On Writing: Spark the Learners’ Interest for Writing

The nature and the necessity of writing

Well-verified classroom reality attests that writing and writing production tasks constitute a multilayered procedure. As such, writing deviates from other aspect of language teaching in requiring holistic and prompt recall of language input.

 The differentiating of proper writing guidance is its productive element; irrefutably so, writing entails immediate, plentiful and proper employment of linguistic skills. This is the point that makes the issue of teaching students how to write notoriously thorny for the instructor. On an extensive scale, it is highly personal; writing is subjective and unique even with the very identical writer at different times or under different circumstances. Yet, our call is the constructible part of the procedure. Everyone can be guided into an effective writer.

Subconsciously English learners erroneously sense they are burdened with the presentation of impeccable pieces of written interlocution, straight from day one;  a deceptive notion that might lead our learners to feelings of inadequacy of means, resources and skill in order to deliver their track of thought into decent essays, articles, letters, reports, emails. In some cases, unrealistic expectations are even raised by the part of the teachers. Frequently we fail to communicate to our classes that the target is tangible, i.e. the deliverance of a delineated written message in the form of discourse is going to be acquired by all of them eventually.

I reason that tendency as follows:

For an inexplicable reason, one combines the notion of essay writing with the notion of perfection. That renders a barrier we need to defy in our routine second language practice.

Writing is discussion and exposure; those two are indispensable parts of the human life and relationships, intrinsic in interactions and transactions, verbal acts and communication. By default, defects, gaps and inconsistencies arise, as they repetitively do in all the aforementioned actions. Mediocre and even disappointing outcomes of the composition are constitutive parts of learning and acquiring knowledge. Hence, we furthermore equip learners with the gear to retrieve and address those inconsistencies in order to achieve optimum results.

Arising as an oxymoron, writing is a down-to-earth, achievable and concrete a notion. Compare, for instance, the effort of the teacher to clarify the intricacies of the English Language Grammar.

Poor Instruction leads to Poor Performance

Shift the essay- grading focus at the time when the teacher assumes the rater’s role.

 Until the procedure completion, the teacher needs to be vested in the guide’s role. It feels counterintuitive, as teachers inevitably feel the spur to grade the general skills chart of the student. We grade papers setting out-of-time grading standards for students. Sometimes we emphasize errors, omissions that are indicative of their linguistic feedback; yet, their correction does not serve the purpose of the writing progress. Grammatical, spelling, syntactical and orthographic mistakes, lapsi calami and poor handwriting correction are of no interest at this time point for the benefit of developing the writing skill; here and now, they are of secondary importance, as they do not serve the intended skill development. Our focus is upon inciting learners to acquire and adopt the mentality of the flow of consciousness. Any over-stress on the linguistic errors might steal the thunder of the content development, the focal point of that stage

The skills of simultaneous redress, automatic correction, edit and proofreading are to be acquired on a later stage, only once the address of the topic at hand has become a part of the learner’s mental equipment.

Instead, every single time we are examining a piece of writing we are to isolate it from the student and the student’s background and let the paper confess. The learner’s essay (not the learner) encounters the rating scale of the Camla Writing grading Grid. This valuable tool lies on the first pages of every HAU book intended for certificate candidates. It serves as the Holy Grail of Writing Instruction concisely communicating the writing tenets as a universal approach. It is advisable to familiarize the students with that scale, so that they acquire a tangible picture of the expected outcomes when they are appointed with writing tasks.

Violating the timing of the grading, the teacher might inflict learners, perpetuating this cycle that originates from the inherent fear of exposure and judgment and lead to over-correction that might lead to poor performance. In the end, the learner ends up fulfilling the law of the anticipated prophesy, that is, they are not efficient in that domain of English language; such perception is sheer fallacy as the learner concentrates on the abstractions that sadly, the teacher might bring into the spotlight. This mentality contributes to undesirable effects. Not unjustifiably so; maybe learners eschew writing- associated activities and writing, manifested by behaviors that range from procrastination to complete withdrawal.

Mentally visit a day of our classroom reality; each call for any writing task, be it an essay or a warm-up task, is met with daunting opposition by students. It is worth investigating the negation to subvert that biased mindset.

As already illustrated in the discussion, learners are convinced they are destined to fail in writing. Thought-provoking reaction, as they are witnessed to feel so long before their contact with the topic and the genre of the essay assigned.

Writing is a synthetic area wherein learners know beforehand that they are required to activate all parts of their learning; they are prejudiced for failure, as everyone carries their soft points. Learners need to know that fissure in the essay do not entail the paralysis of the entire paper. Also, learners –please keep a wary eye on the majority of the adult learners- realize that writing is the field they are bound to be corrected the most. Feelings of frustration and embarrassment are frequently recorded.

