Ten writing tips for

working with EFL

students
Alsu Gilmetdinova, PhD
Head, Office of International Affair
Associate professor, Department of Foreign Languages

Kazan National Research Technical University named after

A.N.Tupolev-KAI (KNRTU-KAI)

28/03/2016
 Content

 Workshop goals
 Agenda
 Background/ context
 Facts
 Terms
 Simulation
 1-5 tips
 Learn and share
 6-19 tips
 Simulation
 Conclusion
 Who am I?

 PhD in Curriculum and Instruction, Purdue University

 Took 4 courses on Second language writing; Seminar in Second
language writing; Second language acquisition; History of
Second language writing
 Taught College Writing for 1st year university students at
Montana State University (MSU)
 Worked as a writing tutor in the Writing Lab, MSU
 Presented at Second Language Writing Symposium
 Workshop goals

 To reflect on the challenges and opportunities of

teaching writing in the EFL context
 To present current approaches to teaching
Second/Foreign Language Writing
 To share best practices in teaching writing for EFL
students’ in the EFL classroom
 To learn and share
 TERMS

 SLW: Second language writing

 EFL: English as a foreign language
 L1: first or native language
 Scaffolding: providing additional language support in L1
or English
 Introduction

 Raise your hand if you teach

 Elementary school children
 Middle/high school
 University
 Adults
 Other
 Turn and talk

 Spend 3 minutes talking about

 Challenges you have teaching EFL
writing
 Opportunities you see to enhance
students’ writing skills in English
 Share 2-3 ideas with the class
 Challenges of teaching EFL writing
General
 Perfectionism in teaching
English
 Heavy focus on theory
 Focus on what teacher
knows VS. what students
want/need to learn
 Class size
 Time constraints
 Accommodating local
needs
EFL writing specific
 Lack of experience in
writing pedagogy and
student training in L1
 Awareness of the need to
invest much time and
energy to teach writing
 Developing own writing
materials and methods
 Developing meaningful
writing tasks (writing as a
way to express oneself)
 Opportunities
General
 Higher motivation to learn
English
 Teaching English is
prestigious and financially
rewarding
 English for specific
purposes (business,
trade, education)
 Focus on socio-cultural
aspects
Writing specific
 Textbooks have more
specific instructions on
teaching writing tasks
 Lots of resources online
 Many professional
development
opportunities
(conference, moocs,
webinars)
 Need to develop writing in
English for e-use
 Facts about Russia

 No targeted training on writing instruction or EFL writing

instruction at any level
 Few writing tasks, if any that come from the real writing
needs
 Little use of drafting/process of revision
 Few EFL teachers are writers themselves
 Students have little experience with a variety of genres
 Little use of peer review and peer feedback, etc.
 Simulation

 Hello, in this unit we talked about literature. Now, I would

like you to write a short story about your favorite book
 Spend five minutes to write 5-7 sentences on this topic
 Tip #1: Develop your teaching
writing philosophy

 Read more about SLW/EFL writing theories

 http://sslw.asu.edu/
 http://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-second-language-writing/
 https://www.tesol.org/connect/interest-sections/second-language-writing
 Consult colleagues and try out new ideas in your own classroom
 Writing is never perfect; it is more than just perfect grammar, correct
organization
I use writing to:
 Develop critical thinking

 Express one’s emotions, ideas

 Come up with novel ideas and connections

 Tell something to someone who wants/needs to hear it in a most

effective way
 Dr. Branch’s rules for writing

1. A writer must have something to say.

1. help students come up with something to say, to get
them engaged enough with the material
2. help our students recognize how to come up with
something to say.
2. A writer has to want to communicate that to other readers.
2. pay attention to the sort of things readers might be
interested in reading, the kinds of writing styles, the
kinds of evidence, the structure
3. A writer needs to figure out how best to communicate what
she has to say to other readers.
3. form and structure, mechanics and punctuation
 Tip #2: Writing is a process

 Discovering ideas
 Choosing the right argument/theme, vocabulary,
examples
 Considering genre, audience, format
 Being aware of one’s own writing style, environment,
strengths and weaknesses
 Accepting productive criticism and revising the draft until
it is “good enough”
 How to teach process writing

1st Draft:
 Choose an idea; study topic, target audience
 Prepare and research necessary information
 Make full sentences from your notes and organize them
logically; Review
2nd Draft:
 Choose a title, write introduction
 Revise content and major grammatical errors
 Sequence ideas logically
3rd Draft:
 Review; write conclusion; final edits
 Tip 3: Genres: Text types
Informational\Explanatory

Reports
Memos
Manuals

Creative Fiction
Editorial Memoir
Critique Anecdotes
Review Autobiographies
Proposal

Narrative
Argumentative
 Teaching genres:
Argumentative

 Before class: Have students complete two vocabulary

handouts: Smoking; Public Transportation
 In class: Check the homework; write the title “Smoking
should be banned from public places”; divide the board
into two; ask students to give you as many supporting
points; hand out the worksheet “Building an argument”;
read the sample text and compare; go over connecting
words; have students start drafting their essay and finish
at home
Tip #4: Teaching-learning
cycle
 Deconstruction
• Focus on target vocabulary (topic specific)
• Set phrases
• Social purpose, place, audience, topic
• Grammar choices
• Text Type/Genre specific language (persuasion,
evaluation, etc)
Example: A letter to a friend: vocabulary (weather,
family members; studies; holidays); set phrases
(opening/closing expressions; responding to news);
grammar (types of questions); text type
 Joint Construction
• Common experience Whole class activity
• Students brainstorm ideas in groups
• Teachers groups main points (L1 support)
• Teacher provides structure, support
o Full sentences, vocabulary, target transitions,
language/register, etc
• Teacher scribes vs. writes: everyone writes
Example: email to the actress from Kamal theatre
after watching a play there
 Independent construction

• Common experience (AGAIN!)

