I found many of
the facts about ESL and NES students writing to be factual and similar to what I
have observed with my ESL students in the clinical I am in. My students depend
on illustrations in the books we are reading and other texts to figure out
words they do not know. Many times they just look at me and expect me to tell
them what the word is because they do not know. When my students are given assignments,
they also rely heavily on background texts and information, so they have a
clearer understanding of what they are going to do an assignment on or reading.
Another thing I have observed from
my students is how they struggle with vocabulary while they are writing and
while they are reading. Many of my students struggle with vocabulary because they
do not know what some words means in English, but are able to say it in Spanish;
that becomes a barrier with them and me because I do not speak Spanish and I’m
not able to help them translate. When they are writing something or creatively writing,
it is difficult to help them come up with an English word when they only know
it in Spanish. They become very resourceful and use each other for help because
some have a bigger vocabulary than others. However, when they are reading something
to me I am able to help describe a word they do not understand, so they can put
a description and picture to the word.
According to the Silva article, they
believed that ESL writing was simpler in the eyes of the NES judges. They struggle
from having a smaller vocabulary than an NES student and they tend to not
revise and reread what they have written. I have found that my students
struggle mostly with writing because of the language barrier and they cannot
think of how to say a word in English. However, they are capable of writing
good, complete sentences. I think ESL learners would have a better “reputation”
if they were taught the skills to revise their work and good writing skills.
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