Writing is a tangible task

A manifest justification of the afore-discussed is that student lack clear itinerary. They -as well as teachers, occasionally-ignore the approach they are to follow after they familiarize with the topic. Students omit the quintessential steps of the stress-free writing procedure, in order to release the best of their ability according to level, age and individual potential.

Having discussed that, one might wonder whether there lies an innate, ubiquitous aversion to the procedure of written speech production. To state so is utterly ironic. Speaking and Writing are intimately interdependent faculties, two facets of the same skill; speech production and the deliverance of a certain message. The message could be the communication of an idea or event, the propagation of knowledge or news, some advice, the sharing of an experience, an opinion statement or a conviction.

Ironic, if we deem that the human breed is hard-wired foe speaking and interlocution, be it silent or verbal. The conclusion we draw is that the feelings of despair and inadequacy might regard the means from the mind or the heart to the blank sheet. Dearth of insistent teaching and examination of the vocabulary, inadequate interaction during the lessons, factor in towards this unsatisfactory repercussion. The effective instruction of the instructed material is to be remained among the high-end priorities of our teaching.

 Teachers’ feelings towards Writing Instruction

Teachers might need to consider whether students subconsciously adopt their instructors’ aversion to the writing instruction. Teaching writing is a challenging call and needs to be approached with flexibility.

At this point of the discussion I wish to make a clarification: Writing involves a degree of personal skill: every piece of writing is unique and telling of the student’s strong and soft points. It reflects their global progress, and the student’s distinct linguistic skills. To a certain pitch, students’ writing even reflects our skill to teach the language effectively. The individual factor yet, does not annihilate that proper writing can be instructed and obtained to all second language learners.

The English language instructor is responsible for the development of the students’ writing ability. Lack of resources, inspiration and competence of the teacher is mirrored upon the ultimate performance of the learners. Teachers erroneously anticipate decent writing outcomes from students because they are supposed to already be equipped, or supposed to already know how to write, or be endowed with the writing charisma from birthright.

Teaching writing demands meticulous reflection, compare and contrast and drawing of conclusions.

The Instructor is to create all the previously mentioned skills from scratch. Take as granted that your learners do not have a clue about compositions, they are in the dark. This will be our common part of departure from now on. When teaching writing, let us bear in mind that rudimentary and accidental knowledge and basic ability of ideas organization do not suffice to render them independent writers (yet).

Let us not confound two distinct realities: the essay content and its construction as a modus operandi.

The second language learner is not expected to offer original and brilliant ideas in order to submit a successful piece of writing. If he attains to do so, it is more than welcome, but it is not a prerequisite. In reality, the nature of the ideas is of no influence and the rater is not entitled to grade the essay based upon the soundness or the authenticity of the content. Second language writers can express any breed of idea they wish to offer that appropriately addresses the topic.

When met with inability to attain that, due to inadequacy of means, i.e. the vocabulary or the organization of ideas, then teachers are to aid towards the completion of that purpose. We need to effectuate that depending on the circumstances. For example, we might employ the elicitation technique, the permission of extra time, the direction through the planning of the essay.

Time management to fit writing in the English classroom

Writing-associated activities and theory of the writing genres demand time. Classroom time is another key factor but not exclusively in terms of quantity, as much as in terms of quality and density. Writing is to be ever-present, an indispensable part of the learning procedure. Let us manage and allocate our time wisely.

Mentally challenging tasks are to be addressed at the beginning of the sessions. If the instructor consumes predefined time dealing with homework correction, dictation-related activities, drill exercises, then, as the course proceeds, no spark of will or élan for writing is left neither for the learners nor for the English tutor.

To the afore-exposed, add the fact that we are not to expect our students to be able to instantaneously shift from the “receptive” mode to the “productive” mode. Students, exactly as we, have their strengths and boundaries to be respected. The learners’ mental stamina is to be stretched only finely and gradually.

Bring Journalistic material into the Class

Theory almost never fails, yet the challenge lies into the implementation of it: The practical aspect of engaging our students into writing is fulfilled by the aid of Journalism; Sparking, digestible narratives are offered in the modern internet- dominated era for decomposition, analysis and exemplification into our second language classes. Journalism touches upon real life and offers a frame of reference. Another blessing journalistic narratives offer is their flexibility and adaptability to the needs and limitations of the English language classes.

Despite their benefits, journalistic passages are underestimated as challenging and time- consuming to be tailored in ESL material. The writing syllabus is subject to adaptation, though. Instead of following a repetitive textbook passage, we could substitute it with updated texts opting for authors of our preference, or the students’ preference. Ignite their interest into reading. Introduce journalism as part of the curriculum that will also change their negative predisposition of discarding anything extra-curricular. Progressively, students develop concrete understanding of why they are undergoing the procedure of essay writing, and how this is attained.

Learners should comprehend that perfect writing requires much writing. Perfect writing gets established by the post- writing tasks. “Everything can be revised, erased, or rearranged later. The courage of creation is making bad beginnings”.