Final Term Assessment Spring 2020

Class: BS Bio Sciences/Bio Technology Start time: 11.45, End time: 2.45
Course Name: English for Academic Purposes Course Code: BIO - 1211
Exam Date: 18th June, 2020 Total Marks: 30 Marks

Instructions:
 Please answer all the questions in this word document.
 In Question No. 1, please select the right option and make it bold.

Q.1 Choose the correct answer from the given options for the following. (05 Marks)
i. A well‐written paragraph should ________
a. focus on a single, coherent idea.
b. consist of logically connected sentences.
c. Both a and b
ii. How long should a paragraph be?
a. Every paragraph should be at least five sentences long.
b. Good paragraphs must be at least one page long.
c. It's okay for paragraphs to vary in length.
iii. Which statement about paragraph length is TRUE?
a. In written dialogue, start a new paragraph with each new speaker.
b. Use short paragraphs when you are analyzing complex ideas or data.
c. Use long paragraphs when you are presenting facts in a technical manual.
iv. Most paragraphs can function as ________
a. miniature essays, each with a main topic and related sentences to support it.
b. thesis statements, summarizing the key arguments in the body of the paper.
c. Both a and b
v. The smooth, logical flow of sentences within a paragraph is called ________
a. paragraph deduction.
b. paragraph coherence.
c. paragraph personality.
vi. How can you strengthen the connection between sentences in a paragraph?
a. Use word patterns such as first, second, third.
b. Repeat a key word, phrase, or synonym.
c. Both a and b
vii. How can you strengthen connections between paragraphs in a paper?
a. Use transitional words or phrases at the beginning of the paragraph.
b. Make sure the first sentence in the next paragraph is extremely long and flowing.
c. Use the phrase “Here's the connection” to let the reader know the concepts are
related.
viii. Which choice shows examples of words and phrases that could signal a cause‐
and‐effect connection?
a. Indeed, very, in fact, extremely, but
b. Therefore, as a result, consequently
c. Above, behind, below, opposite to
ix. The introduction paragraph
 a. should always contain a question.
b. should be longer than the body paragraphs.
c. should contain many details and examples.
d. should be shorter than the body paragraphs.
x. The concluding paragraph
a. should restate all your main ideas again.
b. should be your longest paragraph.
c. should begin with a restated thesis.
d. should always end with the restated thesis.
Q.2 Compose an essay on the given situation of at least 500 words to 700 words. (15 Marks)
Write a well-organized, focused essay, in which you narrate a story about a moment in your
life when you encountered fear and obstacles and treated those obstacles as a demon. Try to
narrow your topic to one or two incidents (consisting of mainly a single narrative), and
completely describe it with some underlying purpose (thesis), which may be a lesson you
learned or taught someone else. There should be an honest reason or moral of your
particular story.

ESSAY:

Life is one of the most precious gifts of God, it meant to be lived very cautiously. But
sometimes some incidents happen so unpredictably that left us in a shock. These
incidents are so memorable that they keep on lingering in our mind. These incidents
usually leave a permanent mark in the lives of those who face it and taught the lessons
of life that cannot be erased by any other experience in life. One such sad incident
happened to me a few months ago on the very first day of my second semester at
university whose memories are indelibly etched on my mind.
It was a beautiful rainy morning and also 1st day of my second semester at university I
was very excited. I also carry my guitar with me because we had planned a jamming
session on that day. So, I just start my bike on that rainy morning and went towards
the University. I almost reached to the university but then suddenly I faced a horrible
accident, my bike got slipped on Road due to wet surface and then a truck just drove
over my bike. I had got badly injured; my guitar broke down and bike got damaged. It
was one of the most dangerous moment of my life. This sudden incident left me in fear
and obstacles.
I was badly injured, People gathered around me. One guy just came and start helping
me he just pick me up from the road and help me in sitting on footpath give me water
and inform my parents about this incident on call and when he saw that I am badly
injured he called the ambulance, when ambulance arrived that guy drop me to the
hospital. At hospital doctors take my x-ray and other test for further treatment.
Fortunately, when x-ray report came it was showing that there is no fracture occur but
my tissues got badly damage which was causing extreme pain. Doctor told me for bed
rest for around one week he gave me some medicines and bandages and then
discharge me from the hospital.
When I reach at home, I was badly horrified the scene of the accident were
continuously revolving in my mind which were causing more fear in my mind I was
also a bit sad that my guitar broke down. Anyways, I just off my first week at
university took one-week bed rest, took medicines on time and got recovered from this
injury. Indeed, it was a horrible experience of my life which lead me in extreme fear
but I faced this fear and this situation by Prayers and reading versus of Quran. My all
fear just vanished within 2 3 weeks.
The lesson that I learned from this incident is that teenagers should need to avoid two
wheels vehicles like bike specially in rainy days otherwise they may face incident like
me. after that incident I start using pick and drop van service for university another
thing that I learn is that life is very short and we have no idea when it will be ended.
Spread love in other life and always be ready for help others.

