The researcher would develop a reading material to improve the writing skills of the Polytechnic students. The

reading material would contain humorous anecdotes as they would motivate and inspire the students to learn

English. At the end of each anecdote the teacher would provide communicative activities such as citation,

measured and rated with the help of the proficiency descriptions given in Arthur Hughes’ book entitled Testing

The students who join Polytechnic colleges lack communication skills. Especially, they could not write good

English. It may be due to their studies through the mother tongue medium, or it may be due to their rural, poor

background. Hence a technique has to be evolved to set right the problem and to make them write fluent and

flawless English. Many linguists have tried different methods to teach the backward students to write good

English. Hence, the researcher also tried to teach written English using a Reading material accompanied with

different communicative activities such as citation, simulation, replication, comparison and reflection. The

them into different groups based on (BC, MBC, SC, &OC) gender (male and female) locality (rural or urban),

parent’s income, student’s medium of instruction at the secondary school level etc. After comparing pre-test

and post-test scores, it is predicted that the reading material (containing humorous anecdotes and

communicative activities) would have improved the writing skills of the students belonging to different

categories.

Ahmed Adel Fatah (2020) in his article entitled “Developing EFL Writing Skills through Communicative

developing writing skills.

writing skills. The researcher wanted to make use of humorous anecdotes to improve the writing skills of the

students in an innovative way. This is entirely a different approach in developing writing skills.

Writing causes Students to think through topics or defend a position. Through this process, students gain an

understanding of logical thinking and the best way to present their ideas. They learn the difference between

facts and opinions and they learn how to support their ideas with facts. Many people have undertaken

researches on improving the writing skills. Only a very few people have attempted to find a suitable technique

to make the students write flawless English using humorous anecdotes which is an innovative technique to

teach writing skills. As the researcher has added communicative activities such as citation, simulation,

replication, comparison and reflection in teaching writing skills, this technique is a novel one.

3. To find out whether there is any significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores of

the students in different components of writing skills in English of the Polytechnic College Students

based on the community they belong to.

4. To find out whether there is any significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores of

the students in different components of writing skills in English of the Polytechnic College Students

based on the medium of instruction they received at the school level.

5. To find out whether there is any significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores of

the students in different components of writing skills in English of the Polytechnic College Students

based on the income of their parents.

6. To find out whether there is any significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores of

components of writing skills of the Polytechnic College students irrespective of the community they

belong to.

3. There exists significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores in different

components of writing skills of the Polytechnic College students irrespective of the medium of

instruction they received at school level.

4. There exists significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores in different

components of writing skills of the Polytechnic College students irrespective of the income of their

parents.

5. There exists significant difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores in different

components of writing skills of the Polytechnic College students irrespective of the occupation of their

parents.

of selection.

incorporated with some of the communicative activities such as citation, simulation, replication, role-play,

improvisation and comparison and contrast. Citation is a process in which the teacher provides a model

sentence and the students have to write sentences of their own using the same sentence pattern. Simulation is

nothing but imitation of a situation or process. It is an imitative representation of a process or system that could

exist in the real world. Replication is an activity in which students rewrite the text or obtain opinions of other

students regarding the subject matter. Polytechnic College students were also trained in correct use of stress

and intonation. The reading material was subjected to the group try-outs. On the basis of the analysis of the try-

out, required correction, modification and refinements were carried out. In order to ascertain the content

severe errors of grammar. Two points will be allotted for the writing with very frequent errors of grammar.

Three points will be allotted for the writing with frequent errors of grammar. For occasional errors of grammar

in the writing four points will be given. For few errors of grammar in the writing five points will be given.

Similarly, in the case of vocabulary, points will be awarded in the ascending order for the following types:

extreme vocabulary limitation, misuse of vocabulary items, frequent errors in the use of vocabulary, use of

inappropriate words and use of circumlocution. In the case of mechanics points will be awarded in the

ascending order for the following types: severe spelling errors, very frequent spelling errors, frequent spelling

errors, less spelling errors and no spelling error. In the case of fluency points will be awarded in the ascending

order for the following types: misused structures, inappropriate structures, little sense of ease of

communication, patchy structures and good communication. In the case of form, points will be awarded in the

College, Karaikudi due to constraints of time. One hundred students were taught the selected humorous

anecdotes using the communicative activities for a period of three months. The present study was based on the

experimental method. The researcher had used the pre-test –post-test single group design in the experiment.

Regarding statistical techniques, the researcher used‘t’ test to find out the significant difference between the

means of the pre-test and post –test scores of the Polytechnic College students. The researcher had classified

the Polytechnic College students into different categories and assessed whether they improved their writing

Humorous Anecdotes can be a powerful and motivating source for writing in English both as a model and as

subject matter. Humorous anecdotes as a model occurs when student’s writing becomes closely similar to the

original work or clearly imitates its content, theme, organization, and style. However, when student’s writing

exhibits original thinking like interpretation or analysis, or when it emerges from, or is creatively stimulated

Mother tongue is learnt by a student in a natural way. But learning a foreign language is an artificial process.

The student is continually surrounded by the mother tongue. It has the strongest social compulsion to learn the

mother tongue. But the learner of a foreign language encounters the language only at intervals. His native

language habits are in continual conflict with those needed for the new language. Secondly, learning a foreign

language requires a lot of practice. Constant and sustained practice is the key to language learning. Therefore it

becomes a painful process. The teacher has to create artificial situations in the classroom to overcome these

Research, 2021.Web.8 May 2025

Communicative Language Teaching Approach among Second Year Faculty of Specific Education