In this essay, I will
explore on different writing activities and writing feedback that would suit
each of the 4 categories of student interest, as recognised by Lipstein &
Renninger, and how their research, could be generalized for our own ESL
students.
Introduction
Even though it is every
teacher’s dream, to see all of their students becoming interested writers, but
it didn’t occur to us that we can teach them to ‘love’ writing. But instead we
chose to see interest in writing as something that a person was born with.
Although interest plays a large role in motivation and confidence, we need a
clearer misunderstanding of how teachers and classroom practices can influence student’s
interest for the act of writing. Rebecca L. Lipstein and K. Ann Renninger
studied the perceptions of 178 students in grades 7, 8 and 9 to develop this
understanding. As a result, they had offer characteristics of students in four
phases of interest and describe instructional approaches to meet students wants
and needs.
Why does interest matters?
John Dewey (1913) explains
that students that are interested in a subject will have more confident about
their work in relation to that subject. Therefore it is effortless for them.
A person’s interest is
said to the most powerful tool in learning. Because, interest can influence
attention, goals and levels of learning.
“Even though interest has been recognized as an important
condition for learning, educators continue to wrestle with the difficulties of
working with academically unmotivated students”
(Hidi & Harackiewic, 2000)
Teachers didn’t know on
how their role could help the students to flourish their interest. It is
because that teacher’s often have thoughts that whether the students are
interested or not, that they might miss to recognize that they could contribute
in developing the student’s interest. A teacher’s dream is to see their
students have interests in writing and becoming a good writer. But in reality,
we find only few of our students with these traits.
As for writing, having an
interest definitely affects the way how the students approach writing and the
results that they receive.
“Research on writing and motivation indicates that students
who have an interest for writing are more likely to set affective goals, make
use of helpful strategies, and seek feedback as they work with writing tasks”
(Lipstein & Renninger, 2007)
Suitable writing strategy for each category of students.
Phase one students
Phase one students are
students that are in primary school. These students are more likely to describe
writing as ‘boring’ and needs a lo0t of work. Usually they are confused on how
do they approach the task.
What they wants
§ Phase one students wants
teachers to understand how writing is something that is hard for them to do.
§ They want writing to feel
easier for them. Something they would enjoy and not hard work.
What they need
Teachers play the role of
facilitating what the student wants. Teachers will need to facilitate them in
receiving concrete suggestions and strategies for them to write.
Writing activities that could be done
1)
Creating sentence completion
§ Provide a worksheet that
has a word written on it. For example, ‘Apples, Apples.
§ Ask them to write simple
sentences to describe the word
Why?
§ Students can relate the
words with what they know. So the task will not be a burden to them.
§ Students could trace the
beginning part of the sentence and just add one or two more sentences to
describe the word.
§ Students could build their
grammar
2)
Create an organized and detailed writing prompts (this
involves 4 worksheets)
§ 1st worksheet
-
Give a worksheet with unfinished sentence. For example ;
‘When I grow up I want to be .’
§ 2nd worksheet
-
This worksheet will have an instruction. For example ; Let’s
say the student wants to be a scientist. The instruction would be ‘What will I
do if I want to be a scientist?’
-
Ask them to fill up the box with simple words explaining on
what they will do if they want to become a scientist.
§ 3rd worksheet
-
Prepare the worksheet for sentence completion. For example ;
‘When I grow up, I want to be a scientist
-
Provide 2 boxes in the worksheet and label them :
-
Box 1 – ‘First I need to do .’
-
Box 2 – Then, I will .’
-
Ask the students to fill up those 2 boxes in simple words /
sentences.
§ 4th worksheet
-
Give a blank piece of worksheet, have the students to join
the words that they had provided to build up sentences.
-
During this exercise, teachers will need to walk them through
it and have them help each other.
Why?
§ Students will know how to
organize their writing, by which comes first method
§ They will be able to make
up sentences by joining them together
§ Its fun and not
pressuring, they will constantly have to use their imagination to make up words
to complete their writing.
Phase two students
What they want
Phase 2 students already
have the basics on how to write. At this phase they like getting feedback from
the teachers. They take writing is to be done in order to please the teachers
and getting back compliments / feedback.
What they need
These students have this
impression of that the right way to do it is the teacher’s way. They need to be
taught and encouraged to have their own say in their writing.
Writing activities that could be done
1)
Creative story writing
The teacher could either give them a topic or let them choose a topic on
their own. Have them construct a story. During this session, the teacher will
facilitate them on how they should write their stories, giving suggestion for
them to ponder on or why they had chosen that particular topic. Have them give
ideas to each other, while the teacher gives comments or feedback about those
ideas.
Why?
§ Promotes creative writing
§ During the session, the teachers
will facilitate, they like getting feedbacks on the article that they are
currently doing, from what the teacher comments on, they improvise.
