ABSTRACT
This qualitative study was conducted to find out the teaching and learning of English essays and their instructional and coping strategies among the four (4) Junior High School English teachers and twelve (12) Junior High School learners as bases for writing workshop. Results revealed that the instructional challenges as observed by the English teachers were: poor learner’s comprehension, spelling, and vocabulary, learner engagement issues, and difficulty in correcting learners’ output; while those as experienced by the learners were: grammar, spelling, and vocabulary; logical organization of ideas; and difficulty in essay format and mechanics. The coping strategies that were employed by the English teachers were: use of activity sheets and exercises on spelling, vocabulary, and writing, use of context clues to unlock the unfamiliar words, give home reading assignments and guided practice, while those as manifested by the learners were: asking help from teachers and peers, use of website and digital applications, compiled words and used them for writing, and planning and organizing of ideas before writing.
Keywords: Teaching and Learning English Essays, Instructional Challenges and Coping Strategies, Bases for Writing Workshop
INTRODUCTION
Essay writing plays an essential role in learning English. One way to enhance students’ creativity and cognitive skills is by making them write. Essay examinations are given not just to test grammar and sentence formation but to evaluate students’ abilities to comprehend and write their ideas coherently. In some countries, writing is the basis of determining the students’ proficiency in any language. Writing an English essay can be one of the hardest things to teach to learners, especially in the barangay areas. Compared to urban schools, most schools in the barangays have different settings that may affect the way students learn. Teachers in these contexts face multiple challenges in guiding students to become confident writers. Limited instructional materials, insufficient writing practice, and the need to balance multiple responsibilities can make it difficult for teachers to provide the feedback and support that students require.
Vance (2024) highlights that English proficiency is integral to assessing global opportunities, particularly in business, science, and academia. These findings reinforce the significance of English in facilitating international communication and educational advancement. Also, English is vital as it helps people to communicate effectively and internationally with one another either orally or in written mode.
In writing, English has been a challenge nowadays; limited learning resources, big student capacity, lack of technology, and students with little to no exposure to the English language are common. These conditions may lead students to perform poorly and lack confidence while writing paragraphed texts. Rural teachers also have students with different learning capabilities under these circumstances.
Learning about these constraints and strategies can help teachers uncover practical solutions that may be beneficial in creating a writing workshop that accommodates English teachers and learners. Moreover, students in rural communities may experience language barriers due to the dominance of their mother tongue in daily communication. This situation can result in difficulties in vocabulary development, grammar usage, and idea organization when writing essays in English. As a result, many learners struggle to express their thoughts clearly and logically, thus leading to low motivation and performance in writing tasks. These challenges highlight the need for effective and context-appropriate instructional approaches suited to the needs of English teachers and learners in barangay schools.
In addition, Rosayda and Apoko (2023), assert that vocabulary mastery such as spelling and determination of word meanings were the learners’ weaknesses.
The researcher has been observing that some of the learners’ vocabulary are not sufficient enough to express their ideas and thoughts in writing essays. She, then, believes that poor vocabulary can affect learners’ performance in writing essays. Researchers’ observations need scientific data for support, the reason why, the researcher conducted this study on teaching and learning English essays and the instructional challenges and coping strategies among the Junior English teachers and learners.
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