Students’ beliefs about barriers to engagement

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
with writing in secondary school English:
A focus group study
I

Sean Hawthorne
WESTERN SPRINGS COLLEGE, AUCKLAND

This paper presents findings about student beliefs regarding the barriers they
face in engaging with writing tasks in English. The participants were 28 Year
10 English students from two Auckland secondary schools. The students
represented engaged writers and reluctant writers from the two schools. Results
suggest that interest in a topic and the perceived relevance of the task to the
student is the main factor influencing engagement. Other findings suggest that
reluctant writers are more likely to be influenced by teacher, self-belief, and
knowledge and skill factors than engaged writers, who are more likely to want
choice and control over their writing. Some gender differences also appeared; in
particular girls appeared to be more aware of the influence of self-belief factors
on engagement, and reluctant girls were particularly influenced by teacher
factors. This study informs English teachers of factors that are important in
improving the engagement of students in writing tasks.

Introduction
The purpose of the study reported here was to explore student beliefs and
thoughts about the writing tasks they were asked to do in their secondary
school English classes and how they felt about them. In particular, the study
focused on the potential barriers to engaging with writing that the students
identified, and on what teachers of English could do to improve engage-
ment. It was expected that students would be able to clearly describe what
they found de-motivating about writing tasks they were asked to do in
English classes. The results from these focus group discussions give some
clear indications of what is needed to improve student engagement with
writing.
In this article the term ‘engagement’ is used because it is a useful meta-
construct for discussing complex tasks such as writing (Fredricks,
Blumenfeld, & Paris, 2004). Engagement has three dimensions: behavioural,
emotional and cognitive, and all three are relevant when discussing engage-
30

ment with writing tasks. Students need to be more than just behaviourally
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involved in a task to be ‘engaged’. Rather, it is the quality of thought and

Number 1
February 2008
purpose that they bring to their involvement that is crucial to being
‘engaged’. While there has been a significant amount of comment on how to

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
improve student engagement in writing, particularly by advocates of the
‘process’ approach to teaching writing (Atwell, 1998; Calkins, 1994; Graves,
2003; Graves & Stuart, 1985; Pritchard & Honeycutt, 2006), little of this work
actually refers to the growing research into motivation (Bruning & Horn,
2000; Hidi & Boscolo, 2007). Although we now seem to have a good under-
standing of the processes involved in writing, we have a lot to learn about
how to develop motivation to write (Bruning & Horn, 2000). In an activity as
complex as writing, issues of engagement assume great importance as it is
necessary for developing writers to persist and practise skills to become pro-
ficient (Hayes & Nash, 1996).
Recent reports into students’ writing highlight that the writing perfor-
mance of adolescents is of concern. In New Zealand, for example, the In
Focus: Student Outcome Overview 2001–2005 kit prepared by the Ministry of
Education (2006) reports on analyses of the writing achievement of students
from Year 5 to Year 12, and concludes that “the writing skills of many sec-
ondary school students are no better than that of many primary school stu-
dents” (Ministry of Education, 2006, p. 13). These results are of concern
because students need to be able to express their thoughts and knowledge
effectively in writing if they are to participate actively in modern society. If
they are reluctant to write at school, students may find themselves unable to
engage fully with a society that requires proficiency in many written genres.
English teachers know that as students progress through primary to sec-
ondary school their liking for English decreases significantly. This decrease
in positive opinions about writing is of concern because it affects student
engagement and achievement (Abu-Hilal, 2000; Boyd, 2002; Bruning &
Horn, 2000; Coldwell & Holland, 2001; Flockton & Crooks, 1998, 2002;
Hansen, 2002; Smith & Elley, 1997). It is the purpose of this study to help
teachers understand what turns students on or off writing so that we can
improve their engagement with this essential skill.

Method
Participants
Participants were 28 (15 boys and 13 girls) Year 10 students drawn from two
co-educational secondary schools from different parts of Auckland. The first
school is a decile 7 central city school with a role of approximately 900
(where the researcher teaches), and the second is a decile 4 West Auckland
school with a roll of approximately 1500 (Decile is an approximate measure of
the socio-economic status of the neighbourhood the school draws from. A 10 point
scale is used where 10 is high and 1 low). Both schools have ethnically diverse
31

populations, although the central city school has a larger proportion of

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Pakeha (European) New Zealanders.