Q.3 Keeping the fundamentals of an abstract (principal objectives, scope of the investigation,
methods used in the research, results, and principal conclusion), write the abstract for the
following research article. (05 marks)

International Journal of English Language and Linguistics Research

Vol.1, No. 1, pp. 32-38, June 2013
Published by European Centre for Research Training and Development UK (www.ea-journals.org)
32
PERCEPTION OF TEACHERS AND STUDENTS TOWARDS METHODS USED IN TEACHING
AND LEARNING OF ENGLISH WRITING SKILLS IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS
Benjamin Towett Koross P.O. Box 192-30200, Kitale, Kenya
Francis C. Indoshi Maseno University P O Box 333 Maseno, Kenya
Tony Okwach Maseno University, P O Box 333, Maseno, Kenya
Keywords; Perception, teaching methods and writing skills
Introduction:
Writing is fundamental to effective communication as revealed by Driscoll (2012). This is
particularly so in an era in which e-mail and other word processed documents are the norm rather
than the exception in a work place. Min (2006) reveals that teachers in Britain where English is first
language, teachers pay more attention to practice in writing class, encouraging students to familiarize
with the language structure and have a good opportunity to express their ideas more easily through
appropriate writing method. This view is similar to that of Chandler (2003) who also advocates for
good opportunities for learners to familiarize with good topics of encouragement.
A teacher is an investigator of the writing processes employed by the students, using observation and
discussion to identify successful methods to teach different aspects of the writing process (Ambuko,
2008). Teachers play different roles in the classroom through different ways. Richard (1990) presents
a comprehensive list for teachers' role in a writing programme. The roles include: - keeping writing
task clear, simple and straight forward, teaching the writing process, developing meaningful
assignments, outlining goals for each writing assignment and teaching the principles - rules,
convention, and guideline of writing as a learner who has a good command of English language will
effectively present his ideas in an organized form, understandable to the examiner and this will
logically translate into a better examination scores(Ellis,1991).
Ahmad and Aziz (2009) note that some teachers believe that classes should be teacher centered,
where the teacher is the expert and the authority in presenting information while other take a learner
centered approach viewing their role as more of student learning. Ndirangu (2004) notes that
inappropriate classroom. Skills such as the use of teacher centered methods sabotage the
achievements and goals of even the meticulously designed curriculum. Eken (2000) noted that in a
student centered class, teachers are more of facilitators and students take on the discussion role;
students are seen as being able to assume a more active and participatory role vis-a-vis traditional
approaches. This teaching method promotes active participation of students in classroom activities.
However, in a classroom setting a teacher should be well equipped with different methods of
teaching English. Ahmad and Aziz (2009) concurs that students generally have a poor grasp of a
language and part of the problem lies with the conventional teaching methods employed. From a
research carried out by Ng'ong'a (2002) it was revealed that Kenyan school leavers continue to
perform poorly due to poor teaching methods. This is because as Alexander (2000) noted instructors
develop a teaching style based on their beliefs about what constitutes good teaching, personal
preferences, their abilities, and the names of their particular discipline. This is done in disregard of
the learners’ needs.
Due to deteriorating of performance in English subject, objectives of writing skills have not been
achieved, yet writing competence is one of the vital requirements outside the school and promoting
teaching and learning of English language skills. There has been persistent complains about poor
English language use in written expression. As reported by KNEC (2010,2011,2012) the
compositions candidates wrote for the last three years reveal serious weaknesses in writing skills and
this has greatly affected the mean scores which dropped from 7.66 in the year 2009 to 5.09 in 2011
as shown in the Table 1:
Table 1: Trends in performance in KCSE mean scores
Year Mean score
2009 7.66
2010 5.83
2011 5.09
(Source: KNEC 2010 – 2012)
