AN INTEGRATED LITERATURE-BASED READING,

WRITING, & DISCUSSION PROGRAM TO IMPROVE

ESL STUDENTS LANGUAGE SKILLS

by

L. Max Voelzke

B.S.Ed., Concordia Teachers College, 1973

Dr. Arlene Barry

Professor in Charge

Dr. Paul Markham

Dr. Steve White

Committee Members

Date project accepted: October 8, 1997

ABSTRACT

This project was initiated to determine the effectiveness of an integrated reading, writing, and discussion literature-based (IL-B) program approach that was developed and used in an English speaking (L1) classroom in improving language skills for English as a Second Language (ESL) students.

The review of literature attempts to show the benefits of using of a literature-based approach in both the L1 and ESL classrooms and further, how it supports the need for integration of the reading, writing, and speaking skills in developing language skills.

The project is a narrative of my experiences. The IL-B program is discussed from its origins and practice in my L1 classroom to its continued practice and development in the ESL classrooms in Kiribati.

The results of using a literature-based program show positive benefits in the day-to-day motivation of students to participate in learning. Other benefits that may be discerned from use of an IL-B program are the far reaching possibilities of continued learner involvement in the reading, writing, and speaking of English.

CHAPTER ONE

Introduction to the Project

The purpose of this project is to show how an integrated reading, writing, and discussion literature-based (IL-B) program as used in a classroom of native English (L1) speakers can be applied to the English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom. It is because of my experiences in using the IL-B program with 6^th grade students and witnessing the improvement of students' skills, motivation and involvement that I felt it would be a program that would effectively apply to the teaching of English as a Second Language (ESL). I will present research and first hand experiences in both English speaking classrooms and ESL classrooms that will show the IL-B program to be an effective, beneficial, and viable means of developing students' English language skills, particularly their speaking or conversational skills.

The use of literature is the heart of an IL-B program. There are many reasons for using literature in a language program, one of which is that children's literature can be one of the most effective teaching materials available for students of all ages (Smallwood, 1991). Through the use of literature, students not only are able to practice their reading, writing, listening, speaking, vocabulary, and grammar skills and general language skills, but they can explore and reflect on the experiences of others, i.e., the characters in the book, their peers, and themselves. They can share their thoughts and beliefs and relate their own experiences and opinions to the story. In using children’s literature in the classroom, children, as Huck (1977) points out, take ownership of an experience they relate to on a personal level, much as they draw away from being manipulated for pedagogical purposes.

If students have a focus, e.g., interesting literature, they naturally become involved with it. They form opinions regarding the characters and the characters' actions and behavior. In their writings and discussions they are able to relate their own lives and experience to the story, and they find that others are interested in and can benefit from their thoughts and experiences. This then motivates them to express themselves in more interesting, worthwhile ways in both writings and in their discussions. It is also a way in which they, in effect, monitor their comprehension through seeing their own ideas in writing, through expressing themselves, and in hearing the perspectives and understandings of their peers. This is especially significant for the ESL students who for the most part rely on activities within the classroom to provide them with needed English language practice.

In their reading, writing, and discussion activities, students are practicing the rhythm of the story, of the language of the dialogues, and are continually enhancing their vocabulary. This is important for the ESL students whose native language structure is often very different from English. Literature provides a natural focus for developing reading, writing, and speaking skills and as they read, write, and discuss, they have an authentic purpose - an important element in learning. By integrating the teaching of these traditionally separately taught skills with a focus on literature, these skills can develop together with much greater benefit for the students in both the L1 and the ESL classrooms addressing both their similar and distinctive needs.

Background Information

In the past three years, since November of 1993, I have been involved in ESL programs in two foreign countries: The Republic of Kiribati (pronounced Kir i bus) and the Republic of Korea. In Kiribati I was a Peace Corps volunteer TESL/Teacher Trainer teaching students, working with local teachers, and presenting in-services on effective ESL teaching methods. In Korea I worked as an ESL teacher teaching students from primary grades through adult.

These countries today are endeavoring to develop more effective ESL programs. In Kiribati the U.S. Peace Corps, in conjunction with the Ministry of Education, was developing and implementing a TESL/Teacher Training program in the primary schools, grades 1-9. The goal of this program was to further develop teachers' skills in teaching English as well as students' English reading, writing, listening, and speaking skills. Grammar books were being replaced by Ready to Read, a program attempting to bring literature to the classroom. The TESL/TT program involved approximately 20+ Peace Corps volunteers (PCVs), each with an education degree, teaching and conducting in-services each at their assigned schools on various atolls. Twenty-four in-services on ESL methods were conducted in a 2-year period, and PCVs co-taught with each of the school's staff and modeled the methods in the classroom.

In Korea, native English speakers, mostly from the US and Canada and not necessarily with education degrees or teaching experience, are being employed, en masse, primarily by private "institutes" to teach English conversation either at the institutes' own classrooms or at various elementary, middle, high schools, businesses, etc. The government also began a program in 1996, now called EPIK (English Program in Korea), which will hopefully bring more direction and continuity to the goal of improving students' and teachers' English skills.

Reading discussions of best methods for teaching leads one to realize that "best" can be, if anything, complex if not ambiguous. It is important, too, to keep in mind that a program can be a success for one and a failure for another; i.e. what the teacher brings or neglects to bring to the program can be a determining factor as to its success or failure. As stated by Eskey (1982), good teachers make good programs. The challenge, of course, is to find effective methods that will fit with the teacher’s philosophy, style, and strengths, and will meet the students' needs.

Origin of the Study

Prior to teaching overseas I taught sixth grade for many years. This project first began in my 6^th grade "English speaking" classroom and was originally initiated to study the effect of an integrated reading, writing, speaking, literature-based program on students' reading motivation and development. Later, when beginning my work in Kiribati, whose English as a Second Language (ESL) programs were not providing students with practical conversation skills, I saw a need for a more effective approach to ESL education. Speaking is not just basic communication; it involves thinking, knowledge, and skills as well as practice and training (Hong & Aiex, 1996). From my experiences in an English speaking Kansas classroom, I believed that using a literature-based integrated approach was a way that could help improve ESL students' reading, writing, listening skills, and particularly students?oral language skills.

Although I applied all aspects of the integrated literature-based program in my work, this project’s focus is on the effectiveness of the reading and discussion of literature in the classroom to improve students?oral English skills. My investigation considers the literature-based program as a whole, from child to adult, but the scope here is also narrowed to focus on its use in the first years of a student’s school career. This project explores the benefits of using an integrated reading, writing, speaking, literature-based program in the ESL classroom which accentuate those elements and will develop ESL students who, after years of study, can communicate effectively in English.

Development of the Project

While teaching in an English speaking 6th grade classroom in the U.S., I fell under mandatory basal curriculum use. Students had little time in which they could read because they were too busy working on "reading skills", i.e. filling in workbooks and worksheets. While this method may not be ineffective, it wasn’t developing readers. My students and I found it to be boring and non-motivating. According to Wood and O’Donnell (1990), research does not support any particular scope and sequence of sub-skills which, if practiced in isolation, will result in competent reading. Improvement in reading occurs only when children read real texts.

Writing also was usually separate, not connected to the students' reading, and I was constantly looking for "interesting and motivating" writing ideas. Reading and writing are developed by using both of them, and as Goodman (1986) says, they are learned most easily when instruction is whole, functional, and meaningful.

