A great number of students usually voice that their least favorite skill is writing because they find it hard to generate ideas and organize them into a coherent text, or when they hit on an idea, they cannot translate it into actual words. No doubt writing is a painstaking job for our students because the skills involved in this process are highly complex: L2 writers have to struggle with the higher level cognitive skills of planning and organization as well as lower level skills such as spelling, word choice, punctuation, and so on when they must pen to write.
However, there is a viable alternative to put an end to this struggle: we, teachers can turn this daunting task into an enjoyable and enlightening learning experience by immersing our students in the world of Literature. As there is a close connection between reading and writing, our students can become confident writers if reading literary texts complements their writing. The aim of this article is to point to compelling evidence for this claim and draw a direct connection with process writing.
Advantages of reading literature to improve writing
First, literature is basically enjoyable. Most people like to «read about human situations, concerns, problems, solutions and emotions» (Vandrick, 2003, 264). Reading inspires students, gives them something to talk and write about apart from their own personal experiences. Undoubtedly, J. K. Rowling and J. R. R. Tolkien, among others, will fire their imagination with their tales of adventure, John Grisham will make them flick through stark realities and 18th century poets will fill their hearts with strong feelings. Either these talented writers or the ones we choose will help our students create lively and memorable written texts.
Secondly, by reading, students get in contact with models of good writing and have the possibility to see how organization, syntax and language and so on should be like. In the same vein, literature serves as a valuable source of language input in the EFL context. Reading broadens EFL learners’ vocabulary and syntactic structures, which can have a positive effect on the quality of their writing pieces. «Students are also exposed to language patterns that help them to see the many and complex ways that sentences and paragraphs can be put together» (Vandrick, 2003: 265).
Thirdly, on pedagogical and cognitive grounds, a literary work can lead us to trigger off contextualized, meaningful and personalized writing. Besides, as Vandrick (ibid) explains «practice in analyzing and interpreting literature, teasing out its multilayered meanings and aspects, cannot help but make students get more sophisticated in their own thinking and writing.» In fact, there is every likelihood that students will feel a real purpose for writing as the context will be clear, realistic as well as stimulating. They will experience that writing does not exist in a vacuum or is not just a language-display activity. This time, writing will pay off the effort.
Finally, it also improves their ability to think critically and independently. While and after reading, students judge the author´s views, make their own opinions and develop new knowledge and, these insightful observations will probably materialize in their writing.
Because of all the reasons mentioned above, we have also thought of different ideas to make students read and afterwards write in an organized way:
Reading and Writing into Action:
It is worth mentioning that our students can start reading from an early age and base their writing pieces on it. To start with, it is important to acknowledge the importance of children’s literature. According to Collie & Slater: «Children’s literature is able to stimulate personal involvement, arousing learners’ interest and provoking strong positive reactions from them; it is meaningful and enjoyable, and reading it has a lasting and beneficial effect upon learner’s linguistic and cultural knowledge» (1987: 6).For example, we can build confidence in our students before writing by reading fables such as Aesop’s Fables, in particular «The Shepherd’s Boy», which most students do not usually have comprehension problems with because they have been reading it since they were children or they have heard of it.
Not only does this fable enable students to practise structures in the simple past and vocabulary, but it also prompts them to release their feelings because they quite often remember their child memories, consider the value of telling the truth and it is useful for their personal growth. Besides, if they feel comfortable with these stories which are familiar to them, they will probably develop a reading habit, which is highly desirable. In addition to this, young students can feel motivated to write creatively because they have received both meaningful and comprehensible input and inspiring ideas. In McKay’s words, «literature may promote our students’ own creativity…it may increase the motivation to interact with a text, and thus ultimately increase their reading proficiency» (1986: 193). In conclusion, fables are short easy reading, students can identify the topic or the problem and relate it to their life and the complexity of these texts is low in comparison with other types of texts. All these features can help our children deal with a language and a culture that do not belong to them when writing.
Children are not the only ESL students who can benefit from this approach; adolescents and adults can also see the bright side of it and do carry out more sophisticated tasks. For instance, a group of students who have read «The Picture of Dorian Gray» by Oscar Wilde can take either on the role of Lord Henry Wotton -Dorian´s unscrupulous friend- or one of the servants who found the body in the attic and, work on his potted biography. There are also interesting short stories written by Wilde like «The Canterville Ghost»; this could be adapted for a stage performance in which students would be in charge of writing the script after focusing on the written version. Then, Wilde´s comic play: «The Importance of being Ernest» let students write down a comparison between the two identities of Jack Worthing. Once again, reading Literature with mature students becomes a springboard for meaningful, personalized and creative writing.