Journal of Language
and Literacy
 Focus groups were formed with students on the basis of their level of
reluctance to write. Two focus groups from each school were formed, each of
HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
seven students. This provided enough variety of responses and experiences
to keep new ideas flowing – but was small enough that every person could
feel heard (Krueger & Casey, 2000; Morgan, 1997). All students in the groups
had completed a questionnaire developed specifically for this study (The
Survey of Motivation to Engage in Writing [SMEW]) that measured their level
of engagement with writing prior to involvement in the focus groups. The
questionnaire was administered to the complete Year 10 cohorts in two
schools during an English class. The students in the groups reflected differ-
ences in levels of engagement with writing tasks, coming from either the top
or bottom quartile of scores from the questionnaire administered at their
school.

Engaged Groups
(E1) – This group consisted of four boys and three girls. The mean score
from the survey results for the participants in this group was 3.82 (out of a
possible 5). In this report the students in E1 are given names starting with
‘A’.
(E2) – This group consisted of four boys and three girls. The mean score
from the survey results for the participants in this group was 3.42. In this
report the students in E2 are given names starting with ‘S’.

Reluctant Groups
(R1) – This group consisted of four boys and three girls. The mean score
from the survey results for the participants in this group was 2.48. In this
report the students in R1 are given names starting with ‘D’.
(R2) – This group consisted of three boys and four girls. The mean score
from the survey results for the participants in this group was 2.39. In this
report the students in R2 are given names starting with ‘T’.

Procedure
The focus groups began with the researcher (as facilitator) describing the
purpose of the group and briefly stating the kinds of questions or topics that
would be covered in the 50-minute discussions. The students were asked to
respond to a range of guiding questions about what types of writing they
liked or disliked and what helped or hindered their engagement with
writing in classroom situations. During the 50 minute discussions the stu-
dents spontaneously clarified and elaborated on each other’s comments and
32 clearly felt able to agree or disagree with one another. To ensure the actual
Volume 31 words and behaviours of the participants in the research were recorded
Number 1 accurately, the focus group sessions were audio-taped (Morgan, 1997). The
February 2008 researcher facilitated each of the focus groups to ensure consistency of
approach in the discussions. All of the audio-tapes were later transcribed
verbatim.

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
Thematic content analysis
The transcripts generated from the audio-tapes were read through carefully
once by the researcher, and notes were made summarising significant or
noteworthy comments and identifying themes that emerged during these
first readings. The participant responses were divided up into units of
meaning (i.e., quotes on particular topics) and these were then grouped into
larger categories. These categories were initially based on the discussion
prompts put to the groups but were amended to reflect the broad themes
that emerged in the comments. After feedback on the categorisation was
received from other researchers, six broad themes were decided upon which
covered most of the comments made by the students, and also reflected the
theoretical conceptualising of reluctance to write that has underpinned this
research. Finally, each student response was analysed and coded. The unit of
analysis used in the coding was the expression of a ‘complete idea’
(comment). This meant it was possible for responses to contain more than
one idea and thus result in more than one coding category. To verify the reli-
ability of the researcher’s coding, one of the classroom teachers indepen-
dently coded approximately 40% of the transcript responses. There was 89%
agreement between the two coders in their coding judgements.

Results
In total, 591 complete ideas (comments) from across the four groups were
coded and placed into one of six themes. The six themes were inter-
est/relevance factors, choice or control factors, environmental factors,
knowledge or skill factors, self-belief factors and teacher factors. The fre-
quency of comments within each theme, and group, is shown in Table 1.

Group commonalities
Results show that interest in a topic, or its perceived relevance, is the pre-
dominant factor that the students attribute to engagement with writing
tasks. This was a common finding across both the engaged and reluctant
groups. The other common finding between the groups was the influence of
environmental factors.

