TESOL 2008 Creating and Maintaining A Classroom Community through Writing Online Mary Lee Wholey

1. TESOL 2008 Creating and Maintaining A Classroom Community through Writing Online Mary Lee Wholey Miriam Horne Concordia University Continuing Education Language Institute Montreal Quebec

2. APPROACH TO WRITING AT A2 • Series of Writing Tasks Leading to Research Paper • Focus on A Variety of Critical Thinking Skills • Awareness of Audience and Purpose • Practice in The Process Approach to Writing • Emphasis on Developing Editing Skills

3. Collaboration Students work in pairs as well as in small groups as they need classroom practice and encouragement from each other and teachers. They are working within a framework of mutual respect and cooperation.

4. To be relevant, learning processes need to recruit, rather than attempt to ignore and erase, the different subjectivities, interests, intentions, commitments and purposes- students bring to learning” A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures The New London Group

5. Multiliteracies • Instruction is a process that learners undertake • The instructor is a designer of that process • Responds to the learner’s own interaction with the material, with the instructor and with each other • The task or learning activities focus the learner on the important elements of the instruction. Gives a chance to try out ideas and reflect on how an individual point of view affects others. • Helps foster individual expression at the same time cohesive classroom community through individual/collective exploration of issues.

6. The Blog An effective tool both for accomplishing academic goals in writing and for developing self-reflective writing that can be shared with others. Gives every member of the class access to their writings; establishing an immediacy that can be likened to conversations.

7. Purpose of the Project • Students become aware of themselves as writers summarizing and reacting to their reading as well as responding to their classmates’ summaries and reactions • Increase the opportunities for reaction and opinion writing on a variety of topics • Open a channel for communicating and connecting with each other in a different context • Establish a new way of communicating with the teacher

8. The hidden agenda Along the way they begin to build an awareness of themselves and others as members of a community of writers.

9. A Community of Writers • Develop a sense of themselves as writers with something to say • Aware of themselves as writers with an audience and a purpose. • Benefit from different perspectives in the feedback to their writing • Develop a shared sense of belonging to a group of learners

10. A Community of Writers “Weblogs provide an excellent tool where literacy advances for both individual expression and collaborative learning.” “The Educated Blogger: Using Weblogs to Promote Literacy in the Classroom. By David Huffaker

11. Sample Blog Writing Making connections for themselves and to each other: a) Actively engage with topics in course b) Examine process of their research writing c) Reflect on their writing process

12. Engage with Course Content Responses to Lecture on Communication Patterns; Meaningful learning; An on-line conversation I personally enjoyed the lecture this morning a lot. In the lecture, the different communication patterns in Male and Female were focused on from the point of view of linguistics and pragmatics. The word of pragmatics was new to me, but I understood well thanks to the lecturer's explanation, how we chose word. The lecturer explained about the Cultural difference in communication pattern with an example of Japanese and American students' discussions. What I found when I heard the situation of Japanese students.... ? as one of Japanese, is... let me see, well, yeah it all depends. …because people in Japan care about the others' feeling so much. That's why ! I can't say 'No' directly to anyone, that's why I don't wanna disagree with someone's opinion.... Eriko, post on Feb. 8, 2007

13. The Beginning of Relationships • Richard said: u know, it's kind of fun that mr. scott use japanese as an ex. because as one of ur classmates, i will think ........is eriko speaking like this? does she have this pattern? ya, i can find some patterns from the communication between u and me......for ex. u rarely say "no" to people. sometimes it might be polite but also it might make u some troubles especially u r in north america now. i think the culture is quite different. anyway, just a suggestion,saying no sometimes might not be a bad thing.........hahahha!!! February 8, 2007 2:59 PM • Maggie said... i noticed that you have many friends here, and i know you've been here for just several months, so i guess "never say no" helps you gain friendship. but anyway, i agree with Richard, sometimes you need to learn how to reject requests otherwise you may put yourself in difficult situations. but please, don't say no to me ^_^ February 8, 2007 3:37 PM

14. Engage with Course Content • Discrimination 1. Extended Definitions 2. Video: “A Class Divided” 3. Reading: The Curse of Being Different by Robert Adler, in The New Scientist, Jan. 13, 2007

