Assessing Writing Skills of the EFL Learners in the Universities of Nineveh Province

Abstract

Writing assessment has been considered as a difficult topic
for learning professionals, mainly when it approaches to assess
the writing of English Foreign Language learners. The present
study aims at answering the following questions: After (3) three
years of learning English Foreign Language writing skill at the
university, have 4th- year students in English departments at
colleges of Education mastered the basic writing skills? It is
hypothesized that: Fourth year students in the departments of
English at the colleges of Education have mastered the basics of
writing skills... To verify the posed hypotheses, two methods
were used: a test and a questionnaire. 50 (male and female)
fourth year Iraqi students in the Departments of English from
College of Education for Humanities/ Mosul University and Al
Hamdaniya University. Based on the findings obtained, it was
found that after three (3) years of studying the writing skills at
university, learners have not yet mastered the of the basic writing
skills. Many of learners lack knowledge in the basic of writing
skill owing to the defect in way of teaching writing, the materials
and techniques used in the classroom, as well as the use of
outdated textbooks, class sizes that are too big, and the amount
of time devoted to learning writing skill each week, additionally
to the weak level of the students themselves