Scott J. Baxter Journals in the Language Classroom In this article I describe some of you would write about the things the ways that journals can be used you want your students to learn. Or as teaching tools in the language maybe you would write about the classroom; in fact, the suggestions I sort of atmosphere you like to have make could be applied to the use of in your classroom. Or perhaps you journals in teaching just about any would write about the factors that led subject. I begin by describing the con- to your becoming a teacher. cept of writing to learn, which is the If you had, in fact, grabbed a piece theoretical foundation that journals of paper and jotted down some infor- are based on. After that, I give practical mation, you would have been doing a advice for using journals in the class- type of writing called writing to learn. room. Next, I share my own advice Writing to learn is thinking as you and present feedback about journals write. And this thinking as you write from students at the American Uni- is the kind of writing that happens versity of Bulgaria. Finally, I end with when people keep journals. specific suggestions for how journals Writing to learn is based on the might be used at different moments assumption that students’ thoughts during a lesson. and understanding can grow and clar- Writing to learn ify through the process of writing. And growth in thought and under- One way to begin is by think- standing can certainly happen in the ing about the concept of writing to foreign language classroom. learn. But, rather than starting with a definition of the concept, I would Writing to learn is usually con- like to start with a thought experi- trasted with writing to communicate. ment. Suppose someone asked you to Writing to communicate is the sort grab a piece of paper and jot down an of graded writing that is typically answer to the question, “What things assigned in classrooms. According to are important to you as a teach- Young (1999), there are several key er?” What would you say? Perhaps differences between writing to learn 22 2009 Number 4 | E n g l i s h TE a c h i n g F o r u m and writing to communicate: (1)  writing To add to Young’s advice, I offer seven to learn emphasizes discovery thinking, as suggestions: opposed to critical thinking; (2) the empha- 1. Ask students to buy a notebook they sis is on developing ideas rather than revis- can easily carry around with them. ing, crafting, or clarifying; (3) the writing Inspiration for a journal entry might is designed to make sense primarily to the come to them at any time, and they writer, rather than to a reader; (4) the audi- are more likely to write in their journal ence is the self and trusted others, rather outside of class if the journal is easy for than a distant audience; (5)  the language them to carry around wherever they go. can be personal, rather than academic and 2. The language of the journal could be formal; (6) the teacher plays the role of men- English, but it could also be their first tor or coach rather than judge; and (7) forms language (L1). Or it could be a mix- include journals, blogs, and rough drafts ture of both. For advanced students, it rather than graded essays, reports, or business makes sense to have them use the target letters. language. For beginners, a journal in This list is one way to think about how their native language might be a place writing to learn and writing to communicate where they can express their feelings differ. Another way to think about what writ- without having to worry about remem- ing to learn is has been illustrated by Casanave bering difficult grammar or vocabulary. and Sosa (2008): 3. Collect and read the journals on a [A] second language student, bored by regular basis—but do not correct. If textbook exercises, longs to be chal- you feel you should respond, then lenged by something more interesting, write about something you liked. which almost always means something Remember that “in a language class, more difficult and more interactive in the end, everything boils down to and almost always something outside the same question: Can you use lan- the conventional school setting. … guage in ways that allow you to convey But if she is doing this in her L2, she whatever your thoughts are? … Can you must hold to a belief that may make express something about yourself, your her fearful at first—she must believe ideas, your curiosities, and questions?” that she does not have to wait until (Casanave and Sosa 2007, 17; italics in her language is error-free in order to the original). transform her experiences and complex thoughts into lines of words. The lines 4. Ask students to leave a blank page do not need to be long. The grammar between entries for room to comment does not need to be perfect. … She also later. Class time could be devoted to needs to be convinced that there is a having students read and reread entries receptive audience consisting of other and respond to what they have written. people who are interested in what she In my experience, students really enjoy having a chance to comment on their has to say. (92) own growth and development in the Advice about using journals journal. Having described what writing to learn 5. Encourage students to write about a is, I now offer advice about using journals wide variety of topics, but the topics in the classroom. Art Young is one of the should always, at least in some way, world’s experts on the topic of journals. His connect with the class. In his book, advice is to integrate journals “into the fabric Engaging Ideas, John Bean suggests that of a course” and “make regular, frequent use one way to begin class is to ask students of them in class,” which will impress upon to discuss a question that they wrote students “that journals are valuable, not just about the night before in their