§ With active interactions
between teachers and students during the sessions and getting instant feedback
at the same time, they will put in extra effort, effortlessly.
Phase Three students
What they want
Students in this phase
loves writing and consider it as a place where they can go and be free. It is
fun for them because they get to make their own rule on what they wanted to
write. And because they like writing they would revise and will gladly spends
more time on writing. They do not prefer feedback and peer conferencing on
telling them how to write.
What they need
To encourage them to write
and to channel their enthusiasm and to broaden their awareness of writing
conventions and audience expectations.
Writing activities that could be done
Because of their need to
express themselves through their ideas, this kind of activity would suit them.
In this phase, the students already know the different types of writing that
they need to use when they are given a topic to write. (narrative, persuasive
or expository).
§ Find an article for them
to express their ideas. For example; write an expository essay on the topic ‘Heavier
punishments for traffic offenders.’
§ Have them explain reasons
to support this topic. Use several examples to support that reason.
Why?
§ As they love to express
themselves in writing, by providing a topic and let them write it however they
want it, could encourage them more.
§ They don’t mind the extra
revision that they need to do, and by doing research ti expands their ideas.
§ They could read aloud
their essays and take part in a teacher – guided discussions to defend their
own point of view.
Phase Four students
What they want?
In this phase, the
students wants to please audiences and themselves by showing balance between
their personal standards to a more widely accepted standards of good writing.
What they need
They need to continuously
be challenged in order to improve and they want and do not mind receiving
constructive feedback about their writing.
Writing
activities that could be done
Research writing
§ The objective is to help
the students incorporate sources in their essay
§ Why we use sources?
§ They will need to do some
research as a way to sort out different reasons.
§ Facilitators need to
emphasize that in order to prove that the ‘thesis’ is correct, they will need
to go beyond and research all ideas.
§ Let the students look at
the author’s use of sources. Asking some possible questions along with it. For
example ; ‘What do quotes do?’, ‘How does the author use the quote?’, ‘What is
the balance between the quotes and the author’s own voice?’
§ Outline to the students
what are the ideal structures for quotes.
§ Break them into small
groups and have them discuss from each other’s papers
§ Write out their essays.
Why?
§ As they do not mind peer
conferencing, it will help them construct and improvise.
§ A more detailed topic was
given because they are already good writers. And from that detailed topic, they
will need to do a lot of revising as their writings will then be presented to
audiences.
Suitable writing feedback
Phase one students – Indicidualised feedback
As they are not good in
writing, they are a bit confused on how to approach the task. So, an
individualised feedback is the best because they want a concrete suggestion
type of feedback from the teachers, to tell them whether they are doing it
correctly in a constructive manner. So, the suggestions are manageable and
easier for them to digest, thus making the writing feels easier.
Phase Two students – Individualized feedback
These students most likely
will accept suggestion given to them without any questions. And if they
completely accept those suggestions, it could not progress them to be a good
writer. Those suggestions could be posed as questions, such as,
‘What if ….?’
‘Why did you choose
these?’
‘What did you choose
these?’
‘What are you trying to
state in the paragraph here ….. is that what you mean?’
By posing the suggestions
as questions, it will make them think of other options that they can use.
Phase Three students – Individualized feedback
The problem here is for
the teachers to give feedback without dismissing as contrary or intrusive to
their way.
Feedback could be given
through audience response. It is due to their desire to impress an audience. For example ;
‘Could you make the point
clear to me, because I am not sure what
you mean?’
With this type of comments,
these students most likely won’t dismiss it. The reason being is that these
comments do not state negative comments about their writing.
Phase Four student – Individualized feedback and peer
conferencing
Individualized feedback
It is important for comments
or suggestions to be balanced. Adding in constructive suggestions, for their
improvement. Reason is, it challenges them and help them grow as good writers.
Peer – conferencing
Constructive comments
given by peers could help them realise what are other ideas that other people
might have. Therefore by comparing their writing to their peers, they could
stretch their writing in order to improve.
During the process of
doing this assignment, I had read a few online journals and e-books that I
found on the internet, regarding Lipstein & Renninger’s research. I am not
an ESL teacher currently, but I can relate their findings to what I experienced
during my school years. I still can recall on how I hate writing. But, from the
activities that were used by my teachers to grab our attention and help us
write, makes writing seems like we are not doing writing, compositions and sort
at all. At the same time, we would actively participate in giving or voicing
out our opinions and putting it into words. And at the end of the day, voila!
We had written something.
If I were to ask from the
point of view of an ESL teacher, I think that Lipstein & Renninger had
helped all teachers by summarizing the phases of students and by what they
prefer and don’t prefer. So, teachers could start building their lesson plans
from there. According to types of phases that the students are categorized in.
