Key words: memoirs, language practice, emotions, writing skills, reading skills, social networks, clues in text.
Students usually consider writing as a requirement to pass a grade, or as a homework, but not a lively means to
express their joys, sorrows, experiences or curiosity. However, through writing their memoirs, students can overcome
their reluctance to write and show significant progress in the process. A memoir, unlike general schoolwork, can make
students reflect about those specific and memorable events that contributed along the road to literacy. Using process
writing to tell that story in English can be a meaningful experience for students.
Considerations on literacy
Traditionally, the word literacy has been used to mean the ability to read and write. Now, literacy means the com-
petence “to carry out complex tasks using reading and writing related to the world of work and to life outside school”
[Cases in Literacy 1989, 36]. The term literacy is being used in other ways such as in cultural literacy, defined as
a way to introduce children “to the major ideas and ideals from past cultures that have defined and shaped today’s
society [Hirsch 1987, 10]. However, most researchers agree that literacy is a tool, a way to learn about the world and
a means to participate more fully in the technological society of the twenty-first century. It is also important to note
that literacy abilities are acquired by individuals only through participation in socially organized activities with writ-
ten language. In defining literacy as a social activity; Barton [1994] implies that literacy has certain roles in society,
according to the demands of the community where one lives.
Literacy uses a symbolic system to represent the world to ourselves, and language is the symbolic system that
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links what goes on inside our heads with what goes on outside. Language mediates between the self and society and
enables us to read, think, and write about the world around us.
The reading and writing connection
Broad consensus exists about the relationship between reading and writing. Most experts agree that reading and
writing are similar and mutually supportive language processes [Butler and Turbill 1984]. Both rely on the reader’s
or writer’s background knowledge to construct meaning and both make use of cueing systems [graphic, semantic,
syntactic] to allow the reader or writer to predict and confirm meaning. Traditionally, as stated by Shanahan [1997],
reading and writing have been viewed as two separate processes with little in common. However, much of the re-
search is guided by the theory that both reading and writing involve meaning making.
An important point in the theory about reading and writing is that both share similar linguistic and cognitive
elements. As readers read and writers compose, both plan, draft, align, revise, and monitor. When readers plan, they
anticipate content; they draft when they have a first picture of content; and they align, revise, and monitor when
they verify their comprehension, guess, or reread. Planning involves two processes: setting goals and using prior
knowledge based on the reader’s background or personal experience. Readers look for clues to help them predict the
upcoming meaning of the text. Then the reader drafts as he or she has a first impression of the text. In aligning, readers
select their viewpoint. Alignment requires that readers and writers reread, rethink, reexamine, and review the author’s
stance in order to interpret the text. During revision and monitoring, readers and writers evaluate what they have read
or written, while composing meaning. Readers and writers are involved in many of the same activities. They generate
ideas, organize, monitor, problem-solve, and revise.
In his influential study about the relationship between reading and writing, Stotsky [1983] concluded that: [1]
good writers tend to be better readers than are less able writers; [2] good writers tend to read more frequently and
widely and to produce more syntactically complex writing; [3] writing itself does not tend to influence reading com-
prehension, but when writing is taught for the purpose of enhancing reading, there are significant gains in comprehen-
sion and retention of information; and [4] reading experiences have as great an effect on writing as direct instruction
in grammar and mechanics.
Process writing
The value of process writing in the classroom has been widely stressed. Students are encouraged to explore a
topic through writing, to share drafts with teachers and peers, and to use each draft as a beginning for the next. Vivian
Zamel [1985] recommended process writing as she castigated sentence-combining because it ignored “the enormous
complexity of writing [pre-writing, organizing, developing, proofreading, revising, etc.]” [1976, 89]. She stated that
“the act of composing should become the result of a genuine need to express one’s personal feelings, experience,
or reactions, all within a climate of encouragement” [1980, 89]. Peter Elbow and Nancy Sommers, as cited by Reid
[1993, 31], described writing as a “discovery procedure which relies heavily on the power of revision to clarify and
refine that discovery.”
Through planning, drafting, revising, editing, with peer and teacher feedback, many teachers have discovered,
accepted, and imple-mented the approaches, and philosophy, associated with process writing. Students begin by
gathering ideas from their own experience and knowledge and then turn to other sources as they search for their own
topic [Reid 1993]. They are given the opportunity to explore a variety of systematic methods of discovery while they
read, write, and talk to each other.
