Inna Gvozdenko, PhDPatricia Ciuffetelli
TEACHING WRITTEN GENRES
TO NEW ARRIVALS
ESL Conference 2009Transforming ESL pedagogy: Educating for Success in Learning
Outline of the Presentation
• Context• Student profiles• Focus on various genres (Why?)• Teaching cycle (What ?& How?)• Key activities• Use of ICT (When?)• Learning outcomes• Reflection (So what?)
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• NPELS is a P – 10 Victorian Government school. It has two campuses
• 314 students: 127 primary and 187 secondary
• Gender: males – 166, females – 146
• Intensive English language program for newly arrived refugees and
migrants
• Minimum of two terms tuition for students with age equivalent
education
• Up to 4 terms tuition for students
at risk or with disrupted schooling
Teaching Context
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• 57% of our students and their families have previously lived in refugee camps. Some have attended schools there.
• Many have experienced trauma, seen war and lost family members.
• Students come from 32 countries
•
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Country/Refugee camp
VictoriaIntensive
ESL programNPELS
MainstreamSchool
TAFE/AMES
Australian Community
work
Multiple Transition for new arrivals
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Why Focus on Written Genres?• NPELS aims “to improve student learning outcomes in the area of
literacy and to further develop the curriculum focus on student oral and written text production across the school” (NPELS, Annual Implementation Plan, 2009 p. 2).
• Interview data with the exited ESL students and their current ESL teachers has revealed that NPELS students benefit from being exposed to and explicitly taught about a range of writing genres at their early stage of English language learning (Gvozdenko, I. 2008, Mainstream school visit report).
• Text types are culturally determined, therefore ESL learners are less likely to be familiar with the features of the text types favoured in our culture.
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What is the Genre Approach
• Explicit teaching about text types:
1) social purpose
2) overall organisational structure
3) linguistic features
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The Curriculum Cycle
• Stage 1: Building Knowledge of the Topic
• Stage 2: Modeling the Text
• Stage 3: Joint Construction of the Text • Stage 4: Independent Writing
Gibbons, P. (2002). Derewianka, B.(1991).
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The genre-based Curriculum Cycle(Hammond, J., 2001)
Building the field Teacher assumes leadership in developing relevant curriculum knowledge, understanding and language. Activities focus on curriculum, knowledge, language relevant to that curriculum knowledge, reading and learning how to read.
ModellingTeacher introduces a specific genre, guides students through explicit talk, demonstration, text deconstruction
Joint ConstructionTeacher shares responsibility with students for writing in the genre through rehearsals, co-constructions, reconstructions.
Independent constructionTeacher withdraws support as far as possible as student exercises control over the focus genre
Opportunities for further reflection on the significance of the genre, and for critical analysis
Key Activities
Week Learning activities/experiences
1 Planning for learning , letters and invitations delivered
2 Meet buddies, play “The Cat in the Hat”, shared reading in small groups songs performed by students
3 Book report writing, information reports, excursions
4 View the movie “The Cat in the Hat”Writing a comparative essay and a persuasive letter to the editor, information reports
5 Formal oral presentations
6 Incursion “Snake busters”, games session
7 Make muffins, morning tea session
8 Make posters about students’ learning experiences (Part 1)
9 Make posters about students’ learning experiences (Part 2)
10 Prepare “Thank you” cards and presentations of the term activities 10
Text Types Targeted in 10 Week Teaching Cycle
Written texts Oral texts
Primary Secondary Primary Secondary
•Recount
• Information Report
• Procedure
•Transactional Texts (e.g. Letter writing, invitations)
•Recount
• Information Report
• Procedure
•Transactional Texts
• Book report
• Comparative essay
•Information Report (Oral presentation on reptiles)
• Procedure (How to play …)
• Recount
• Narrative
•Information Report
• Procedure
•Transactional texts
• Delivery of letters
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Selection of Text Types- Justification
Primary • Curriculum expectation• Text type linked to topic• Student interest • Age appropriateness
Secondary • Curriculum expectation• Text type linked to topic• Negotiated curriculum approach• Use of ICT
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A Negotiated Approach in the ESL Classroom (Breen, M. & Littlejohn, A.,2000)
Issues opened for negotiation:General enquiry: How do you feel in a new class? What are your values?
Purposes: What are your short/long term goals? What are your expectations of the class?
Teacher/student role expectations: What is your role in class? What do you think the teacher’s role is?
Content: What topics would you like to study? What skills do you want to develop?
Learning to learn: Do you know your learning style? How do you learn best? What strategies do you use in learning English? What activities do you like/dislike? Where would you like to go on excursions?
Evaluation: How would you like to be assessed? What could be the outcome of the work? What have you learned? Have you achieved your personal goals?