The mean score is below the average mark required by higher institutions to select students for
competitive courses. English language is a medium of instruction and a compulsory subject in which
a student is supposed to do well to be selected for a competitive course.
There has been a general outcry expressed by educationalists, employers, parents on the view that
most of the form four leavers are not fully equipped with proper communication skills evidenced in
oral interviews and written application letters. Barasa (2005) noted that universities have voiced
concern about receiving first year students who can hardly write, read and hold discussions in
English. The downward trend in performance across the curriculum has raised concern to the
curriculum developers because English is used to teach and test other subjects except Kiswahili,
African and foreign languages. Therefore, little mastery of writing skills can be a serious impediment
to the acquisition of skills and knowledge for other subjects that require an English background for
teaching and writing (KNEC, 2010). Therefore, this research was a response to this need and focus
on necessary resources and methods used in teaching and learning English writing skills among
students in secondary schools.
The purpose of the study was to establish perception of teachers and students towards methods used
in teaching and learning of writing skills in secondary schools in West Pokot County, Kenya.
Objectives of the study were:
• Establish perceptions of teachers and students towards methods used in teaching English Writing
skills.
• Compare perceptions of students and teachers towards methods used in teaching English writing
skills.
Methodology:
Research Design the research design adopted was descriptive survey. As Bryman (2004) observes,
the design is relevant since it entails the collection of data on more than one case and at a single point
in time in order to collect a body of data in relation to two or more variables, which are then
examined to detect the patterns of association, of behavior that are difficult to observe directly and
when it is desirable to sample a large number of subjects for investigations.
Target Population the target population of the study was 31 English teachers and 2580 form four
students in West Pokot County secondary schools. The form four students were used because they
were had experienced the curriculum longest to comment on methods used in teaching and learning
of English writing skills.
Sample and Sampling Procedure the formula of Krejcie and Morgan (cited in Kathuri & Pals
(1993) was used to calculate the sample size by estimating the sample size (s) needed. The sample
size was 334 students who were selected by use of simple random sampling technique. All 31 form
four teachers were selected by use of saturated sampling technique.
Instruments:
Teachers and student’s questionnaires were used to collect data. Teachers questionnaire had
statements concerning the methods used in teaching of writing skills while student questionnaires
had statements concerning the methods used in learning of writing skills. The Likert Scale was used
to rate teachers and students’ perceptions. The scale ranged from 1 (strongly disagree), 2 (disagree),
3 (neutral), 4 (agree) to 5 (strongly agree). The teachers’ students were to mark on every statement
their perception in reference to the rating scale. The mean scores were used to judge teachers and
student’s perception. A score of 3 denoted neutral perception, a mean score of less than 3 denoted
negative perceptions and a mean score of above 3 denoted positive perceptions. The overall
perception of teachers and students was attained by summing up the mean scores of all respondents
(Σ ms) and divided by the number of respondents.
Validity of Instruments:
Validity of the instruments was ascertained by expert judgment of research specialists from the
Department of Educational Communication, Technology and Curriculum Studies. The views of the
experts were used to revise the questionnaires.
Reliability of the Instruments:
Reliability is a measure of how consistent the results from a test are (Kombo & Tromp, 2006).
Reliability of teachers and student’s questionnaires was determined by use of Cronbach’s alpha
formula for the internal consistency of the instruments. The results yielded 0.81 as the coefficient
reliability for students’ questionnaires and 0.87 for teachers’ questionnaires. These values were
considered high enough to judge the instruments as reliable.

