Insights into the student writing process

Jenifer Spencer

Freelance Language Consultant and Author
EAP Essentials. Garnet Education (UK)

Abstract

In writing materials for specialist courses and editing PhDs and papers, I have obtained insights into parts of the student and scholarly writing processes that are not always available in the context of classroom EAP teaching, or are very time consuming for busy teachers to access. In this session I will share some of these insights using texts from two students, with their permission. Using examples of student texts (from a PhD and a published paper) and one student’s feedback on his writing process, I will explore how the teacher can support the student’s writing journey through collaborative exploration of what is effective writing and how language can work to achieve this, through a solid combination of a solid vocabulary resource in the subject area and careful and confident uses of cohesive devices and a not-too-reverent approach to some language teaching orthodoxy, such as avoiding repetition. 

I will show examples of how the journey towards developing the language needed in the disciplinary area can involve an ontological approach to the objects and concepts under study, by sharing the students’ understanding of the subject area and the teachers’ understanding of the way language works. I also give some examples of what I see as effective writing, and invite the participants to decide what elements of language and structure are supporting this skill. I will also look at the value of training students to recognise the strengths in their own writing and develop those, rather than presenting them with models to copy.