English 495: Tuesday, March 29

As each week goes by, I find more and more connections with the current articles and things that have been discussed or have been read in other classes/at other times. This Tuesday's readings were no exception. The articles based around China's decree of teaching presented one such instance. "Thus the shift towards computer/network-based courses with a clear emphasis on content-rich subject matter maps out a concrete curicular infrastructure for achieving the new literacy," writes You (193). The use of this content-rich subject matter harkens back to the book that I am reading for our book review, The Content-Based Classroom. In this book, the authors discuss injecting meaninful content in the classroom instruction, content that connects with students and allows them to use the background information that they come to school with...regardless of how much or how little cultural awareness they may have of classroom methods, techniques, and culture in the United States.

Unfortunately, You paints a relatively bleak pictures of how those English reforms were doing a few years later. The topics used touched little on Chinese life, something that has apparently strayed from the content-infused approach discussed in the previous paragraph. The decree also spoke of creating a student-centered classroom, one that we have continually read about and one that gives the students the opportunity to discuss and learn by doing. Yet, these English classroom, especially for writing, appear to be merely a pipeline from teacher to student. Simply feeding students the answers and having them regurgitate them does little good.

As I read Lei's article discussing the writing strategies of two Chinese college students studying English, I found myself, whether ironically or not, in the work. These two students were working to successfully write in a different language, implementing a multitude of different strategies to do so. Yet, if teachers are to strive to find some commonality amongst their diverse students, I can see how writing strategies may be a place to begin. When I write, I utilize the internet, other social connections, my own notes, my own experiences, my own motivation to achieve in English writing--much as these two students do. Regardless of the L1 language, some similiarities in how people write--at least in English--do exist, and teachers should embrace these. Clearly, I do not utitlize my first language when writing English because, obviously, English is my first language; so, one difference does exist there, and, as so many authors that I have read this semester assert, teachers must be aware of how L1 literacy plays a role in the l2 writing of students...so yet another connection to other readings is made.