It is important for all
teachers to know the strength of their students. It will make activities be
done much easier. 2 things could be accomplished, the student understands what
they are learning because the teachers does not only teach but facilitates them
on what they need. Teaches on the other hand achieved their teaching goals.
What I understand from
their work also, is that to teach writing to student is age – related. Most
important thing is interest. Because according to them, interest for writing
affects the ways that students approach writing and the results they achieve.
To have them be interested in writing is the first step to sculpt a good
writer.
Student wants to be heard.
So, by facilitating their needs according to the phases, it will deepen their
interest for writing.
“It is worth noting that the needs of students in one phase
becomes the wants of students in the next phase.”
(Lipstein & Renninger)
Therefore, by noting their
needs, students will then develop more interest in writing, enjoying what was
once hard for them.
Also, in their research,
they had provide, the proper ‘what kind of feedbacks’ on student’s paper,
according to their phases.
We cannot use only certain
kind of feedback for all of the students. Certain phases might use or need more
than 1 type of feedback in order for them to be a strong writers.
Advantages of peer – conferencing
Lipstein & Renninger
spoke about peer – conferencing in their work. It is a successful ambition,
students could learn a lot not just about what are their strength and
weaknesses, but also how and what it takes to make a good story.
But not all phases likes
peer – conferencing. Because to them, at that stage they don’t like to be
criticise especially by someone whom they think who is not superior enough to
be commenting their work.
But at certain phases,
peer – conferencing are needed and could be useful because it helps them see their work from other people points
of view, not just one particular person.
There are many pros and
cons of peer – conferencing, and every pros will have its cons.
The pros of peer
conferencing are we get to view our own writing from other people’s
perspective. From there we would know what did we do wrong, how do we correct
it and so on. Peer conferencing is good because we get to share ideas with
other people. No one can say the same thing as someone else; therefore, we get
wide variety of opinions.
Furthermore, I do believe
that the more students are actively engaged in something, the more and the
better they learn. Through peer conferencing students takes an active role,
because all these times, teachers and students worked in an isolated
environment. A situation where students write and teacher’s grade. Therefore,
students missed out on an opportunity to learn from each other, having
conversations about their writing and read more. So, by having student
participates in peer conferencing, they will take interest at other’s writing.
Also a root for them, when they receive back their essays from their teacher’s.
Promoting peer
conferencing will have the students understand that they are not being lectured
to but they can teach each other. Students must know what is wrong before
having to correct it. Therefore by viewing their peers work, the more they
could learn and apply that knowledge to their own writing. They train their
eyes to spot the mistakes, so that they won’t repeat that same mistakes.
Lastly, the pros of peer
conferencing are less paperwork for teachers. When peers edited their work,
teachers could concentrate more on the students.
Disadvantages of peer conferencing
Peer conferencing has no
grading system on the qualities of peer review. Different journals have
different sets of standards. We would not know the reviewer’s quality and
expertise.
There might be chances
that a good writing could get rejected, whilst a poor writing could easily
pass. Because, maybe writing are judged whether the other peer likes them or
not, rather than the results of the writing.
Students don’t really know
how to evaluate writings. Perhaps more on minor, mundane mistakes, for example;
grammar and punctuation mistakes rather than the content.
Having students to judge
their peer’s work could be uneasy. Resulting to them not giving honest
comments.
Can Lipstein & Renninger research be generalized.
After reading through
their work, I would suggest their theories can and should be generalized.
Because, we would just focus on the needs that they had stated, and enhance
student’s interest in writing rather than making them feel like it’s a burden.
Therefore, understanding of the student’s characteristic according to their
phases could really help teachers.
By learning writing,
students enhance their skills in grammar, spellings and learning new words, in
their way as how they want it to be. Provided that lesson plans be carried out
effectively, the results would be amazing.
Conclusion
I concluded that, and we
all know that to educate people is a tedious process. Everyone has their own
sets of mind and their own way of thinking. But in an overall manner, in
writing, each phase of students has their own ways on how they need their
lessons be taught to them. it is important for teachers to listen to their
students need, to make them be successful and achieve the satisfaction of being
a good educator.
REFERENCES
v
5 reasons student should
be doing peer editing, viewed at http://secondarysolutionsblog.com/5-reasons-students-should-be-doing-more-peer-editing/
accessed on 12th Nov 2013.
v
Renninger, K. Ann, (2009)'Interest and Identity Development in
Instruction: An Inductive Model',
Educational Psychologist, 44:2, 105 — 118
v Rebecca L. Lipstein and K.
Ann Renninger (2007), Interest for
Writing: How Teachers Can Make a Difference, The English Journal, Vol. 96,
No. 4 (Mar., 2007), pp. 79-85,
vEngaging students in the writing process, viewed at http://engagingstudentminds.wordpress.com/author/bethanyalder/
accessed on 12th Nov 2013.
