Comics and the writing skill

Abstract

Education evolves, even more the strategies of learning a language. Teaching the English language is essential to put into practice learning skills and, of course, productive skills. The main aim of the study was to analyze the use of comics in the development of writing skills. This was a quasi-experimental study with a group of 24 participants. They were from the fourth semester of "Pedagogía de los Idiomas Nacionales y Extranjeros" program at Universidad Técnica de Ambato. It lasted 2 weeks with four sessions in total. At the beginning of the experiment, the participants took a pre-test. Then, they were taught by applying comics to develop the writing activities. At the end of the treatment, students took a post-test. They were evaluated by using an PET rubric from Cambridge for the writing paper. Finally, the data gathered was analyzed using the T-students statistical test. The results demonstrated that by implementing comics in the lesson plans students improved their writing skill. Before the application of the treatment, the control group achieved 6.9 points in the pre-test and 7.1 in the post-test over 10 points. Nevertheless, the experimental group got 7 in the pre-test and 8.7 points in the posttest over 10 points. This means that the experimental group had shown an increase in the average score, it is evident that between the control group and the experimental group there is a difference of 1.7 points. According to the data obtained, it is evident that the experimental group demonstrated a high proficiency level.