ABSTRACT
I’m having a very hard time teaching my ESL 105 class (expository writing), and I’m wondering if you could visit my class and if we could please talk. I heard that you taught ESL writing for many years and that you might have some ideas. I think I’m a good writer, but that fact does not seem to help me in teaching academic writing to these international students. I just don’t know how to help them. I haven’t taught writing to ESL students before, but I’ve taught other ESL classes at the community college (and loved it!) before I started my M.A. degree. My students are studying in engineering, business, chemistry, history, biology, some other areas of science, but I cannot remember which ones. They are mostly Asians, but I have three Hispanic students who actually graduated from high school here and who tested into my class from the Writing Program-four students from Europe and two Arabic speakers. They all seem to have different needs when it comes to writing and their writing is all over the place. In general, the sample essays that I collected from them were full of errors and so poorly organized. I feel completely overwhelmed in trying to respond, so I haven’t done anything with the papers. The students keep asking me about them because they want them back before their next essay is due. I just don’t know where to begin. Some grad students who have taught the course before gave me the syllabus and some materials, and there is a book. But, these syllabi are mostly based around the exercises in the book. Oh yes, a number of students don’t think the exercises I have them do in the book are helpful and have told me so (both in and after class-another problem). I wouldn’t say they have a bad attitude really; I think they just want to improve their writing abilities, and I don’t seem to be helping them. Can you please meet with me and help me soon? I’ll be in the lab all morning and will try to come back to find you. Also, my phone number is below, and I have a mailbox in the Department. [Personal correspondence, 2009]
Task: Reflect
1. If you were the person to whom the note in the vignette was directed, what specific advice would you give to this teacher in order to help him
move forward in solving the problems he is experiencing in his L2 academic writing class?