journals ‘busywork,’ because they are used daily as stu- (Bean 1996). Such a question might dents and teacher build the knowledge of the be “What confused you about today’s course” (Young 1999, 18). reading or class?” Or “How does your E n g l i s h TE a c h i n g F o r u m | Number 4 2009 23 personal experience relate to the mate- an Internet search engine. Making the rial?” Another possibility is to ask stu- connection between the class and the dents to write a poem about the course larger life of the student can offer a material. One of the simplest types number of creative possibilities; haiku of poems that students could write is is one option. haiku. A haiku is an imagistic poem 6. Keep a journal along with your stu- with 17  syllables arranged in three dents. Ask your students to write dur- serial lines of 5–7–5. Imagistic means ing class time, and write along with using concrete words like spider, egg, ice them. Writing with your students tells cream, or pencil to convey a general or them that the teacher takes the idea of universal feeling, idea, or concept such journals seriously, and so should they. as beauty, justice, or language learning. Keeping a journal along with your Writing haiku is not difficult to learn, students also helps you see how much and it offers students an opportunity time is needed to complete a task, helps to creatively respond to what they are you be more reasonable with what you learning. One of my students, in just expect, and gives you a clue as to how five minutes, created this haiku in her interesting the prompts are that you journal: give to your students. taking an exam 7. Look for ways to use the journal during on a hot day violates class time. Even if you can find only basic human rights. five minutes per week of class time, that (Darim, Lebanon) time could be used for journal writing. Look for ways to connect the journal Here are two more examples of haiku with what you consider important in that my students wrote as a creative the class. In the final section of this response to their reading on some of paper, I suggest specific journal writing the dialogues of Plato: activities. “Symposium” Student opinions Join me in my house I think that there is genuine value in For a talk like cat and mouse. listening to the voices of learners. Part of The cheese is on me. having a learner-centered classroom, at least (Samar, Lebanon) in my opinion, means hearing the voices of the learners. Those voices remind me of the Plato is long dead reasons I like being a language educator. Yet his dialogues are still In the spring of 2007, I used journals as Alive and kicking an integral part of my classes at the Ameri- (Mirvat, Lebanon) can University of Bulgaria. At the end of the semester, I asked students to write about what I would suggest two sources for learn- surprised them and what advice they have for ing how to write haiku. For more on students who are asked to keep journals. In haiku as a tool for learning, see Ziliak’s this section, I offer three sets of opinions from (forthcoming) article on haiku eco- my students. nomics. For an excellent introduction to reading and writing haiku, with an Student Opinion 1 extensive chapter on teaching haiku to I was surprised by the ease with which young learners, see Higginson (1985). the whole process went. It wasn’t difficult, it Richard Wright (1998) and Etheridge wasn’t scary and it didn’t bite me. Probably Knight (1986) have published a num- the most surprising things about keeping a ber of haiku that my students have journal was the volume of paper I wasted found worth their time. In addition, (whole two trees dead—I feel like a mur- there are many websites devoted to derer) and the exactness of details kept in haiku that can be easily found with my mind, which however have no chance of 24 2009 Number 4 | E n g l i s h TE a c h i n g F o r u m being released except when a person is with a … writing in my journal. … I felt that the piece of paper and pen. Advices: Be creative! journal was the best place I could express my Love your journal! Your journal is your friend! ideas. I could write a perfect draft in there. I (so are trees but you know, this is a journal- could put the best very first thought in there. tree trade-off). Be specific! Be sincere! Be up And it did not take much time. … So surpris- to date with entries! Be ready to argue and ingly, keeping the journal brought back my defend your position! Be ready to make mis- self-confidence for writing in English. It also takes—both grammatical and spelling—that’s helped me broaden out my thoughts, pushing why it’s a journal and not a paper. Write about me to think further about stuff and analyze things you’re interested in and which you problems. … like—make it interesting! (make a tree’s death I would advise [students] to accept [the meaningful). (Magdalena, Bulgaria) journal] from the beginning as a very good opportunity and not to worry about it at all. Student Opinion 2 I would advise them not to think they will At the beginning I did not exactly know waste a lot of time writing the entries. Because what a journal was. I realized that one day they won’t. They will actually gain time as as I was reading my journals I compared the they will become not just better but also faster ones I had written in the beginning with the at writing. And they will always find topics. ones I had written in the end. They differed I am sure when I say this. The last advice I so much from each other. The journals I had want to give them is to just start writing, even written in the beginning of the semester were if they think they don’t [know] what to say on more formal and seemed more like essays. … I that topic. The words will come, the ideas too. started to change my way of writing journals. (Arita, Kosovo) I became more open to them and less formal. I