Four Square Method and writing skill

Abstract

Writing skill is one of the productive skills known as one of the most difficult skills to master especially in EFL learners. One effective method to teach writing skills is the use of the Four-Square Method consisting of a graphic organizer of four squares; three of the squares were completed with the supporting ideas, and the last one filled with the summary or conclusive sentence. Thus, the main objective of this research was to identify Four-Square Method’s efficacy in enhancing the English writing among second year students of baccalaureate in the Unidad Educative Cristóbal Colón. The methodology applied was pre-experimental with a quantitative approach. With the purpose of collecting the information, the Cambridge Preliminary English Test for schools was applied, it was used in both the pre-test and post-test. The data were collected from 20 high school students, consisting of ten males and ten females, consequently, the test was scored using the Cambridge writing rubric which contained the following criteria: Content, Communicative achievement, Organization and language, each of those categories were scored from zero to five points. Within the experimental phase, there were eight lessons plans were developed, which described the activities that were developed in a period of five weeks. It should be noted that during the interventions, the covered topics were all related to students’ general knowledge guided and structured with the Four-Square method. All the numerical data collected with the pre-test and post-test was thoroughly analyzed with the IBM SPSS software. Main findings suggest that significant improvements in writing skills were achieved after the interventions.