M a education paper-v methods of teaching english

B.Controlled and Graded Writing Exercises 
Apart from its intrinsic interest or value, writing is an essential classroom activity. It is of 
considerable importance for consolidating learning in the other skill areas. It provides a 
welcome change in activity and is useful in the area of testing. 
Writing activities traditionally have taken the form of writing out of paradigms, and 
grammatical exercises, dictation, translation and imitative and free composition.
Controlled writing concerns itself with structures, use of appropriate words, punctuations, 
word order etc. and not with facts or ideas. 
The following are the processes, from the simplest to the more challenging, which a learner 
undergoes in a supervised setting to learn writing. 
Transcription / Copying: The work set for copying should consist of sections of work already 
learned orally and read with the teacher. When assigned lists of words to be learned the 
learners may be asked to copy the words several times as they are learning them, thus 
imprinting the graphic outlines more firmly in their minds. Credit should be given for accuracy 
in copying in order to encourage learners in careful observation of details. 
Reproduction: The learner attempts to write without originality what he has learned orally and 
read in his textbook. The learner is asked to reproduce without a copy only the sentences and 
phrases which he has learned to copy. He will then compare this version with the original for 
correction. 
Next the learner is asked to write down sentences he has memorised, read and copied as they 
are dictated to him. 
Further practice in reproduction takes the form of the writing of pattern-drill responses of the 
repetitive type. The learner reproduces, at a cue from the teacher, pattern sentences which have 
been practiced orally in classroom activities and studied in the textbook. The emphasis is 
entirely on accuracy of reproduction. 

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Recombination: Here the learner is required to reproduce learned work with minor 
adaptations. At this stage writing practice may take a number of forms. Learners will write out 
structure drills of various kinds: making substitutions of words and phrases, transforming 
sentences, expanding them to include further information within the limits of learned phrases, 
contracting them by substituting pronouns for nouns or single words for groups of words. The 
writing of drills not only gives valuable practice in accurate and correct construction of 
sentences but consolidates what has been learned orally. 
Guided writing: The learner may begin with completion exercises where parts of sentences 
are given and the structural pattern is established for him. Replacement exercises may be 
devised in which a section of the sentence can be replaced by a number of different phrases, 
giving the learner the opportunity to express new meanings for e.g. a substitution drill, outline 
stories, summary writing, and questions.