Interest/Relevance Factors
The most significant theme to come through the focus group discussions
was the importance of interest in a topic and the perceived relevance that the
students felt about the writing tasks they were asked to do. In total, com-
33

ments related to this theme (whether positive or negative) accounted for

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36% of all the comments the students made. In each group, except group E2,
Journal of Language
and Literacy
 Table 1. Frequency of Each Category of Comment Within Each Group

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42 Student comments Engaged Frequency of Reluctant Frequency of
on various themes Groups Comments Groups Comments
Within Engaged Within Reluctant
Groups Groups
E1 E2 R1 R2
Comments No. No. No. % No. No. No. %
Interest/Relevance factors 85 28 113 40 54 49 103 33
Choice & Control factors 21 12 33 12 13 4 17 5
Environmental factors 25 33 58 21 32 18 50 16
Learning/Knowledge/
Skill factors 21 14 35 13 22 23 45 14
Self-Belief factors 17 6 23 8 21 15 36 12
Teacher factors 6 11 17 6 40 21 61 19
Total Comments 175 104 279 182 130 312

this area was by far the most commented on by the students (group E2
placed environmental factors slightly above interest/relevance). Group E1,
the group with the most engaged students, made the most number of com-
ments in this area (49% of their comments were about interest and rele-
vance). This suggests that for these students, who are comfortable in their
ability to write and who enjoy writing overall, their interest in a topic and its
perceived relevance to them is by far the most significant factor influencing
their engagement. The following quotes from students in each group exem-
plify the common concern with interest across the four groups.

ALEX: The more you care about the topic the more you’ll care about the writing.
ALICE: If you give people topics that they are interested in or motivated about
that helps.
SHELLY: The more you write about something that you don’t want to write
about, the more you hate writing and don’t want to do it.
DAN: (People) just can’t be bothered. The topic’s not interesting or they just
don’t like writing
DEREK: I don’t like writing essays about things that I don’t give a crap about,
basically.
TOM: Topics. There’s just nothing of interest. It’s just a waste of time if you
don’t like it.

Students were also concerned about how often they were given topics to
write about that they perceived of as having no relevance to their own lives
34

or goals, or where they could not even see the need for doing the writing
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task.
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AARON: I don’t care about teenage issues much because they’re a bit trivial

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
really.
DON: I don’t like it when you’re just copying something that you’ve been
asked to write down. I don’t see the point.
DEBRA: I don’t like writing about the past. I hate the past. I mean, who cares?
DIANE: I quite like writing my opinion about real stuff.
TRACY: [Why can’t we write about]… what’s happening in today. Like what’s
happening in the 21st century.
TOBY: Not like old stuff like Egyptian stuff and World War 2 stuff.
TAMMY: Yeah, like something that’s real.

Environmental factors
After interest/relevance the next largest category for overall comments
being made was the influence of environmental factors on student engage-
ment with writing. The environmental factors included working at home or
at school, working alone or collaboratively, the classroom atmosphere and
also the medium that was used to do the writing and the time given to
writing tasks. Both groups of writers appear to find the same environmental
factors enhance or hinder engagement with writing. For example, all groups
commented on the fact that they usually preferred to work on computers
rather than handwriting for their writing tasks. The reasons for this ranged
from finding it physically easier to type than to handwrite through to prefer-
ring the end look of what they had produced on the computer.

SHANE: It’s better on computers.

DAVE: Let us do assignments on computers. That’s good. That helps with my
writing ‘cos it’s easy. You don’t get a sore hand from writing.
TRELICE: If you’re writing’s usually messy you can write better on computer.

It was also noted that disruptive or distracting students in classes hinder

engagement. This theme was important in all four groups but there were a
few points of difference between the engaged and reluctant writers. The
engaged students from group E1 were usually able to work around any dis-
tractions.

ABBY: If you want to work you sometimes have to separate yourself from the
talkers so you won’t be distracted.

On the other hand, the reluctant writers in group R2 let disruption become a
reason not to have to engage with the writing tasks. 35

TRACY: half the people in our classes won’t listen to the teachers anyway. We
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just talk anyway… so there’s no point trying.

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and Literacy
 Time and place factors were also commonly mentioned as influencing
engagement. That is, students commented that they sometimes found the
HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
time of day in which they were asked to complete writing tasks a hindrance
to their engagement. They did not get enough time to complete a task prop-
erly or they mostly preferred to do writing at home in their own environ-
ments.