Another important aspect of process writing is peer review, which has been proven useful in many ways. First,
peer review gives students opportunities to share their strategies and their work and to get feedback from a variety of
readers. Texts do not evolve in a vacuum, and peer review groups enable students to realize that social, political, and
personal contexts influence writing. Secondly, peer review helps writers at all levels of writing proficiency understand
their interactive relationship with their readers. Their fellow students question varied interpretations and misunder-
standings and dramatize the necessity for the writers to provide verbal signs that will enable readers to understand
the intended meaning. Thirdly, peer review promotes respect for negotiation and cooperation, a spirit of mutual re-
sponsibility, in addition to respect and trust. Finally, students in peer review groups learn and practice a “language of
response,” gaining a perspective about their audience and an assessment of writing in terms of how their readers may
react to or comprehend their text [Reid 1993].
A writing workshop
The students taking part in this workshop were attending their English sixth class in an undergraduate program in
English, and the syllabus of the course stated that writing should be emphasized. Therefore I proposed writing literacy
memoirs as a means to fulfill the objectives of the course.
Literacy memoirs* was understood in the workshop as defined by William Zinsser, cited by Dillon [2000, 21], as
“unlike an autobiography, which moves in a dutiful line from birth to fame, omitting nothing significant.... [Rather,]
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the writer of a memoir takes us back to a corner of his or her life that was unusually vivid or intense.... [A] memoir
is a window into a life.”
A memoir is also an opportunity to understand social, cultural, and historical events in our past, as well as individ-
uals and texts that have influenced who we are today. Thus, students were told to write about those vivid experiences,
events, decisions, or people that had influenced or shaped them into the literate individuals they are.
The first step was reading samples of literacy memoirs [two excerpts are given in Appendix A]. Reading was used
to take advantage of its interactivity with writing. Therefore, through reading these samples, students were expected
to discover the topics and writing strategies that had led the writers to produce those pieces. These samples were read
and analyzed in terms of their content and organization.
The next step was for students to think about vivid experiences they wanted to write about and share with others,
as they were told that their writings would be published in a compendium or “book” that would be kept at the depart-
ment library.
Then, students came up with topics such as:
• How I became a teacher
• Difficulties in finding the right field of study at the university
• How I fell in love with the English language
• A significant adventure in literacy from childhood
• Reading and writing experiences throughout different levels of education
• Dilemmas about becoming a teacher
• A hidden dream to become an architect
After thinking about their topics, students wrote their plans using lists of ideas or diagrams, including the signifi-
cant events they would take into account to develop their writing. Students later handed their plans to their peers, who
gave them written feedback. For the feedback, I told them to ask whether the event would be described in chrono-
logical order and what specific examples the writer would include. Peer work was used to give the writers the idea of
an audience so that they could think about the potential reader and know that writing would be a collaborative work
where readers and writers could learn together through interaction.
In the next step, students wrote the first draft and gave it to their peers for revision inclass. I made it very clear that
in this first reading peer reviewers would be focusing on content and reminded them to concentrate on meaning that
could maximize appeal for the reader. Then, I gave 3.1students a checklist to guide their feedback. The list included
questions such as:
• Is there a unity of development?
• Is the whole writing focused on the same topic?
• Is there enough information about the event?
• Do I want to know more about this specific event?
• Are there vivid examples to make the writing interesting?
• Are the beginning, development, and ending clear?
• Do I feel interested in the story?
• How can the writer make it more interesting for the reader?
• Is there a balance in the information?
• Are there any unnecessary details?
• Does the beginning catch the reader’s attention?
• Is it necessary to add a more striking ending?
• Does the account of events give me a complete picture of the experience?
After the students wrote their feedback in class, I collected that draft and gave the writers feedback based on the
same checklist. When I returned the first draft, I talked to each student individually about the feedback given. I had 25
students in this class, so it involved significant time and effort to do this activity, but this kind of individual tutoring
is necessary because each student shows a different problem.
Then students wrote a second draft, taking into account the suggestions given by their peers and me. Each new
draft had to include the previous ones so that peers, writers, and I could notice the improvements. Once the second
draft was handed to peers, it was time to edit it. Students were asked to correct conventions [spelling, punctuation,
capitalization], organization, and grammar. useIn reviewing the organization, they were asked to concentrate on para-
graphs, giving suggestions to similar ideas for one paragraph and to develop one topic sentence in each paragraph.
For grammar they used a correction code they were familiar with [/: unnecessary word; WO: word order, VT: verb
tense; VF: verb form; WW: wrong word; etc.].
