text purpose. 

Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar 

For many learners this is an issue, especially those whose first language is not English, but we need to remember at Level 1 and 2 there are more marks available for composition. For Pearson, we mark the SPaG holistically and the key is how it effects the understanding and tone of the text. A spelling mistake or a punctuation error is unlikely to affect the overall feel of a text, but grammar can. If you look at the phrase: 

I went shopping tomorrow.

This sentence is difficult to understand. It is written in the past tense but has the future referencing word tomorrow in there. This has a more negative effect on clarity as we cannot be sure what the writer is talking about. 

To support SPaG development, and proofreading skills, take a number of sentences with errors and ask the learner (or learners) to correct them. This is more relevant if you personalise the activity by using their own errors and can be made fun by working in teams and racing to complete a series of sentences (once the first error is corrected, the team get the next error to work on). This works well at the start of a lesson where you will be giving back work you have marked.  

Writing Formats

It is always important to ensure that a learner is prepared for the different formats that the assessment may ask them to complete. It is a good idea to RAG rate your learners individually based on their experience of writing these texts (personally I have experience of writing blogs, but have never filled in a witness testimony, so it is important for me to practise that before the assessment). To support with this, we have produced a guide to writing formats for Level 1 and 2.

This guide sets out the purpose, format features and level of formality required in each text. In terms of the formality of language it is important to be aware that the learner’s concept of formal and informal language may well be different to those of the standards. As an example, in a mini test I wrote the example of informal language I included was the word hassle, rather than some of the slang terms that some of learners used. In addition, there are a number of Level 1 and Level 2 exemplar questions. Showing how to lay out and respond.

These include: 

• Diary Entry
• Review 
• Email
• Article
• Online Forum
• Eye Witness Testimony

Marking assessments and constructive feedback 

If you do ask your learners to do a piece of writing, I feel it is important to mark it in a way that is consistent with the way their assessments would be marked. It gives both you and them a clearer understanding of how their work will be judged and how assessment ready they are. To support with this, we now have sample marked learner work for Level 1 and Level 2. There are examples of good passes, close passes and fails in there alongside clear feedback from the lead examiners to help you understand where learners lose and gain marks. In addition to this, it also very important to be constructive with your feedback and provide support for further development for your learners. You have the opportunity to use their work to help them improve. 

Word Counts

Finally, I just wanted to mention my biggest bugbear from teaching and examining: word counts. There is nothing more disheartening than a learner failing their writing assessment by one mark and that you can see that they have spent time counting the number of words they have used (often they would write numbers in the text). With this in mind, Pearson does not automatically penalise a learner for being over or under the word count; it is a guide. Obviously, a learner who writes less may well not be writing enough to fully demonstrate their skills and complete the task, and a learner who writes more might well be repetitious and they could be penalised for either of these. The learners would be better off spending this time proofreading their work and might be able to pick up an error that might well be the difference between passing and failing. 

It might be better to look at the tasks in terms of time rather than word counts. There is a longer task and a shorter task. We could then break these tasks into 35 minutes for the longer task and 25 minutes for the shorter task. Below is a table showing an approximate guide for the time a learner could spend on tasks and activities. This, of course, may well be different for different learners. 

Chris Briggs, Sector Manager Post-16 English and Maths