ABBY: [Some] tasks could be spread out a bit more.

ANN: I much prefer to do [my essays] at home.
SALLY: The time of day as well. Like if it’s first period sometimes you’re “ugh’ or
last period when it’s too hot and you’re bothered and tired and you just
want to go home.
SEAN: [at home] you can do what you want, listen to music
DAVE: It’s not good to write in the last period.
TANIA: I don’t like writing after school.

Another trend in the comments on environmental factors was whether or

not students were allowed to work in groups or discuss their ideas and
drafts. While a few students across the groups preferred to work individual-
ly, most preferred being able to share their writing with a partner or group
because this helped them feel good about what they had written and also
gave them further ideas.

ABBY: I think we should have more discussions in class, because it helps you
get more passionate about stuff when you’re getting different points of
view. Arguing with someone will make you more interested in it.
SALLY: I don’t know, but, well there are other people here to help you. You can
get other people’s ideas about what you’re writing.
DIANE: I like projects and stuff where you have to do lots of things together.
TANIA: If you talk about it with a friend then you get a detention. It depends on
the teacher but lots of my teachers won’t let us talk then write.

Apart from these two thematic categories, where there was significant uni-
formity in the number and tenor of comments being made, the other four
categories showed differences between the groups that are discussed next.

Group differences
The most striking differences that emerged between the two groups of stu-
dents were in the frequency of comments made about the importance of
teacher support and the influence choice and control factors had on levels of
engagement. Reluctant girls made the most comments about the effects of
36

teacher influences on their engagement with writing, and the reluctant

Volume 31

groups expressed more negative beliefs about themselves as writers. The

Number 1
February 2008
results presented in Table 1 show that there were some differences in the fre-
quencies of comments made between the ‘engaged’ and ‘reluctant’ groups.

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
The two areas that are statistically significant, and that are focused on below,
are those associated with teacher factors and choice and control factors.

Teacher factors
The most significant area of difference between engaged and reluctant stu-
dents was the contrast in the number of comments made on the influence of
teacher factors. The students in the reluctant groups accounted for 78% of
the comments associated with the positive or negative influence of the
teacher. An independent t-test was conducted to compare the frequency of
comments made on teacher factors for engaged students (M = 1.21, SD =
1.31) and reluctant students (M = 3.93, SD = 4.36). There was a significant
difference [t(26) = -2.23, p < .05, partial eta squared = .15] in the frequency of
comments on this area made between engaged students and reluctant stu-
dents. The following comments from students in the reluctant writer groups
highlight teacher behaviours that the students felt would affect their engage-
ment with their work.

DIANE: Some teachers just explain it, to the point where they think that they’ve
done enough explaining... and then they look at us like we should know
by now.
DEBRA: Teachers are good when they’re not, like, too strict but when they will
help you and listen to you.
TRELICE: Explain things properly. Instead of just making us writing it down and
we don’t know what to do.
TANIA: The way they teach it. Teachers need to explain things better.

