Report

Diana Katona & Matt Milanowski Fall 2009

**__ESL Learners & Co-Authoring in the Classroom__** Learning English as a second language is not one of the easiest things to do. It takes time, dedication and it makes for a lot of mistakes to take place before words are used correctly. That is why having a guide and someone to be there as you are learning is such a crucial part of ESL students’ learning. Part of our study for this final was to see how coauthoring benefits ESL students as they try to master their English language knowledge. As I read some of the articles we found on both coauthoring and different ways of teaching ESL students, I found that coauthoring and student editing is often used in the classroom to help students out, especially since a teacher cannot always find the time to help each student. Susan R. Adams started her career as an ESL classroom teacher, not very found of the idea to begin with and when she realized her students didn’t want to write, she didn’t make them. She avoided having her students write as much as possible because she noticed they had a difficult time writing more than a few sentences at a time. That quickly changed when she came back from a writing workshop for teachers. There she learned that her students need to be proud of being writers, but before they get there, they need to understand that writing can be a difficult process even for a teacher. She started by showing her students her own examples and how she struggles with the writing process. This encouraged her students. They began to analyze poems, write their own poems, and write their own stories. The students worked together to help each other find the right words they were looking for. When the student works were done, Adams found ways to display them for other students and teachers to see, and when the students were given positive feedback, they were more proud of their work than ever before. Adams realized she needed to encourage her students and stick when them on their process even when it is difficult and frustrating so they can learn how to write. An article by Charlotte Bruce titled //Spy Works- A Collaborative Creative Writing Model// in 2001, discussed a creative writing project done at a high school. Students had the chance to work with the CIA to visit the headquarters, do research on spying and write their own stories about them. This particular class has many different languages and backgrounds they used to incorporate in their stories and they bounced ideas off of each other to make a better story. There are plenty more articles and research that has been done on ESL student teaching, but somehow they seem to have the same message. When teachers encourage their students, come up with creative projects, and have the students learn from each other, the ESL students learn more effectively. It’s not an easy process to teach someone how to write in their second or third language, but I’ve been there and I’ve done it and if it wasn’t for my classmates who helped me find the right words when I was struggling, and if it wasn’t for my teachers who encouraged me to keep on going even when it was the hardest, I wouldn’t have learned as quickly and as efficiently. Even after 14 years of being here, I still wrestle to find the right words to say at times, but there’s usually always somebody I can rely on to help me find the missing word. And that’s what it’s all about: coauthoring in life.

The idea of co-authoring in the classroom sounds like an impossible task to too many teachers these, who also neglect some of the benefits of literature circles and workshop groups. Co-authoring is something that, when used properly, can allow students to make discoveries together that a teacher might not otherwise be able to inspire. While reading articles on this topic, it became apparent from the start that there is some an ill used interchange in terms. To clear up what co-authoring is, Michele Ann Eodice offers the definition of co-authoring is two or more people writing something face-to-face. This allows students to bounce ideas back and forth and explore different points of view. This is different from one person writing and another checking it over and adding a part. Other articles went into how practicing teachers have used co-authorship in the classroom. For example, Helen Dale writes about how she observed her class in small groups working on a writing assignment. She notes that students don’t separate revising and editing and leave them for the end. Instead students unconsciously do these things while they are writing. This takes a lot of burden off a teacher, who usually has to struggle to get students to revise and edit, while also teaching students how to do those things in an engaging, self-lead fashion. Another article by Nancy Adir, is an example of a form of Co-authoring being used in a class. This is an interesting article, as it includes an ESL learner’s side to it. Nancy has students from Africa, working on their English writing, collaboratively write a story with students from America. This isn’t face-to-face interaction, but given the Atlantic Oceans position between the two groups of students it is still a very interesting project that more teachers might want to pursue. These articles are just skimming the surface on the study of co-authorship and workshop groups. From what was read in our research efforts it is apparent that co-authoring, and group work in general, is very beneficial, not only to ESL learners, but to all students learning how to write. This kind of structure in the classroom gives students an audience a part from the teacher, and it gives ESL students a guide through the mess that is the English language that is their age.