English compositions by Japanese often fail to convey accurate messages to readers. One reason for this is that these writers lack analytical and organizational skills. In this paper, I will first describe the way English writing is usually taught in Japanese junior and senior high schools. Next, I will discuss how I use four developmental tools in a one-year listening and writing course for intermediate-level college freshmen who are non-English majors: (1) fluency journal writing, (2) working journal writing, (3) expository writing with an assigned topic, and (4) free expository writing. Finally, I will introduce my "sharing approach," which asks students to analyze and learn from each other's writing.
Japanese Teaching Methods
In general, the teaching of English in Japanese junior and senior high schools puts total emphasis on grammar rules. Linguistic forms are introduced through stories in grammar and composition textbooks, and grammatical explanations and rewriting plus translation practice from Japanese to English follow. Since the stress is all on accurate reproduction of patterns, Japanese college students are unable to use English as a means of self expression.
Japanese college students are never made aware of the differences between Western and Japanese methods of organization. Western writing is deductive: The main idea is presented at the beginning of a paragraph and then followed by reasons or illustrations. Japanese writing is inductive: Illustrations and examples are presented before the main idea, which is often implied rather than directly stated. Most writing in English by Japanese college students is inductive, because it reflects the way they think and write in Japanese (Kaplan, 1996). The course described below gives students training in analyzing and organizing their writing deductively.
The Four Developmental Tools
Fluency journal
I begin the course by assigning fluency journals, the first of the four developmental tools. This is a homework assignment in which students write as much as possible, since evaluation is based entirely on the amount of English written. They are not to be concerned about grammatical errors, since I correct them. Students submit two fluency journals in the first semester and use the same notebook for both so they can see how their fluency increased.
Some of the errors I observe are caused by literal translations from Japanese. For example, (my corrections appear in parentheses):
- Today was a game. (Today we had a game.)
- Died men and women are very much. (The number of dead is very large.)
Since students have no frame of reference for identifying and correcting these errors on their own, the teacherﾕs guidance is valuable. Therefore, the fluency journals help students begin to write freely, and my corrections give them correct models of the expressions they want to use.
Working journal
The second developmental tool, the working journal (Spack & Sadow, 1983) gives students the opportunity to exchange opinions in writing with their teacher. The working journal, like the fluency journal is submitted once a semester. The parameters for the working journal are the same as those for the fluency journal, with the addition that some kind of opinion should be expressed. English news articles and editorials form the basis for the studentsﾕ writing.
In the journals written in 1997, 20 out of 97 freshmen wrote about the murders in Kobe in February and May of that year, in which a fourteen-year-old boy killed two elementary school children. Some students wrote that they were ashamed that society could produce such a killer. In my written comments, I reminded students that this boy did not represent every boy in Japan and told them not to make such generalizations without taking exceptions into account. As a follow-up, I told students to respond to my comments. Sixteen out of twenty students wrote that they hadn't noticed their overgeneralization until I pointed it out. The working journal, therefore helps develop studentsﾕ awareness of how they are expressing themselves and with teacher correction, gives them opportunities to learn how to write good English sentences.
Controlled expository writing
During the second semester, I assign one expository composition about the English education systems in Japan. Students choose from two areas: high school or university. They analyze and evaluate their effectiveness, and suggest solutions to problems they identified. Before starting, I give them the following ground rules:
- The paper should be organized into sections (i.e., introduction, body, and conclusion).
- Each paragraph should be cohesive (i.e., the topic sentence should be supported by other sentences in the paragraph.
- Discourse markers such as conjunctions, demonstrative pronouns, and listing signals should be used.
- Abstract statements should be followed by concrete examples or illustrations.
- Opinions should be clearly stated at the beginning.
These five items reflect the deductive development of a paragraph. The following is an uncorrected example of controlled expository writing (Example 1).
Example 1
The English education in this university is effective. I think that the English education in this university is the most effective that Iﾕd ever studied for 8 years. There are two main reasons why I think so. Firstly, teachers speak only English during the class. The more I take the classes, the more I was used to English. And I naturally develop English comprehension skill. The second reason is the teachers in this university teach us practical English. When I was a junior and senior high school student, the teachers taught us English for entrance examinations. They said, "This question will be given on the next exam." So I used to study it very hard. I think that I had been studied English only to pass the entrance examination.
It is clear that the instructions had been followed in this draft. A deductive approach is evident as the student supported his opinion with illustrations and reasoning. After I check the errors, students submit their revised, corrected versions.
Free expository writing
The final assignment is the fourth tool, a free expository composition, which is assigned once in the second semester. After watching a video dealing with discrimination against women, students write a free expository paper which becomes a deductively developed discussion about one of the points presented in the video. An uncorrected example dealing with racial discrimination appears below (Example 2).
