blog 6

Thoughts regarding "Tutoring ESL Students" Also, the links to my two vignette drafts here. I just linked them to my post "blog 7" because I wasn't sure where else to post them. 

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Tutoring ESL Students: 

I like the stress put on the individual; by addressing a writer’s problems on an individual level, I think it protects the writer’s voice while still providing them the help they need. As opposed to clumping students together and saying, “Just do this.”

But I also see the problem in having a talented English speaker help a non-native speaker. This mirrors what I’m learning in my Linguistics course, and since taking it, I realize how much harder it really is to learn a new language. Primarily because the rules (and linguistically, sounds) don’t always transfer over so it’s extremely difficult for the student to translate their thoughts in a (grammatically) correct way.

I can relate to feeling like I am responsible for fixing an entire paper to the point of an exceptional passing grade.

Like the first step of acknowledging the good.

It’s also true that most readers gloss over mistakes. The brain automatically supplies what it wants/expects to see so many people don’t realize mistakes unless they’re pointed out to them.

Never heard of a translation issue somehow having a positive effect. Would like to see an example of that.

At this point the information seems a bit obvious.

Help with language or writing process; I think in this respect, it is difficult, possibly impossible, to separate the two. I agree that the distinction is not clear cut, but I disagree that finding out which one is causing the problem is as crucial to solving the problem as they say it is. I can’t put my finger on why this idea bothers me so much, it just seems like maybe the writers are oversimplifying the problem by saying it can be broken up into two categories of possible causation. I think they might influence each other too much to be properly separated.

Although the piece says that the results of “Do ESL writers compose differently” are extremely tentative, I have witnessed an ESL writer do the exact things the authors describe.

A basic linguistics curse would be more helpful than taking a grammar refresher course. I also doubt the helpfulness of self-study seminars for the given topic.

Interesting to point out that most students are looking for someone to “fix” their paper as opposed to helping them correct their writing styles. Typical of the American school system that dictates the test, the final grade, is what counts. Interesting how, despite having differences, ESL and NES kids both react the same way when writing papers: fix what I wrote, so I know what you want, so I can get a good grade. That lesson has transcended the language barrier. 

“written accent” sounds like a stylistic thing.

The “strategies that work” section was surprisingly unhelpful, and kind of contradictory to what was said earlier in the article.