Chapter 12. Persuasive Writing

Chapter. 11 - Poetry Writing

Chapter. 8 - Expository Writing

Expository Writing is to write about some information. The writer researches about and explains specific information. It has several structures and types. The commonly used outcome of expository writing is reports. It can be done individually or with groups. And there are two types of reports; Collaborative reports and individual reports. The collaborative reports are very efficient way to learn how to divide their parts, share them, and compile them to make a complited report. "Children benefit from writing a group report, first, because the group provides a support system, and second because group members share the laborious parts of the work" (Tompkins, 2008, p. 177).


Response to

Chapter. 7 - Biographical Writing

Biographical writing is an efficient way for students to practice writing about chronicle events of someone's life and about the reflection on it. Teachers can draw students' interest by biographical writing. "Children like to investigate the lives of well-known personalities as they read biographies and share information about themselves and their lives as they write personal naratives and autobiographies" (Tompkins, 2008, p. 147).

There are three types of Biographical writing; Personal narratives, Autobiographies, Biographies. And the process of these three types is generally as below.
The format and the proper feature of writing should be considered first before writing. Next step is to gather information and organize the information. And then write and share it with peers.



Respond to

Chapter. 5 - Journal Writing

In writing instruction journal means a series of writings done by a person in response to daily life. “It contains description of events and reflections about the events (Peyton, 1990).”
Journal writing can be used with all ages of learners and with learners at various proficiency levels. Studies indicate that this learning activity may be used successfully for a wide variety of individuals ranging from elementary to advanced level. And in journal writing, a writer can choose a topic among various topics according to various purposes. "Children use journals to record personal experiences, explore reactions and interpretations to books they read and videos they view, and record and analyze information about literature, writing, and social studies and science topics (Tomkins, 2008, p. 98)

Response to

Chapter. 4 - Assessing Children's Writing

Assessment gives students the clue of what they know and what they don't know so that they can check their learning. And, of course, writing assessing is necessary to enhance students' writing skills. "The goal of writing assessment is to help children become better writers" (Tomkins, 2008, p. 74). And Brown states that "In your evaluation of student writing the most instructive evaluative feedback you can give is your comments, both specific and summative, regarding the student's work" (Brown, 2007, p. 414) The efficient and effective feedback should provide students with specific information that students need to enhace their writing skill.

There are many kinds of writing evaluation. Among them Portfolio Assessment is a very good way to reflect their writings. "Reflection is an important component of portfolio assessment because it rewuires children to pause and become aware of themselves as writers (Tompkins, 2008. p. 91)


Response to Kyoungchun Kim

According to Kyoungchun Kim, "Among various forms of writing assessment, the most impressive one to me is portfolio because teachers can apparently examine writing process and writing product after finishing writing. Also portfolio is more realistic than any other writing assessment form." As I said above I absoliutely agree with him. Portfolio assessment is the best way for teachers to check the process of writing, and give them effective feedback.



References

Brown H. Douglas. (2006). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy (3rd ed.). White Plains, NY : Longman.

Tompkins, Gail E. (2008). Teaching Writing : Balancing Process and Product. Upper Saddle River, NJ : Pearson.

Problem-Solution Essay : Falling Down of Teachers' Educational Authority

Falling Down of Teachers' Educational Authority

In these days, the teachers' educational authority has been falling down more and more. It is the most serious social problems in Korean society. Students tend to ignore their teachers’ instructions and they don’t obey teachers’ orders. Sometimes they behave violently in front of their teachers. Even though they think those their behaviors are bad, they don’t consider them as serious problems. So we as teachers need to figure out the reasons of the serious social problem, the effects of the problem and what should be done to solve the problem.

First of all we need to find out the reasons of the problem. There are many reasons of the problem. First, it’s because of students’ wrong belief. Some students think it’s brave to behave violently to their teachers. Students who are in adolescence tend to behave in defiance to their teachers characteristically. Even though they think they shouldn’t defy their teachers, they do care their peers’ eyes. And they can be a hero once they behave violently to their teachers. It’s quite wrong and dangerous illusion.

The second reason is the failure in home education in tow-income family. There have been increasing the number of the two- income family in Korea. So parents don’t have much time do home education. So students tend to be selfish and don’t have enough chances to learn basic etiquette and morality.

The last and most important cause of the problem is ordinance on the prohibition of physical punishment enacted by Geonggi-Province in Korea. The effect of the ordinance has been massive. And there has been a fierce debate on it. Teachers don’t have any proper alternative ways to control the students who don’t follow and ignore teachers’ instructions. Rather, it seems Korean society doesn’t care the teachers’ educational authority comparing with the past. There was an article after the ordinance was enacted. Many students say to their teachers “You should know that you can not punish us. It’s the new ordinance. You should follow the ordinance.”