started writing using “I” and expressing Using journals in the classroom my exact opinion on everything. And that As Fulwiler (1987) has shown, journals was the thing I appreciated most. Usually I can be adapted to a wide variety of teaching kept my ideas to myself as I am very shy and situations. In this section, I offer concrete sug- sometimes even if I wanted to say something I gestions for using journals in three teaching did not. Writing journals helped me not only situations. [improve] my writing, an aim that I think I Starting class. Start class with five minutes realized, but also it helped me [improve] as a of journal writing. Students could be asked to person. It stimulated my critical thinking and write about a question that will be the subject looking at things deeper. I started to look at of that day’s lesson. Perhaps students could them from a different perspective and analyze listen to a quotation that will form part of the them more. I found it really helpful [both] lesson and write a response to it. Use the first in the developing writing skills perspective or five minutes of class as a transition from what developing self-confidence and being more the student was doing before class started analytic. (Erka, Albania) (walking, eating, talking on a cell phone, lis- tening to an iPod) to the subject of the class. Student Opinion 3 Ending class. End class by asking students At the beginning, I was very skeptical and to describe one thing they learned today worried, finding hundred reasons it would or what lingering questions or confusions be difficult. … By opening the journal and they still have. Ending class with a journal starting to write on a topic before prior activity asks students to finish the period by thinking on what to write, I realized I would synthesizing the course material rather than come up with some really good thoughts and by grabbing their jacket, cell phone, books, observations of issues. So it helped us not in and notebook. just improving our performance in written Focusing. Interrupt a lecture by asking English, but also in training us to think, to students to write for five minutes. Listening reflect on issues, to think of the problems and is a passive activity and note-taking is often try to find solutions. … And I did not expect mechanical. Plan a pause in the middle of the this. That is why it surprised me. I did not lecture and ask students to write an answer expect that I could put that much of reflective to a question that connects to the section of E n g l i s h TE a c h i n g F o r u m | Number 4 2009 25 the lecture they just heard. A heated discus- with the course material when she is writ- sion dominated by two or three students ing—and learning—in her notebook. can be cooled off by asking all the students References to write down their opinions on the topic and why they think as they do. A class where Bean, J. C. 1996. Engaging ideas: The professor’s guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, and students are reluctant to participate might be active learning in the classroom. San Francisco: re-energized by having students write about Jossey-Bass. the topic. Even the best of students drift off Casanave, C. P., and M. Sosa. 2007. Respite for and daydream occasionally. Journal writing teachers: Reflection and renewal in the teaching requires students to stop being observers and life. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. ——. 2008. Getting in line: The challenge (and to be participants for a few minutes. importance) of speaking and writing about dif- ficult ideas. In The oral-literate connection: Per- Conclusions spectives on L2 speaking, writing, and other media Students certainly could keep electronic interactions, ed. D. Belcher and A. Hirvela, journals in the form of a blog or a wiki, or 87–109. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. through email. However, paper-based note- Fulwiler, T. 1987. Teaching with writing. Ports- books offer a number of attractive features. A mouth, NH: Boynton/Cook. paper journal does not require electricity or an Higginson, W. J. (with P. Harter). 1985. The haiku Internet connection. A paper journal is lighter handbook: How to write, share, and teach haiku. and more portable than most computers. And New York: Kodansha International. Knight, E. 1986. The essential Etheridge Knight. while paper journals can be destroyed in rain Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press. or fire, people never lose an entry due to a Wright, R. 1998. Haiku: This other world. New computer virus or hard drive failure. York: Arcade. Paper-based journals also offer an addi- Young, A. 1999. Teaching writing across the curricu- tional advantage: they bring mind and body lum, 3rd ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. closer together. One of my students, at the Ziliak, S. T. Forthcoming. Haiku economics: Little end of a semester of intensive journal writ- aids for teaching big economic pluralists. Inter- ing, commented that, for the first time, she national Journal of Pluralism and Economics realized there was a relationship between her Education 1 (1). http://economistsview.typepad. mood and her handwriting. She discovered com/files/haiku-economics-ziliak.pdf. that she had four or five styles of handwrit- ing—a self-discovery she had never made in her years of using computers to write. Certainly journals will not work for every- Scott J. Baxter has taught at universities one, but, for many students and teachers, in Poland, Bulgaria, and Lebanon. He now journals offer an opportunity to find a per- directs the writing center and the writing sonal connection with the course material. It across the curriculum program at the Uni- is impossible for a student not to be engaged versity of North Dakota. 26 2009 Number 4 | E n g l i s h TE a c h i n g F o r u m