Finally, after many years, I was able to develop and direct my own reading program based at first on my own beliefs concerning reading and later on the research I began conducting for this project. In 1987 when Christa McAuliffe Elementary School first opened, another 6th grade teacher and myself initiated a literature-based program. Multiple copies of trade books were ordered and significantly NO workbooks or ditto masters for worksheets. For about six years my developing literature-based reading/writing program's focus was primarily on Read, Think and Write or RTW, initially inspired by Youngblood’s (1985) idea. It was really RTWD, however -- D for discussing. Literature was the focus, and in simple terms my students read books.

When I speak of reading, it almost always involved writing and discussion in some form because students were constantly involved in talking about their readings and writings with me, with partners, or in small groups. They read books of choice selected from library, home, and classroom. The classroom library was filled with quality literature. There were multiple copies of many of these books, some of which were assigned, usually 2 per quarter, and most of which became students?personal choices.

So students read, wrote, and discussed. They thought about parts they didn't understand; they interacted with the characters and events in the stories, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating them, and relating them to their own life experiences; they inferred, predicted, drew conclusions, expanded their vocabulary, and they read with enthusiasm. Through this they became a community, a society of readers. I found my classroom practice to be in sync with the research of Fisher & Hiebert, (1990) who believe that the acquisition of literacy occurs in the context of purposeful communication where meaning is socially constructed.

I viewed reading, writing and speaking as inseparable, not to be accomplished in isolation. For writing to help reading, strategies that link the two are crucial said Noyce & Christie (1989). One enhances the other; one provides continual opportunities for another. It is more than just beneficial to integrate them; it is necessary to integrate literature with writing and discussion on a daily, ongoing basis if students are going to be able to fully develop those skills.

One might say that the purpose of reading is to understand what the author has to say. But what I think the author says and what another thinks the author says do not and need not always agree. Literature holds a unique and personal meaning for each individual in his/her life experience, and in order to access that meaning, responding through writing and discussion is necessary. Reading is obviously a communication of the author to the reader, but some see the central purpose of reading as internal to and generated by the reader (Bogdan & Straw, 1990). This moves away from testually determined interpretations because it insists on recognition of the reader's contribution to the meaning derived during a reading event. It is this perspective toward reading which characterizes what is often called reader-response theory and which underlies response-based approaches to literature (Many & Wiseman, 1992).

Reading, writing, and speaking should be thought of as a partnership, each benefiting the other. They mutually reinforce each other (Teale and Martinez, 1989). All readers bring prior knowledge with them to their reading. Using literature is a way of tapping in to that source. The text is a stimulus activating elements of the reader's past experience--his experience both with literature and with life. If children know and understand good literature there's opportunity to transfer something of what they know into what they write. If they (students) are immersed in literature and encouraged to talk about it, reflect upon it, raise questions about it, they may become better writers (Stewig, 1980). Sometimes the first step towards immersion is understanding students?preconceived ideas about reading.

Students often began their 6th grade school year with an "attitude" about reading and unfortunately that attitude was all too often negative. For many this was due to their self-perceptions of being poor readers, and they were typically found in the "low" reading group in the past. Some considered reading something to be endured. Others simply viewed reading as boring work, i.e., answering questions, filling in workbooks and worksheets, etc. with some unknown purpose. An overabundance of skills oriented instruction causes students to feel no control of their reading comprehension -- a learned helplessness. They expect assigned reading to be boring. Interestingly they often view "reading a good story" as something done at home, separate from what they think of as reading class.

As the school year began, I tried to dispel some of these beliefs. They were somewhat wary as I explained to them they would have no workbooks or worksheets, would not be answering questions at the end of a story, and could read any book they wanted. They were further dumbfounded as we selected books from the Easy/Picture books in the library and just read them. They were not looking at what the author said so much as participating in the fun of the stories, the feelings and the ideas that they evoked. These stories, many of which they had probably read years before, were still fun for them, and they grew enthusiastic as they became more assured the "bubble" would not pop.

In the same manner, the same sense of enjoyment and motivation can be and needs to be a part of the ESL classroom. In the past, English grammar has usually been the main focus of students' ESL education. The English conversation instruction students typically received, if any, and then usually taught by native English speakers, was in isolation from most reading and/or writing involvement. Schools and classrooms were often devoid of any storybooks in English. English was a "subject" -- knowledge to be learned, stored, and tested, not a language that should be learned, enjoyed, utilized and manipulated. The learning environment was sometimes rigid with high demands for "knowledge" or with few demands and little perceived need for learning.

Though many of these past practices are still true today, some programs are moving away from this approach. Educators are seeking new and effective methods of instruction with more thought being given to the "whole" learner and more emphasis to conversation/speaking skills and the use of literature in the ESL classroom. When using literature as the focus as in the IL-B program, the teacher guides the students at a level that presents a reasonable amount of information. The students are not dropped in the middle of expectations that outreach their abilities, but are guided to participate in building an active base of language through their reading, writing, and discussing.

There are definite advantages to an IL-B program in both the L1 and ESL classroom and the research literature is encouraging. It depicts an effective approach that develops students?thinking abilities, one that’s motivating for both the student and the teacher, and one that interrelates the reading, writing, and speaking aspect of language learning.

CHAPTER TWO

Review of Related Literature

As previously noted, I began the project during the time I was developing my integrated reading, writing, and speaking literature-based (IL-B) program in my "English speaking" (L1) classroom. The more literature I reviewed, the more resolved I became to pursue a literature based reading program. When I began teaching English as a Second Language (ESL), it added a new dimension to the project. I saw a new application for my IL-B program and another avenue to pursue in reviewing literature.

The basic premise of this project is that each of the language components -- reading, writing, and speaking ?are related and interdependent, supporting each other’s development and a literature-based program provides an effective focus for their development in both the L1 classroom and the ESL classroom. If the aim is to help students acquire a second language, then teaching only reading or only writing, for example, is ultimately useless states Perrotta (1994). When a program is integrated, i.e., the processes of reading, writing, and speaking in an ESL classroom are taught together, it better develops students?learning than when they are taught as separate units. They function together in a child’s natural environment so they should not be separated in the classroom teaching. ESL students make sense of language as a totality as well as any monolingual students.

This review of literature attempts to provide an impetus for the use of an IL-B program. It is not, however, meant to be presented as a method for all situations or for all teachers. Though research support is mixed regarding a literature-based reading program, it positively stands out from others for what it can bring to and develop in learners. The array of descriptive works, the number and type of studies with their monumental number of variables, plus the added aspect that methods are never applied in exactly the same way by different teachers, at different times, can be mind boggling. Lemlech (1984) says research on reading programs has failed to demonstrate which approach to the teaching of reading is superior or more efficient than the others for rarely does a teacher use a "pure" form but a combination.

Second language research shows some of the strengths and weaknesses of a particular teaching method or technique, and it provides information that can influence and guide teaching, but it doesn’t provide any patented methods (Cook, 1991). Patented methods are not what is being sought; there are no patented teachers. What is being sought is effectiveness, which is found in the use of literature in language programs.

IL-B Program

The use of children’s literature is foremost in an integrated reading, writing, and discussion literature-based program (IL-B) classroom. As previously stated, children's literature can be one of the most effective teaching materials available for students of all ages says Smallwood, (1991). Using it to develop literacy is a well-documented approach for elementary students, both native and nonnative speakers. It is newer but increasingly popular, also, with adult ESL learners, especially in ESL family literacy programs.

