‘I Can’t believe they didn’t use Dictionaries’: Exploring the role of popular culture in a second language creative writing process.

Dr Marietta RossettoSchool of Education Flinders University

in collaboration with Ms Antonella Macchia

Exploring visual modality options in lower secondary, second language learning

Synthesis of Researchers’ Views on Comics

CONSTrash! Wertham ( 1955) discussed

comic books as ‘trash’ in his text Seduction of the Innocents.

( Wertham, 1955 in Norton, 2003: 140)

Superficial and Shallow!

Pre service teachers’ views on comic books.

( Student teachers, 1997 in Norton, 2003: 141)

CONSTrivia! Teachers’ views as reported by

elementary school students.( Students views in Norton, 2003: 141)

Not Challenging! Teachers’ views as reported by

elementary school students.( Students views in Norton, 2003: 141)

Waste of Time! Parents’ views as reported by

elementary school students.( Students views in Norton, 2003: 141)

Synthesis of Researchers’ Views on Comics

PROSLiterate Underlife provides an opportunity to refute

official expectations and negotiate social roles within other powerful circles

( Finders, 1997: 25-26 in Norton, 2003: 143)

Unofficial Curriculum to what extent is comic book

culture associated with an unofficial curriculum in which much learning, debate and engagement take place? Such a curriculum receives little validation in the public sphere of schooling and the private sphere of home

(Norton, 2003:144)

PROSCultural Bridges through comic books children find

common links – important for the development of community relationships – important bride to tolerance and community building

(Norton, 2003:144)

Private Curriculum comic books can be seen as an

extension of children’s own personal worlds – a curriculum that gives them insights into social relationships, friendships, and communities – makes them particularly sensitive to criticism by teachers and parents.

(Norton, 2003:145)

Consideration of the issue of visual modalities in multimodal texts

…most texts now involve a complex interplay of written text, images and other graphic or sound elements, designed as coherent ( often at the first level visual rather than verbal) entities by means of layout.

(Kress and Van Leeuwen on multimodal texts, 2006: 17)

…MATERIALS MADE FOR CHILDREN MAKE INTENSE REPRESENTATIONAL USE OF IMAGES; IN MATERIALS DEMANDED FROM CHILDREN – IN VARIOUS FORMS OF ASSESSMENT PARTICULARLY – WRITING REMAINS THE EXPECTED AND DOMINANT MODE

( Kress and Van Leeuwen, 2006: 16)

Importance of valuing CHILDREN as both USERS and MAKERS of COMMUNICATION

(Norton, 2003:144)…ESPECIALLY IN THE LIGHT OF THE INCREASINGLY VISUAL NATURE OF COMMUNICATION, SCHOLARS NEED TO RETHINK THE VIEW THAT VISUAL MODALITIES ARE A DISTRACTION IN THE PROCESS OF MEANING MAKING

(Kress, 2000 in Norton, 2003:145)

Research Questions

Will the use of key lexis (key word) enhancement, combined with image sequencing, have an effect on students’ ability to think and write in Italian?

Will group work, using text and image, provide an effective zone of proximal development for creative writing?

Will the use of text and image enable students to sequence a narrative scaffold creatively?

Participants

The Participants in this study:

26 Year 9 students – 15 boys and 11 girls were approached

All of the students participated in the study.

They came from a range of multicultural backgrounds.

The students had not undertaken creative writing in Years 8 & 9 as part of a curriculum focus.

Exploring the impact of visuals in a second language creative writing process.

The project began in mid November, 2007 and the time allocated was 2x90 minute lessons for writing and presenting and a 1x50 minute session for evaluating the learning experiences and celebrating the stories.

The preferred methodology for the lessons was the 5 Phase teaching model (Feez & Joyce, 1998) for teaching text types, based on Vygotsky’s ZPD:

1. Building the Context 2. Modelling

3. Joint 4. Independent 5. Related

The First Lesson 90 Minute Lesson

Phase 1: Building the Context:

The project began with a brief introduction to the students acknowledging their choice of the Simpsons as the preferred comic medium. The intro session also consisted of a warm up which included a quiz and the viewing of an episode of the Simpsons.

The First 90 Minute Lesson (contd)

Phase 1: Building the Context

KEY WORDS: participants were given an extensive vocabulary of technical phrases and idiomatic expressions (in the target language) with a jumbled collection of English translations to match up.

The Second 90 Minute Lesson (held one week later)

Recall: Students were given an impromptu vocabulary matching activity with a random selection of words – two of the target language words did not have the English meanings provided = an individual activity.

Phase 2: Modelling Students were given a story board template with

the narrative scaffold provided in Italian + an envelope with 19 images + the jumbled vocabulary from the previous lesson.

Students were clear on expectations and encouraged to continue working in groups

A pep talk on creative writing was given 1) on being creative 2) on thinking in Italian 3) on using the scaffold

The Second 90 Minute Lesson ( contd)

Second 90 minute lesson (held one week later): Phase 3: Joint Key words Choosing images and appropriate text Applying the Scaffold Applying strategies for Visual Integration: Visual

Relationship/ Visual Organisation/ Visual Sequencing (Bailey: 1995)

Creative Writing

So what was achieved?

Making Connections: narrative scaffold – transfer of knowledge from English – integrated learningActive Construction: Applying Strategies – guessing, contextual clues, linguistic clues Writing and Thinking in Italian – using the metalanguage.Higher level thinking – using text and image to create irony using text and image to create humour creating comic relief and suspense using text and imageSuccessful outcomes – all groups presented successful narratives ‘with gusto’Social Interaction:Working in groups - Sharing KnowledgeReflection:Negotiated contentAll students enjoyed working in groups: ‘working effectively’ ‘relied on the whole group not just 1 or 2 people’ ‘enjoyable and helpful’ ‘good for learning how to use the vocab in writing’

11 Girls – Test Results 1 and 2

6

5

4

3

2

1

60 70 80 90 100

5

4

3

2

1

30 70 80 90 100

15 Boys – Test Results 1 and 2

6

5

4

3

2

1

20 50 60 70 80

5

4

3

2

1

60 70 80 90