Final Project - ideas and possibilites

I still feel far from actually narrowing down a topic—I tend to have big ideas and a hard time whittling them down into a feasible question. For now, here are some tentative thoughts:

In general, I am interested in world Englishes and classroom perceptions of them. I know that as a teacher I have corrected some student “mistakes” that turned out to be accepted in varieties of English that are not my own—this might not be too common, but for example: I corrected the student-written “at the weekend” and later realizing that in British English, “at” is the correct preposition in that phrase. I’m not sure what kind of research questions to turn this topic into, though. Perhaps I could look at the “damage” done by these types of corrections? Or the experiences of ESL students who speak/learned/write in one variety of English and then are immersed in another variety (speakers of Indian varieties studying in the U.S., for example)—and if and how their writing (and their attitudes toward writing) are affected.

Another, more specific, question I am interested in is when and how fossilization occurs in terms of ESL/EFL writing (and whether or not that differs in an ESL context vs. an EFL context). Knowing more about this might give new light to the error correction debate: when it is more important to correct, etc. Something of this sort could turn into a data study, but I think this sort of question would work better (toward a more comprehensible answer) by synthesizing research already done.

Contrastive Rhetoric

Immediately upon reading the opening quote from Edward Sapir, I went into the linguist-trained mode: be wary of Sapir and Whorf, and don’t take the strong versions of their “hypothesis” (which wasn’t even a hypothesis and which has strong and weak versions).

As Casanave makes clear, we cannot and should not take it as an easy truth but we cannot simply reject the concept either. She suggests that the reality of cultural influence is much more complex and less extreme than most researchers want to consider (and then introduces Kaplan’s whole concept of Contrastive Rhetoric in a pretty critical way; see page 31). She reasonably asks, “what is a ‘cultural’ pattern of rhetorical organization?” (30). This is intangible—and can therefore be created and debated by scholars—and yet we’re trying to apply this intangibility to something “concrete” (at least, we think it’s concrete)—a piece of L2 writing—so that we can better measure this “concrete” thing against some “tangible” standard.

Kowal said that “Kaplan’s views of English and Oriental (and so on) rhetoric come from Kaplan’s own prescriptive expectations as a U.S. scholar within a very particular kind of educational system rather than from an understand of world Englishes” (Casanave 38). This seems obvious and evident to me; Hinds pointed out (also in Casanave) that Kaplan’s representation of English is ethnocentric. It seems that Kaplan would have to have been very aware and very careful to not make it so—and even had he been aware, some ethnocentricity could still be identified, as he’s writing from his own perspective in English. That’s what happens in contrasts. His base is English, because that’s what he knows—we shouldn’t be surprised that some ethnocentricity exists. But then, I think that’s one of the basic problems with CR: a comparison must have a base (standards and norms), and researchers are basing themselves in English—however, in assuming (even without bad intention) that what they know is the default, they “tend to create cultural differences that promote the superiority of Western writing” (Kubota, via Connor 233).

Can we say at some point that the rhetoric depends on the writer more than the culture? Or can we at least recognize that the writer has some power within and around the culture? And what about the reader? The gender of the writer, the education level, the generation? (Connor begins to mention, in her conclusion, the need for sensitivity toward some of these aspects.) As in English, no rhetorical structure in any language is absolute law. Let’s compare great writers of academia, poetry, and fiction within cultures. Certainly they won’t all follow the same structure, even within a language. There may be conventions per language or per culture or per country, but there’s no way of saying that all U.S. native-speaking English writers follow these specific characteristics.

And then there’s the generational problem: we’ve seen differences of writing produced under current-traditional and process approaches; should we group this all together as twentieth-century English rhetoric? This change is not a confined phenomenon; Casanave points out that “The famous eight-legged Chinese essay…is no longer an influential genre” (37). Conventions, styles, and movements change. They’re not confined by cultures.

I see the potential of CR. Some knowledge on culturally various rhetorics could help me as a teacher understand student approaches and figure out new strategies for L2 writing, but not in absolute terms. That languages make or have certain conventions, I accept. But I accept that those are not fixed.