After spending a school year observing Andre’s first grade literature-based program in action, Knipping & Andre (1988) say, "The children’s responses to the strategy delighted us. We have learned that, when young children read and share valued pieces of literature with their teacher and a small group of peers, their responses reveal careful thought, spontaneous emotion and surprising depth." (p. 70) A curriculum of literature would recognize that literary transactions yield knowledge about one’s self and other, as well as about the texts and authors. It would accept a much wider range of modes of discourse about literature, and it would encourage the exploratory and expressive as well as the analytical and rational (Probst, 1988).

In an IL-B classroom, students read and learn to read selections which expand their worlds by acknowledging and building upon their present understandings and attitudes. Working with peers and teachers they discover elements in the texts that extend beyond the particular book to larger contexts and issues of significance (DeLawter, 1992) .

In a study done by Many & Wiseman (1992) to study the effects of teaching approaches on students responses to literature, one hundred and twenty 3rd grade students were randomly assigned to 3 groups. The first, using literary analysis approach, centered on identifying and critiquing literary elements. The second group used literary experience having students react to the storyline. The third group was only read to and had no discussion. In free written responses, the literary analysis group focused more on specifics related to character development or how they would act in an event, and the literary experience group tended to become more involved in the story and were able to see similarities between characters and real people. The no-discussion group generally focused on retelling and more simple description. These researchers feel that through involvement in literature students may see a limitless supply of experiences and will bring with them knowledge and skills which will enlighten their aesthetic literary experiences.

Through the process of interacting socially and linguistically, not merely through being exposed to language, learners develop functional expertise says Long (1983). Sharing literature creates a powerful bond between people and opens opportunities for learning and expression that with other methods remained closed to the students. Dolly (1990) notes that many students never imagine that they can question, challenge, and respond to a text or writer, perhaps because they, like some of the children Heath (1983) studied, have rarely seen reading and writing used for genuine communicative purposes.

An IL-B classroom has a propensity for eliciting student output, both written and spoken. Too often in the L1 classroom there is an abundance of teacher talking (Chaudron, 1988). In the ESL classroom, also, student participation is often limited, students usually responding rather than initiating any discussion. Chaudron cites figures from various sources about teacher talk where teacher talk took up an average of 77% of the time in bilingual kindergarten classrooms in Canada, 69% in a 6^th grade immersion class, and 61% in 6^th grade foreign language classes.

In an IL-B classroom, when the students in an ESL classroom have the opportunity to participate in discussion, they benefit from the practice and others, too, are listening, processing, and learning. Participation can consist of activities such as listening, thinking about what is going on, and internal repetition, or it can consist of more active participation involving peer or small group interaction and communication. There is also the possibility of using other skills often practiced only by the teacher such as topic-nomination, turn-allocation, focusing, summarizing, and clarifying (Llewelyn, 1990). Participation is an integral part of the IL-B program, i.e. involvement in the story, in the writing and in the oral interaction. Student participation creates "ownership" of the activities and of the learning process.

Ernst & Richard (1994) completed a yearlong ethnographic study of an ESL classroom that illustrated students?"ownership", growth, and enjoyment in relation to their oral and written language development resulting from their participation in an integrated ESL program. Ebele, a second grade ESL student, is quoted saying, ".... in my English as a second language classroom, writing is cool. We can write what we want to write. And we talk and read. I wish I could be in ESL all day." In her classroom, Ebele uses reading and writing to explore, share enjoy, and think about topics that are of interest to her says Ernst & Richard. In their physical setting students were surrounded by a wide array of interesting ‘words and print?and other students in the classroom were also actively involved with the environment. This program was more than just integrated, it was interactional.

Ernst (1994) studied the use of the Talking Circle. The Talking Circle is a group activity used by the teacher to encourage discussion and interaction among the students. The implications drawn from this study were that ESL students need abundant practice to hear and use the new language, and when topics of interest to the students are discussed, the students will be motivated to use the language.

Goldenberg (1994) uses the term instructional conversations, or ICs, which are discussion-based lessons geared toward creating richly textured opportunities for students?conceptual and linguistic development. They are basically conversations the students engage in with the teacher and among themselves. They are instructional in their intent -- promoting learning, and conversational in their quality -- natural and spontaneous. Simple though it may seem, as one might think of the Talking Circle, the experience of Goldenberg & Gallimore (1991) suggests otherwise ?that instructional ICs are professionally and intellectually demanding teaching/learning events that come neither easily nor naturally. The message applies to the IL-B classroom as well. While teaching ESL students, Andre, in Knipping & Andre (1988), realized her role in helping children communicate their responses was to be a catalyst but found herself at times taking a directive approach. It takes sensitivity and constant self-evaluation to stay truly aware of the direction being taken while teaching.

As teachers develop their own skills and styles, one aspect of reading seems to remain constant. Reading aloud to students daily, whatever the age, is a means by which students can begin to develop their language. It begins in early childhood. In just the same way that the child is conditioned by a soothing tone of voice to expect calmness and security, so, too, can the child be conditioned to the sound of the reading voice (Trelease, 1987). In studies over two decades on "early readers" indicate four factors present in the home environment: The child is read to regularly, books are available in the home, paper and pencil are available for the child, and the child’s interests in reading and writing are stimulated by praising the child’s efforts at reading and writing, taking the child to the library, buying books, etc. In becoming a fluent reader, a person goes through many stages that are similar to a child who is learning a spoken language. In the early years of instruction, children are usually allowed to go through a "silent period" during which they build up acquired competence through active listening. Some suggest that providing a silent period for all second language learners would be beneficial (Krashen, 1981).

Reading aloud to learners is effective during the silent period of second language (L2) acquisition according to Dulay, Burt, & Krashen (1982), because they can just listen and focus on understanding, without needing to produce language. After a book has been enjoyed and understood, numerous speaking, reading, and writing opportunities can emerge. The teacher can adjust reading materials to learners' interests, needs, and levels of L2 proficiency by carefully selecting appropriate books.

Pedagogically, children's literature functions as a path by which children move from oral language to written language. It focuses on the meaning being communicated. In other words, children's literature is decidedly meaning-centered (Newman & Pujol, 1996). A child on the road to literacy has special needs which writers of children’s literature accommodate, and children’s literature has certain characteristics that separate it from stories for older students. It must convey meaning to an audience that has a limited vocabulary as well as incomplete control over written language. Children's authors, say Newman & Pujol, use three methods to help overcome this problem: (a) familiar linguistic forms, syntax and vocabulary used in children's books tend to be common , (b) predictable rhetorical structures, that readers can anticipate in upcoming portions of the narrative, and (c) rich visual imagery, use of pictures supporting the informational content of the narrative. Children's literature uses the inherent interest in the reading experience, particularly story telling, to motivate the child to keep searching for meaning in spite of the difficulties.

Thogmartin (1996) says the key to using real literature at the beginning of formal reading instruction is in using books that are predictable. Rhodes (1981) discusses the characteristics of predictable books of which the following also have relevance to the ESL learner: They have a repetitive pattern (an additional aid for language learning, but it's not a boring, repetitive drill), and there is a good match between the text and its illustrations (picture books offer the advantage of illustrations to explain much of the vocabulary). Instead of ethereal words with no substance or even disconnected words with pictures, there is a context, a wholeness, and children can identify with the story line and the characters. Many use elements of rhyme and rhythm which increases overall predictability (something young students especially enjoy and which provides practice even with pronunciation, again, in an interesting context). Many also use a cumulative pattern as the story progresses as in The Gingerbread Man. It doesn’t take students long to be chanting along with the storyteller or acting out the story themselves. So many activities can be done with stories like this that are fun and non-threatening for the young student to participate in, giving a variety of opportunities for using and developing his/her English speaking skills while growing in confidence.

