I Am Not Sure What You Mean but I Will Send the Picture Again

What this handout is about

When you ask students writing in English language as an additional language what they would like to piece of work on, they volition oftentimes say that they'd similar you to check their grammer. "Checking the grammar" can experience uncomfortably close to proofreading and editing students' papers for them—which writing coaches know is strictly out of bounds. Unfortunately, multilingual writers have been unfairly denied access to language feedback because of the very potent prohibition against editing, but the adept news is that we tin still be very helpful without compromising our principles.

This page provides a scrap of important historical context for the discussion and offers strategies for responding to the grammar-checking request in ways that respect the pedagogical philosophies of the writing center and the instructional needs of students writing in a foreign language. The list of strategies is followed by excerpts of coaching sessions, with annotations that illustrate how some of the strategies work in existent conversations between writing coaches and multilingual writers.

1984: The triple whammy for multilingual writers

In 1984, several of the most influential texts in writing center history were published. You will probably recognize the first ii considering the vocabulary and the philosophy are however driving forces in today'due south writing centers:

1. Reigstad & McAndrew: Division of the writing procedure into "higher order" and "lower society" concerns, establishing a value-laden sequence of content and arrangement earlier grammar and punctuation.
2. North: Staunch annunciation that writing centers were non centers for mechanical remediation and error correction. "In a writing eye, the object is to brand sure that writers, and not necessarily their texts, are what get changed by instruction…our task is to produce improve writers, not improve writing" (p. 69).
3. Friedlander: Assertion that writing centers run into the needs of foreign students by focusing on mechanical remediation and error correction. The content of students' essays should be discussed just as much as necessary for accurate error correction.

The writing process was divided, the writing centre's territory was firmly staked, and the perceived needs of multilingual writers were placed squarely outside the parameters of the writing center's mission, pedagogical philosophy, and standard procedure. No wonder we've struggled so much!

In fairness to the scholars above, they meant to emphasize that writers should concentrate on developing their ideas before they worried near comma splices, and to emphasize that truly practiced writing involved the long-term development of a complex set of skills. These ideas are still so powerfully present in writing centers today because they are so very true. Unfortunately, they had the unintended event of marginalizing discussions of sentence structure, word choice, punctuation, and grammatical errors until very late in the writing process.

In truth, ideas can not exist separated from the language used to limited them. Multilingual writers are avant-garde language learners who are working toward the command of a sophisticated range of vocabulary, judgement structures, bailiwick-specific expressions, idioms, etc. Multilingual writers are also developing writers, and then they do need the same kind of process-oriented and "higher club" feedback that monolingual writers need. Quite ofttimes, though, their ability to develop the content of their essays is limited by a lack of vocabulary or past difficulty with complex sentence structures. As coaches, you lot tin can back up the evolution of writing skills by talking virtually linguistic communication at whatsoever point in the writing procedure where it might be helpful.

It's adept to discourage premature concern with nit-picky editing decisions, just it'due south nifty to encourage exploration of the correct language for expressing a smashing thought. Exist flexible and be comfy with the fluid, back and forth movement between discussing the ideas and the language.

What do you do when students say, "Just check my grammer"?

1. Answer positively. ("Sure, we can take a wait at the linguistic communication stuff…"). Lectures nigh how we teach proofreading strategies or how we don't really do grammar in the writing center put students on the defensive when they have a legitimate need for feedback on their language utilize. Just say yes, and move on to the side by side step.
2. Elicit other concerns. ("What else would you similar to talk about today? Are you lot still working on the content?"). Students will often identify quite a range of concerns with simple prompting at the commencement of the session, specially after they've been reassured that you'll assistance them identify issues with a language they're still learning.
3. Enquire for an overview. ("Tell me virtually what yous're working on and where you are in the process."). Explaining their writing projection (the assignment and the text and so far) gives students the chance to produce "comprehensible output"—a chance to employ the English linguistic communication to express their thoughts conspicuously and to make themselves understood. We know that language learners are able to understand a lot more than than they are able to spontaneously produce in a foreign language, and it'due south actually hard work to express complex thoughts sufficiently in a language that's non your ain. Past asking questions, past listening carefully, and by request follow-up questions, you can help students work through the process of communicating clearly in English, and you can give yourself a mental framework of the project that will exist helpful when language questions arise in specific parts of the text.
4. Read the unabridged draft. You may detect grammatical errors on the showtime or second page, merely continue reading. You'll get a sense of the student'southward consummate argument, and you'll have time to recognize more serious errors that may occur subsequently in the paper.
5. Stop but for farthermost issues. Sometimes a sentence may be so malformed that the idea is completely obscured. You can make a annotation to come back to that point later, but if you do decide to end, inquire a wide question and then mind carefully ("Can you tell me more virtually this thought?"). Try to be attuned specially to places where the student's language apply is truly interfering with your ability to empathise what they're trying to say. Clarifying these expressions takes priority over small errors that don't really interfere with your understanding.
6. Recast the student's explanation more grammatically. ("Let me run into if I sympathize you correctly. You lot're maxim that…"). If you understood and explained correctly, the pupil can hear the idea expressed in grammatical English and can make note of it—they tin can add it to their English linguistic communication repertoire. However, if your recasting (your paraphrased caption) doesn't match the student'southward intended meaning, or if you can reasonably offering two different interpretations of the text, you tin examine the passage more than closely to effigy out why information technology was unclear. Then you can work together on correcting whatever is confusing about the pupil'southward original expressions. This back and forth procedure is called "negotiation of meaning" ("Is this what you lot hateful?" "No, I mean this." "Oh, okay. We say it like this." "Oh, okay. Thanks.")
7. Provide "linguistic input"—language that students read and hear. This "input" might be bits of English that are new to them (like a new discussion or idiomatic expression), or it might be familiar bits of English being used in ways they've never heard earlier. You are non usurping control if yous make language suggestions that convey the student's ideas. If you've listened carefully plenty that you know what they're trying to express, help them out.
8. Apply resource. Even if y'all know the grammar, innovate students to language resources they tin can use independently at other times.
9. Certificate the puzzles. If you come across particularly interesting or confusing samples of language use, keep a copy to share with your colleagues and mentors. Information technology may serve as a useful grooming sample, so you're serving the community well.