Error Correction (and student demands)

I have a stack of article summaries, written by upper-intermediate level ESL students, awaiting my attention as soon as I finish this blog post. I’m probably going to pick up my pen, give each student a check mark for effort, and then circle or correct one or two patterns of error per summary.

These stances on error correction are difficult—I have a pretty set position when it comes to correcting spoken errors, but I’m not as decided with written errors. I found my own experiences in line with Casanave’s observation: “Not surprisingly, more students report that they want and appreciate teachers’ commentary, but in particular they claim to want help with grammar and vocabulary and may feel that a teacher who does not correct these language errors is not doing her job” (87). As I’ve said in class, my students often demand error correction from me. Casanave explains that students “tend to believe” that this type of correction helps, and although the studies presented in her chapter are generally pointing to an opposite direction or are inconclusive, there seems to have been at least some instances in which certain aspects of writing have improved with certain types of feedback and correction (pgs. 90-1).

Ferris reports that student opinions regularly show that they think error correction is a key aspect to their success (55). If students believe correction is essential, how do we incorporate these findings and change their views? They enter a class with these strong perceptions, and as Casanave even points out, we might only have a semester to work with them. Ferris suggests that we might need to raise student awareness about why correction is important (or, I suppose, depending on your own opinions, not important) (55). But in an L2 classroom that’s not always going to be practical—especially if students already have certain beliefs.

If writing can improve without local or careful correction, what does that say about the reverse? That is, does correction harm in any way (besides taking extra time and effort on the teacher’s part, though I’d argue that sometimes it takes less effort to red-pen mechanical and grammatical errors)? As Ferris says, “…if the existing longitudinal studies do not reliably demonstrate the efficacy of error feedback, they certainly do not prove its uselessness either” (55). That is, if the studies don’t conclude that correction is good, that doesn’t mean we can assume it’s bad. Truscott argues that it can give a bad impression to the students (Casanave 88), but in my experience that doesn’t hold true for many students who want and demand correction.

So what about the internal factor—the attitude or motivational changes due to error correction? Truscott, as cited in Casanave, says that it can be “discouraging” (88), but I don’t think that’s the only case. Some students seem to thrive on it. What if I make corrections to pacify the students, which boosts their confidence in me as a teacher, which then might in turn boost their motivation and confidence in their own writing? This will not happen with every student, of course, but part of my point is that each learner is unique (even if we can classify them by styles) and it’s possible that different learners respond in different ways: perhaps some are discouraged by error correction and perhaps others try to (even if they actually don’t) correct or revise future writing because of it.

Did any of the studies cited seem to really show that correction can be detrimental? And if not, does that mean that it is okay to continue correcting, or is that just teacher apathy and unwillingness to change an established system?

Individual L2 learners

Reading through Leki’s chapter on characteristics of L2 writers, I was struck by how often the result of some study was followed by a contradictory finding. I know that this chapter is basically a reference list identifying some of the findings in the field, meant to gather and present as much information as possible—and of course, some of those findings will contradict.

Reid’s article’s title states the apparent purpose of dividing learners into categories and naming how a person learns: we are “identifying the language needs.” As seen in Ferris’s article and Leki’s summative chapter, though, there are a whole lot of factors that may (or may not) influence and individual’s L2 abilities. Just looking at our own literacy histories, it is clear that each of us has had different motivations, different teaching and learning situations, and different results in our second language experiences. Although various characteristics are mentioned in Leki’s chapter, it surprised me that, put together, results or correlations for most were inconclusive. I also expected to see more influence between categories (as with the age-education level-time in US-L2 writing capability on pg. 116); it seems to me that certain categories (especially those dealing with the background and the relationship between the L1 and the L2) would influence many other categories in very evident ways. As far as what I have observed in my own ESL teaching, it’s very hard to categorize learners in simple divisions, or to find that one particular student will match the case study of another student.

I am interested to discuss, in the future, how L1 culture (especially in the cases of International students and Late-arriving resident students, according to Ferris’s terms) influences L2 learning—and looking at whether or how it depends on the L1. Education style may differ entirely between the L1 and the L2 culture. Reading through Leki’s chapter, I began to wonder if all of the researchers who are cited would agree that their findings are similar or different, and what each of their scales to determine “skilled” were.