Data Collection:
Questionnaires were administered to teachers and students by the researcher personally, so as to
make clarification when need arose. The researcher made personal visitation to the schools and met
the respective Head teachers and informed them about the research and arranged for data collection.
Data analysis Data was analyzed by use of mean scores to determine perception ant t-test to
determine difference in perception between teachers and students
Results and Discussion:
Perception of Teachers and Students towards Methods used in Teaching English writing Skills. The
findings of teachers and students on perceptions towards the methods used in teaching English
writing skills are shown in Table 2.
Table 2: Perception of Teachers and Students towards Methods used in Teaching English writing
Skills.
Respondents Mean score Perspective
Teachers 2.49 Negative
Students 2.32 Negative
The findings reveal that teachers’ perception was negative; the mean score was 2.49 meaning that
teachers are not aware of the appropriate methods used in teaching English writing skills. The
findings also reveal that learners’ perception was negative with a mean score of 2.32 which is lower
than the teachers’ mean. Students are not aware of the methods they are supposed to use in learning
English Writing Skills. Teachers appear not to be informed in terms of the syllabus from the Kenya
Institute of Curriculum Development that contains appropriate methods to be used in terms of
developing English writing skills. The findings reveal that development of writing skills is a
challenge among students. The study implies that performance in English subject may be dismal as a
result of poor methods of content delivery. This has implications for changes in training of teachers
to focus on different methods selected in accordance with objectives, learners’ needs, interests,
beliefs and competencies (Simonson, 2004). The findings concur with the observations made by
Indoshi and Okwara (2011), with the view that majority of teachers who are adequately educated and
professionally trained are capable of producing good results at the end of primary education and also
having a high degree of autonomy and flexibility in the delivery of lessons, but may still fail to have
their learners acquire proficiency in academic skills of writing.
Comparison of Perceptions between Teachers and Students towards Methods used to teach
English writing Skills
To find the differences in perception between teachers and students, a t-test was done on the mean
scores of teachers and students. The findings are presented in Table 3.
Table 3: Test for differences in the average perception scores on the determinants for achievement
95%
Standard error confidence
Mean
Determinant for the mean limits (95% Df p-value
difference
difference CL) on mean
difference
Lower Upper
limit limit
Methods -0.17 0.12 -0.41 0.07 363 0.1594

Mean difference = Average score for the students - Average score for the teachers
The difference in average perception on the methods used in teaching and learning of English
Writing Skills between the teachers and the students is -0.17 (95% CL: -0.41, 0.07). This difference
is statistically non-significant (p-value=0.1594). This means that both the teachers and the students
are similar in their perception on the methods. However, Kang’ahi (2012) found that teachers and
students in their perspective on methods of teaching Kiswahili were different. This comparison
between teachers and students implies that teachers engage students with what they know and
students cannot even learn on their own. The findings show that any kind of learning of writing skills
among students depend on teachers. It shows that traditional methods of teaching writing skills are
still being used, whereby teachers are still the source of everything. As Kutz (1993) observed, there
is excessive trust in teachers towards learners learning without due regard to the learning conditions.
Yang and Huang (2008) argued that although teachers believed that students might benefit from
utilization of appropriate method in instruction, they faced barriers that made integration difficult to
implement. This observation could explain why the current study findings of students’ perception
was negative and similar to other studies like of Al-Senaidi et al (2009) where by the findings
revealed that students had low perception towards some teaching methods used to develop writing
skills.
Conclusion and Implications:
The study reveal that teachers and students had negative perception of methods used in teaching and
learning of English writing skills but the perceptions were not significantly different. It could be the
reason why the students’ performance in English writing skills has been deteriorating. These findings
imply the need for paradigm shift in methodology for teachers to develop interest in writing skills to
find in order to develop competence in written English. Also teacher training institutions may have to
revise their curriculum to develop writing skills.
References:

ABSTRACT:
Making aptitudes are noteworthy for fruitful correspondence. Nevertheless, the
improvement of making aptitudes among understudies depends upon the systems used
in teaching and learning. Late survey of making wellness among understudies in
schools shows that predominant piece of them can't make properly. This raise worry
regarding methodologies used in teaching and learning. Low degrees of making
aptitudes in West Pokot have hugely affected when all is said in done mean scores in
the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) appraisals. The explanation
behind the examination was to choose the perspective on instructors and understudies
towards the methods used in educating and learning of English making capacities in
assistant schools in West Pokot County of Kenya. The objectives of the examination
were first, to set up teachers and understudies’ perspective on methods used in
teaching and learning of forming aptitudes and second, to investigate instructors and
understudy’s impression of procedures used in training and getting the hang of
creating capacities. The assessment masses were 31 teachers of English and 2580
structure four understudies. The model size included 31 instructors of English and 334
structure four understudies picked through fundamental sporadic testing procedure.
Data was accumulated through studies and separated by use of mean and t-test. The
examination revealed that the two instructors and understudies had negative
perception towards procedures used in training and learning of English making
capacities and this was not quantifiably different.