【正文】  With the increasing trend to study abroad， international tests of English such as IELTS （International English Language Testing System） and TOFEL （The Test of English as a Foreign Language） have become more and more popular. As a result， English as a foreign language becomes more and more essential. Writing， one of the basic skills in English learning， which also has been included in those international English tests， makes the majority of students feel frustrated， especially the students who want to study abroad and who have to pass the exams of IELTS， TOFEL， or GRE（Graduate Record Examination）. This paper introduces the relevant background of English writing， and an IELTS writing practice conducted by myself in 2011 will be discussed as an example to illustrate the importance of teamwork in IELTS writing. 
　　Listening， reading， writing， and speaking are the four basic skills during the process of learning and teaching English. Many teachers and students find that writing is a messy business， which can be a process involving selecting topics， generating ideas， writing drafts， revising and editing. As for English teachers， there are some basic issues that needed to be aware of when they help students practice writing skills， such as grammar， lexis， coherence and cohesion. 
　　Writing is a complex process， which is an important part in different kinds of English tests. There are a large number of approaches to practice writing skills. Teachers need to choose the right approaches to teach students. According to different aims or different learning motivations， an appropriate method will be chosen to teach students. Harmer states that in the teaching of writing， teachers can either focus on the product of that writing or on the writing process （2007， 325）. When concentrating on the product， students are interested in the aim of a task and the end of the task. In other words， a product approach focuses on producing a text reproduces the model （Thornbury， 2006， 249）. Another approach is called a process approach. Many teachers prefer this kind of approach during the process of teaching writing. This approach pays more attention to more original sequence of classroom activities， like brainstorming， pre-writing， writing drafts， revising， and producing a final version. It is clear that a process approach asks students to consider the procedure of making sentences or paragraphs into a piece of work. For practicing writing skills， a process approach was thought to be appropriate. It added a valuable new dimension to language classrooms. However， it brought some criticisms. Nunan thinks that the process approach confines the students largely to narrative forms and that leads to a serious limitation on their ability to master different text types for specific purposes and academic writing （1995， 87）. Rodrigues claims that students need models to practice， they need to improve even mechanical skills， and they still need time to think through their ideas and write for real purposes. A successful writer should have some common characteristics either he or she uses a process approach or a product approach. In Thornbury’s opinion， he argues that writers need to be able to produce grammatically accurate sentences， content， punctuate these sentences properly， select and maintain an appropriate style （2006， 248）. Hedge points out that some characteristics of successful writers， for the very first， good writers pay more attention to the overall meaning and organization of a text， and engage in a lot planning activities. For the second， a successful writer will re-write and revise before he or she finishes the writing. And another characteristic of successful writers is that they have high awareness of audience （2000， 305）. They think about what the audience want to know， how to make writing clearly and more understandable. The audience is an essential concept for all writers. Writers choose different topics and different methods of presenting their ideas according to different audience （Reid， 1998， 2）. In order to make the writing communicative， the writer should know who will read the work and why they read it. 
　　No matter teachers choose a process approach or a product approach， teachers play three important roles in teaching as the following stated. First of all， teachers will be leaders and organizer in writing tasks. Usually， teachers give the topic and create the right conditions for generating ideas. Teachers set a series of activities， such as brainstorming. Second， teachers are one of the resources in writing tasks. Teachers are always ready to supply help and information. When students do a writing task， teachers need to offer advices and suggestions in a constructive and worthwhile way. Last but not least， teachers are feedback providers after students have completed their writing task. 
　　To improve writing skills， especially in the international tests such as IELTS is of great need. An example of finishing an IELTS writing task by five of my students while I was an English teacher as a part-time job in the training organization of Hengdong Haina in Kunming in the year of 2011 will be discussed as an evidence to prove the significance of teamwork in IELTS writing. Of course， teamwork involves in the process approach. 
　　I was an English teacher who was in charge of two courses， and they were IELTS writing and TOFEL reading respectively. There were five students in my writing class. And this class is called a VIP class or mini-class， which means that no more than five students in one classroom. In my previous teaching classes， I always asked my students to write individually after I had analyzed the task. Those students made different mistakes， from words spelling， via grammatical mistakes， to the illogic of the whole writing. To some extent， their writing skills had not been greatly improved. In order to change this phenomenon， I talked with the director of the Teaching Department of Hengdong Haina. I exchanged my advices to her， and she accepted them， telling me to have a try. On the day of May 21st， 2011， my teaching plan which was teamwork-oriented came into being. My whole process could be seen from the chart below. Seven steps with specific tasks were invented to help my students to complete the writing task step by step with quality and quantity. A little bit more introduction of IELTS writing is necessary. Actually， IELTS writing is divided into two kinds， one is academic， and the other is general. And in the IELTS writing tasks， they are divided into writing task 1 and writing task 2. The writing task 1 in academic is totally different form that of general， however， the writing task 2 is the same for both. Writing task 1 usually deals with charts， such as pie chart， flow chart， line graph， and so forth. In this kind of mission， 20 minutes could be spent， and at least 150 words are required. Writing task 2 is far more difficult. It copes with topics which involve every aspect of life， such as environment， education， family issues， and things like that， some controversial topics. According to the requirements of task 2， 40 minutes will be spent on this task， and at least 250 words are required. I had finished the teaching of the first two parts of Unit 3， and the third part – Exam Practice was the focus of today from the text book Writing for IELTS on page 25.