I know that is often a problem in L2 studies; determining what is considered “fluent” or “proficient” is difficult. Skill in language is extremely complex and complicated to measure, even in L1 (how do we grade "good" writing in First-Year Composition classes?). So I was curious what we should take from results like this: “More skilled L2 writers attended more to content, referring more to audience, especially in terms of modifying content and presenting stronger or weaker opinions; their main objective was convincing the reader of their opinion” (100). Are those writers considered skilled because they did precisely those things? Or was their skill judged on a separate level and these details were noticed after deciding that they were highly skilled? I know we touched on this briefly in class last week, but whether or not those strategies produce “good writing” can also be a cultural matter.

I am also curious as to whether the type of learner (Reid’s “eye” and “ear” learners) can be connected to specific L1s or certain cultural contexts. How would we know? Would identifying a connection there affect the way I (or you) teach an ESL class?

And, even if certain connections can be identified between, say, cultural background, age, intrinsic motivation, and proficiency, would that really change the way I teach if I am standing in front a class of twenty students, each of whom has variations in context? And let's take the opposite stance: if research keeps coming up with contradictions and inconclusive results (that is, no correlation can be definitively found between many of these characteristics), then how should I choose the "best" way to teach in a group setting?

My Literacy Autobiography

Though I am able to communicate with little difficulty in a language besides English and though I use it regularly, I don’t consider myself bilingual. My use of Spanish is very personal and I do not yet feel fluent in academic or professional contexts, especially when considering the skill of writing.

I began learning Spanish on a whim; after a trip to Mexico during a college summer, I decided that I’d like to speak the language.

Now, I use it on a daily basis. I recently moved back to the States from Ecuador, where I worked as an EFL teacher. In general, my sociolinguistic competence is at a better level than my grammatical competence; that is, I am comfortable using Spanish in various social situations (particularly in Ecuador), but sometimes struggle to conjugate verbs correctly or use more formal (rather than colloquial) vocabulary.

In the time I decided to learn Spanish, I was just beginning my Bachelor’s degree but had already set a personal goal of graduating in just three years, and had no time in my busy schedule to take a language class. I had already passed the language requirement for the degree, as I had taken four years of German classes in high school. With that, I figured I already knew how to learn a language, and so I set out to teach myself. I began with the basics: I bought a grammar book, read a few chapters a week, and wrote out answers to the practice exercises.

The book helped with many fundamental aspects, such as the placement of accent marks, but what helped me most, and kept the language always fresh in my mind, was regular communication with Spanish-speaking friends. I wrote emails to them and used both languages, often putting the shortest or most direct sentences in Spanish.

After graduation (and many trips all over Mexico between), I decided to take a language-intensive course in Ecuador, hoping to improve all areas of my Spanish.

I would have done well to better research institute options; my chosen school was not demanding in the students’ use and mastery of the language. In fact, as many students chose to skip classes, on a few occasions I was the only one present and my teachers had to improvise a class, usually by asking me to read articles aloud. During my time there, I learned most about the language traveling inside the country, negotiating in the market, and trying to use the public transportation system. A final two-page essay was required as part of the final project of the school, but there was little explanation of the assignment. I researched in English and made notes in English before I sat down to carefully translate my ideas into a short, jolting essay in Spanish.

I went back to the States for a short time but kept in touch, via email, with a friend I had met in Ecuador. Though he was fluent in English, we generally communicated in Spanish. The emails were quirky and verbose (both of us being language aficionados) and helped to forge a deep, strong friendship; they are certainly responsible for much of my vocabulary and my ability to discuss and write about personal interests, art, and literature in Spanish.

A short time after, I moved to Ecuador to look for work and to immerse myself entirely in the language and the culture. I picked up much of the language simply speaking with people, a method that is good in the sense that I learned to communicate very quickly and in a very Ecuadorian way (that is, I was often accepted into the culture), but not as good in terms of learning a universally correct Spanish. There are certain verb tenses that are not commonly used in Ecuador (misued, some would say), such as the subjunctive preterite, and in many cases, even now, I am not even aware that I am using them differently or incorrectly.

