We should all be teachers of English

Shawna Kay Williams Pinnock

Monday, August 15, 2016

Teachers of English are not the only ones responsible for facilitating students’ development as
competent communicators.

In recent years, researchers in education have stoutly advocated for writing across the
curriculum (WAC). This movement encourages teachers, regardless of their areas of
specialisation, to provide students with meaningful writing opportunities.

While these writing assignments would be assessed on the basis of their constituent subject
matter, they would also be evaluated against a characteristic benchmark of good writing:
correctness, conciseness, clarity and cohesion. All teachers would, essentially, be writing
coaches, and the teachers of English would, of course, take the lead.

Interestingly, although this forward thrust in education has proved effective in many North
American classrooms, it has not been well received by all educators. Generally, teachers in the
content areas believe writing should be taught and practised exclusively in the language
classroom.

The latter misconception, perhaps, partly accounts for many of our students’ sub-par
performance in English-based assessments. According to Marge Scherer in her text Challenging
the Whole Child: Reflections on Best Practices in Learning, Teaching and Leadership, "students
need extensive practice" (2009, p 70) in expressing themselves. The language classroom, on its
own, cannot provide all the writing stimuli and practice students require to substantially hone
their expression. Content-area writing should therefore be viewed as a form of complementary
language practice and, ultimately, as a contemporary nostrum for poor composition.

Moreover, writing in the content areas is integral in preparing students to meet the potential
demands of work. Employees are often tasked with preparing varied expository documents for
specific business communication inter alia. Consequently, students must be facilitated in
developing the requisite composition skills for their prospective posts.
Additionally, research has consistently proved that writing allows students to clarify the
instructional input they receive. Steve Peha, in his publication
Writing Across the Curriculum, reasons that as students write, they clear up the "confusion" and
clean out the "clutter" (2003, p4). They also reinforce and, sometimes, even permanently and
subconsciously, commit new information to their existing schemata.

I know that some of our local teachers allow students to write, even extensively so, in the
content areas. Not surprisingly, most of these students who are so tasked are studying at the
Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination
levels and are required to write in continuous prose as part of their examinations. However,
writing across the curriculum should not be restricted to certain grade levels. All students
should be helped to acclimatise to this progressive culture in education.

No, you are not going to suddenly transform your maths class, for example, into an English
session. Perhaps, this week, you can allow your students to pretend to be brilliant maths tutors
who have been individually tasked to explain, to a group of struggling students, the process of
solving a quadratic equation, for example.

Allow the students to write their explanations in continuous prose, prior to their sharing.
Undoubtedly, this assignment will afford all learners reasonable practice with using the target
language. Over time, with the frequent presentation of similarly structured writing tasks,
students will develop an admirable facility in using the Jamaican Standard English, particularly
the register of the subject.

As students continue to write short or extended pieces, they will also be compelled to clarify,
reinforce and communicate what you have taught and what they have discovered. In essence,
writing across the curriculum can be an excellent mechanism for students’ self-assessment and
teachers’ ongoing evaluation of their practice.

Again, teachers of English are not the only ones responsible for facilitating students’
development as competent communicators. Every teacher has a role to play in advancing our
students’ writing, and by extension, overall language skills.

Shawna Kay Williams-Pinnock is a teacher of English and a graduate student at The University
of the West Indies, Mona. Send comments to the Observer or to Shawna201@gmail.com.
Protect Your Baby’s Brain; Turn Off The TV!
Published: Wednesday | July 25, 2018 | 12:00 AM
In 2014, I spent some time working as a foreign-language instructor in the very quaint and slow-
paced prefecture of Songyuan, China. A Chinese teacher who resided near the apartment
where I stayed, quickly befriended me and invited me into her home which she shared with her
husband and five-month-old daughter.
One day, during one of my invited visits to her home, I sat in the living room and watched
television as she prepared dinner. My engagement was, however, short-lived.
The baby awoke and my friend took her into the room. Within a blink, the television was turned
off. My friend had done it. She then looked at me and smiled, while I looked on in utter wonder.
"No! No! Not good for baby," she explained, while pointing to the television set.
Coming from a culture where children are fed a steady diet of television from the moment they
exit the womb, I thought my dear friend had gone delirious! I was adamant that children could
learn many things from watching television, especially from shows that are rich in educational
content. After all, my eight-year-old niece at the time had acquired her Spanish vocabulary
from her own engagement with same.
Buoyed by this cultural knowledge, and experience, I, in the simplest and most comprehensible
English I could find, sought to counter her stance.
"No! No! Bad! Bad for baby!" she maintained.
I allowed the matter to rest, and instead watched her as she allowed the baby to toy with the
colourful mobiles around the room. There was no television on, but she was no less an
adorable, and playful bundle of joy.
Days later, I revisited the matter and conducted some secondary research. Frankly, I wanted,
more than anything, to prove my point. However, the literature disproved much of what I had
thought, and I had to concede. My friend was indeed right.
DAMAGING EFFECTS
Televised educational programmes can be intellectually stimulating. However, when children
are exposed to any form of audiovisual media at too early an age, they can experience a
number of mental setbacks.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), television media "have potentially
negative effects and no known positive effects for children younger than two years". What is
more is that "while the television is on, there's less talking, and talk time is very important in
language development" (Ari Brown, AAP committee member).
As a matter of fact, a parent normally speaks 940 words per hour when a toddler is around.
Once the television is on, this drops materially by 770 words! Other studies have also confirmed
a growing correlation between increased television viewing and developmental delays in
children.
Early television exposure has also been associated with attention disorders. This is because the
projected videos change constantly, and so a child is gradually conditioned to not focus on
anything for any prolonged period.
Background television - that is, when the television is on but the child is not actively watching it
- can be equally damaging. The sounds can be distracting and thus make toddlers unable to
focus on their hands-on play.
ALTERNATIVE MEANS OF ENGAGEMENT
In light of these findings, I am now concerned about children whose parents allow them to feast
on all forms of audiovisual electronics. Such devices are often used to keep them quiet and
controlled at home or elsewhere. While, admittedly, no parent can spend the entire day
reading and talking with their children, I suggest that they take heed of these warnings and
explore alternative means of engagement and entertainment.
Paediatricians recommend that parents allow their children to play independently as much as it
is possible to do so. Independent play is believed to aid children's mental and motor
development.
Additionally, when you are out with your children, instead of placating them with a game on
the phone or tablet, point out environmental prints to them and involve them in discussing
same. This will encourage early literacy development.
On this note, do not be like a mother who was most impatient with her five-year-old son (it
seems) while they both journeyed on the bus on which I, too, was a passenger.
"Wah dat, Mommy?" the child asked repeatedly, every time he saw or heard something that he
did not recognise.
"Cho, man! Tap the noise! Yuh chat too much!" the mother sternly scolded.
She refused to feed his hungry mind, despite his many questions and the countless teachable
moments.
- Shawna Kay Williams-Pinnock is an educator. Email comments to shawna201@gmail.com.