1.

MODEL
Pre-Writing:
Beginners: Print out pictures from the Madeline Francis’ Hansel and
Gretel story (attached) or upload into a Power Point presentation, one
picture per slide. Divide students into groups of three. Assign each
group member a task: sentence creator, writer, editor. Then, show each
picture (in chronological order) for 30 seconds. Each group needs to
create a sentence to describe what is happening in the picture and each
of the 3 group members are assigned a job. The sentence creator
dictates a sentence to the writer, the writer writes the sentence that is
spoken, and the editor checks for grammar, spelling and formatting
mistakes. (Students can change job assignments with each new picture.)
After all the pictures are shown, each group should read their story to
the class.

Intermediate: Progressive Writing Activity: Divide students into

groups of 3-4, have them make a circle with their desks or sit at the
same table, and ask students to take out a pen/pencil and a notebook.
Write on the board, “Once upon a time, there was a poor family who
didn’t have enough money to buy food…..” Students should copy this
sentence in their notebooks. Then, allow students one minute to write as
much as they can in their notebook. Remind them to write clearly
because other students will have to read and understand their writing.
After 1 minute, have the students pass their notebooks to the person on
their left. Then, students have one minute to read what is written in the
new notebook and write as many sentences as they can to add to the
story. After one minute, they pass their notebooks again and have
another minute to read and write in the new notebook. This continues
until each group member has written in everyone’s notebooks, and the
original owner receives his/her notebook again. Finally, the notebook
owners will have 1 more minute to read what has been written by the
classmates and finish the story. (Encourage students to be as creative or
silly as possible). Then, ask the students to read their stories to each
other. Finally, if time permits, ask for one volunteer from each group to
read their story. This usually provokes a lot of laughs from the class.

Advanced: 5 minute journal activity: Give students 5 minutes to write

about a problem they faced at some point in their life and describe how
they solved the problem. Were they happy with the solution? Why or
why not? After the students finish writing, ask a few students to read
their stories to the class.
*At some point, students need to read the story, either as a homework
assignment or an in class reading.

Writing activity:
Beginners: Have students submit a “book report.” Book reports can
include:
Description of 5 characters: write 1 sentence about each character
Summary of the story: write 1 paragraph
Opinion: Did you like the story? Why or why not?
Alternate ending: Create a different ending to the story in 4-5 sentences.

Intermediate: Divide students into groups or 3-4. Have students write a

script for Hansel and Gretel, but have them create a different ending
than the story.

Advanced: In groups, give students 5-10 minutes to make an outline of

some problems and solutions the characters in Hansel and Gretel faced.
Then, students return to their desks and complete an in-class writing
assignment. Students should write a 5 paragraph essay in class
discussing at least 3 problems the characters faced in the story and
describe how each problem was solved. For more of a challenge, have
students also include their own, new solution to each problem.

Post-Writing Activities:
Beginners: Have students present their book report to the class, using a
PowerPoint presentation OR pictures they created (for younger
learners).

Intermediate: Students perform skits using the scripts they wrote.

Students in the audience should evaluate the performances using a
rubric provided by the teacher (possibly focusing on various grammar
and vocabulary points).

Advanced: Working in groups of 3-4, students in each group will peer

review each other’s papers using a rubric or questions provided by the
teacher. Upon completion, ask students as a class about the problems
they noticed most while reviewing other classmates’ papers and discuss
how to fix those problems.

2. How to Create Voice in TESOL Writing

Upon getting her driver’s license in high school, my friend Teresa
became a terror on the streets. She chatted on her cell phone while
driving, consistently failed to check her side mirrors before changing
lanes, and zoomed 10-15 miles over the speed limit at any given time. I,
on the other hand, drove hunched nervously over the steering wheel,
eyes darting from side to side, usually crawling at around 2-3 miles
under the speed limit.
And yet, I was the first of the two of us to get a traffic ticket.

Teresa had been stopped before, sure, but when she just widened her
eyes, teared up, and apologized profusely, the police officers let her off
with a warning. Upon finding myself in the same situation, however, I
became so terrified that I went mute, barely squeaking out a “sorry”
before accepting my $120 ticket.

This experience serves as a reminder that how we present information is

often as important as the information we present. In writing, the “how”
of presenting information - or the style, personality, point of view, and
tone of a text - is called the voice, and it affects how our message is
interpreted, and thus received, by our audience. The effective use of
voice in writing can make a big difference in the strength, clarity, and
readability of a text, while allowing the writer to show her/his
personality, emotions, and ideas.

Unfortunately, even the best writing class may neglect voice in favor of
grammar, structure, information, and other more tangible writing skills.
In fact, many teachers assume that voice cannot be taught - that students
must organically “discover” their voice through extensive writing.