Familiar sequences also are often characteristic of predictable books. Eric Carle (1979), in his book The Very Hungry Caterpillar, uses two sequences that are familiar to most young children: numbers and the days of the week. These are words an ESL student begins learning early on. Rather than memorization disconnected from a context, the story provides an enjoyable context and adds words to the learning that will enable the student to form complete and understandable sentences. Using predictable books in the initial stages of a formal reading program allows the emergent reader to utilize everything he has learned about reading up to that point (Thogmartin, 1996).

In Britton's (1982) view, as cited by Nathenson-Mejia (1989), learning language is much more than learning grammar rules, spelling, and other surface features of the language. There is a deeper sense of organization, a way to understand and represent the world, which is learned through language. Britton feels that achievement through language is primary--learning how to organize and interpret personal experiences through the use of language. In order to accomplish this, children must be actively involved in creating language and looking at what has been created, both by themselves and others. The writing and reading of literary works, both professional and student-created, allow the students to learn through language instead of merely memorizing rules through drill practice. The creation of and personal interaction with literature by children allows for a negotiation of meaning not possible through skill and drill activities.

Chaudron (1988) states that perhaps the most well-known position concerning the influence of instruction on L2 development is that of Krashen (1982). According to Chaudron, Krashen views the effects of instruction as limited; however, he says the classroom should function to provide the learner with comprehensible target language (TL) input in an affectively supportive climate. Long (1983) argues, according to Chaudron, that the advantage instruction has over naturalistic acquisition context must lie in part in the experience of "treating language as object" and "learning" to control performance on a variety of L2 tasks. Involvement in a literature-based program accomplishes both a comprehensible TL input and instruction. As students and teacher are involved in a story, i.e., reading, discussing, or acting it out, that’s instruction in a supportive environment. During discussions, the teacher or the students may look more closely at any number of things such as vocabulary, rhyme, or grammatical considerations. So at times it’s a little of "input in a supportive environment" and "treating language as an object" at others. A child in the early years of learning his/her native language is not left to just "acquire" that language completely, but is often actively taught through repetition, practice, participation, and encouragement.

Fisher and Hiebert (1990) examined the efficacy of literature-based (LB) and skills-oriented (SO) approaches in two 2^nd and two 6^th grade classrooms in establishing classroom learning tasks that foster higher-order thinking in reading and writing, or, they say, what some call the higher literacies. The total time in reading activities, averaging 94 minutes, was approximately the same for both groups except one SO 6^th grade group which was about 10 percent less. The total time on writing tasks was 600 minutes for the LB 2^nd grade and 6^th grade groups, 185 minutes for the SO 2^nd grade group, and near zero for the SO 6^th grade group. Language arts tasks (per se) appeared in only the SO 6^th grade group. Students in the LB group spent more time in tasks with relatively higher cognitive complexity compared to the SO group. With an exception of one case in spelling, the average student product specification was higher for literacy activities in the LB groups compared to the SO groups. For reading activities with individual student products, product specification by students was higher in the LB groups than in the SO groups. Fisher and Hiebert feel that the greater variety and the higher average task size in the LB groups may mean less differences between the learning tasks students encounter inside and outside the classroom.

Somewhat larger tasks were implemented in the LB classes compared to SO classes without any apparent increase in management problems. In fact, what they found was less time and effort being devoted to classroom management. Many concerns in education were addressed in this study that causes one to take a closer look at the LB approach versus other more skills-oriented approaches.

There are other aspects of using literature to consider for older students. Brown & Nation (1997) say the idea that learners can develop their language knowledge through extensive reading is attractive for several reasons. Readers can learn at their own level without being locked into an inflexible class program, learners can follow their interests in choosing what to read and thus increase their motivation for learning, and students have the opportunity for learning to occur outside the classroom.

The "book flood" studies reviewed by Elley (1991) show striking increases made on measures of language use, language knowledge, and academic performance. The studies that Elley was involved in are substantial in terms of length (12-36 months) and number of students (from over a hundred to several thousand). The book flood studies involved learners spending the greater part of their class time reading books that interested them. An interesting finding in some of the studies was the improvement made in writing, which appeared most dramatically in the tests given two years after the beginning of the book flood.

The measures of academic success involved the examinations used across the school system, and learners in the "book flood" groups had a greater than normal success rate in these examinations. These studies present compelling evidence of the improvements in second language acquisition that can be brought about by such programs. Elley (1991, pp. 378-379) attributes the success to five factors: Extensive input of meaningful print, incidental learning, the integration of oral and written activity, focus on meaning rather than form, and high intrinsic motivation.

Reading & Writing Connection

Student writing takes many forms in the classroom, but as noted earlier, for writing to help reading and reading to help writing, strategies that link the two are crucial. Research suggests that isolated writing practice not connected to reading has little effect on students' reading skills (Noyce & Christie, 1989). Researchers look at these connections from a variety of perspectives, i.e., reading helps writing, writing helps reading, etc. with emphasis being placed on the integration and interaction of the components being studied. If one part is limited, it can retard not only the development of that part but possibly the development of the others.

Hudelson (1984) notes that ESL teaching often concentrates on developing mastery of basic English skills before providing opportunities to read or to write. As exists presently in Korea, ESL classes using a social-communicative style to develop conversation skills have become an emphasis with no connection to reading or writing in the program.

In L2 classes limitations have often been put on students writing, saying in effect, "Don’t do it unless you can do it right." Perrotta (1994) says it is important to be aware of research results demonstrating that children begin writing for meaning and communication long before they have mastered real language or are capable of reading. Writing, then, is obviously an important part of students?language development. Urzua (1987), as cited by Perrotta, (1994), concludes that the writing process helps children develop a surprising amount of cognitive, social and linguistic skills. From first language (L1) research there are strong correlations between reading and writing abilities (Stotsky, 1983), and Teale and Sulzby (1986) state simply that producing a written message brings together reading and writing processes.

Peyton (1990) notes one context that promotes writing development is one where children receive extensive language input through reading and being read to, as well as through oral and written interactions with the teacher or their peers. An integrated literature-based program emphasizes and builds on these correlations to more fully develop students?skills. Carson, J. E., Carrell, P. L., Silberstein, S., Kroll, B., & Kuehn, P. A. (1990) say that the second language learner doesn't improve reading skills only from reading, and the same is true for writing. Instruction and improvement in one can enhance the other.

If a student's discussion or writing is directed in the appropriate way, it can cause a student to think about his/her reading using higher level thinking skills, i.e., to analyze, synthesize, or evaluate. According to Van Dijk's theory of discourse processing (1977), any activity that induces greater engagement with the discourse will produce more inferential information in recalling that discourse. Thus, those types of responses that require students to reflect and to use their own words are more likely to develop inferential thinking.

Smith (1988) cites Hayes (1985) who says many theorists believe that written responses positively influence the quality of the inferences students make about the texts they read. If that is accurate, says Smith, teachers could influence comprehension by combining writing with reading. Writing is a way of promoting engagement with a text which leads to better comprehension. Marino, J. L., Gould, S. M., & Haas, L. W. (1985) said researchers speculated that text related writing assignments may have contributed to improving students' reading comprehension by activating prior knowledge and arousing personal interests. Smith (1988) cites Beach & Bridwell (1984) and Flower (1979) who indicated that various researchers reasoned that writing fosters the identification of significant information in a text and encourages reflection as the reader organizes the information into a coherent response. This is applicable to the ESL students?needs as they learn to organize language information into written and also oral responses. The key is that the student "organizes" the information into a coherent response. The student is able to produce and synthesize, not just mimic phrases that are memorized.

