Poetry 4 English Learners

As I have pointed out in the previous posts, many authors have advocated for the place of literature in the EFL, ESL, and EAL class, however most text books and teachers opt for prose extracts. Poetry is not a considered a common or easy option for English language learners, therefore its place in the curriculum needs to be justified and emphasized. I’m going to put forward two fundamental reasons for including poetry in the English Language class: poetry appeals both to the heart and the mind, that is to say affective and cognitive strategies interact with poetry in such a way that learning becomes meaningful and pleasurable. Let’s start with affective factors. Poetry is about powerful positive and negative emotions everyone experiences such as love, fear and happiness. It is also about ordinary and extraordinary events which happen to all of us. The language and topics addressed are full of real content and become personal and meaningful to the students. Furthermore, poetry allows subconscious issues to emerge enabling students to discuss their feelings and grow emotionally. It also encourages communication and the sharing of both experiences and feelings, thereby helping both themselves as well as each other. On the other hand, reading and writing poetry is also a cognitive endeavour. Readers will have to decipher and guess the coded or symbolic meaning of the text, whereas the recreation of poetic texts requires the use of intellectual skills such as the synthesis and codification of information. Memory and repetition are essential aspects of poetry which will also reinforce learning. Poetry is an unparalleled way of building awareness of prosodic and suprasegmental features of language learning such as stress, rhythm and intonation, which can only be acquired by the intensive listening and repetition which poetry offers. Poetry also favours skills integration because it should be listened to, read, written and recited. But the greatest value of poetry for teachers is the unlimited amount of poems available of different types, styles, length, epochs, topics, and geographical locations. Learners may not be able to read a whole novel, or even a short story, but they will be able to tackle a poem. They will not be able to write a longer text, but they will be able to write a poem. The variety available to students and teachers is unlimited. There are poems which have survived from Old English literature and twitter poems being written with 140 characters in English speaking countries around the world. One of the greatest challenges is how to integrate poetry in the English class. This blog’s main aim is to offer teachers and learners information and ideas in order to listen to, read, recite, write and enjoy poetry in class.

Why include literature in English Language learning? Part II

Surprisingly, not a great deal has been added to theoretical aspects of the place of literature in the English Language curriculum in the last decades and in many cases the same authors are reediting and updating their original work. For example John McRae has updated his book “The Language of Poetry” (2003, first published in 1998) and Carter’s “Investigating English Discourse: Language, Literacy, Literature” first published in 1997 was reprinted in 2003. University bibliographies on the topic still quote the authors in my previous entry. I would however identify a shift in the emphasis of the literature which is now more concerned with methodological and pedagogical aspects of teaching literature, than justification and general theory. Almost forty years after Widdowson’s “Stylistics”, the benefits of using literary texts with English learners is still being discussed and proposed by many authors. Ronald Carter himself who is presently Research Professor of Modern English Language, Faculty of Arts at the University of Nottingham UK, is still researching on practical aspects of this topic in articles such as Literature and Language Awareness: Using literature to achieve CEFR outcomes in Journal of Second Language Teaching and Research (2011). His colleague at Nottingham, Peter Stockwell with whom Carter has written The Language and Literature Reader (2008) has recently written articles such as On Teaching Literature Itself (2007) which you can read on his Academia.edu page Gillian Lazar is still investigating and lecturing on this subject and has recently written an article on the topic 'Meanings and Metaphors' (2003), published by Cambridge University Press, in which she proposes ways of exploiting metaphors in literary texts in the English class to develop learner autonomy enhance creativity and increase vocabulary learning. Much is being investigated regarding the types of materials to be used in second language classrooms such as articles by B. A. Smallwood, Center for Applied Linguistics and Vardell Hadaway and Young Matching books and readers: Selecting literature for English learners. In conclusion, the issues which concern educators at the moment are not about whether to teach literature in EFL, ESL and EAL classes, but rather which types of materials to use and which teaching strategies to employ.