　　For the very first step， I guided my students to analyze Writing Task 2 on page 25. I invited one of the five students to read the task aloud. The task is shown as the following and you can see it from the appendix.
　　Writing Task 2
　　You should spend about 40 minutes on this task. 
　　Write about the following topic：
　　Young people should spend more time on cultural activities such as music and theatre and less time on sport. How far do you agree with this statement？
　　Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
　　Write at least 175 words. 
　　After the student’s reading， I asked them several questions towards this writing task， such as the main idea， what kind of this topic， and so forth. To let their ideas become more active， I organized them to be in a discussion on this task. Students were assigned as different roles， like a group leader， idea providers， facilitators， and notes taker. With specific assignment， students were busy with expressing their own ideas. And this discussion combined the students who were good at talking and writing respectively together. Ten minutes later， I interrupted them for the limit of the time of one class. And a piece of paper full of their ideas had been presented in front of me. And the students all felt satisfied with their own contribution to this discussion. 
　　In order to let them know more clearly about their own ideas， I asked them to write a guideline. Five minutes later， the students had completed. Five students as a group had come to a conclusion unanimously， they supported that students should spend more time on sports rather than on cultural activities and music. The very next step was to write the essay. Five students， each of them was in charge of one paragraph. In fact， two students were together to be in charge of one paragraph， so four paragraphs were composed.  After the completion of each paragraph， the note taker put those five paragraphs together as an essay. For some specific reasons which would not be talked here， I scored their first draft two days later， and gave them feedbacks on the same day. At the same class， I gave them 45 minutes to revise their first draft and handed it to me. 
　　After the whole process of writing， my students had achieved a much better level of writing. Each of the students contributed into this task which gave them much pride. At the same time， their thoughts towards IELTS writing had been exchanged through discussion and writing. The advantages of each student had been fully used. This kind of process approach – teamwork writing is proved to be feasible and practical for the above reasons. For the last， the significance of teamwork in IELTS writing has been proved from the case study.
　　References：
　　1. Harmer， J. 2007. The Practice of English Language Teaching. Harlow： Longman. 
　　2. Hedge， T. 2000. Teaching and Learning in the Language Classroom. Oxford： Oxford University Press. 
　　3. Nunan， D. 1995. Language Teaching Methodology. London： Prentice Hall. 
　　4. Reid， J. M. 1988. The Process of Composition. London： Prentice Hall. 
　　5. Thornbury， S. 2006. An A-Z of ELT. Oxford： Macmillan. 
　　6. Rodrigues， R. J. 1985. “Moving away from writing-process workshop”. English Journal， 74： 24-7.
　　7.     Wickly， Person. 2005. Writing for IELTS. Oxford： Oxford University Press. 
　　Appendix 
　　1. Part 3： Exam Practice 
　　Writing Task 2
　　You should spend about 40 minutes on this task. 
　　Write about the following topic：
　　Young people should spend more time on cultural activities such as music and theatre and less time on sport. How far do you agree with this statement？
　　Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.
　　Write at least 175 words.
　　2. Student’s final version of writing task 2 on page 25
　　Sports or cultural activities， it is really hard to choose which side I stand for because one thousand readers， there are one thousand Hamlets. But in my suggestion， I prefer to spend more time on sports such as boxing， running rather than time on cultural activities. 
　　On the one hand， people do not have a lot of time to do sports， they need to spend lots of time in daily work， such as listening to music and watching TV are total convenient. It is a fact that they just need to spend a free time at home. On the other hand， nowadays， if you want to do some kinds of sports， you need to go to gymnasiums. Sometimes， people do not want to spend much more money in gymnastics. Also， if they do sports on the streets， it is not safe for citizens.
　　Sports also do good for our health. It is important that. If we spend less time to do sports or do exercise， maybe it will do harm to our health. I prefer to do more exercise on the weekend. It brings me fresh air and I can enjoy it. But if I spend time watch a movie， maybe I will be fat. It is bad for our health. 
　　In conclusion， I believe that we should spend more time on sports and spend time on music as same as pastime because doing sport are important to our body conditions and health.