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Outcomes of the negotiation process AREAS OF INTEREST
Australia
Customs of different countries
Love and funny books
Celebration
Social skills
Technology
Grammar: Present, Past and Future tenses
Punctuation
Passive voice
Paragraph writing
EXPECTATIONS
Improve speaking and listening
Extracurricular activities
Learn new words
Learn about the world
Get a good position in class
Be brave and don’t be afraid of people
ACTIVITIES
Quiz , excursions
Word search
Watching news & movies
Using ICT
Typing stories
Grammar exercises
Group work, drama
Drawing, cooking
Listening to music
Playing games
Project work
Singing songs
Reading books
ASSESSMENT
Grammar worksheets & tests
Rubrics
Story writing Letter writing
Debating
Dictation
Spelling test
Listening test
Oral presentations
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Text type: Information ReportBuilding background knowledge •Read books about topics•Explicit vocab building •Watched DVDs•Independent research•Incursion/excursion
ModellingDeconstruction of exemplar information report(e.g. cloze activities)
Joint ConstructionCollaborative writing of information report (model the writing process)
Independent/small group construction
•Students independently construct text with minimum teacher support (Planning, drafting, editing, revising and publishing)
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Text Deconstruction Activities at the Modelling Stage
Crocodiles Crocodiles are reptiles.
Crocodiles have hard scales and sharp teeth.
Crocodiles eat small animals.
Some crocodiles live in fresh water.
Crocodiles are dangerous.
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Text Deconstruction Activities at the Modelling Stage
What are crocodiles?
How do you feel about crocodiles?
What do crocodiles look like?
Title:
Text Deconstruction Activities at the Modelling Stage
Crocodiles
Crocodiles are reptiles.
Crocodiles have _______ scales and _______ teeth.
Crocodiles eat _______ animals.
Crocodiles are dangerous.
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small hard sharp
Use of ICT
• Software– Word – Publisher – Power Point Presentation – Movie Maker
• Interactive White Board
• A set of laptops and class computers
• Emails
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Students’ Learning Outcomes
• Magazine “16 A+”• Two articles for the “Voices” magazine “”• Poster: “Learning about writing genres: Fun with
16 A and PT7”, displayed in the library• Using a Movie Maker “Our learning journey”• Dioramas about reptiles and oral presentations• Power Point Presentations “Marine Life”, “Snake
busters”, “Werribee Zoo” and “City Landmarks”• Class displays in Room 28 and PT7
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Students’ FeedbackPRIMARY STUDENTS
• Fatah: “I liked learning about snakes and writing about snakes”.• Adila: “I tried my best to do a beautiful writing in my letter”.
SECONDARY STUDENTS
• Fahmida: “I learned how to write with good manners and respect, have good points and then present the information in Power Point”.
• Mohammad: “The writing of essays is good because I improve my English.”
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Genres I am confident I am very confident
Information report 8 7
Letter and invitation 7 8
Comparative essay 8 7
Teachers’ Reflections on Teaching Genres
• High level student interest in and motivation towards learning about different written genres
• The importance of not making assumptions about students’ background knowledge of particular genres
• The importance of building knowledge of targeted written genres (i.e. social purpose of different texts, audience, organisational structure, language features)
• Building understanding of the writing process (i.e. planning, drafting, editing, publication / presentation)
• Curriculum Cycle – the need to provide scaffolding through modelling, text deconstruction before expecting students to create targeted texts independently
• While many genres were covered during the 10 week teaching cycle, the following issues emerged for us:
- How much knowledge of each text type exposed and explicitly taught did the students retain?
- How many text types should be covered in an 10 week program for secondary and 6 month program for primary?
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Making a giant poster
“I learned how to plan and design a poster. All students were interested in making posters. Primary students gave us some advice. I liked to make posters because they made me happy and showed what we had done.”
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ReferencesBreen, M.P. & Littlejohn, A .(2000). (Eds.) Classroom-decision making: negotiation and process syllabuses in practice. Cambridge University Press.Derewianka, Beverly.(1990). Exploring How Texts Work. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.Gibbons, Pauline. (2002). Scaffolding Language Scaffolding Learning. Teaching Second Language Learners in the Mainstream Classroom. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.Gvozdenko, I. (2008). Exit students’ and their ESL teachers ‘reflection on learning English at NPELS. Mainstream school visits.Hammond, J. (2001). Scaffolding and language in Hammond, J. (ed.) Scaffolding teaching and learning and literacy education. NSW: primary English teaching Association. Smith,A., Elley, N, Croft,D & Ciuffetelli, P. First Edition (2007). PM Writing Teachers' Guide Books (1, 2 &3 ), Cengage Learning ,South Melbourne.
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