Retention is an important aspect of effective reading in which writing continues to play a part and which directly relate to ESL students as they develop the skills necessary to become fluent in the reading, writing, and speaking of English. Bretzing and Kulhavy (1979) reported that students who took notes in paraphrase form were better able to recall information than those who took verbatim notes or none at all. Results from several of their studies seem to favor those written responses that require a greater depth of processing which dictation doesn’t involve.

Noyce & Christie (1989) say that integrating the writing of questions with reading promotes retention of ideas by affording students the opportunity to reread; they (the written questions) help focus the students' attention and keeps them on task. The questions also facilitate communication between students by providing a visual base from which to operate. According to Singer & Donlon (1982) and Balajthy (1983) in Noyce & Christie (1989), research shows that teaching students to construct their own questions can improve retention of both narrative and expository material.

Even simple retelling has merit. Smith (1988) cites Dansereau (1974) who found that college students who paraphrased in writing or described orally a prose passage they had read, performed better on a delayed recall test than students who merely read the passage, and those who generated questions about it did as well.

According to studies cited by Stotsky (1983), in a study of 700 seventh graders that good writers engaged in more leisure-time reading than poor writers. In a study of 10th grade students, he found that the effective writer was also apt to be a reader. As discussed by Noyce & Christie (1989), Krashen (1984) cites six correlational studies which found that good writers tend to do more reading outside of class than poor writers and notes that a number of experimental studies have reported that increased reading was more effective in promoting writing skills than additional grammar study or writing practice.

Just as writing influences a student's ability to read, so does reading have an impact on the student's writing. Frank Smith (1983) says learners need to find and assimilate a multitude of facts and examples ranging from individual spellings to the appropriate organization on complex texts. Where can all these facts and examples be found when they are not available in the lectures, textbooks, and exercises to which children are exposed in classrooms? They must be found in what other people have written. He says that to learn how to write for newspapers, you must read newspapers, etc. They must read like a writer in order to learn how to write like a writer.

Smith (1984) contends that only from reading can we learn the multitude of rules and conventions connected with different types of writing. Krashen (1984), as cited by Noyce and Christie (1989), extends Smith's theory by adding a distinction between writing competence (knowledge of writing) and writing performance (use of knowledge in actual writing). Reading is necessary for writing competence, but repeated practice and instruction on certain aspects of writing are also necessary for improved performance.

Jaggar, Carrara, & Weiss (1986) studied how the reading of literature influences 4th grade students' narrative writing and vice versa in classrooms where a strong literature-based reading program is integrated with a process approach to writing. The classroom was loaded with books, and the surroundings were rich with bulletin boards centered on reading, story elements, etc. Students participated daily in sustained silent reading (SSR) and daily talked about and wrote about their reading. From the researchers?observations and looking at students' writings, they say there is evidence that in writing children borrow ideas from their reading, incorporating these into their own personal experiences to form the content of their stories. They will begin to experiment with various conventions of narrative writing. They feel their observations confirm Graves's (1983) and Calkins's (1983) findings which show that in classrooms with a process approach to writing, the conditions are more similar to those in which real writers write, i.e., students' work has genuine purpose and real audiences.

Other Factors

There are many other factors that have an influence on students?learning, and a literature-based program supports many of these. Every time a student reads, he/she is exposed to either new vocabulary or to practicing in context previously learned vocabulary. Learning vocabulary is integral to learning a new language and the learning is enhanced through the use of literature in an IL-B approach. In his study of "explaining vocabulary to students", Baker (1990) quoted a teacher who said, "An explanation can’t just be one word. You need a context." Many teachers, Baker further notes, see transferring explanation away from the teacher to the learner as a worthwhile, salient strategy (easily accomplished in literature discussion groups), while teacher explanation, checking understanding, and repetition are also important.

In many non-IL-B classrooms, answering questions regarding vocabulary sometimes may not be a part of a particular lesson form and thus may not be addressed when the questions occur since it would interrupt the focus of the lesson. With a literature-based approach, the focus is on the student involvement with the story and with the vocabulary. Students would have a variety of ways for assuring word comprehension -- from the context (words and often pictures), from peers, and from the teacher. Students are more prone to gain understanding as they go, not later at some so called "opportune" time.

One suggestion that has been made is to postpone reading until students have at least an intermediate-level grasp of the foreign language. Such a policy ignores the role that reading can play in foreign language acquisition, particularly in the all-important learning of new words. Students can benefit by making reading a part of their foreign language study from the beginning (Bramford & Day, 1997).

Although all language learners need opportunities to use language in situations they find meaningful, L2 learners vary widely in their inclinations and abilities to take advantage of those opportunities (Genishi, 1989). Reading activities focusing upon students?interests and needs can engender the needed personal involvement (Wollan-Bonilla, 1989).

The attitude of students towards learning is certainly a factor in a student’s achievement and the positive reactions of students towards literature is a factor to be considered. Attitudes of students and even others, e.g. parents and teachers, significantly affect their orientation toward the target language. Extensive research on teaching French in Britain found a close relationship between students?achievement and the attitudes toward learning French held by their teachers and the principal of the school; the more positive the attitudes, the greater the achievement (Barstall, 1975).

Accompanying the importance of attitude and the possible outcome of positive attitudes is the amount of time a class or individual student spends involved in language study. Halpern, (1976) studied the importance of time spent in a language class as a factor in language learning. He looked at two groups of 2^nd grade students learning French. The first group had class for 15 minutes per day in kindergarten and 20 minutes per day in the 1^st and 2^nd grade. The second group had class for 30 minutes per day in Kindergarten and 40 minutes per day in 1^st and 2^nd grade. The second group with double the time spent was, not surprisingly, found to have learned significantly more of the language. Time spent within the classroom in this study was dictated by the school program, but the effort students expend in learning in the classroom, and the time spent involved outside the classroom would depend more upon the students?personal attitude, motivation and interest.

The motivation for learning to read comes from the desire to read "real books" and that imaginative literature must be the content of the reading program (Newman & Pujol, 1996). Even very young children know the difference between those books which sustain and excite their imaginations by telling real stories and those basic texts which are primarily designed for instruction in reading (Newman & Pujol, 1996). What is there to prevent a child from learning to read from a real story, or a teacher from using that story to teach reading?

The use of children's literature is of pedagogical value in language learning: improving comprehension, increasing vocabulary development, and serving as a model for writing. Young readers' experiences with children's literature can encourage the development of a broader vision of themselves and society (Langer, 1990 and Harris 1994) according to Newman & Pujol (1996). Through books, children can reflect on their own experiences and explore those of others who have different ways of life and of knowing the world.

CHAPTER THREE

The Narrative Process

What follows is a narrative reflection of my first ESL endeavor ?in a new land, in a new culture, with new challenges. It is not a project of test groups and control groups, of data and percentages. It is a project sharing the experiences of bringing together my 'personal practical knowledge', beliefs, and experiences as a teacher; the new knowledge I gained, the new teaching opportunities I had, and life challenges I encountered; and the needs of the students and teachers I served as a Peace Corps volunteer.

Images are a component of ‘personal practical knowledge?and are defined by Clandinin (1986: 166) in the following way: Image is a personal, meta-level, organizing concept in personal practical knowledge in that it embodies a person's experience; finds expression in practice, and is the perspective from which new experience is taken. It is this experiential knowledge that is embodied in us as persons and is enacted in our classroom practices and in our lives (Clandinin,1993).

