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★ how to deal with errors in student writing
- errors that are interfere with comprehension
- errors that are stigmatized
- errors that are current focus of instruction
- errors that occur frequently
★ self-correcting by students
- indirect approach
- using coding sheets containing symbols and abbreviations such as WF for "word form"
- not to be effective
- be difficult to implement with complexity
★ being taught by teachers
- a grammar mini lesson
- text analysis/discovery activities, a brief deductive explanation
- consistent and clear explanation
For a writing course, it is useful to think of three components of objectives:
(1) a description of the performance itself, or what the student is expected to write (e.g., essays, descriptive paragraphs, or business memoranda)
(2) the conditions under which the writing will be done (e.g., at home or in class, and with or without feedback between drafts)
(3) the level of performance that will be deemed acceptable, that is, the criteria for evaluation in terms of such considerations as organization use of vocabulary, or sentence types
★ There is less consensus on how feedback should be given, when, by whom, and what sort of feedback is most useful.
★ commenting primarily on content → commenting on language issues
★ Based on this notion of content first, a common practice in writing courses is to require three drafts of a paper with two cycles of feedback and revision
→ first focusing primarily on global issues of content and organization
→ second on language issues
According to Williams (2005) → learners' proficiency
(1) low level: picture description tasks, giving advice or instructions, and collaborative activities
(2) high level: authentic academic writing such as summaries, proposals, reading responses, case studies, and annotated bibliographies
★ useful guidelines for assignments
(1) Make sure that the scope of the task is feasible within the time allotted.
(2) Structure the task to reduce the possibility of plagiarism.
(3) Provide appropriate scaffolding of the task.
(4) Specify the topic, genre, and purpose.
(5) Provide the scoring criteria at the beginning.
(6) Specify intermediate deadlines for assignments
★ Class time
- The writing takes a lot of practice.
Kroll (2001)'s the list of tasks that any writing teacher must accomplish
(1) designing/implementing a syllabus
(2) planning individual class sessions
(3) providing opportunities for writing
(4) responding to that writing
★ A vague learning outcome such as "Students will improve their writing in this course" is less useful than the following outcome statements
.
(1) Produce organized paragraphs (7 sentence minimum) with topic sentences, supporting details, and concluding sentences through a process of drafting and revision
(2) Use the language of narration, exemplification, process, comparison/contrast, or description
(3) Demonstrate coherence using repetition of key words, pronouns, synonyms, and signal words
According to Leki, Cumming, and Silva (2008),
A writing curriculum involves the organization of learning activities for students to develop abilities to produce
(a) meaningful, accurate written texts,
(b) by composing effectively and
(c) engaging in the discourse appropriate to specific social contexts and purposes
→ the writing product, the writing process, and tailoring writing
Lesson planning
★ Planning must be done on two level
(1) writing cycle
- three phases such as pre-writing, writing, and revising/editing
(2) individual lesson
- five phases such as activation of prior learning, preview/warm-up, lesson core, closure, and follow-up/reflection
→ Teachers should be mindful of maintaining a balance between teacher-centered and student-centered activities, providing enough time for students to practice and apply concepts, and leaving time at the end to make sure that students understand whatever homework is assigned
★ oral comments, written comments, for both in feedback
(1) written feedback: to reinforce the strengths of a paper or indicate areas where improvement is needed → time-consuming, open to misunderstandings and different interpretations
(2) oral comments: to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the paper → not being possible in some setting such as on office hours or unavailable outside class
(3+) recording comments: faster and easier for teachers, additional practice in listening comprehension, oral-aural channel such as vocal inflections and pitch
★ peer feedback
(1) an authentic audience
(2) critical reading skills
(3) focusing on issues that teachers do not have time
☆ potential drawbacks to the use of peer feedback
(1) students do not always give good feedback
(2) students frequently resist or disregard peer feedback activities
Pre-writing activities
▲ One of the greatest challenges in writing is getting started.
▲ Pre-writing activities can be targeted toward linguistic development, fluency, idea generation, building up knowledge about a topic, or combination of all of these.
▲ a starting place for writing = readings
→ Writing teachers need to think carefully about how they will use readings in their courses.
→ Some questions for writing teachers
○ What will students do with the reading in their writing?
○ What challenges might this reading pose to students?
○ How can I exploit this reading to teach something about writing?