I collected the second drafts and edited them as well. Again I gave students written and oral feedback, focusing
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404
on paragraph organization since several students wrote one-sentence paragraphs or included different ideas or events
in the same paragraph.
Throughout the writing process, students were supposed to make the relevant corrections after getting feedback
from peers and then after my feedback. Revising would have been easy with computers; however, students didn’t
have easy access to computers at home or at the university. Sometimes they could type their paper but could not print
it, so very few students were able to type all drafts on a computer. It was not until the last draft that all students typed
their work and gave it to me on a floppy disk, with nice formats in most cases, since they knew that the articles would
be printed and published in a compendium or “book.”
The students were very excited about the publication of their work. After receiving all the articles, I wrote an
introduction with the theory, procedure, and outcomes involved. Two compendiums or “books” were bound and kept
at the department library for students in other classes to read.
A summary of the process used to produced the students’ memoirs appears in the chart on the previous page.
Observations on the workshop
Students viewed themselves as writers. Writing agood piece gave them confidence, helped them discover their
strengths, made them feel satisfied with their work, and gave them a sense of achievement and belief in their own
skills, as students pointed out:
• “At the beginning I didn’t know what to do, but after writing the different drafts, I got confident and could write
very well.”
• “I couldn’t believe in my abilities to write. This was an opportunity for me to believe that I could become a good
writer.”
These comments show that students are aware of their own capacities to use English. Their opinions helped them
build their self-esteem and confidence in their communicative competence in the language. The mastery of all linguis-
tic skills of speaking, listening, reading, and writing that they were expected to achieve at this level helped them see
themselves as successful users of English.
Students valued the process. They became aware that writing takes time and effort and that it is a complex, recur-
sive process that demands their commitment and dedication. We can notice that through their own words:
• “I made a lot of progress in writing because I learned some useful techniques.”
• “It was a very good experience because I wrote something I liked and I learned to write stage by stage.”
The process of exploring a topic through writing, sharing drafts, revising, and editing showed students the value
of using each draft as the beginning of the next. Revision and editing helped them refine the discovery and the power
of working step by step. Process writing gave the students a feeling of discovery and achievement, lowering anxiety
and strengthening their confidence in learning.
Writing became a rewarding activity. The students enjoyed writing their literacy memoirs. As stated earlier, re-
luctance to write is one of the biggest problems teachers face today; however, this problem was tackled appropriately
throughout this experience, as students said:
• “I enjoyed writing about my own feelings in English.”
• “It was a very good experience for me because I could write about a little part of my life in English and at the
same time I learned how to do it.”
Writing a memoir gave students motivation to write and involved them affectively with their task. Affectivity,
often overlooked by teachers, plays an important role as students become involved in a rewarding, pleasant, and sat-
isfactory activity that makes writing in the second language enjoyable, meaningful, and memorable.
Peer review played an important role. Students were very receptive to their peers’ comments. They were eager
to read the comments, and it was amazing for me to notice how accurate peers’ feedback was, not only referring to
content but to form as well. It was evident that students worked collaboratively and developedan interactive relation-
ship as readers and writers, learning from one another. Peer correction gave the writers the feeling of readership and
therefore helped them build the idea of writing to impact and impress the reader. Besides, the fact that the audience
was not only the teacher gave the students additional motivation to write. They worked more enthusiastically because
they knew that their articles would be published in a compendium or “book” that would be kept at the department
library and therefore might be read by students in other classes. They also knew that their drafts would be used in a
workshop with teachers.
Computers make revision easier. Using a computer is invaluable for an activity like this one, even though in our
case it was not possible to type and correct the drafts since most students didn’t have easy access to a computer. It is
easy and less time-consuming to correct draft after draft in the computer. This stresses the need for students to become
computer literate.
An opportunity to know the students better is at hand. I must admit that I saw my students differently when I read
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about their lives. Their dilemmas about whether or not to become teachers, the way they fell in love with the English
language, the influential people in their lives, their struggles to find the right fields of study after secondary school,
the change from secondary school to university life, and even the hard lives some of them had led were all moving.
After reading their stories I saw them as human beings with struggles, histories, and expectations not yet met who
were eager to discover new paths in life. Recognizing my students’ background and the individuals and experiences
that helped them shape their decisions helped me understand their cultural background and find better ways to meet
their needs.
