EMPLOYING TRACK CHANGES IN WRITING INSTRUCTION TO FACILITATE EFFECTIVE REVIEW AND REVISION BY STUDENTS

Abstract

The 2018 General Education Curriculum for Literature defines the purpose of teaching writing as developing students’ thinking and their ability to write. At each grade level, one requirement is to “compose texts following the correct process,” which comprises four stages: (1) preparation, (2) idea generation and outlining, (3) drafting, and (4) reviewing and revising. In practice, however, the reviewing and revising stage is often neglected by both teachers and students, despite its central role in the writing process. To address this gap, we utilized the Track Changes feature in Microsoft Word to guide students’writing, enabling them to review and revise their drafts effectively across both linguistic and non-linguistic aspects. An experiment in Class 11AX at FPT High School (Can Tho) demonstrated this approach is effective: students’ writing quality improved after each review–revision session, and teachers could clearly observe students’ progress in developing their writing skills.