Thursday, August 4, 2016

2016 Symposium on Second Language Writing



The (tentative) schedule for the Symposium on Second Language Writing is now out. This year the conference is at Arizona State University from October 20 to October 22. Please share widely, and consider attending. http://sslw.asu.edu/2016/schedule.html

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Words Fail

I found this piece by Curzan helpful in thinking about how to move beyond the place of having no words to process the difficult events we see everyday to finding the language to do so. This is also helpful to think about with our non-native speaking writers. It might not be an issue of language that's preventing them from writing about difficult events; it might be the events themselves. http://chronicle.com/blogs/linguafranca/2016/07/13/words-fail/

Thursday, June 30, 2016

Textbooks and Resources for Teaching SLW - Higher Education ESL

50 Steps to Improving Your Academic Writing - Chris Sowton -Garnett Publishing 2011
ISBN:  978-1859646557

Academic Writing for Graduate Students, Swales & Feak

Advanced Grammar by Helen Hoyt Schmidt (Pearson)

Basic English Grammar & Workbook, Azar

Exploring Options in Academic Writing: Effective Vocabulary and Grammar Use by Jan Frodesen (Author), Margi Wald (Author), University of Michigan Press - 2016 - ISBN-13: 978-0472034260

Fundamentals of English Grammar, Azar

Grammar Choices, Caplan

Great Writing and Final Draft series (Keith Folse)

Introduction to Academic Writing, by Oshima & Hogue 

Longman Academic Writing Series 5 

Making Connections, 1, Williams

New Passwords I, Butler

New Passwords II, Butler

Sixty Words, Cranker

Sourcework: Academic Writing From Sources, Dollahite

Stylish Academic Writing by Helen Sword (Harvard University Press, 2012)

Top 20: Great Grammar for Great Writing, Folse

Understanding and Using English Grammar with On-Line Subscription, Azar

Writing Academic English, by Oshima & Hogue 

Writing Today (Pearson) 

Writing for Computer Science, Justin Zobel, 1998, Springer

Writing in the Sciences: Exploring Conventions of Scientific Discourse, Ann Penrose and Steven Katz, 2004, Bedford/St. Martin's Press

Essentials of Writing Biomedical Research Papers, Zeiger (Ed.), 2000, McGraw Hill

Writing in the Social Sciences, Steward & Smelstor, 1984, Scott Foresman 

A Short Guide to Writing about Art, Sylvan Barnet, 2003, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about Literature, Barnet & Cain, 2003, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about Biology, Pechenik, 2004, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about Chemistry, Beall & Trimbur, 2001, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about History, Marius, 2002, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about Music, Porush, 2000, Longman

A Short Guide to Writing about Social Science, Cuba, 2002, Longman

Writing Up Research: Experiemental Research Report Writing for Students of English by Robert Weissberg and Suzanne Buker.



Textbooks and Resources for Teaching SLW - EFL



Devine, Felice Primeau. Goof-Proof Grammar. Learning Express, 2002

Hacker, Diana, et al. A Writer's Reference, Bedford/St. Martins, Boston, 2007

Murray, Neil. Writing Essays in English Language and Linguistics: Principles, Tips and Strategies for Undergraduates, Cambridge University Press, New York; Cambridge, 2012

New English File series

Friday, April 15, 2016

Providing Feedback on Feedback - Brown Bag Presentation - Spring 2016 - Columbia University Teachers College



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“HOW DO I RESPOND?”: AN EXAMINATION OF
SECOND LANGUAGE WRITING TEACHER CANDIDATES’
RESPONSES TO MULTILINGUAL STUDENT WRITERS

Dr. Cate Crosby, Faculty
TESOL& Applied Linguistics Program
Teachers College, Columbia University

Because of the diverse linguistic and educational backgrounds multilingual writers bring to the writing process, second language writing (SLW) teachers are presented with unique writing challenges to address in the classroom. Moreover, the experience SLW instructors have with providing feedback to multilingual writers often addresses local errors in writing rather than global. Finally, because writing feedback is one of the most common ways to instruct multilingual writers on how to improve their writing, there is the need for it to be comprehensible. However, it is often the case that this is not so (Stern & Solomon, 2006). This brown bag presents the results of a study of ten SLW teacher candidates’ responses to U.S.-educated multilingual writers that was carried out in a first year writing course for the purpose of learning about writing errors and providing feedback. Results show the teacher candidates developed a strong sense of the multilingual writers’ academic literacy needs and greater confidence in responding to global and local writing issues. 

Link to the Brown Bag Presentation - Spring 2016 -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Cq-Y97PpUc