Writing and Reading Can be Fun
Some interesting projects have been done using songs as the students´ written production after reading. Bonilla M. and Del Campo M. (2008) issued a research paper called: «English classroom projects: Turning Experience into Learning for both Teachers and Students Through Literature», where students were able to write songs after reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling. According to these researchers, students were organized in pairs and they had to write a draft of a song that summarized a chapter of a book bearing in mind aspects like coherence, rhythm, rhyme, grammar, among other issues while their teacher actively participated in the process of feedback until the final versions were produced. Some examples of these students’ production are available on the Universidad Pedagógica Nacional´s virtual magazine. As it can be seen, students can also have a lot of fun when they write about what they have read while important issues such as contextualized and meaningful writing is developed.
Process Writing and Collaborative Learning
Reading literary pieces can be complemented with a process approach to teaching writing. In the above examples, students are expected to work in groups to write their drafts which will be revised by the teacher and peers. Peer revision is subject to their level of proficiency. Students will have the chance to reflect upon the models they were exposed while reading, the language used in them, their own reading and writing skills and new strategies introduced by their own teacher or peers and learn to take more responsibility for their own writing process. What is more, in the process of writing the communication of the message is paramount and, therefore, the developing, but inaccurate, attempts at organization, grammar and lexis are not penalized because after drafting and redrafting students will gain control of these sub-skills.
Collaborative learning is also pivotal. Learners work together, exchanging broader perspectives and opinions and brainstorming richer ideas thanks to the insights gained after much reading. They also share resources, help and support each other to reach a common goal: their written production. Even if learners have to turn in an individual piece, process writing implies collaborative learning. When they give peer feedback, they commit themselves to reading their drafts critically so as to improve them and reading extensively can contribute to more favourable and constructive feedback on their part. Most importantly, it has a boomerang effect because as students read their peers’ work critically, they become more seasoned readers, which in turn, helps them to be better writers.
Reading and Writing, a joint venture
From a humanistic standpoint, individual learners possess unique needs and goals (apart from their interests and learning styles) which we, teachers should hear and attend to diligently. This is the case of our students´ usual concern about their writing skills. There already exists an array of strategies and tips to help our students turn into talented writers but we have tried to make our humble contribution with this proposal: ESL students can excel at their writing when they read Literature fluently. By reading, students can discover that the field of Literature hides an incredible and never-ending source of motivating writing tasks as well as inspiring ideas to start writing and liven up their productions and reliable writing models to get by. Some teachers may rightfully claim that our initiative is doomed to failure from the start because in a visually-oriented society, students do not fancy reading. However, the literary world caters for all ages, proficiency levels in the L2 and likes ranging from classic works to contemporary version and varied genres. In this case, we must do our part of the share and first of all determine and respond to their demands, otherwise we might fail to attract their attention and our attempt to make a logical connection between reading and writing may break. On cognitive grounds, our proposal promotes not only a solid integration of these two skills but also makes emphasis on helping learners understand the very process of writing. It is our wish that our proposal mobilizes teachers around the world and more L2 students engross themselves in books to be better writers.
References
Bonilla M, Martha; Del Campo M, Marcela. (2008) English classroom projects: turning experience into learning for both teachers and students through literature. Folios de literatura e idiomas No. 28. Universidad Pedagógica Nacional: Bogotá.
http://www.scielo.org.co/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0123-48702008000200011&lng=en&nrm=iso
Collie, J. & S. Slater. (1987). Literature in the Language Classroom: A Resource Book of Ideas and Activities. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
McKay, S. (1986). Literature in the ESL Classroom. In C. J. Brumfit and R.A. Carter (Eds.), Literature and Language Teaching (pp. 191-198). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Vandrick, S. (2003) Literature in the teaching of second language composition. In Kroll, B. ed. Exploring the dynamics of second language writing.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Authors
Andrea Milagros Aparcana Cespedes
Andrea Fabiana Marrari
Silvia Gabriela Fernández
Marcela Díaz Ramírez
Martha Isabel Diaz Ramirez
Iris Susana Morena