Colleges require lots of writings and these vary both in amount and diversity. Some assignments may be relatively straightforward and similar to things students have written before, such as lab report. Other kinds of assignments such as problem solving report, critical essays, briefs, design papers, case studies, to name just a few, require more than they have encountered.
Writing about literature, indeed, involves the understanding of what lies beyond paragraphs. Students need to critically read the story before writing their own critical analysis. Voss said that critical quality of a writing includes at least three characteristics:
- College writing requires students to do not only locate and report information but also evaluate it. Critical writing involves critical reading.
- Students are expected to make judgments. Evaluate some information should be supported by recommendation or solution.
- Students are expected to be both more thorough and more precise. To do this, students need to have more than one piece of evidence and information, to use more than one source, to look at things more than one way. College writing needs a more mature perspective on the subject. (1992:44–45)
This paper limits only for writing about prose fiction in the forms of short story or novel. My purpose of writing this paper is to provide guidance in teaching critical writing about literature since in collegiate study, students are expected not only to read literature but to analyze it critically and write the result of this analytical analysis.
Theoretical background
Theme
Many good prose fictions appeal to our love of narration. They repay our attention in a good tale of adventure, love, or conflict. Often a short story or a novel will leave us with a dominant impression which is the main idea this work communicates to us. This is called theme of the story.
Sometime the theme is fairly easy to discern. However, some great works do not present an obvious point. Instead, the students as readers have to read closely, analytically, and imaginatively to discern a point.
Characteristics of prose fiction
Fiction involves narrative and therefore exhibits characteristics that can be isolated and considered separately. Plot, characterization, conflict and point of view are the main characteristics of prose fiction.
Plot in a story is the sequence of events. It includes what, when, and why things happen. It might be sequence of time or cause and effect.
Characterization provides the people of the story, including main, central opposing and supporting characters. There are major and minor characters. Characters may be also classified into flat or round, and static or developing characters.
Conflict gives life to the story. It generates plot and brings characterization into focus through actions. It presents problems to be solved and may take the form of person versus person, person versus environment, and person versus self.
Point of view is the point from which a story is told. Third person omniscient means the writer is located outside the story and tells not only what happens but also what selected characters are thinking. Third person limited means the writer limits what he/she can see. First person means the writer is inside the story. He/she is the participant of the story. The last point of view is the most difficult because the narrator tells only what characters say. There is no interpretation.
Rich language
By rich language it is meant the word choices. It is the diction the writer chooses to tell the story. This language is significant and contributes to the theme. Rich language may take the form of symbolism and imagery (Voss 1992).
Teaching writing procedures
I propose to teach this writing critically about literature by combining two approaches: product and process approach. Bringing together the best of these two approaches, we aim to build bridges between reading and writing. We guide students through reader response, close analysis, and critical thinking and relate this to writing by giving students practice in observing the techniques of real writers at work such as writing multiple drafts, collaborating, and revising critically.
There are some skills need to be taught concerning writing prose: language use, mechanical skills, treatment of content, stylistic skills, and judgment skills (Heaton 1989). The first two skills (language use and mechanical skills) should be a review of what they have studied earlier. The focus of teaching critical writing about literature is on the rest (content, stylistic and judgment skills).
Pre-writing
Before asking students to write about literature, we need to remind them the context and content of their writing (Tribble 1997). It means they should understand what the purpose of the text and whom they are writing for. This very first step involves some activity that is called planning (Hedge 2002) or thinking (Voss 1992, Tribble 1997).
In teaching writing about literature, we may set this pre-writing activity in the form of discussion about the work, tapping the students’ background knowledge. This schematic knowledge is important to help them read the work. The teacher may act as the target reader for the students’ writing.
Next step is what we call as generating, focusing, and structuring (White and Arndt 1991, cited by Tribble 1997). Generating helps the students to find what they want to write. Discussion and sharing their experiences relating to a particular work may lead to motivation in writing. Focusing helps the students to prioritize what they want to write. Structuring activity will help the students to organize their writing. In this stage, students have to conceptualize what they have in mind. Brainstorming and mind mapping are the commonest way in doing so.
Composing and drafting
To write critically one needs to read critically. Composing and drafting in writing about literature may be done by reviewing the guided questions for critical analysis. See the following guided questions.
1. Setting.
It refers to when and where the story takes place. It includes the physical surroundings of the story. What details of the setting do you find in the story? Remember that details may involve details about the time period of the story and details about situation, for example the valley, the fog, and isolation of the place.
2. Plot
What actually happened in the story? State the lone of development. Which scene would you call most important and why?
3. Characterization
How many characters are there? Who are they and how important are they? What are their motives, attitudes and mindsets?
