LiLT Forum at JALT 2019

Using Literature Effectively for Learner Agency

 

  • Day: Saturday, November 2nd
  • Time: 12:10 PM – 1:40 PM (90 minutes)
  • Room: 1005

The Presenters

Richard Hodson, Seinan Gakuin University

Session Chair

 

 

 

Mary Hillis, Kwansei Gakuin University

Read, Research, and Write: Ethnographic Poetry in the Classroom

This presentation will describe the use of ethnographic poetry for learners at a Japanese university. After reading and discussing ethnographic poems in class, students engaged in their own poetry projects, conducting interviews about food, home, or other topics, and presenting excerpts in poetic form. An analysis of topics explored and techniques used by students will be presented along with examples of their work. By the end of this presentation, teachers should have ideas for using ethnographic poems to encourage language awareness, independent learning, and creativity.

 

Jane Joritz-Nakagawa, Freelance

Poetry, passion, and learner agency 

I will focus on activities students can do autonomously (with minimal or no teacher help/input) but very successfully individually and in groups in relation to poetry. These activities include oral readings, discussions, journal writing, poem writing, speeches, role play, and essay and report writing / research.  Enthusiasm, fun, risk-taking, and personalization (of topics and tasks) are integral to the approach I will describe. Because the activities are inherently interesting and because students succeed at them motivation to learn occurs.

 

Madoka Nagado, University of the Ryukyus

Autofiction as an effective writing exercise

My focus is on the potential of the use of autofiction, a hybrid creative form that combines autobiographical writing and fiction, in undergraduate composition classrooms. While autofiction has been increasingly discussed as a literary approach to personal identity creation/exploration, only a few focus on its pedagogical implications. I argue that autofiction offers an effective strategy that enables students to develop self-knowledge and a sense of agency as writers. The compositional benefits of adapting fictionality in autobiographical writing would let students choose, elaborate, and creatively explore their subjects all the while giving them liberty to bypass uncomfortable or sensitive topics.

 

Susan Laura Sullivan, Tokai University

Student Autonomy through Creativity

Many classes concentrate on already created literature. Students are not necessarily part of the creative act, except for analysis. Literature remains ‘othered’; only an aspect of language practice as opposed to one of self-expression. If students have the tools to analyse and to create literature, they are able to write, discuss, listen, read and think more freely on a range of topics, because they are invested in the work, and understand it intimately. That is, their schemata are truly opened, and this enables them to communicate with others, employing varying scales and techniques related to linguistic competence, autonomy and agency.