Overview of WRD 543
Students in Dr. Jason Schneider’s WRD 543: Teaching ESL Writing course learned to better understand the theoretical and practical issues connected to writing studies in an increasingly diverse world.
WRD 543 is a graduate-level course, open to all MA in WRD students, and is offered every other year. It provides concentration credit for students in DePaul’s Teaching Writing and Language concentration of the MA in WRD and counts for Methods credit for those students pursuing the Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) certificate. Structured around readings and weekly discussion posts, the course helps students to understand the teaching of writing to multilingual students.
Professor Schneider sees the course as essential not only for students in the TESOL certificate program, but for anyone who wants to teach writing. Says Schneider,
I feel anyone who wants to teach writing needs to have a basis for understanding students who use English as a second or additional language. You’re always going to find second-language speakers in your courses and you need to have the knowledge to draw upon to make supportive choices for these students.
What Students Do in WRD 543
Each week, WRD 543 students will help lead some of the class discussions and even design practice lessons based on concepts and methods from class readings. There will also be practical activities. For example, in a couple different weeks students may be given sample essays written by ESL students and decide either how they would give feedback and guidance to the student, or to assign what they believed to be an appropriate score on the basis of a rubric. Exercises such as this allowed students to hone their feedback and assessment process through hands-on practice and collaboration.
Professor Schneider, who last year was awarded a coveted Excellence in Teaching Award, sees this application of theory in practical ways as essential to both students’ learning and his own. Says Schneider, “It’s always interesting to me to let people bring in their own experience as learners. It expands my own understanding of how people go about language learning, and what kinds of teachers people aspire to become.”
At least once during the quarter, Professor Schneider also lets students read and discuss books according to their particular interests in ESL/EAL writing. This usually includes some “classics” from the field, such as Controversies in Second Language Writing by Christine Casanave and Connecting Reading and Writing in Second Language Writing Instruction by Alan Hirvela, as well brand-new books, such as Shawna Shapiro’s Cultivating Critical Language Awareness in the Writing Classroom.
New Perspectives for Teaching in a Diverse World
Ultimately, WRD 543 encourages students to look at teaching writing from a perspective outside their own, and to recognize the many ways that writing can be impacted by one’s native language or background. It’s also a course that can open students’ eyes to the challenges and possibilities of teaching writing in a diverse city like Chicago. Says Professor Schneider,
A lot of teachers feel they don’t know what do with multilingual students or they’re viewed negatively. I’d like to move away from that viewpoint, and realize that students who speak other languages and who are from other cultures can be a positive resource in the classroom.