4. Point of view
Which point of view does the author use? What advantages would the author get from using this point of view? How would the story differ if it is written in different point of views? Which is the best?
5. Language
How do we know there is symbolic language in the story? What do they symbolize?
6. Theme
If you were assigned to make statement of the point of the story, what would the statement be?
Revising and editing
In this stage, teacher has to make sure that the students understand that good writers tend to get the content right first and leave details until later (Hedge 1988, cited by Tribble 1997). In revising, students as writers should get the things right, involving the choice of vocabulary and expression. In editing, they work with spelling, punctuation and grammar.
Testing
There will be the final test for this writing class but it would only share 30% of total score. The rest of 70% will be from daily activity. It includes in-class activity or writing assignments.
The tasks in this final test would be those they have ever encounter before. The task may vary but all lead to writing skill. As stated by Hughes (2003) that using direct testing is one of the ways to achieve beneficial backwash from a test.
Scoring
Analytical marking scheme is used for this classroom evaluation since it enables students to home in on weaknesses and to capitalize on their strengths (Brown 2004, Heaton 1989). This marking scheme is closer to classroom instruction than to formal testing. Complete analytical marking scheme I use is cited from Brown (2004) with the weighing of my own.
On-going assessment is done for fairness’ sake. It may be both at the initial stage and at the later stage of composing. Assessment at the initial stage involves commenting on the more global error whereas that at the later stage of composing focuses on the local error (Brown 2004). Teacher should be careful in providing this comment because over-correction at an early stage can be disheartening and de-motivating (Field 1999).
Feedback would be given to accompany the given score to achieve beneficial backwash of the test. In this case, teacher should not abandon either to providing their own feedback or giving a chance for peer feedback (Ferris 2003). Teacher’s feedback plays great role here and Sugita (2006) shows that the feedback in imperative comment leads to more substantive changes with positive effect. Peer feedback is also crucial because the potentially high level of interaction between one student as writer and other(s) as reader(s) would possibly result in a more sympathetic feedback than that of their more distant and judgmental teacher (Rollinson 2005).
Using computer
The basic writing tool provided by the computer is a word processor. Using word processor in teaching writing may advise some advantages. This technology lets the students to do the revision more quickly and easily. The ease with which words, phrases, clauses, and sentences can be added, deleted, or moved suggests that it may function as a macro-level revision tool (Pennington 2003). And because writing is a never-ending revision process, it opens them the way of becoming good writers. With its spellchecker, word processor makes the students easier to find mistakes in spelling. Word processor also gives opportunity to present the product (writing) in a good-looking way (Voss 1992). Word processor removes the problems of poor handwriting that some students suffer from (Harmer 2001, Hedge 2002).
Computer also affects the stages in writing process. Planning becomes more of the later stage instead of beginning activity because students who use computer may be writing while they are planning (Hass 1989, cited by Pennington 2003).
Conclusion
Writing should be taught as a process of discovery of something beyond the reading material, in this case, fiction prose. It implies that revision becomes the main focus of the course and the teacher intervenes to guide the students through the process. Related to critical thinking, students should be able to review the text (story) without any feeling that they have to agree to it. Even when they disagree, they are able to write it in a mature way, putting reason rather than emotion. (by Utami Utar)
Reference
Brown, H. Douglas. 2004. Language Assessment. Principles and Classroom Practices. New York: Pearson Education Inc.
Ferris, Dana. 2003. “Responding to writing”. In Exploring the Dynamics of Second Language Writing. (Barbara Kroll, ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Field, Kit. 1999. “Developing productive language skills-speaking and writing”. In Teaching Modern Foreign Languages at Advanced Level. (Norbert Pachler, ed.). London: Routledge
Harmer, Jeremy. 2001. The Practice of English Language Teaching. Essex: Pearson Education Limited
Heaton, J. Brian. 1989. Writing English Language Tests. New York: Longman Inc
Hedge, Tricia. 2002. Teaching and Learning in the Language Classroom. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Hughes, Arthur. 2003. Testing for Language Teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Pennington, Martha C. 2003. “The impact of the computer in the second language writing”. In Exploring the Dynamics of Second Language Writing. (Barbara Kroll, ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Rollinson, Paul. 2005. “Using peer feedback in the ESL writing class”. In ELT Journal Volume 59/ 1 January © Oxford University Press
Sugita, Yoshihito. 2006. “The impact of teacher’s comment types on students’ revision”. In ELT Journal. Volume 60/1 January © Oxford University Press
Tribble, Christopher. 1997. Writing. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Voss, Ralph F. and Michael L. Keene. 1992. The Heath Guide to College Writing. Lexington, Massachusetts: D.C. Heath and Company
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