Colombian students need to improve punctuation and spelling, says UNESCO

A total of 8625 third and sixth grade students in Colombian schools participated in the Writing Test of the Regional Comparative and Explanatory Study (ERCE), a diagnosis made by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 16 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean to measure the communication skills of children.

The test asked students to put into practice their ability to create a relevant text based on a particular communicative situation and appropriate to their level of schooling. Third graders had to write a letter to a friend about a trip and a review about the national dance. In sixth grade they had to describe a non-existent animal and ask the mayor with a letter to close a street for an event.

Because it was written, it was not a standardized test nor did it have a single answer, so analyzing the results has an additional complexity. That explains why the results of the test, carried out in 2019, were revealed only this Tuesday, March 22.

Claudia Uribe, director of the Regional Office of Education for Latin America and the Caribbean, said that writing is one of the most demanded skills in the workplace and is essential for working in multiple trades and professions.

Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic and Uruguay also participated in the measurement. Boys and girls from all socio-economic backgrounds were included.

Although 87% of third year boys and girls understood the instruction of describing a trip, 68% of them could not write a text that could be typecast in the letter genre, that is, that had a formula of greeting, body and farewell or signature.

With regard to presenting the dance, only 33.4% made the introduction that was requested. 62.6% made stories or invitations that had to do with the subject but did not fulfill the requested communicative purpose.

Although 50% of students showed that they could write coherent and cohesive texts, 81% committed at least one misspelling in their compositions; 21.1% committed more than seven.

In the case of sixth grade, 95.4% understood that they should write a letter with the elements corresponding to that textual category, of which 51.6 per cent added arguments as to why the street should be closed.

Regarding the presentation of the animal, 83.5% of students were able to talk about the non-existent creature and attributed at least one quality to it. Some (10%) forgot to name it. 53.4% did write a text that fit the category: an encyclopedia entry with a title and several attributes.

76.4% of sixth graders were able to write without repeating words and 82.1% showed cohesion and coherence. However, 34.9% had more than one spelling error in their composition. In addition, 46.3% of them had several scoring errors.

To improve specific areas and raise the level of writing among the lowest-qualified students, UNESCO recommends being explicit with students about what is expected of them when they compose a text.

Describing the expected quality characteristics — punctuation, vocabulary, coherence, textual typology — will help them pay attention and correct what is needed on their own.

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