And then what are the effects of the problem? First, loosening in controlling students for teachers are the natural consequence. And even worse, the collapse of public education system is the natural one too.

Second, teachers’ morale on their job can decline. And it can have bad effects on their classes. Eventually the final victim of the problem can be the students.
And lastly, the most and serious effect is to violate other students’ learning rights. If some students ignore their teachers’ instructions, the class must be failed. And then the rest of the students lose their rights to learn for the class.

Then what should be done to solve the problem? We as teachers should find the proper solutions.First, students need to modify their mindsets. They need to realize that the respect to their teachers is the most basic etiquette in education. So schools and parents need to expand the education on basic etiquette and morality than now.

And the most important and basic solution for this problem is abolition on the prohibition of physical punishment. In my opinion, moderate physical punishment is needed in education. Of course the severe and indiscreet physical punishment has very bad effects on controlling students. But most of teachers are reasonable people who can control themselves with their rationality. The most serious problem of the ordinance on the prohibition of physical punishment enacted by Geonggi-province is that they haven’t suggested proper alternatives of the physical punishment to control students yet.

Not only teachers but also other members of Korean society should realize seriousness of the problem of falling down teachers’ educational authority, and try to make efforts to solve the problem because the future of Korea depends on our students and education.

Graphic Organizers for Problem-Solution Essay

Assignment # 2 - Minilesson

Assignment#2_minilesson_JungNH

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Tompkins, Chapter 3 - Writing Strategies and Skills

The comparision of capable and novice writers on page 56 of the textbook let me know an important clue for writing instruction: The most significant defference between the capable and novice writers depends on their strategies use.
Tompkins states " The position in this book is that teachers have the responsibility to teach children how to write, and part of that responsibilty is teaching children the strategies and skills that capable writers use. Although it is true that children learn many things inductively through meaningful literacy ecperiences, instruction is important." (Tompkins, 2008) I agree to this opinion. Most of people can just write. But there is a gap between being able to just write and knowing how to organize some information or ideas, put them together, and revise it wee and efficiently. They are totally different. So teachers should help students learn the processes, strategies, and skills for writing instruction.

Tompkins, Chapter 2 - Writing Workshop

Tompkins states " No matter which way teachers use writing workshop, its great benefit is that children become familiar with the ebb and flow of the writing process and experience the exhilaration that all authors feel as they publish their writing and share it with readers." (Tompkins, 2008) Teachers can provide students with opportunities to think about something by themselves, to write about what they have thought considering the proper writing process, and to learn how to express what they wrote effectively and efficiently through the writing workshop. And there are 4 components of writing workshop: writing, sharing, minilessons, and reading aloud to children.
With these 4 components, students can organize what they have thought, share it with others, and get some feedback on it.

Tompkins, Chapter 1 - Teaching Children to Write

In a writing class, a teacher should provide specific processes so that students can learn what should they do in each process. Tompkin said, "The writing process is a way of looking at writing instruction in which the emphasis is shifted from children's finished products to what think and do as they write. (Tompkins, 2008) And chapter 1 gave me the clear 5 writing processes ; Prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing. With thses clear processes, students can learn how to form the structures, what to consider when writing efficiently and effectively.
With these process-based appraoch a teacher can provide students with opportunities to think what they do in each process as Brown noted, "The process approach is an attempt to take advantage of the nature of the written code (unlike conversation, it can be planned and given an unlimited number of revisions before its release) to give students a chance to think as they write. Another way of putting it is that writing is indeed a thinking process." (Brown, 2006)


Response to Tae Hyun Kim

Tae Hyn Kim said, "As teachers, we are expected to do the leading and supporting role for children to express certain ideas and feelings they want to write and share with the audience. But teachers shouldn't do everything out of worry for the students rather we need to focus on how to have them lead themselves in a self-motivated and self-monitoring process." I agree with him at the point of view that teachers should not only do the leading role bt also help students lead themselves at the same time.




References

Brown H. Douglas. (2006). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy (3rd ed.). White Plains, NY : Longman.

Tompkins, Gail E. (2008). Teaching Writing : Balancing Process and Product. Upper Saddle River, NJ : Pearson. p 6.

Hello 545~!!

I know it's been quite late. Now I'm starting 545 class.

I graduated from Dankook graduate school of education.
I got both Master's degree in English education and teacher's license there.

I have been working at a middle school as an English teacher since 2009. I’m in charge of 1st and 2nd grade students. So my target teaching level is 1-3 grade of middle school.
I'm not a regular teacher. Someday I want to be a regular teacher. (If one want to be a regular teacher, the one should pass a national regular teacher certification examination. And only those who got teacher’s license can apply for the exam in Korea.)

For my dream, I have many things to learn. I believe this course will be helpful for my dream.