What Shall We Learn?

With my last post I discussed how I wanted my students to view me as a writing teacher.  After looking back at my response I realized I value the individual.  I feel this is a value that a lot of new teachers go into the classroom with, but I have seen many first year teachers become overwhelmed with the reality of teaching to the test and following standards and then sadly drop individualized teaching methods.  I know that I will be unable to fully combat the stress and new workload of my first year of teaching, but I feel that if I consistently focus on the individual not only will my students benefit, but by not leaving individualized teaching at the wayside, I will create a successful classroom community early on in my career.  

Having discussed the student’s view of me, I want to now move on to what the students will gain from the class.

What do I want my students to leave my class having learned? Developed? Practiced? Why?

This is a question that I could spend years answering.  I want my students to learn and practice everything! I want them to be expert writers! But I don’t believe that I can teach them everything there is to know about writing in just one year, so I should probably focus on a few key things that I would like them to learn.  

One of the most important lessons I have learned is the difference between speaking English and writing English.  Since I grew up in an Appalachian culture, my writing teachers always focused on teaching the differences between written and spoken language, and letting us develop both.  We were encouraged to speak in our natural dialects and develop our creative writing style and voice with our personal dialects.  Written language or academic English was then placed with academic and argumentative papers.  I want to continue this practice in my own classroom.  

Understanding the separation between spoken and written language helped me to develop my own style and voice and also allowed me to take pride in my cultures dialect.  In an informal response to the article, “English Language Learners,” I stated, “How we speak English and how we write it are two different things and we as teachers need to understand the differences and help our ELL students connect their speaking with their writing.  I think that this could be accomplished with frequent short creative writing assignments.  With creative writing the students won’t feel as pressured and stressed about having to accomplish all the aspects of academic/argumentative writing, but they will still gain practice in how English works when written.  Also, I think that having students read their writing out loud to see how it translates from written to verbal can also help them see the differences between speech and written and can also help teachers understand what areas of writing the students are struggling more in.”

Creative writing not only allows students with different dialects to utilize their cultures language, but creative writing also allows English Language Learners to practice writing in English and helps them to see the differences between written and spoken language without the pressure of an academic essay. 

I want my students to understand the differences between written and spoken English so they are able to develop both their academic style of writing and also develop a style and voice that is separate from academic writing.  Allowing students to practice developing written and spoken English also teaches them that their personal dialects or other languages are not less than Academic English, but instead used for different purposes. 

While I feel that the separation of written and spoken language is very important for students to learn I also believe that teaching students a multitude of pre-writing methods helps them to see more than one way of thinking and also prepares them for future writing endeavors.

Cubing is one strategy that students can use when pre-writing.

Earlier in this semester I completed a collaborative pedagogy project where I was required to partner with a classmate and teach my class about pre-writing.  During the presentation we taught the class multiple different ways of brainstorming and pre-writing.  I want my students to learn multiple methods of pre-writing because I don’t want my students to think that there is only way they’re supposed to think when developing a paper.  I want them to develop their own brainstorming and pre-writing skills so they are better prepared for future papers, college writing, and work force writing.    

Students do not all think the same or write the same; so obviously not all students will brainstorm or complete pre-writes the same.  By teaching students different ways to pre-write, they will be able to pick and choose which method or methods work best for them.  Pre-writing and brainstorming skills are not only needed for the college bound student, but also for the military bound student, the vocational student, and the students that go into the workforce.  Understanding how they personally brainstorm or pre-write will prepare students to think on their own in whatever career they choose. 

I know that teaching pre-writing and the differences between spoken and written language are only two ideas that I want my students to learn. But both of these ideas can be taught and practiced throughout the year or semester I spend with my students.  These are not just one day lessons, but continual lessons that students will develop and personalize during their time with me, and hopefully continue to develop once they leave my classroom.  

I found this video helpful in explaining how dialects are used in literature and how writers can use them.  I would utilize parts of this video to illustrate to students how they can use their own dialects and what using a dialect in your writing does for the story.