15. Comment on the Following: “Oh, great sprit, keep me from ever judging a man until I've walked in his moccasins.“ Experience Directly Related to Topic: I understand the effects of discrimination on children very well because I was experienced during my childhood. I don't want to use such a strong word to my family, but I have to say that I was discriminated by my grandmother for a very long time. The only reason… because I am a girl, the only female grandchild in my family….I was so confused and felt being hurt. I thought it's my problem, I'm not good enough to get my grandmother's attention even though in fact I did excellently. For a long time accumulating gradually, it became my behaviour. When I do anything I decided to do, I demand myself exactly. … In my case, although I successfully treat my problem and get many surprise by discovering myself, it's still a very stressful and painful experience that a child should not suffer. When I saw this video, I was shocked. It's really the most efficient way to teach people understanding discrimination through experiencing it by themselves. Posted by Helen.

16. Tomas said…I had an experience very similar to yours, for some years I annalysed some features of my behaviour and personality that made me suffer and made me loss my self confidence, somehow, I changed somethings after a period of reflexion, introspection and reading and thinking a lot...I guess it´s something normal during the transition for being an adult...well, what I wonder Helen is...Do you think that your grandma was discriminated during her childhood the same way she did against you? March 6, 2008 6:25 PM Helen said... Tomas, may be you are right! My grandmother probably was discriminated by others because of her gender so that she thought it's normal to do this to me. Anyway, I forgive her. I do get some other benefic from this experience. It's all over... March 6, 2008 8:44 PM Revealing themselves; Connecting to others

17. Teacher Blog Responses to Course Content We really enjoyed the lunch which gave us the opportunity to chat with you on another level than in the classroom!! Enjoy the rest of the weekend. There are a lot of colds and the flu going around. Try to be careful: eat well, drink fluids and sleep enough.By the way, I have been reading your summaries and must say that you certainly have understood the concept of a summary. However, since this was a first draft there is of course room for improvement in terms of clarification, grammar points and cohesive devices. We'll be working on that on Monday and/or Tuesday.See you on Monday, Lili

18. Examine the Process of Research Writing At the Start • Make a rough plan for the research topic. Start with your list of questions from the brainstorming and the readings you have done so far. • Bring in your plan on Monday. Lili

19. THE PLANNING PROCESS I had a good plan for research project about e-commerce. However, I thought that was too general to research so that I focused on more specific subject, which is the Enterprise Resource Planning System. So far, I just started reading the books and gathering articles, monographs, and papers …but honestly speaking, I am really struggling for paraphrasing, summarizing, and organizing. I know the reason that I spend too much time for planning to do something well when I think that is very important for me so that I afraid to start to do it without planning and considering deeply. In addition, I am a programmer so when I program something, I do not program it without the map of process for it because the process of planning and analyzing as much as detail is the most important rule to avoid re-program or re-design. It is an obsessional habit. I hope I will finish in on time with satisfaction. I welcome who has a good advice or tips for me. Could you comment for meThanks you…. POSTED BY SEO,JEOUNG-HWAN AT 3:04 AM

20. amporn said... hello my buddy....I am also a programmer. we have things in common. I think, you had better start writing because the plan for writing program and writing paper are different. We can use the same logic to plan, but it does not need to be long. It is not a big big big project. Planing to write program is essential and we have to be very specific to make a plan, otherwise the process of writing program can not be develop organizely. So, Just start it my friend. If you need help for paraphrasing or summary, i am available after class....Good luck FEBRUARY 26, 2007 10:01 AM Sharing Perspectives on the Writing Process • Seo,Jeoung-hwan said... Thanks you for your advices. Now I have started to write my research but still cannot ㅜ.ㅜ FEBRUARY 26, 2007 6:28 PM liliconcordia said... • look at you plan quickly and just free write! We will work with you from there. Your intro was fine.Hope to see you in class soon

21. Mid-Way: Writing Drafts- Progress • Post from Teacher: You have all been working hard and you need to continue to do so....in this last English course before you go out into the big world....university, work, travelling, etc.!!!SOME REMINDERS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR THE RESEARCH PAPER1. Write something everyday and send to us whatever you have written even if it is only one page. In other words, don't wait till you have finished the section to send us your work.2. Send only the work you haven't already given to us. For example,if you gave us(or sent us) the first two pages of a section, don't give or send them again along with the next few pages. 3. Don't forget to attribute (in text references: eg.(Meyrs, 2004)at the end of a paraphrase or Meyrs (2004) points out....... or when quoting a sentence or a passage, "...................." (Meyers, 2004, pg 15). 4. Even if you are not sure of the exact form, you need to put in the references as you are writing.