As you may gather from this article, that is not our view on voice!
Student writing that does not employ appropriate or strong personal
voice may not incur a traffic ticket, but it will make for bland,
uninspiring reading. There are a number of tactics English language
teachers can use to inspire and instruct students to write with strong and
appropriate voice even as very novice language learners. Here are some
ideas, by level:

Basic levels: At basic levels, students need guidance, structure, and

instruction. However, these elements should not prevent them from
“discovering” their voice! Writing assignments which require students
to draw on their own world knowledge and life experience naturally lead
students to develop voice in their writing, as do writing assignments that
speak to students’ personal interests and areas of expertise. In addition,
asking students to write simple texts with a specific audience in mind (a
family member, a favorite sports player, a romantic partner) will achieve
much the same end.

Intermediate levels: The concept of voice may be explicitly introduced

at the intermediate levels. Students should be exposed to a variety of
examples of texts that employ strong voice. Vocabulary building and
guided use of a thesaurus are particularly important at this level as
students struggle to understand increasingly complicated material and
convey ever more complex and subtle messages in their writing.

At this level, student may be asked to:

Read and evaluate simple scenarios written from a variety of points of

view (for example, a description of a trip to the grocery store written
from a mother’s perspective, a child’s perspective, a single person’s
perspective, and the cashier’s perspective).

Actively reflect on how the narrator’s point of view and intended

audience may affect the voice of a text.
Read similar texts written for different audiences (an email to a college
professor, a peer, and a trusted adult, for example) and discuss how the
voice of a text changes depending on intended audience.

Rewrite texts from a variety of perspectives (e.g. recounting a trip to the

grocery store from the perspective of the car being driven to the store).

Perform “dramatic readings” or even put on plays based on their

assigned reading as a way to reinforce that writing can have drama,
personality, and distinctive style and tone.

Advanced levels:

At advanced levels, students may be ready to independently identify

voice in more sophisticated texts, as well as evaluate the effectiveness of
the voice used in assigned readings. Students should be given examples
not only of strong and appropriate voice, but also inappropriate or weak
voice to come to identify the difference between the two. Reading
poetry may be especially helpful at this level for gaining a grasp of the
music of language, as well as how metaphors may be used to strengthen
a piece of writing.

Students may be asked to:

Rewrite the endings of news articles and stories to change the “moral”
of the story.
Rewrite texts from the third to the first or second person, or experiment
with active vs. passive voice.

Write on topics about which they have very strong opinions, or which
are controversial (depending on students’ ages and the teaching
context).

Include humor or irony in their writing, and to evaluate how this affects
the quality and impact of the text.

One particularly fun activity involves dividing the class into 4-5 groups.
Each group is given a 1-2 sentence scenario and a list of adverbs
(angrily, jealously, trustingly, innocently, etc.) and must rewrite the
scenario once for each adverb. The scenarios are written or projected on
the board and the other groups must compete to label each scenario with
the appropriate adverb based on the voice of the text.

General tips:

Continuously expand student vocabulary with vocabulary lists,

vocabulary building activities, and varied reading assignments. A
sophisticated vocabulary, and especially the ability to use a variety of
strong verbs, adjectives, and adverbs, is vital for nuanced and effective
writing, as well as the development of individual voice.

When grading and providing feedback on student writing, do not

completely rewrite students’ sentences. Pointing out grammatical errors
is fine, but changing the wording on whole sentences may take away the
subtleties of the student’s intended message.
Experiment with providing progressively looser guidelines for writing
assignments, allowing students to explore the writing styles and
structures that works best for them.

The voice of a piece of writing allows the author to not only provide
more subtle shades of meaning in his or her writing, but also to show his
or her personality to readers. Guiding students in developing strong and
situationally appropriate voice in their writing will ultimately help them
produce effective, clear, and attention-grabbing work in both English
and their primary language.

3. Example Outline
Outline
Topic:How to write an essay
I. Introduction
A. Why we write essays (situations)
B. Writing essays is easy if you know the basic
structure and formula
C. Will talk about THREE steps to writing essays
II. Body
A. Pre-writing
1. Planning is important to make sure we have enough
ideas
2. Planning helps us not repeat ideas
3. Planning helps us see how our ideas move
smoothly and logically
4. First step is to make an outline
 5. When we make an outline, we list out the ideas
that will go in each paragraphalong with supporting
details
B. Writing
1. After we make the outline, we put those ideas
into complete sentences.
2. Don’t worry about grammar and spelling too much
right now.
C. Editing
1. Last step is to read the essay and check for
mistakes in spelling and grammar.
2. Reading out loud will help us find mistakes
3. Always leave at least a few minutes in timed
essays for editing
III. Conclusion
A. Many students think writing essays is difficult,
but all essays follow a similar pattern
B. If you know the pattern, writing essays is easy.
C. The steps include planning, writing, and editing
D. If you follow this process, you will write excellent
essays

