What L2 Creative Writing Teachers Need to Know

A writing Prompt

Materials: Creative writing prompt (below)

Directions: You can spend at least an hour doing this, and the kids will be reading, writing, laughing, and writing more. First, you hand out a writing prompt - a piece of paper on which the beginning of a story is already written (I have provided several examples below). Have the students read the introduction, then give them 5 or 10 minutes to continue writing the story.  After the predetermined amount of time has passed, yell, "Stop!" at which time the students pass their papers clockwise.  Each student now must read what has been written by another student, and they have another 5 or 10 minutes to continue the story.  Keep going, passing papers clockwise, until the student has his/her original paper back. The student can then provide his/her own conclusion to the story.

Found in:  http://www.stickyball.net/writing/282.html

 

A Collaborative Approach to Writing

 I have used this method with many adult ESL classes at the beginner and intermediate levels. It works with groups that work well together anyway, and don't have any heavy issues dividing them. I assign a topic, for example, finishing a story such as "The Lady or the Tiger?," their weekend, or their hometown. The students double space their work and hand it in. I critique it thoroughly, circling errors, drawing arrows to show mistakes in word order, writing question marks where I don't understand, suggesting words by giving a few letters as hints, etc. I then photocopy all the stories and hand back a booklet containing all the stories to each student. We work through several during each class, checking with each writer as to what they really meant, and helping each writer to polish their work. This technique obviously demands a high level of student-student and teacher-student respect, and it builds even greater respect. I often compliment the students on their interesting sentences and thank them for their efforts (i.e. "It's good you made that mistake so we could learn this new word."; "I'm glad you mixed up those two verbs so we could talk about how important it is to use the correct one.") I emphasize the miscommunication caused by errors, so they can see that writing correctly is not a matter of pleasing the teacher but of saying what they really mean. I tell the students how wonderful it is that they can all learn from each other, and they really buy into it.

With a very small class, I have the students all write their paragraphs on the board. I then go through them with a red marker, highlighting what I'd like changed, and we correct it as a class. The students often like to copy each other's stories.

I use some of their sentences on our weekly tests. This validates the importance of the learning that occurs during this activity, as well as the students' experiences and ideas. I have also had the students write about their home and re-write their stories when corrected, then put them all into a booklet and given it to them for Christmas.

Found in: http://www.eslcafe.com/idea/index.cgi?display:981165693-2392.txt

 

Newspaper Picture Articles

This is an old-favourite lesson of mine which always works well with teenagers or adults, from intermediate to advanced levels. It is a great collaborative writing activity and can work well if you have been studying newspaper language, reported speech or narrative tenses.

Aims: For groups of students to devise a newspaper story based on random pictures.

Level: B1+

Preparation: You will need to prepare several pictures (enough for 4 per every 3 students as a minimum). The best pictures are ones cut out of newspapers, the more unusual the better, and I try to avoid pictures of anyone famous. You could also use pictures from magazines, or find some on a site such as eltpics. I tend to cut good photos out of newspapers as and when I find them and keep them in a plastic wallet (and you’ll be surprised about all the uses you might find for them!)

Task:

1. Put your students into groups, 3 is the best number I find.

2. Lie the pictures face down on a table and ask one member of each group to come and choose 4 pictures at random.

3. Tell the students that the 4 pictures they have were all in a newspaper to illustrate 1 story. Ask them to try and think of a story that would connect all the stories. Give them plenty of time to discuss and come up with ideas.

4. Ask them to nominate one student to write or type the story out. Make sure all the students are involved in this stage, you could even suggest they take it in turns to write. For lower levels, what they produce will often be more like a story but for higher levels try and encourage them to write it more in the style of a newspaper article (ie. clear time, date, factual information, quotes from important people). You may want to set a word limit here too.

5. When they have finished the story, ask all the students in the group to re-read it and check for any errors.

6. Ask the groups to think of a headline for the story. Elicit what features headlines normally have (eg. use present tenses, sensational language, omission of articles/verbs, using only key words)

7. At this stage you might want to ask the students to read their articles to the class (make sure if one student has done most of the writing they don’t also read) while showing the pictures that inspired them, or you could make posters to display in class, or you could scan pictures in and put on a class blog or wiki.

(This is another one of those lessons that I got from somewhere but I have used for so many years I no longer remember where it was from originally. If anyone knows, please let me know so I can reference it

Found in: https://creativitiesefl.wordpress.com/2013/02/24/newspaper-picture-articles/ 

 

Three Creative Writing Exercises

For students of English as a second language, creative writing is a way to learn to play with words and experiment with expressing thoughts and feelings. Creative, or imaginative writing, allows students to practice communicating using everyday language as well as rehearsing the vocabulary used in specific situations, such as when shopping or asking directions. Using creative writing as part of a teaching plan allows ESL teachers to gauge the progress of each student and make sure a student’s foreign language writing abilities are keeping pace with their speaking skills. Here are three specific exercises a student can practice to enhance their creative writing ability:

 

Keep a Journal

Each student keeps a diary or journal in which they record everyday events and activities. The exercise can be adjusted to allow for different levels of language ability. For instance, ask beginner students to record just one or two words each day to describe the weather, or an item of clothing they are wearing that day. Have more advanced students write in complete sentences, detailing one or more of their daily activities.

 

Practice Punctuation

Make up two characters to write about and have them discuss a film that the student has recently watched. Have one character love the film and the other character hate it. Write the dialogue between them as they discuss what they thought of the film. Use the correct punctuation for dialogue throughout. Make the exercise more challenging by using two characters who are complete opposites, such as an old lady and a little boy. Adapt the exercise for beginner students by asking them to simply describe characters or actors within a film they have seen.

 

Past and Future Tense Poems

Writing short poetry verses is a good way to learn how to use the different tenses in the English language. Write a short poem in the past tense that describes what you did yesterday, then write a short poem in the future tense that describes what you have planned for tomorrow. In the past tense you will use phrases such as I went, I saw, I was, We were, and for the future tense you will use phrases such as I will, I am going, I want to, I will and We shall.

Found in: https://www.eslpartyland.com/creative-writing-esl-student