22. Mid-Way Reflections As a survivor of this extremely stressful experience, I have many useful tips that I want to share with you guys... At beginning of this project, I knew it's not an task that can be dealed with easily. I'm very interested in the way we doing the research paper. Every steps that we prepared for the paper including how to use library and how to find the articles is so intersting that I'm very active to participate in all the activities. But Lili and Adrianne show us the research paper that be done by others before, I'm dumbfounded. It seems like a very formal real assignment that is given to an university student. I wondered how it can be done so perfectly and completely.

23. Anyway, we have already started. • Searching articles on database, finding books in the library, I did everything as the schedule planned, but I feltperplexed. I didn't feel that I was getting into my topic. Of course, the part of the reason is my topic is a big one which is difficult to find the point I need focus on.

24. When I was doing research in the library, I was so exciting because I thought I found what is exactly I want to talk about: the relationship between stress and memory… but because memory topic is related with biology field which I'm not familiar with, I gave up memory topic, instead of it, I choose stress as my topic. … I thought so at that time, it's not very difficult to read all the materials and to use notes to order the logic and then papers will come out naturally. But when things are really going on, sometimes they are not like what you think they should be.

25. When I finally got starting to write my paper, the more I wrote, the more I felt confused. To my surprise, I found it's very hard to get into my topic without the clear explanation of memory and stress, if I want to explain it clearly,I have to do both topic toghter! But I still thought I could find a solution because it was too late to change topic, so I continued to write until Tuesday evening, then, I really felt if I want to do a good job, I have to stop working, something wrong with the process. It's a serious situation.

26. For this reason, I decided to rebuild all my work so that I was abstent two whole days in the library. I know the dangerousness of doing this in university, but I want to give myself a chance to focus on the thing I'm interested in this time. I read a lot about stress and memory, although it has many technique parts that really drives me crazy, I told myself that it's not that hard, I can and have to handle it because it's my choice that I have responsibility. • I found a big problem which lead to that I couldn't get into my topic is because too much technique parts I couldn't really understand without helping of rudiments. Therefore, I went to google and found many nonprofessional articles to help me get general ideas and to be familiar with some important technique vocabularies. And then, it's much easier to understand journals. I turned off my mobile phone and not to check my E-mail so that I can do my job quietly. After two days hard working, I finally figure out my problem. I felt that I'm ready to go to school because I don't know what I can say with teachers when I'm not really figure out my problem. (I'm really sorry to Lili and Adranne...)

27. When I talk with Lili and Adranne, I found it's really helpful when discussed with teachers, and I thought what they told me that when students have trouble with their tasks, it's better to ask help form teachers and professors, is right. They are experienced and much more professional that students, they understand what you are trying to do so that they can help you get an easy way of your task. It's saving time.Obviously, I'm not good at asking for help. That is because I have already used to the education model in China. In China, one class has too many students so that it is impossible to help every student in the class for a teacher. I'm trained to figure out own problems by myself from childhood, so I am not even realized that I need help. I do get a lot of knowledge when I deal with the problem alone, but it spent too much time which in fact is not necessary to spend on and it's not allowed to do this in university. Thanks to this extremely stressful experience, now I know what need to do when I face the similar situation next time.In my case, research project is not finishing yet. But I'm trying to do a good job. I hope that I can get a happy ending~~~

28. Coming to the Finish LineTHIS WEEKEND IS DEDICATED TO FINISHING UP YOUR RESEARCH PAPER. • 1. Remember to send us your drafts. Don't wait to finish your entire paper before sending to us whatever you have done throughout the next couple of days. We especially need to see anything that is still a first draft so that you have time to correct.2. When you have finished correcting, you can send to us what you have corrected and eventually the entire paper.We (Adrianne or Lili) will edit and send to you the corrections electronically or in person as quickly as possible. Don't wait for our corrections. Just keep on sending as you finish little by little. If you live in the downtown area, please let us know). We will give you a time to meet us on Sunday to talk over your corrections. But even if you do come on Sunday, remember to send your drafts to us today and perhaps tomorrow morning, so that we can suggest corrections before we see you. 3. Don't forget to consult your Book: Honest Work in College, Chapter 7 in particular or the Concordia Library Information At the end of the Unit on Male/Female)4. Make sure that you send us your Reference List so that we can help etc .if necessary.5. In the RESEARCH PROJECT unit, (Part 1 of your materials), take a look at the check list of what you need to do before handing in the paper. If you have any questions ask.That's it for now...Take a look at the blog again tomorrow...may have more instructions.Have a good working weekend. Don't stress out too much...although a little stress might actually push you to finish!!