The notion that we make many stops along the way as our thinking develops seems particularly apt when we consider teaching as a reflective practice; reflecting on our practice allows us to search for relationships (for meaning) about teaching and learning (Muscella & Paget, 1994). John Dewey's (1933) notions of reflective thinking, were seen as an iterative process from which "partial conclusions emerge during the course of reflection. These are temporary stopping places, landings of past thought that are also stations of departure for subsequent thought. We do not reach 'the' conclusion at a single jump" (p. 75).

The Beginning

I arrived on the main island of Tarawa in the Republic of Kiribati where I would complete 3 months of pre-service Peace Corps training on a variety of topics ranging from personal health, to cultural awareness and sensitivity, to ESL teaching methods. My job title was TESL/Teacher Trainer, and I would eventually be living and working at a school on one of the outer islands.

Throughout the training program it was encouraging to find that many of the ideas discussed during the ESL training closely coincided with my own precepts and that few of the approaches covered were any different than those I had employed in my English speaking classroom. Also, the direction the Peace Corps sponsored program in Kiribati was taking was one that involved the use of literature. The drawback, however, was that the program was new, and many of the outer island schools at that time had varying amounts of books ?from few to nearly none. So, it was going to be a little tougher than I thought. Nevertheless, I would have the opportunity to put into practice an integration of my beliefs regarding reading with ESL applications as they related to the needs of the teachers and the students I would be assisting and teaching.

Once the training was completed and all my living supplies were purchased and packed, I flew to the atoll of Abemama where I would spend the next two years. I would work at Barebutanna School the first year and eventually move to Tekatia School to work the second year.

It is difficult if not impossible to fully understand the reality of a situation that one is not involved in, and the circumstances there were, to say the least, different from my suburban life and school classroom. The best way to overcome that, and especially true here, was to just observe. Through observation we learn about things we might teach, about ourselves as learners, and most importantly about the children we teach (Genishi, 1989).

In my stateside classroom I had always spent 4-6 weeks proactively preparing students and myself for the school year, i.e. getting acquainted, learning students?interests, talents, and attitudes about school and learning, matching my teaching to their needs, establishing expectations, and classroom programs and routines. I spent time teaching students how to be independent learners and how to enjoy the learning before I began the content. This ultimately set the tone as the school year began and saved me and my students countless hours of repetitious instruction throughout the year allowing more class time to be more efficiently used for learning. So, too, on Abemama, I initially spent time in and out of the classroom getting acquainted with the reality of my new environment, i.e., getting acquainted with students?and teachers? with their attitudes towards education, towards learning/teaching English, and its value to them. I had to consider whether my ideas of using literature to develop English skills would fit. I needed to understand the current education process as it was practiced on that atoll.

Picture first the physical setting of the school. Sitting right next to the beach of the lagoon, each class had its own separate classroom. Two were newer buildings built of concrete block with a cement floor, large window openings, and a metal roof. The rest were built of local materials, i.e., ‘stick?walls, coral-sand floors, and coconut palm thatch roofs. None of the classrooms had lights; there was no electricity. Inside each was a chalk board, and classes five through nine had desks for two made of metal and plywood; the other classes sat on coconut palm mats on the ground. That was all unless a teacher constructed a shelf or two.

Students on Abemama had never lived anywhere but on an atoll in the middle of the Pacific, and few, if any, had ever been in another country. Their whole experience base, or in reading terminology, their prior knowledge, was limited to the confines of the islands and the sea. The only animals they had first hand knowledge of were dogs, cats, pigs, chickens, frogs, lizards, rats, 3 or 4 kinds of birds, and, of course, a variety of sea life. The rest were only pictures in a book. Their ‘view of the outside world?was gained primarily from what they learned in school and from what they saw in American movies. (About once a week, a man with a projector and a generator came to a nearby village to show a movie.)

In school, students had little contact with books as a learning tool, and they had even less on a personal level. Most of the books the school did have were old and seldom used by anyone. The school had obtained some text books, a few basal readers that a previous PCV had acquired, and there were also books from the Ready to Read series that the Kiribati Ministry of Education was promoting. These Ready to Read books were some excellent books; however, the books were seldom used in the classroom with the exception of the 3 or 4 "Big Books" being used in two of the lower grades. Most of the reading done during English instruction was in the form of written material on the chalkboard which students copied, and for the upper classes, it was taken from an old grammar book. Students never composed stories. Their writing was in the form of copying and answering questions written on the chalkboard. There was no interaction among students, no discussion while searching for answers to story questions. For many, their only accomplishment was to have copied all the questions. If stories and books didn’t spark the interests of these students, then using literature just wasn’t all that I thought it could be.

My goal for the students, then, was to first get them involved with books by using the ones the school did have available. My goal for the school was to assist in obtaining more books for our library. During my first few months at the school, with some volunteer help, I organized the books that were presently available. I was fortunate to have any to organize as some other PCVs on other islands found their schools were almost completely lacking in any children’s books. I sent off letters to book donor organizations asking for all types of books, but primarily children’s literature and magazines such as National Geographic World. Nothing happened quickly on this remote atoll in the Pacific, and it took many months, but books did finally start arriving.

Meanwhile, I used the books we had. Students needed to have the opportunity to make full use of the books outside of school as well as at school. I wanted to get the students involved in some "hands on" experiences with books so I started sessions in our "library" for every class, discussing book care and procedures that were seemingly simple such as turning pages. The use of the library, browsing, and check out and return procedures were discussed. As follow-up, special library sessions were held with each class. The previous lessons were reviewed, students selected a book to check out, and then I would read one or two stories to them. I believed that reading aloud to students could have a significant effect on their language and literacy acquisition (Cochran-Smith, 1984). This strategy has proven to be an effective means of developing speaking, reading, and writing skills in second language learners says Miles (1997). It was necessary to have teachers begin getting in the habit of reading daily to their students and involving them in the stories.

My immediate goals were to engage students in reading and experiencing the stories and to model for the teachers the use of books as the focal point for their English program. I began taking a few of the children’s books and magazines with me to all classes I was teaching. I took National Geographic, National Geographic World magazines (mainly for the pictures), and story books from about a primer level to a grade 2 or 3 reading level depending on the class.

Initially, in the younger classes, 1-6, I would just share the books or magazines by showing the pictures, using words or phrases repetitiously like, "What’s this picture?", "It’s a?.", and doing all in an animated manner. Most of the students were attentive and also very inquisitive. They soon were asking, "What’s this picture?" Next, I would give them control of the books and magazines, having them form small groups, and letting them set their own agenda. They shared with me and each other interesting pictures and words they could read. It sparked quite a lot of speaking both in their native language and in using what they knew in English. I would then read a story or two to them, having them just listen without reading along.

It wasn’t long before students began "reading" along with me during these daily stories. In fact, I could hardly keep them from it. At first they were memorizing the story just as an L1 student will do with his/her first reading books, but soon the words were being read and most could identify any of the words in isolation. I would monitor students?real recognition of the words by simply pointing to a word out of sequence and asking a student to read it. Sometimes I would even ask them to translate to I-Kiribati (as much for my personal benefit as theirs). Of course, many times I didn’t really know if they were correct or not so I just went by the confidence they showed in answering or by the consensus of the group. The younger students especially liked reading along as a group, and later, as they grew more confident, individually.