One complicating factor in this result was the marked difference between
the reluctant boys and reluctant girls for this category, which makes it more
likely that the differences in regard to teacher factors are more significant for
reluctant girls than for reluctant boys. Girls made 57 (73%) of the 78 com-
ments relating to the positive or negative influences teachers can have on
engagement with writing. In this small study, however, even this large dif-
ference in the frequency of comments on this issue was not statistically sig-
nificant. When looked at in combination with group membership, results
showed that girls in the ‘reluctant’ writer groups (R1 & R2) made 49 (86%) of
the 57 comments made by girls about the effects of teacher factors. This sug-
gests that for girls who are reluctant to write the way they perceive the
teacher has an important role in their reluctance to write.
37
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Choice and control factors
The next most significant difference between the two types of groups was
Journal of Language
and Literacy
 that associated with choice and control factors. The engaged students made
66% of the comments associated with the effects of having choice or control,
HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
or the lack of it, on their engagement to write. An independent t-test was
conducted to compare the frequency of comments made on control factors
for engaged students (M=2.36, SD=1.78) and reluctant students (M=1.21,
SD= 1.19). While not significant [t(26) = 2.00, p =.058, partial eta squared =
.13], the result suggested that engaged students were likely to be more aware
that being able to adapt or mould tasks to suit their particular interests, or
strengths in terms of writing genre, were important in motivating them to
do their best with the writing.
ABBY: [You should] have choice about your topics and what to write about.
ALICE: If you give people topics that they are interested in or motivated about
that helps.
SHELLY: [I like creative writing because] it gives you the freedom to do what you
want.
SAM: [I don’t like] formal writing and essays where you’ve got like, I don’t
know, a rigid way of doing it.
The group with the highest overall levels of engagement (E1) contrasts
markedly with the group with the lowest levels of engagement (R2). Twelve
percent of the comments in E1 dealt with the importance of having choice, or
not, in their engagement with tasks. This contrasts with only 3% of com-
ments from R2. A one-way between groups analysis of variance was con-
ducted to explore the frequency of comments made regarding control effects.
When scores for frequency of comments made between the four different
groups were compared there was a statistically significant difference in
scores for the four groups [F(3,24) = 3.45, p <.05, partial eta squared = .30].
Post–hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated that the mean
score for group E1 (M = 3.00, SD = 1.63) was significantly different from
group R2 (M = 0.57, SD = 0.79). Groups E2 and R1 did not differ significant-
ly from any of the other groups. The students in group R2 also expressed the
fact that they experienced very few opportunities to choose any of their own
writing tasks. This latter group disliked writing so much, however, that the
ability to choose between different types of writing tasks made little differ-
ence to their overall engagement, because any task that involved writing
was regarded in the same negative light.
TANIA: We never get to write about anything we want.
TRACY: I can never think of what to write. For all types of topics.
TOBY: I’ve just got nothing to write about.
38
Self-belief factors
Students in the reluctant groups made 61% of comments related to the self-
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belief theme. Although there was no statistically significant difference

Number 1
February 2008
between groups, the results suggest that reluctant students may be more
aware that belief in themselves as writers plays a potentially important part

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
in determining levels of motivation or engagement with writing tasks. An
interesting result was the difference in the results by gender for self-belief
factors. Girls made 37 (63%) of the 59 comments on self-belief factors. This
result raised the possibility that girls were more aware of the potential
effects students’ beliefs about themselves as writers could have on their
engagement with writing. It is also possible that for girls self-belief issues
may be more important in terms of how much they will engage with writing
tasks than for boys.
Groups E1 and E2 made only passing comments about how a sense of
failure might stop (other) students from wanting to write, whereas groups
R1 and R2 spoke personally about how experiencing failure, or believing
that they would fail, was an important factor in hindering their engagement
with writing.

DAN: I hate knowing how dumb I am. Like, being in a low class I just feel like
shit and don’t want to do any work.
DEBRA: People just think I know I’m not going to do well so what’s the point of
trying.
DAVE: If you think you’re going to do badly people think they’re just not going
to do well so it’s stops them trying.
TRELICE: I worry about the teacher marking it all the time.
TRACY: I was never any good at writing at school.
TAMMY: Yeah. I used to write quite a lot at Intermediate, ‘cos it was easy and
now the standards got too hard and it’s just really boring.

Knowledge, skill and learning factors

The fourth area of difference was the number of comments students made
about how their knowledge, or skill, or feeling that they were learning some-
thing, influenced their levels of engagement. The reluctant writers made
56% of the comments about the influence that knowledge and skill had on
their engagement. Of interest was the fact that they made 69% of the com-
ments about how knowing something or knowing they had the skill to do a
writing task (being self-efficacious for writing) improved their writing
engagement. This suggests that for reluctant writers much of their reluctance
may arise from a feeling that they do not know what to do for a task or how
to approach a task and that they don’t know what to write about in terms of
content. Many of the reluctant writers in this study mentioned being
required to write about topics about which they had no background knowl-
39

edge and that this had a negative impact on how motivated they were to
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attempt the task.