Conclusion
Given the right conditions, writing can become a rewarding activity that fosters students’ language competence,
and in this case, it was proved that asking students to write a literacy memoir can inspire students to write a piece that
provides opportunities to reflect on a past experience that helped develop their literacy, giving them the possibility to
become better writers in English as well. Reading students’ memoirs provides the teacher with valuable information
about the students’ cultural background that can enrich the student-teacher relationship and empower the teacher to
create and maintain an atmosphere of mutual respect and understanding so that learning English is not only a cogni-
tive task but a rich human experience as well.
References
1 Barton, D. 1994. Literacy: An introduction to the ecology of written language. Oxford: Bockwell. Buder, A, and J. Turbill.
1984.
2 Towards a reading-writing classroom. Portsmouth, XH: Heinemann. Cases in literacy: An agendafor discussion. 1989.
Newark, DE: International Reading Association and The National Council of Teachers of English.
3 Dillon, R. D. 2000. Kids insight: Reconsidering how to meet the literacy needs of all students. Newark:International Reading
Association. Hirsh, E. D., Jr. 1987. Cultural literacy: What every American needs to know. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
4 Reid, J. M. 1993. Teaching ESL writing. Engle-wood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall Regents.
5 Shanahan, T. 1997. Reading-Writing relationships, thematic units, inquiry learning: In pursuit of effective integrated literacy
instruction. The Reading Teacher 52: 12-19.
6 Stotsky, S. 1983. Research on reading-writing rela¬tionship: A synthesis and suggested directions. Language Arts 60: 627-
42.
7 Zamel, V. 1976. Teaching composition in the ESL classroom: What we can learn from research in the teaching of English.
TESOL Quarterly 10 [1]: 67-76.
Смаилбекова Ш.Д. - Гумилев атындағы ЕҰУ Халықаралық қатынастар факультетінің аға оқытушысы.
Шетел тілін окытуда шығарманың практикалық пайдасы.
Бұл мақалада оқу-әдістемелік тәжірибенің бір түрінің түсіндірмесі жазылған, нақтылап айтқанда студенттердің
естелік жазбалары. Студенттерде қуанышты, мүңды, әуесқойлық немесе жаңа өмірлік тәжірибеге үйреткен
мәселелерді қарастыра отырып, бұл жобаға қызушылық білдіреді. Сондықтан олар толық және грамматика жағынан
дұрыс жазуға тырысады. Бұл ең алдымен олардың тілдік тәжірибесін жетілдіреді.
Түйін сөздер: ғұмырнама, тілдік тәжірибе, эмоция, хаттық дағдылар, оқылым дағдылары, әлеуметтік желілер.
Смаилбекова Ш.Д. - старший преподаватель ЕНУ им. Л.Н.Гумилева факультет МО. Практическая польза
сочинений в обучении иностранному языку.
В статье описан один из методов учебной письменной практики, а именно запись воспоминаний студентов. Повествуя
о событиях, которые вызвали у студентов радость, печаль, любопытство или научили новому жизненному опыту,
студенты втягиваются в процесс и это заставляет их писать больше, грамотнее, и как следствие нарабатывать
языковую практику.
Ключевые слова: мемуары, языковая практика, эмоции, навыки письма, навыки чтения, социальные сети, зацепки
в тексте.
Accepted for publication 02.03.2016.
Л.Н. Гумилев атындағы ЕҰУ Хабаршысы
406
УДК 373.6.016.02:519.711
Т.И. СМАГЛИЙ
1
, Б.Ш. БАЙМУХАМБЕТОВА
2
к.п.н.
1
, доктор философии (Phd) Костанайский государственный
педагогический институт
ТЕХНОЛОГИЯ ФОРМИРОВАНИЯ ГОТОВНОСТИ БУДУЩИХ УЧИТЕЛЕЙ К ПРОФЕССИОНАЛЬНО-
ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКОМУ СОТРУДНИЧЕСТВУ
Статья посвящена актуальной проблеме высшей школы – формированию готовности будущих учителей
к профессионально-педагогическому сотрудничеству. В ней описывается исследовательская работа,
направленная на разработку и проверку технологии формирования готовности будущих учителей к
профессионально-педагогическому сотрудничеству. Исходя из идеи уровневого подхода, выделяются три
уровня сформированности данной готовности: репродуктивный, репродуктивно-творческий, творческий.
Разработанная технология формирования готовности к профессионально-педагогическому
сотрудничеству представляет собой единство трёх модулей, имеющие свою цель, содержание, методы и
средства обучения, результат.
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