Getting to Know My Students

I wrote "Getting to Know My Students" last semester after interviewing 3 high school English students. This displays some of my concerns in teaching the subject of English as well as gives me somewhat a perspective of what works and doesn't work in the classroom.

Even saying the word ‘writing’ causes most students, especially those in high school, to cringe at the thought. Is it really that hard or are students just being lazy? Do they just have trouble getting started or are students really incapable of writing a good piece? Do they even want to become better writers? As a recent high school graduate, I don’t remember writing being used as a learning tool very often in the classrooms I attended. I remember doing a few history reports, but as far as regular assignments of essays in English courses, there weren’t many. The fact that I never wrote a graded essay my senior year of high school is the sole reason why I was led to be a high school English teacher. Entering into English composition courses in college, I felt concerned, unprepared and behind the learning curve. As a future teacher, it is my goal to help reduce some of this anxiety felt by English students, and help make them better writers by the time they leave my classroom.

To better get in touch with students in high school now, I interviewed three high school seniors to ask them about how they felt about the writing process and what I could do as a future teacher to make the process less nerve-racking. For interview questions see Appendix A. The three students I interviewed were Tara Skipper, Jonathan Caron, and Emily Klein. All three students attend Murphy High School and, after a little warming up, enjoyed speaking to me about writing. They shared their likes, comments, thoughts, and certainly, their dislikes on writing. I took away from all three of my interviews: first of all, students need teachers to engage them with more brainstorming ideas before they begin writing; students do want to improve their writing skills, they just need the tools; and the anxiety of writing can be reduced by a few slight modifications by the teacher.

The Hardest Part is Getting Started

After being asked, “What do you dislike about writing?” Emily Klein responded with, “Starting it, how to start the introduction.” All three students all responded with the introduction paragraph of their essays as being the most difficult. Because the introduction seems to be a problem spot in writing an essay, students tend to get frustrated when they can’t get started right away. Using more effective brainstorming or building exercises seems to be one way to eliminate “writers block” for students. However, the problem is they already are using some form of prewriting. So what could a teacher do to help reduce this anxiety? I think a common problem for most students is that it is hard to make connections with the topics they know little about. Discussions and talking about unfamiliar topics before students begin to write could really help students begin their essays. Another way to eliminate the students’ anxiety about the introduction would be to show sample essays on a similar topic. This could open the flow of ideas as wells as, help the student approach the introduction with more understanding. Also, breaking up the students into groups of 3-5 (not every time an essay is assigned) would also help students come up with ways to begin their essays and give them more time to think, talk, and share about the topic being written about. In addition to these ways to help reduce anxiety of writing a paper is to suggest beginning with the body of the essay, which will help tie together their thoughts so a clear thesis can be constructed. This method was never taught to me as a high school student, but I think this would really help eliminate the stress of getting started for some students.

Keeping the Students’ Interest
One question that I found imperative to ask in my interviews was, “Would you like to improve your writing skills?” Consequently, all three students responded with “Yes!” I think it is important that the students want to become better at writing. The problem is keeping their interest throughout high school and so on. The first thing that Jonathan told me when he sat down was, “I hate English,” but later I found out that he really enjoys writing about “himself and other people.” Keeping the topics age appropriate and current is important as well, especially when it comes to writing topics. They don’t want to write about what they did last summer-- they would rather write about topics that they can connect with. I asked Tara Skipper if she remembered what her most recent piece of writing, and her response was, “Yes, we wrote on the most inspirational person last year. I wrote it about my grandmother. I liked talking about her because she is deceased now, and I like hearing about how others are inspired by other people’s lives.”

Not only do students like to write, but they understand that it is a learning tool. All three of my students said they didn’t mind writing research papers, in fact they actually found them easier to write than most other forms of writing. They said that the process just seemed longer, and sometimes “boring at times” because of the actual research. Keeping the topics fresh, current, and interesting to high school students is a challenge that will not always be met because different students like writing about different things. Giving more choices in what they write about was one suggestion that Emily gave me. “I really like writing about other people’s lives rather than my own, or making up something about someone else.” She also went on to say that she enjoyed having more freedom in what he could write about rather than something that was assigned. It seems that covering a wide variety of topics may keep their interest in writing and make English class more interesting to the students.

How Teachers Can Reduce Anxiety for Students
Although the students could never really give me an answer when I asked, “How can a teacher make writing less stressful for the student?” or “How I could reduce anxiety is the classroom?” they did give me several areas of concern throughout the interview. First off, all three students said that they had mixed feelings about using peer evaluations. They generally said that the use of them didn’t seem to be effective because most of the time other students goofed off and didn’t really proofread their papers. When asked about her position on peer evaluations, Emily Klein responded with, “It depends on what we’re writing about, if it is something more personal, I’d rather not have somebody else read it other than my teacher, family, or parents.” After hearing the students’ responses and contemplating my own experiences with this type of evaluation, I think that as a teacher it is important to establish the classroom as a safe environment, even if this means that peer evaluations should just be monitored more closely. This could be done by giving more strict guidelines on what should be edited in a peer’s essay.

Another area of importance is where the writing should take place. I think that assignments like reflection paragraphs are fine to assign in the classroom, but as far as writing papers for grades, the students should be given time at home to finish. All three of my students had different responses when I asked whether they wrote better at home or in class. They should be given the opportunity to take an assigned essay home to look over and proofread. I assume that not all students will take advantage of this opportunity, but I think it is fair for those students, much like me, who have trouble focusing in an unsettling environment.

After talking with Tara, Jonathan, and Emily, I really understood how influential English teachers are to writing and how I, as a future teacher, can reduce some of this writing anxiety for my students. I took away from my interviews that students really need the most help with starting their papers whether this be showing examples of introductions or helping them make a connection to the subject. They also shared with me how “boring” writing can be at times and how giving more relate-able topics may keep the students’ attention longer. These three students also gave me some areas of concern that make them feel hesitate about writing. Some of the limitations to my research are that I only spoke to only three students, all of which attend the same school.

Appendix A

What are your future goals (jobs, college…) and how are they going to incorporate writing in the future?

What do you consider “writing”?
What was your most recent or favorite writing assignment that a teacher assigned?
What topics to you enjoy writing about and why?
When you begin writing an essay, how do you plan ahead, as in ‘brainstorming’ or pre-writing?
What do you dislike most about the entire process of writing?
Do you write better at home or in the classroom?
Which part of the essay is the hardest for you, the introduction, body, or conclusion (ending)?
When graded on essays, do you think the grading is fair?
Would you like to improve your writing skills?
Have you ever had a peer look over a paper for you, and did you like/dislike this type of evaluation?
Have you ever been given any helpful tools from a teacher or peer about the writing process?
Do you find writing research papers difficult?
How could a teacher reduce anxiety about writing for a student?
Do you consider yourself a good writer?
Which of the following types of writing is your least favorite? Narrative, Expository, Persuasive, Compare and Contrast, etc…