4/ Writing Activities

Writing activities can come in many different forms. For a

communicative teacher, writing activities often represent a chance for
students to finally show off their learning and respond to the material
presented in class. Thus, writing activities are windows into a learners’
mind, giving teachers a chance to assess what students know and think
(focus on meaning), as well is how well they are performing (focus on
form). These two paradigms, focusing on meaning and form,
fundamentally change the kinds of activities teachers create when
assigning writing activities. Those who focus on meaning are generally
interested in how well their learners communicate their own ideas, and
often spend time creating activities that give learners time to generate,
germinate, and expand ideas. On the other hand, for the “focus on form”
teacher, writing activities can represent opportunities for learners to
follow particular linguistic principles. These teachers often create
activities that elicit the proper use of writing conventions or
grammatical rules. The activities presented in this section can be used
for both paradigms, and often, with just a little imagination, can be used
and modified in ways that can simultaneously accomplish a teacher’s
requirements to pay attention to both meaning and form. Notice that
many of these activities require a teacher to think of a prompt in order to
be successful. A prompt can be a question, a statement, or even a picture
or object that students must respond to. Writing is often enhanced by the
teacher’s ability to inspire students to WANT to write, which can be
achieved with the quality and interest level of the prompts teachers
create. When focusing on meaning, try to ask questions that are all
based on a similar theme. This will activate background information.
For example, if the class will be talking about the beaches of Hawaii for
their next lesson, try to ask 4-8 questions that will encourage students to
think about Hawaii (animals, people, food, places). When focusing on
form, ask questions that will allow learners to respond to that form. For
example, when teaching the past tense, ask learners to describe what
they did last week, last year, over the summer, and so forth.
1. Workstations
Place four to eight large sheets of poster size paper on the walls of the
room, leaving enough room for learners to form groups. On each paper
is a question or prompt that students must answer. Questions might be
personal or impersonal, based on a reading or lecture, or even based on a
grammatical principle you want learners to demonstrate. When you
create these “workstations,” you might want to set up some rules. For
example, you might way to require each student to write one sentence at
each station, or move in ShANE DiXON 19 groups to a new station
every fi ve minutes. For convenience, you might have students write at
their desk fi rst on small sticky notes, and then have them transfer their
notes to the posters. Upon fi nishing the activity, you might ask students
to read each thought and star the ones they like best, or you might
correct any mistakes or emphasize the vocabulary shared. This is a great
activity to get students moving and generating ideas.
2. Free-writes
Free-writing is a technique in which students write continuously for a
set period of time without regard to spelling, grammar, or topic. Some
writers use the technique to collect initial thoughts and ideas on a topic,
often as a preliminary draft to more formal writing. A free write means
that students are “free” to write whatever they want, but often you must
guide the free-write with a prompt.
3. Fast-writes
A fast-write is similar to a free-write because spelling, grammar, and
vocabulary are not evaluated. However, what is evaluated is the number
of words written in a given time. Students can gain a sense of
accomplishment as they see their writing speed increase. They are
generally given an easy topic to fast-write about, and sometimes a
teacher will discuss the prompt ahead of time and elicit vocabulary
words on the board before the learners begins. For a fast-write to be
accurate, a teacher must ensure that the activity is done the same way
every time.
4. Brainstorming
Brainstorming is an informal way of generating topics to write about. It
can be done at any time during the writing process. Writers can
brainstorm the topics for a whole paper or for just a conclusion or an
example. The important point about brainstorming is that there should
be no pressure to be “brilliant.” Students should simply open their minds
to whatever pops into them. Think of it as a kind of free association. For
example, with an advanced group discussing poverty and education,
teachers might say something like, “When I say ‘literacy,’ what pops
into your mind?” Much of what the students will come up with may not
be useful, but that’s okay. Part of brainstorming will involve a selection
process. A teacher might write students’ ideas on the board, or invite a
student to write down the ideas. A teacher can also rephrase questions or
add to questions to help students to respond more fully. For example, a
teacher might ask, “Is literacy important? Why?” or “What do you think
is stopping literacy today?” Afterwards, the teacher might go back to the
question: “What else pops into your mind when I say literacy?” As a
general rule, when brainstorming with a classroom, expect silence and
expect the need for the teacher to follow up with questions. Teachers
may also need to call on individuals, or invite students to speak in pairs
and groups before sharing in front of the class.

4. Writing Activities Ideas

Here are three writing activities that you can try out in the classroom:

Three Wishes: Have your students imagine that they have been given
three wishes. What would they wish for? They should write down their
wishes and share them in a small group. You could also have students
draw a picture to represent their wishes and display these wishes around
the classroom.

Story starters: Each student will imagine that they are Sheherezade and
are starting to tell a new story. Give the students about 2-3 minutes to
write down a story starter. When the time is up, instruct students to pass
their papers to the person sitting next to them. This person will read
what the other person wrote and continue the story, and so on. You can
adjust the amount of time that you give each person to write depending
on the level of your students. When everyone finishes, the original
writer will receive their story back. Students will work on reading and
writing fluency during this activity because they will need to read and
write quickly, but they should enjoy practicing it in this fun, lighthearted
manner.

Advice Column: Students will imagine that they are one of the
characters from Aladdin and the 1,000 Arabian Nights. Their character
has a problem and needs some advice from friends or family members.
Hand note cards out to each student to write their problem down and ask
for advice. Collect all of the note cards and redistribute them. Students
should read through the problem and write their advice down on the
back of the card. Then they should deliver it to the original writer. To
wrap up, you can have a class discussion about the kinds of problems
and types of advice given for the problems.