Example 2
I will talk about the problem concerned with Koreans who live in Japan. I chose this theme for two reasons. First, there are many Koreans around us. In spite of that, there are many discriminations against them. Second, I was a Korean. So I had wanted to know more about them.
This example shows effective organization and analysis. However, the expression ﾒin spite of thatﾓ does not connect the surrounding sentences and there are conflicts between the use of the present and past tenses. These errors were pointed out to the student and corrected in the final version.
Example 3 is a draft composition about bullying, the contents of which are not focussed:
Example 3 (draft)
There are many discriminations in the world. There are for sex, races, disabled people. Firstly, the discriminations for disabled people is sometimes taken the wrong way. Some people say, ﾒThey are ordinary. Donﾕt think they are abnormal.ﾓ But I think itﾕs wrong.Because itﾕs natural for us to think the people are different from ourselves. So even if others tell us not to think so, the strange is the strange. We canﾕt change our ideas. Then what should we do? I think the most important thing is to recognize the differences, besides to deny them thoughtlessly. Secondly about the discrimination for sex. This is especially related to business. For example, the male are given priority in finding work and promotion even if the female are able.
My comments on the draft version were: "Limit your topic. Why do you think discrimination exists?" Note in the revised version (Example 4) how much the student has improved his organizational skills and deductive development.
Example 4 (revised version)
When I watched news program on TV, one of the news was a suicide of a junior high school student. The cause of it was bullying. In watching this program, I recalled my childhood. Did I bully someone? Yes, I did. I bullied a girl with my friend just because she was obedient and bad at telling her own opinion. Now I understand we were stupid. Bullying is to distinguish a group from one person, and to beat the person physically and spiritually, with the fellows of a group. Bullying is a kind of discrimination. So I will talk about bullying. Kingokkoﾓ was a play. "Kin" means a germ and "gokko" means a play in Japanese. If my friend touched the girl, we recognized her as a dirty girl. She could remove the dirt when she touched someone else. So we were going to clean up the dirt with each other. It was a play. But it must have been a unbearable cruelty for her.
Then why did we do such a thing? Because we feel a sense of unity. When we did "kingokko," we actually felt strong bonds of friendship. At present day, there are many bullying. For example, a group beats someone up and threaten to bring money. It is done by one group, not one person. Present bullying is done for a sense of unity, too. But bad thing is pleasant. Because the more they sense what they do is bad, the stronger they feel bonds of friendship.
In the revised version above (Example 4), the student introduced his own bitter experience and dealt with this exclusively. By limiting his topic, he could strongly appeal to readers. He organized the three paragraphs deductively. In the second paragraph, kingokko was introduced in the first sentence and was explained and supported by other sentences. In the third paragraph, he raised the question of why they played the trick and analyzed why the resulting discrimination occurred.
The following chart summarizes the aims of the four developmental tools and how they were used (Table 1).
Table 1: Four Developmental Tools
|
Tool |
Aims |
Implementation |
| Fluency Journal | to write freely without worrying about errors | by writing about everyday life |
| Working Journal | to develop analytical skills and to express opinions | by reading English newspaper articles and editorials |
| Controlled Expository Writing | to develop organizational skills and the ability to use rhetorical patterns | by writing based on an assigned topic |
| Free Expository Writing | to improve organizational skills (focussing on the topic, setting the scene) | by doing background research and personal reflection before writing |
Sharing Approach
Students develop organizational and analytical skills by examining other classmatesﾕ papers. I organize students into pairs and give them a six-point checklist to follow:
- Is the essay well-organized?
- Is the orientation clear?
- Are problems clearly described?
- Are reasons for the problems analyzed?
- Are solutions offered?
- Are the paragraphs cohesively developed?
I demonstrate how to use the checklist and tell the students to help their partners revise their drafts for the final version.
A questionnaire distributed at the end of the course revealed that students had found sharing to be the most useful activity of the class. They wrote that they found it difficult to express themselves without the sharing and this activity helped them improve their organizational skills.
Conclusion
This paper began with the observation that Japanese students lack analytical and organizational skills needed for writing in English. Because the teaching of grammar rules is overemphasized in the teaching of English in Japan, and written expression has been all but ignored, college students find it difficult to produce descriptive and opinion paragraphs. To remedy this, I have presented four tasks to help students develop organizational skills and analytical skills and become clearer, more convincing English writers.
References
Kaplan, R. (1966). Cultural thought patterns in intercultural education. Language Learning, 16(1, 2), 1-20.
Spack, R., & Sadow, C. (1983). Student-teacher working journals in ESL freshman composition. TESOL Quarterly, 17(4), 575-593.