I tried for awhile to keep a sort of journal solely in Spanish, documenting my experience with the language (like my daily encounter with the phrase “ya mismo,” which, when translated, would mean “right away,” but in Ecuador seemed to mean something like “in another hour or two”). Then, I’d give it to my aforementioned friend, by this time more than a friend, and rather than dates, we’d have grammar and vocabulary lessons in which he’d review my writing.

In reality, though, the journal idea didn’t last long and because my work life revolved around English, much of my experience practicing writing in my first year living abroad was generally limited to text messages. One of the perks of dating a language and literature teacher is that even text messages would get sent back to me with my spelling corrected or a verb changed to subjunctive.

Work reports were done in English, and though I taught some writing skills in my English classes, the method I was using emphasized speaking and listening much more and I didn’t get many opportunities to analyze stylistic differences in English and Spanish writing.

I read in Spanish on occasion, usually short stories by Ecuadorian and South American authors. Generally, though, I preferred to read longer literature in English, because, as my excuse went when I decided to read the classic “Don Quixote” and bought an English edition, “it doesn’t take as much work.” (Though when I said it in Spanish, I played off a double meaning: "Me cuesta menos," meaning literally, "it costs me less"--which it did, as I bought in the States and books in Ecuador are expensive, but also meaning something like "it costs my brain less work.")

My partner and I collaborated for a few months on some translation projects (both Spanish-English and English-Spanish) for a cell phone company. My primary task was to translate texts into English; I knew very well that I did not have the adequate skills to write at the required level in Spanish. I lacked the formality needed for that type of writing, as well as much of the technical vocabulary.

Now, in the USA again, I actually write more often in Spanish, using it primarily to communicate with friends and family-in-law via email, chat, or text messages. I also tend to write in Spanish for day-to-day at-home writing, such as grocery lists, reminders, and on the house calendar.

Because my home life is partially in Spanish (my partner and I live together), I am accustomed to using it for basic little tasks. It feels natural. In these contexts, it doesn’t differ much from the way I use English. However, I still feel very insecure about writing formal letters, essays, or stories in Spanish. I have rarely needed to take on those first two tasks, except in visa-related situations and job searches in Ecuador. I have attempted to write a few short stories too, but I am certainly much more secure in English.

Many stylistic choices that I make in English do not translate perfectly to Spanish, and so even my personal writing in Spanish often sounds strange. I am so comfortable with my style of writing in English that I often unthinkingly transfer it to Spanish. For example, I know that I tend to use punctuation in Spanish in the same way I would use English punctuation (especially commas, with which I take fully liberty in English), though that sometimes has unusual results in Spanish.

Also, because I learned a lot of my Spanish by ear, my spelling skills developed later than my speaking skills. Spanish has a much closer sound-spelling relationship than English, but still, the written form is not always predictable based on phonetics alone. For a long time, I took to interrupting a conversation when I heard a new word in order to spell that word aloud; that helped me both confirm the spelling and visualize the word in order to remember it.

I can comfortably use both Spanish and English to express myself socially and personally. However, English is my writing language and my academic language. My writing in English has become more formalized since returning to academia, but this has not changed my writing in Spanish. Even hypothetically facing an academic task of writing in Spanish makes me sweat: that’s not how I’m used to using my Spanish skills. I am very open verbally in Spanish, as I’m used to speaking on a daily basis. But, I’m used to speaking casually. In fact, my Spanish is very closely linked to so much of my personal life that it feels natural to use it in casual social contexts. It is also the language I used to assert my independence, living on my own for a time in Ecuador. Any writing that I am able to achieve in Spanish reflects some of the defensiveness I learned in the language and culture: I am direct, sometimes even to the point of seeming rude or angry.

I am comfortable speaking Spanish; even in my experiences in Spanish-speaking countries outside of Ecuador, I am capable of making myself understood and overcoming any miscommunications in conversation. Writing is the skill which I lack most, a skill I lack simply because I don’t practice it.