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and Literacy
 DEBRA: [Writing about] a holiday or something is alright ‘cos you know what

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
you’re doing so you can write.
TRACY: ‘Cos you don’t understand what you have to do.
TANIA: Essays. Yeah, and speeches. I hate writing them – because you don’t
know what to do.
Discussion
The students in this study were able to make some very clear statements
about what aspects of writing tasks improved their engagement.
Overwhelmingly, interest in and perceived relevance of the tasks they were
asked to write about were the main factors that made students more or less
engaged. Interest in a topic is thought to have positive influences on a
student’s writing because it links what students know about a topic with
what they value. For example, high levels of topic knowledge, interest and
discourse knowledge have all been found to have positive impacts on the
quality of narrative writing in ninth grade and undergraduate students
(Shell, Bruning, & Colvin, 1995). This was supported by the results of this
study where many of the reasons students gave to explain why they pre-
ferred some topics or types of writing over others had to do with their topic
knowledge or knowledge of how to write in that style of writing. This seems
particularly important with the most reluctant writers who often lack both
the skills in how to write in particular styles, as well as lacking topic knowl-
edge to have anything to actually write about. The implication for teaching
is that we should be careful to give students the opportunity to write on
topics they are knowledgeable about and to teach them the topic and dis-
course knowledge they need to be able to do the task.
Although Bruning & Horn (2000) have noted that there is still not a lot of
empirical evidence about the importance of providing students with
‘authentic’ tasks, this study strongly supports the conclusion that students
need to see the links between the work required of them and the real world –
or the personal goals they have set for themselves. Providing students with
real audiences or purposes to direct their writing helps build an awareness
of audience in them as writers, and helps connect with their personal inter-
ests and goals. If we only give students writing tasks that have no real
context or a purpose that makes no connections with what the student
values or perceives as being important we cannot blame them for having
little interest in trying to communicate their knowledge and ideas. One of
the issues in secondary schooling that may affect teachers’ ability to give
authentic writing tasks is the pressure exerted by the national qualifications.
These privilege a small number of writing tasks and also decrease the
40 authenticity by setting very short and controlled time constraints on the pro-
Volume 31 duction of the writing, and often only have the artificial audience of the
Number 1 ‘assessor’. The effect of these qualifications on student writing and motiva-
February 2008 tion needs to be further examined.
 The results of this study support previous research that shows that
engagement is also influenced by students’ perceptions of teacher warmth

HAWTHORNE • AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LITERACY, Vol. 31, No. 1, 2008. pp. 30–42
and interest in them and their work (Wentzel, 1997). This was especially
evident in the results of the reluctant girls. The reasons behind this result
need further investigation, but it is possible that reluctant girls are more
affected by perceptions of teacher support because they may share the
stereotypical view that girls should be able to write better than boys and that
they should enjoy it more (Pajares, 2003). Rather than attributing their reluc-
tance to write as something that they are able to control and manage them-
selves, the reluctant girls in this study appear to place more responsibility
for their engagement at the feet of the teachers than other groups of stu-
dents.
The present study also supports previous research that self-perception
and belief is an important factor influencing levels of engagement with a
task (Klassen, 2002; Pajares & Valiante, 2006). People’s beliefs about their
abilities in particular domains are known to be important in motivating
them to do what they can to achieve. One area that needs future research,
however, is the suggestion in this study that girls seemed more aware of the
effect of self-belief on engagement.

Conclusion
The goal of this study was to find out what students felt helped or hindered
their engagement with writing tasks. This study supports the findings of
prior research identifying four conditions that are required to enhance the
motivation to write. Namely, (1) Nurture students’ functional beliefs about
writing. (2) Foster student engagement through authentic writing goals and
contexts. (3) Provide a supportive context for writing. (4) Create a positive
emotional environment in which to write (Bruning & Horn, 2000). In addi-
tion, this study suggests that teachers of English can improve the engage-
ment of their students in writing tasks by: (a) allowing students choice in
their tasks wherever possible; (b) explaining the purpose and relevance of
each task; (c) allowing students chances to collaborate on tasks; (c) being
open to negotiation about deadlines, task expectations etc so that students
perceive them as realistic; (d) ensuring students have understood all of the
components in the task; (e) ensuring students have been taught the knowl-
edge and skills or strategies needed to complete the task successfully and (f)
giving feedback that is constructive and detailed.

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Volume 31
Number 1
February 2008