• Apply scaffolding when needed
• Use graphic organizer
• Offer to translate/negotiate language
• Use writing process – edit & revise
• Write independently…
Example: students choose their own topic and model what
they learnt in previous stages
 Tip #5: Prepare students for
writing

1. Address student objections to writing

1. Anticipate objections, prepare answers
2. Explain the “cash value” of writing
2. Decide what you want to focus on
1. Strong thesis; specific grammar item; critical thinking;
connecting words, etc. (choose few)
2. Make your expectations clear, use a rubric
3. Manage your time grading
1. Grade only what you focus on
2. Use clear and consistent marking system
 Using rubrics for grading

2-
CATEGORY 4 - Very Good 3 - Good Needs Improvement 1 - Unsatisfactory Points
Sentences & Sentences and paragraphs All sentences are complete Most sentences are Many sentence fragments or
are complete, well- and well-constructed (no complete and well- run-on sentences OR
Paragraphs constructed and of varied fragments, no run-ons). constructed. Paragraphing paragraphing needs lots of
structure. Paragraphing is generally needs some work. work.
done well.

Grammar & spelling Writer makes no errors in Writer makes 1-2 errors in Writer makes 3-4 errors in Writer makes more than 4
grammar or spelling. grammar and/or spelling. grammar and/or spelling errors in grammar and/or
spelling.

Ideas Ideas were expressed in a Ideas were expressed in a Ideas were somewhat The letter seemed to be a
clear and organized fashion. pretty clear manner, but the organized, but were not very collection of unrelated
ESLItWriting
was easy 001
to figure out organziation could have clear. It took more than one sentences. It was very
what the letter was about. been better. reading to figure out what difficult to figure out what
the letter was about. the letter was about.

Length The letter is 10 or more The letter is 8-9 sentences. The letter is 5-7 sentences. The letter is less than 5
sentences. sentences.

Capitalization and Writer makes no errors in Writer makes 1-2 errors in Writer makes 3-4 errors in Writer makes more than 4
capitalization and capitalization and capitalization and errors in capitalization and
Punctuation punctuation. punctuation. punctuation. punctuation.
 Learn and share

 Turnto your partner and share

how you can apply one of these
ideas in your classroom
 Tip #6: Writing workshop

 Always have students bring something to class:

 Notes from the reading (what they (dis)liked, most
surprising/strangest idea; most (dis)agreeable point)
 Comments about specific sentences, parts of the text
 Draft of the essay
 T: chart

 Quotes  Comments
 Sentence starters  Finish the sentences
 Key words  Phrases or full sentences
 Graphic organizer  Key statements
 Term  Definition
 Tip #7: Peer work

 Use their fellow students’ writing as a way of seeing their

own better
 Audience is more than just a teacher: peer, parent,
friend, recruiter, etc.
 Use a variety of peer support
 Guide and monitor peer work
 Types of peer work

 Peer letter
 Read your peer’s essay, take notes
 Look at the sample peer letter
 Write your response, follow instructions
 Read around
 The writer reads, others follow along with a copy, mark places
with mistakes and confusing points
 Readers make marginal and in-text comments
 Tip #8: Workshop students’
papers

 Take one essay (without name) and make copies of it to

class
 Together with the class read through the text, identify
main issues
 Choose 3-5 patterns of mistakes
 Take the first pattern of mistakes and explain it
 Ask students to do it with you
 Ask students to identify similar mistakes and fix them on their
own
 Evaluating students’ papers

 Show an example of a student’s essay

 Tip #9: Troubleshoot common
mistakes

 As you are grading keep track of most common mistakes

 Type up these mistakes and do a grammar review on
them in class
 Use a document camera to show these mistakes and fix
them together with the class
 Correct the sentences, and make a quiz out of them
 Tip #10: Commenting on
students’ papers

 Focus on global patterns

 Start with a positive comment
 If it is draft 1 or 2 (out of 3) spend little time on minor
grammar mistakes
 Avoid vague marginal comments: tense; word choice;
grammar
 Instead: fix the form of present simple; check the
meaning of ___; fix the word order
 Simulation

 Hello, in this unit we learned about literature. Now we

are going to use everything that we learned in this unit
(vocabulary, discussions about literature, etc.) to develop
our writing skills. We will do it in three stages. First, we
will read and analyze a text together, then we will create
a short text together, and lastly, after you learn how texts
are written and how to write them, you will write your
own.
 Conclusion

 Teaching writing should always be catered to the needs

and interests of the students as much as possible
 Teaching writing should be accompanied with much
guidance, instructions in all stages of writing – from
conceiving the idea till the final edits
 Teaching writing should be consistently used to help
students express their ideas
 Teaching writing should help focus on ideas more than
on grammar mistakes, although the latter should be
systematically explained and corrected.