29. Hard Lessons Learned Jarno said: Now I am sitting before my laptop thinking...I learnt so many things from doing research project which I really need to learn! When I was in primary school...doing maths...I always did it over and over to make sure that I have the correct answer...this habit has been along with me till now. Whatever I wrote, even in Chinese, I will read it over and over to make sure the spelling, grammar, prop words and everything. That's one of the reasons that I have not finished it.I don't like the situation now, all of you have done your successful wonderful projects, except me...From now on, I won't wait until last minute, although maybe I will, but I will try my best...I need to change the way of doing a research project, actually, the way of doing almost everything...To the project itself, I really notice the importance of citation. I'll continue throughout everything before I write a section and make something like a outline, although everything I might change...For my writing skills, I really do not know...maybe nothing...But I learnt how to search different sources, it is very important to the university...I appreciate Advanced Two to give us such important chances to learn before university!I am lucky enough to have my wonderful teachers Lili and Adrianne to worry about Jarno, care about Jarno, help to Jarno, encourage Jarno...

30. Support Natasha said: • Your message sound as a poetry ... that's really beautiful. Don't worry about the time that you take for writing your paper. It's the first time that you write a research paper so it will be better the next time because you will have already got an experience...It is the process of learning for everybody in this class so you are not in the wrong way ;-) Jarno,you are a completist, me either. For me, I think that asking ourselves to do things perfectly is not too bad. Although, we always feel very tired but at least we are working hard and learn a lot from our hard working. You don't have enough self-confidence, you should be proud of yourself, you are doing very well! We are slow but we will get our own way of doing things. Don't worry.

31. Reflections on Blog Writing; Expressing Ideas Fully and Freely • I have two blogs in Chinese, but before we started writing our blogs, I'm still worried about it because I'm not good at free writing in English and I really hate time limited when I'm writing something. As you saw, the first post about skyscraper which we wrote in the lab is a mess, even myself don't want to read it again when I finished. But according to my personality, once I decided to do something, I will push myself to try my best. I made a big change from creating my own blog style. I want to mark it as mine, maybe a little bit special, but that is the only way make me feel that this is my field which I should be responsible. Change the appearance is not the only thing I want, create my own writing style and develop the ability to say what I want to say are the most important points that I try to get. At the beginning, it's not easy to write in a free way because I don't have enough confidence to use the language well. With continuing of this course, the skills which I learnt from our practicing help me to get into this project deeper. It's getting easier to do free writing and I wrote longer and longer than before ( Although sometimes longer doesn't mean better...). And I found that it's very interesting to read and leave comments for other classmates ( I even get more ideas when I read other's blogs). • Blog is a real good way to show a person in a different way, and also a new way to communicate with each other ( I love this part!) I know that the best way to do blog is to do it as early as possible so that you can get more chance to show your idears to more people and discuss, but due to the stressful research project I didn't do it on time...However, I tried to leave comments for your guys early at least~~~As Jarno said, I think that keep renewing our blogs is a very good way to practice our English and keep touch with each other, and I hope I can do it for a long time ( although I can not promise...)

32. “Here are my experiences of what works with students: Concrete tasks in the classroom Set up tasks where students have to link to each other Insist on feedback to other students Encourage feedback of posts Set tasks that require reading and linking to other weblogs” Jill Walker From Network Literacy Learning with Blogging and Web 2.0

33. Acknowledgements • Thanks to the teachers and students of Advanced 2 Sessions in 2007-2008 • Eriko, Richard, Maggie, Jeoung-Hwan, Amporn, Helen, Jarno, Tomas and Natasha • Adrianne Sklar and Lili Ullman

34. Contact • Mary Lee Wholey: ml_wholey@hotmail.com • Miriam Horne:mimhorne@hotmail.com • Concordia University • Continuing Education Language Institute • 1600 Ste. Catherine Ouest • Montreal Quebec • H3H 2S7