Developing Language Skills in the Writing Class: Why, What, How, and Who

Mechanics Awareness

When reading and writing, I am constantly aware of vocabulary, grammar, and usage. As my literacy skills developed I would notice the how author’s syntax was different from how I would frame my sentences, but were still grammatically correct nonetheless. English is such an interesting language because there are so many different ways to be simultaneously right and wrong when reading and writing. There are so many different ways that the meaning of our writings can be interpreted; I do my best to ensure that my meaning is plain and clear.

Acquired Language

I view literacy as a daily, lifelong process which includes academic and informal language acquisition. I learned what acceptable academic documents were by reading academic articles. When presenting a formal project I also took on the voice of the academic article and used similar vocabulary when speaking. Without this knowledge, my research papers would probably be littered with personal voice with little additional insight.

Like most people, any informal development literacy activities were acquired when I was young and usually involve reading various topics of interest. My mom always encouraged me to read everything: newspaper comic strips, magazines, signs. I soon developed a tendency to read anything that could catch my eye. I’m still learning about how to approach various forms of formal and informal literacy opportunities because there are still words I’m learning and styles I’m adapting to that furthers my knowledge.

L2 Students’ Language Development

It depends on the student’s readiness for language development in a writing or literacy course. There could be a system of recommendations based on class scores and performance that demonstrates how prepared an L2 student is for the next class. However, seeing that the vast majority of native English speakers in the US don’t speak or write in completely correct English, I don’t see the need for L2 students to go beyond a certain point in English literacy learning. Things such as vocabulary, active voice, punctuation, and transitioning should be the focus for L2 learners that are advanced acquirers in academic settings. The purpose of writing in academic settings is to present data and convey multiple ideas that follow a central theme or ultimate finding. If students are able to stay in the present tense, use higher-than-expected vocabulary, correctly punctuate, and transition to the next idea then small things like subject-verb agreement and word choice or word form are simple editing fixes.

Developing Students’ Linguistic Knowledge

As a prospective teacher, I feel very comfortable developing the linguistic knowledge of my writing students. It wouldn’t necessarily be an easy task, but it’s an important one. My major concern is deciding if what I’m teaching them is vital to their writing or insignificant. Ferris’ ideas of treatable and untreatable errors is mentioned on page 336 and I’m still reflecting on the idea of errors such as lexical choice or sentence structure (Ferris & Hedgcock, 2014).  Should these errors be ignored and left for students to figure out on their own or could students end up fossiling the errors as correct information? Would the mini-lessons that are suggested help the student that’s struggling the most? I fear teaching topics in a way that students might find hard to comprehend or too simple to pay attention to.

References

Ferris, D.R. & Hedgcock, J.S. (2014). Teaching L2 composition: purpose, process,        

   and practice, 3, 40.

Improving Accuracy in Student Writing: Error Treatment in the Class Composition

My Writing Process

I focus on the linguistic accuracy of my work as I am typing or writing. I know that none of my work is without error, but I try to catch as many issues as possible. I developed this strategy after years and years of formal education and correction at home to acquire the grammatical knowledge that I use to edit my work. In addition to being taught by authority figures, as my knowledge of sentence structure developed, I began to notice the sentence structure I books I read. If I liked how the author’s style I would try to mimic it in school during my next writing assignment. Whatever errors I made in developing a new writing style would be corrected by my teacher.

Effective Editing Approach

Overall, I believe that my approach to editing is effective to a certain degree. I usually make very few grammatical or punctuation errors since I edit as I go. However, it isn’t time efficient. What takes other people two or three minutes to go back and make revisions, takes me much, much longer. This provides me with the foresight to see if I should scrap an idea or add or delete a few words or sentences, but sometimes the concept suffers because I make too many corrections. I’ve recently tried writing down main points. While my typing time is faster because my ideas are written down, I may make more errors in other areas.

Student Feedback Error

Being grammatically correct was drilled at home and by certain teachers at school, it would be the most challenging to give students feedback on grammar. It would be difficult to step outside of my biases about grammar. I would be questioning if I’m giving too much attention to a small grammatical error.

Grammar is also a wide and varied subject. There are so many rules in addition to possibilities, that often native English speakers are confused. If not taught consistently and constantly reinforced at a young age, grammar is daunting to learn. I feel that for ELLs it is a difficult concept to grasp because the only answer that you can provide for why their sentence is incorrect is simply: those are the rules.

Ideas for L2 Student Editing

I would encourage L2 students to type their written work into Google Docs or Microsoft Word to help with editing written work. I would also show them how to turn on the grammar function so they will have to click on and have the program explain why their sentence needs correcting. I’m sure that there are other programs that students can use in the self-editing process, however, my knowledge is limited. In addition to using writing programs, I would encourage students to have a page of notes providing examples of sentences, articles, and other things that they can use in the self-editing process. I currently use the aforementioned programs and I have used a similar page of notes in the past, but my current process of editing only contains one of those elements and I would not suggest that as the only method of editing to L2 students. I also wouldn’t suggest them editing every single error as they write or type. It’s too time consuming and I would rather them focus on their ideas and structuring a sentence to the best of their ability.