Why include literature in English language learning? Part I

The first issue I’d like to talk about is why use literature when teaching English language learners. Some teachers and many learners think it’s unnecessary or even impossible due to their limited knowledge of the language. It’s important for both to remember or realize that literature fulfills an irreplaceable role in classrooms. The first researcher who identified the value of integrating the teaching of English literature to language learners was Henry Widdowson In his pioneering text, Stylistics and the Teaching of Literature (1975), he proposed a combination of linguistics and literary study which enables teachers and educators to explore literature in the language class. Sandra McKay opened the debate in her article Literature in the EFL Classroom in Tesol Quarterly (December 1982)in which she concluded that “For many students, literature can provide a key to motivating them to read in English. For all students, literature is an ideal vehicle for illustrating language use and for introducing cultural assumptions.” The following years and decades witnessed many more books proposing reasons and methods for using literature in communicative classrooms. Carter and Long (1991) discussed three main approaches to the teaching of literature: language learning, culture and personal growth. They identify the linguistic model as the most common approach to literature in English classrooms. The text is dissected mainly as a combination of grammar and vocabulary, with some attention to denotation and connotation and symbolism in language use. The cultural model views literature as a more interdisciplinary field. A way for learners to develop their artistic sensitivity and awareness of cultural representations such as values, and cultural background including contemporary as well as historical literary movements, figures and works. The personal growth model emphasises the treatment of universal themes such as love, trauma, loss, which will encourage learners to express their opinions and feelings in order to make connections between their own personal and cultural experiences and those expressed in the text. Most authors also propose that an integration of the three approaches would be more beneficial for language learning. It seems more appropriate to combine the three aspects when including literature in the curriculum in order to provide more enjoyable and enriching learning situation for students. For more information on this first wave of books on the subject look into: Brumfit and Carter in Literature and Language Teaching (OUP 1986); Carter & Long, Teaching Literature (Longman 1991); Collie, J., & Slater, S. Literature in the Language Classroom (CUP 1987); Maley and Duff, in Literature (OUP 1990); and Carter & McRae, editors of Language, Literature and the Learner (Longman 1996); Gillian Lazar:'Literature and Language Teaching: A guide for teachers and trainers' (1993), 'A Window on Literature' (1999).

Blog Presentation

Hi poetry lovers, I'm Lucy Garcia Magaldi. Experienced although not yet exhausted English teacher. Over the past thirty years I have been teaching English to children, teenagers, young and older adults at Secondary schools, Adult Education Centers and University; I have also been involved in pre, initial, and in-service teacher training in Spain. Right now, what concerns me most is how to motivate myself, and consequently my students to learn English. There is no generally acknowledged single best teaching method which suits all students or teachers, but that's not stopping me from searching for ways in which to help my students learn to speak and write English, learn to grow emotionally, and learn how to appreciate our world (past and present) through its artistic and cultural manifestations. I've discovered that poetry is an ideal way into my students heads and hearts, and through this blog I'd like to share my reflections, my findings and my experiences with you, as they occur or as I am able to recall and articulate them for a wider audience.

Nate Conference 2013

I'm thrilled to be giving a workshop at this year's Nate Conference at Stratford-upon-Avon entitled: "Teaching EFL and EAL through poetry and digital media", on Friday 28th June at 10.45. Just in case there are any problems with technology and because I'm sure there won't be enough time to go through all the resources and materials I'll be presenting, I've decided to put them all up on this blog. I've actually wanted to do this for a long time in order to reach a larger audience and receive feedback from other teachers. I also feel it would be useful for Conference participants to have all the materials available online without the need to carry around (or lose) photocopies. I haven't finished setting up the blog yet, in fact, it's taken me a couple of evenings just to organize the layout and get started, but I hope all (or at least most) of the Conference materials will be up here by the 27th of June when I'll be catching the plane to Stratford. Enough for day 1. More about me tomorrow!