The process approach
★ the dominant paradigm in writing instruction
→ Students produce more than one draft of each piece of writing for feedback and evaluation, and emphasis is placed on supporting students through the various stages of writing.
Reading and writing connections
▲ The connection between reading and writing is an important consideration.
▲ Reading and writing are intimately connected and that one cannot easily be taught without the other.
■ Hirvela (2004)'s three main areas of reading-writing connections
(1) Reader response theory: reader's active participation
→ Teachers can ask them to reflect on the strategies they use for reading.
(2) Writing to read: using writing as a way of interpreting and understanding a text
→ writing about a topic in preparation for reading about it
(3) Reading to write: using reading as source of input in creating written text
★ the best practices that teachers should be aware of to teach writing effectively
(1) understanding why their students want or need to write
(2) being familiar with research on the writing process
(3) connections between reading and writing
(4) the role grammar and error correction
Student background and needs
(1) age and educational background of the writers
- children: writing for school
- adult: not necessarily writing for their jobs
(2) difference between L2 learners and foreign language learners
(3) "eye" learners and "ear" learners
- "eye" learners: through formal education
→ strengths in formal vocabulary and explicit knowledge of grammar
→ lacking the fluency and naturalness
- "ear" learners: through informal education, Generation 1.5"
(4) for academic reasons and for career reasons
→ Much of this literature assumes that students are writing for academic purposes; this may not always be the case.
▲ Students are frequently told to "use your own words" and are warned about the seriousness of plagiarism and its consequences.
▲ Writing teachers need to understand what these issues are so they can help their students learn to incorporate source materials into their writing appropriately.
▲ intertextulaity: all writing uses words and phrases that are preexisting and combined in new ways, referring to and building on what has come before.
▲ Beginning writers may have difficulties understanding how to follow their instructors' guidance about using their words and paraphrasing.
The role of grammar and error correction in writing
★ beginning writing teacher
- to point out and correct student errors
- to become frustrated both by the amount of time for error correction
(1) cognitive ability
- second language writing = writing ability + L2 proficiency
- L1: composing text is highly complex task that involves the consideration of many factors
- L2: more complex because of adding L2 attention on finding the appropriate language to express their ideas clearly and accurately
- low level students: new language form and structure
- high level students: composition process
→ Focusing on knowledge and skills
(2) sociocultural perspective
- the process of learning to write is the process of becoming a member of a discourse community
- different conventions for publishing articles in different disciplines
→ focusing on a purpose, audience, cultural setting
⇨ L2 writers need more of everything: more practice writing, more opportunities to develop effective writing strategies
⇨ Writing teachers need to aware that their students will not become experts over the course of few weeks or months and need to develop realistic expectations regarding what can be accomplished in a single term.
● Keyboarding and social media networks such as Facebook
- synchronous (real-time) communication as chats
- asynchronous communication formats as emails
- hypermedia authoring as designing webpages
● the availability of large language corpora
- a useful tool for teachers and students
- controlled corpus searches → improved students' awareness of specific linguistic choices
● automated systems for scoring and providing feedback on writing
- speed and reliability
- contradicting to the very nature of writing
- only counting things, not reading them
- no contextualization
● increasing use of automated software for detecting plagiarism
★ Globalization and technological advances
→ written communication in essence
★ Writing has moved to a more central place in curriculum.
★ the nature of L2 writing ability = cognitive + sociocultural
★ the difference between speaking and writing
- Writing takes longer than speaking, leaving physical trace
- Feedback is absent → more careful use of words
- In cognitive domain
▲ different purposes and functions: planned and permanent
▲ writing is more formal and use more complex structures
▲ correctness is more highly valued in writing
1. What does it mean to know how to write?
2. What is the role of writing in the second/foreign language curriculum?
3. What do English as a second or foreign language teachers need to know about writing to design and teach a writing course?
○ English teacher: Elizabeth
○ Students: 16 students form 11 different countries, different discipline
○ Procedure
- grouping
- giving them writing assignments
- reminding them of audience, purpose, and genre
- asking them to report on the similarities and differences
- giving them handout listing several of verbs
- presenting the instruction
- introducing writing assignment
○ Features of the class
(1) a collaborative class
(2) reading as a first step for writing
(3) writing in one subject area → writing in another (x)
(4) global issue (audience, purpose) + local issue (verbs)
⇨ Writing in a second language is complicated endeavor.