Writing is fun!

For many years young people at school have been writing on a sheet of paper in order to do activities or homework. We can say that it is part of a ‘traditional teaching’ in which students did every task using just a pen/ pencil and a notebook. Nowadays, we can notice that if these kinds of activities are implemented in a lesson, young people tend to be off-task or they do them just because they need to have a certain mark so as to be promoted. However, we cannot deny that Writing is an essential and helpful skill that students must develop. But, we must also admit that we are living in a technological era which offers new alternatives that might be fascinating and advantageous for the current students. Therefore, a ‘new way of writing’ must be considered taking into account not only the power of writing, but also the benefits of the innovations available in the digital world so as to have other options for working in order to make our lessons more motivated.

            If we ask young people about what they think about Writing, we might well listen to phrases like ‘oh, such a boring thing’, ‘why should we write? I can’t see the point of writing’, ‘It is a waste of time’ among others similar to these ones which reflect the negative perspective that young people have on what Writing is actually. However, we believe that no one should limit oneself to such a point of view and go beyond and look for the positive aspect of Writing. For this, we propose to think about Writing in a reflective way so then, the person who writes might find it meaningful and engaging. Now, if we think about young people at school, it is advisable to work with ‘learning journals’ as Jennifer Moon (2010) affirms ‘[it] is usually a vehicle for reflection’. Hence, the students will have the opportunity to think critically in order to write a personal journal. The students will have the possibility of using their voices by making a reflection that represents an orientation to the way they live their lives (Moon, 2010), that is to say, students can express their experiences, thoughts and feelings in a comfortable way. By using learning journals, students might have new tools for seeing better (Fulwiler, 1986, as cited in Moon, 2010) improving their learning day-to-day.

            In this modern century, we must consider what Dudeney et.al.(2013) define as digital literacies so as to be able to make use of the technologies at our disposal effectively as it is demonstrated in the image on the left. It is crucial for us since the current learners are constantly keeping in touch with technology and implementing it properly in our lessons might well benefit the teaching and learning process. Thus, students’ digital skills need to be developed and in order to do so, we can incorporate activities like a creation of a blog in which students will have the opportunity not only to share with others what they have written, but also to participate in wide social groupings. Teaching digital literacy work in our English lesson appeals to today's youth and might encourage the students’ participation significantly. And, what is even more important is that it makes the lessons more relevant. Hence, students might well be engaged in their writing task and find the purpose of it. What is more, the development of digital skills might help adult learners get ahead in the workplace, or prepare younger learners for better future job opportunities (Dudeney et.al. 2013).

In view of all the aspects mentioned above, we think that it is really necessary to modify that students’ ‘misconception’ about what Writing is. We, as future teachers, must raise awareness of the benefits of writing by showing them interesting tasks in which students can see the purpose of writing. Consequently, we strongly believe that if we integrate a learning journal together with digital literacies into our lessons, we will ensure a change in the students’ minds. So, come on people, we are in the 21st century, let’s start and show students that writing is fun!     

  

REFERENCES

Dudeney, G, Hockly, N and Pegrum, M (2013): Digital Literacies. Harlow: Pearson. 

Moon, J. (2010). Assessment- Learning Journals and Logs. UCD: Dublin.