Some characteristics of children’s literature make it one of the most effective teaching materials available for beginning ESL readers?reading along and learning (Smallwood, 1991). The syntax and the vocabulary was often repeated allowing for repeated exposure and practice throughout a story which quickly began developing the students?sight vocabulary. The story structures were predictable. Students could often correctly predict what would happen next. Pictures supported the stories?content so the student could rely on them as they tried to make sense of new words. They also made the story visually interesting. These students loved stories, but they also loved the pictures that went with them.

The youngest group of students, class 1, especially loved the predictable "big book" I’m the King of the Mountain. They never seemed to tire of the story. They could sit and listen, read along, or when it came to acting it out, every child in the class was always ready to participate. These students quickly learned this story and other stories I brought to class. Their vocabulary grew as we talked about the characters and their actions and words like next, after, and before. They soon began to make the connection between the words in print and the words they learned as we read.

The stories were "authentic", meaning simply that they met students?needs and interests. Students were learning English from these stories and at the same time were meeting their needs for being active and having fun. Through the process of these stories being read, being listened to, and talked about, students became actively involved in their own learning of English.

I was using these stories to work with the youngest students who had in most cases no English knowledge, and I also used them with students who had acquired some ESL skills. First and foremost, the students were enjoying the books. They enjoyed just looking at the pictures and talking among themselves. They liked to have the stories read to them and to read along, and they soon came to form favorites they wanted to have read. To see even a few students sitting around during break time with a book was certainly an inspiring sight.

Since I was just learning their language, sentences from their stories were seldom translated as a whole though I would translate a word or two at certain times. For example: "What do you see?" might be explained with "what" and the I-Kiribati word translation "tera" with a questioning expression, "you" = "ko" and point to the person ( they practiced personal pronouns a lot), and "see" - point to eyes and mime looking at something. I would then repeat the question, "What do you see?" and focus their attention on common things from the books which gave them models for future reference, and on things around them, continuing to model and elicit with "I see a ....." It didn’t take long until more and more students were fully understanding these questions and statements.

The questions and statements I used were of a range that could be answered by students with a range of skill levels. I wanted all students to be able to respond and to have the opportunity to be successful. Students not only began learning what I was saying, internalizing it without translation, but they became more aware of what to consider as we read the variety of stories. Some groups of older students after a few months were able to talk about the story independent of my leadership and initiated their own questions and statements.

I also used a retelling procedure which also helped the Kiribati teacher and me to periodically assess a student’s progress. (Generally, the only assessment in any class was done by testing at the end of a term.) Retelling allows students to structure their responses according to their own interpretation/reconstruction of the text and to use the language to the extent of their individual competence. (Some writers suggest cueing during retellings or using probing questions if the retelling is incomplete.) The quality of their retelling was judged simply as adequate or inadequate, and as skills progressed, according to the richness of the retelling (Harris and Sipay, 1990).

I continued to read to the students daily, and involved them in some type of dialog from asking what letter they saw to asking open ended and repetitious questions, or using eliciting statements about the pictures and the stories we were reading. I might ask, "What do you see?" and at first model a response, " I see a .....," and they in round robin fashion would then ask and get answers from classmates. A picture might show a character running, and I would say, "He’s running," and with emphasized gestures, "I can run. Can you run?", then prompting the group with "Yes, I can. I can run."

The stories they enjoyed and were involved in gave us a focus, and this easily led to other "action verbs" that they liked to participate in acting out and even substituting within the stories. I could then expand on questions like "What can you do?" with other examples of what the students could do, and with answers, "I can....." Also, changing to the "present continuous", "What are you doing? with the answer, "I’m.....-ing." From these simple lesson grew more involved interactions without the structure models and included more descriptive words (adjectives and adverbs) learned from the stories.

These are brief and simple examples of involving students in learning. The sentence structures, coupled with the support of the books being read, gave students a model they could use for their own communication. When I saw students outside of school, I was still "teaching" and tried to reinforce the idea that the English they learned at school could be used everywhere. When possible I involved students in writing, from the forming of individual letters using the books as the source, to drawing pictures with captions. The latter was sometimes done after discussions to recall or react to events of a story. After we had talked and acted out words or events of the story, they would write their own sentences. I helped them only to the point of guiding them to answers but not to giving the answers.

Students also drew pictures and wrote about real life events of their own. This seemed to more easily add the dimension of building their vocabulary of English words for common things and activities around them. Rather than just listing items for memorizing, they were used out of need to communicate through something the students created. Instead of words out of context, e.g., ‘te ni? = the coconut tree or ‘te tari?= the sea, they were used in context with what they experienced daily, i.e. climbing and swimming.

An often asked question was, "How do you spell ______?" I wanted to encourage their independence so at first I told them to think of the sounds they heard and the letters that might make those sounds, to talk it over with a friend, and to think where the word might be found. Sometimes, once they came up with their answer, I would verify its correctness, and I would write it on the chalkboard. There was no absolute approach, but soon students were choosing to do it more independently and were coming to me for the answer only to verify what they’d found. They would write words of their choosing, and sometimes illustrations, on pieces of paper, and we would post them in the room. These served as vocabulary reminders and personal reviews each day.

There comes, it is hoped, the transference from the classroom to actual usage outside the classroom. I recall a class 1 child calling to me, "Maketi (sounds like Ma`-kis), we're climbing the tree." We had been reading a story in which children were playing and climbing trees. The student was able to model his own communication from that learning. This relating of one's own actions to those of characters in a story is not accomplished through isolated vocabulary and sentence structure study, nor effectively through conversation memorization. It comes through students?involvement in the events and characters of the stories and the confidence gained through reading, writing, and discussing the stories.

Students related what they could do or would like to do with what characters did in the stories. Their vocabulary grew, they could retell the stories, they could act them out. They were communicating through their actions, through writing, and through speaking.. They were actively learning new words, they were gaining more competency in the language. Most of the students continued to be engaged in the literature, however, due to our shortage of books and limitations of variety, the easier books became too easy and sometimes boring to the older students, and the jump up to the "chapter" books was just too big of a jump and we had nothing in between. To keep many of the older students involved with reading, I began having them read to the younger students. How much more students could be involved and learn if we had had a full range and variety of books and books that even more directly related to them. As the months passed, the students in grades 5-9 were needing more stimulating stories. This seemed to me to be similar to students in L1 classrooms whose skills hadn’t kept up with their progression in grades. They needed books they could read, and at the same time, books that were of interest to them, books with stories that were more challenging, involving them intellectually, and emotionally.

Most often, as soon as these ESL students left the classroom with their peers, they began speaking in their native tongue, not English. So, in their real life activities, where L2 practice might have done a lot of good, the students reverted back to their own language. What was needed was a ‘reality?students could become involved with having English as the language of use. As people read literature, they become involved in its ‘reality? They cry, get angry, become frightened, they laugh, they feel good; they respond as if it were happening. Outside the classroom, students determined the language they used based on many factors, cultural to immediate need. At least for the time the students are in the classroom they are in a real environment that uses English for what might be called authentic purposes.

The Reading Group

To evaluate and verify students?English skills improvement through the use of literature other than by subjective evaluations (which I personally think are often the best evaluations), I started a simple literature-based reading, writing, discussion intervention group. I began meeting with five 5^th grade students each day after school for 30 minutes. Each student was supplied with a lesson notebook and a pencil for daily writing. I selected books that were substantial enough for them to learn from, that were interesting, and simple enough as not to be beyond their understanding. I initially taught them through modeling and ‘think alouds?that I wanted them to ask any questions they had about the story, word meanings, etc., and that their writing was to be anything they wanted to write in relation to the story ?words, sentences, phrases, even pictures -- anything.