What if students really mean, "Simply check my grammer"?

There does come a time writers are fix to concentrate strictly on their grammar. They're satisfied with everything else, and as writers, yous know that's a happy identify to be. Normally we teach proofreading strategies to native speakers at this stage. We tin can do this with multilingual writers also, but nosotros besides take to adjust our strategies to adapt their status equally language learners. These suggestions are meant to assistance you with that adjustment.

There'due south a strong misconception that there will be "patterns of mistake"—certain types of errors that occur repeatedly in the text. Sometimes that does happen, only more frequently, there will simply be one or ii instances of twenty five dissimilar kinds of mistake. That'due south okay. Y'all can nonetheless exploit the educational value of an error, having confidence that students will attempt to apply what they acquire to their subsequent writing.

Ii things to notation: Showtime, even though the strategies listed below concentrate more on straight proofreading and grammar checking, remember that you lot can as well use all of the strategies listed above for correcting the grammar by clarifying the intended meaning. Second, when yous practice notice an error, you lot can enquire, "How do y'all commonly proofread for this kind of mistake?" or say to the educatee, "Allow's endeavour to find a few more examples of this structure, just to double-cheque them." Look for right and incorrect examples because nosotros need our successes reinforced as well! It'southward a great opportunity to appraise the student's proofreading skills and practise some strategy building.

Think of these strategies as being listed in the order they should be used in, but feel comfortable to experiment with the order, depending on the pupil, the writing project, and your ain judgment. Play with them to encounter how each strategy helps enhance the students' learning experience.

1. Ask students to identify specific feedback targets ("Testify me what you're not sure about."). You can ask a variety of questions: why they're not sure about that sentence, if they can think of other ways to express the thought, what rules they know near the particular grammar structure, if they checked a reference book, if they can show you the folio and then you can look at the rules together, etc. In other words, you can learn a lot about the students' thought processes that will exist helpful in working with each of them. One caution: exist sensitive to how much time you're spending on these questions. It can be frustrating to students if every unmarried error is interrogated at length, as you can imagine. Idioms and prepositions are great candidates for a coach'due south quick corrections because they're so idiosyncratic. Structures that follow a fix of rules more systematically, like verb tense or gerunds vs. participles, are good candidates for more questioning. (Locate the grammar references in the Writing Center if yous didn't understand "gerunds vs. participles"!)
2. Ask where they struggled to brand language choices. Sometimes they actually do believe they've written everything in correct English, and so they can't point to a judgement they think might be incorrect. If you enquire them to testify you lot where they had to work at it, yous have a take chances to interrogate their decision-making process ("Why was this a hard choice? How else were you thinking of proverb it? What made you choose this fashion?") and to either congratulate them and reinforce a correct choice, or to right them and perhaps teach them a trick for making the right pick next time (a mnemonic device, a great folio in your favorite reference volume, etc.).
3. Place "high gravity" errors–errors that truly interfered with your comprehension. Work with the educatee to figure out how/why the judgement structure or word option is obscuring their intended meaning. When they've explained their idea enough that you sympathise it, offer them the language they need to express their idea grammatically.
4. Move on to repeated errors. Ask questions about their choices or their full general knowledge (east.chiliad., "Why did you choose this verb tense?" or "What do you know nigh verb tenses?"). Ask the student if they have a favorite grammar resources and/or share your own favorite grammar resources. Work through correcting the error together, helping the educatee sympathise and apply the rules. Find a couple more than examples of the same kind of mistake and let the pupil use the resource to endeavor correcting the mistakes. When they feel confident that they tin can detect and right that type of error, motion on to another.
5. Give prepositions away like processed. Introduce students to "learner's dictionaries," which include data about word + preposition combinations, but feel comfortable freely offering up these important little words. Learning to use "upward" correctly in one sentence volition non ensure that students will use it correctly in another sentence in the same way that learning about other structures will, and this trivial act of kindness can assistance students stay more engaged with the rest of the procedure.

The strategies in action

These transcripts are excerpted from sessions with second linguistic communication writers. They have been annotated to explain a scrap about what was happening, what the students were trying to achieve, what the coaches were trying to attain, and to illustrate a few of the concepts and strategies listed above. Read each extract without reading the comments, but to get the flow of the conversation. Read them once again, looking at each of the marginal comments as you lot reflect on the information on this page.

Resources

See our English Linguistic communication Resources page for several learner's dictionaries and other linguistic communication learning resources and strategies.

You can find very articulate explanations of grammar structures and an First-class drove of idioms and phrasal verbs, which ESL students commonly struggle with, at UsingEnglish.com.

References

Friedlander, A. (1984). Meeting the needs of foreign students in the writing centre. In G. A. Olson (Ed.) Writing centers: Theory and administration (pp. 206-214). Urbana, IL: NCTE.

North, S. (1984). The idea of a writing center. College English, 46, 433-446.

Reigstad, T. J., & McAndrew, D. A. (1984). Grooming tutors for writing conferences. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.

---

This work is licensed under a Creative Eatables Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License.
Yous may reproduce information technology for non-commercial use if you lot utilise the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Heart, University of North Carolina at Chapel Colina

Make a Gift

kelynackwithim.blogspot.com

Source: https://writingcenter.unc.edu/just-check-my-grammar/

Share this post