Each day we met, I would first read a story to the 5 students, and they would only listen. Next, I would either read it again myself, have them read along with me, or let one of them read (by choice), and I might read along with that student. After two weeks, the group could choose to read a story independently which they did at times. When I read to them I would stop at times for discussion questions or eliciting statements. If they read independently, I would move from student to student and involve each one in some discussion. Finally, I would have the students write in their lesson books. These I kept and made comments in regarding their writing, usually just a positive word or phrase, and made sure each entry was dated. I also kept my own journal, i.e. a record of the story we read each day, a sampling of the questions I asked, and my general impressions of the students?oral participation and writing improvement.

At first, the students?writings consisted of only a phrase or two or an isolated word or words, perhaps a picture, or something copied from the story. As lessons progressed, the students?became more involved in the discussions, their pronunciation and oral reading improved, and their writing included more complete sentences; pictures with captions seemed to be a favorite. This continued for a period of about 6 weeks, up until a term break. Unfortunately, it was during that time that my house caught fire and everything in it was turned to ash.

A Sample Lesson

The following is an example of what might be done while working with ESL students. I used this type of procedure with the class 5 group and while working with classes 7-9. I also presented this procedure as part of a teachers?inservice on classroom discussion using children’s literature. It is not completely my own construction but an example I recalled from years past. Keep in mind it is an exaggeration for the sake of clarity but does exemplify the mass of thoughts that flash through a reader’s mind as a story is read. A teacher certainly would not do the following with every sentence in a story or with every story for that matter, for it would detract from the enjoyment of the story, the language flow and rhythm, and thus defeat some of the purposes of using literature. A teacher would utilize these and other possibilities according to the students' needs and interests.

Using the nursery rhyme "Jack and Jill", the first line reads, "Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water." The teacher can ask the students knowledge level or text explicit questions: "Who is the story about? Where did they go? What did they do? The answers to these are all found in the words of the sentence itself. Answers to questions like, "What do you think ‘fetch?means? What is a ‘pail?" involve some prior knowledge or using context clues to determine meaning.

It is important that the teacher ask some higher level thinking questions, guiding the students to relate the ideas and events of the story to their own lives and to make some judgements: "Have you ever had to ‘fetch?something? What have you heard people say instead of "fetch"? Do you have ‘chores?at home? Tell us about them. How old do you think Jack and Jill are? Why did both of them go? What did they do with the water? How do you think they felt?" Next, the teacher might elicit more from some of the statements like, "Tell me more about Jack. Tell me more about Jill." The teacher may also point out the irregular verb form and either elicit or tell about it. "Look at the word ‘went? It’s past tense for the verb ‘go? I ‘went?to the movie last night. You try a sentence....etc." There are, of course, more possibilities (don’t forget the possible spontaneous questions and comments the students will initiate).

At some point, other types of activities can be used. Rhymes are fun, and students, depending on their skill level, can compose their own using the presented structure(s) as a guide. Students?will try it out orally as they search for words, coming up with rhyming nonsense words, too. They can then even work through the writing process of pre-writing, rough draft, revising, editing, and publishing.

The teacher must balance instruction with the enjoyment of the story, but very often the two will overlap. In this case the students have some opportunities to show what they know, to consider the meaning on their own terms and relate it to themselves. They have the opportunity to create. They are learning what they might consider when reading stories on their own, and they are even learning some grammar ?painlessly.

Classes 7-9

Besides working with the student of classes 1-6, I also worked with the students in classes 7, 8, and 9. They had special needs as I will explain, and one of my main goals was to guide students to enjoy and participate in reading. Once in class 7, for many, the main focus was on them doing well on the Common Entrance Exam (CEE). The CEE, given in September each year, was to qualify them for a secondary school the following school year. (The school year was made up of 3-13 week terms beginning approximately the first of February through the middle of December). If students didn’t qualify in class 7 (12-13 years old), they took it again in class 8 and finally in class 9. If they didn’t qualify in class 9, their school days were generally over.

The test was comprised of one part Kiribati, one part Mathematics ?half of which was computation and the other half word problems in English, and one part English with tests on listening comprehension, reading comprehension, grammar, and writing. A lot of time was traditionally devoted to what amounted to a lot of cramming, teaching to the test, and taking "mock" tests ?tests from past years and tests made up by the teachers.

During the first and second terms, both in 1994, while I was at Barebutanna Primary School, and in 1995, while I was at Tekatia Primary School, after school sessions were held three times a week covering the three areas on the CEE. The program was somewhat similar at both schools. On the "English" day, I and two other teachers worked with students on listening comprehension, reading comprehension and writing, and grammar, each teaching three 40-minute sessions. Three groups were created based on ability since there was such a wide range of students?skill levels.

I taught the reading comprehension and writing lessons. During this time I used the questioning/eliciting approach previously described along with questions similar to the types of question found on past CEEs which were completely knowledge and comprehension level questions. I still used the available literature, but I also used stories of the type they would have on their exams. These were stories relating directly to their culture, i.e. the settings, events, and characters were of Kiribati.

In November of 1994 when the CEE results were announced, of the twenty-two (22) class 7-9 students sitting for the test, fifteen (15) passed (approximately 70%)and would attend a secondary school the following school year. Barebutanna School had the highest passing rate of the 3 Abemama schools, 4 more than the second highest school and also with the highest percentage passing. The following year, while I was at Tekatia School, the students?there ranked first in the number and percentage passing the CEE, and Barebutanna School, not far behind, ranked 2^nd.

Teacher Training

A main part of my purpose on Abemama was to conduct teacher inservices. The real impact I hoped to make here was not so much just with the students but with the teachers who would be teaching the students long after I had gone. A total of twelve inservices were given during each school year on a variety of topics all related primarily to improving teachers?skills in teaching English. Topics included English in the classroom, teaching vocabulary, eliciting, asking questions, etc. I managed to include the use of children’s literature in all of them.

This seemed to me to be an overabundance of information for anyone to process. I knew that for teachers to change or alter the way in which they taught required simple changes, i.e., changes that could easily put into practice and soon become a part of their teaching routines. When trained in a new method, one that’s perhaps very different from one’s own habits, a teacher continually must work to avoid reverting to their past, more ineffective methods. It’s difficult to make change a part of oneself. Having each inservice topic applicable to a literature-based approach, I felt, would give teachers a constant throughout the program. I believed using literature in the classroom was a method that could be more easily and "naturally" implemented by the teachers.

The Korean Experience

In Korea, I worked in the city of Suwon for a foreign language institute or commonly referred to there as a "hakwon". These language institutes (hakwons), are private businesses that primarily offer English conversation classes and also contract with schools, businesses, and the government to provide teachers to teach conversation English at their locations. The classes I taught at the hakwon were elementary and middle school students, and I had a weekly class of Korean English teachers. Most of the time I taught at elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools, and at a government training center teaching government employees, with the bulk of my assignments at middle schools and high schools.

My experiences in Korea were a complete contrast to those in Kiribati. I had few opportunities to use literature or writing in the classes I taught. In fact, the availability of literature in English in the schools was more limited than on the remote atoll of Abemama. Conversation was the focus of the instruction, using a conversation workbook with lessons on such topics as introductions, meeting friends, and any number of situations. The only use of literature I could engage in, and this was seldom, was reading aloud to students.

In two classes at one girls?high school, a 6-week session of classes was begun before the students had any workbooks so I decided the content of the class period. I brought a book I had obtained, a simplified version of The Secret Garden, and read to the students for about 10 minutes each class period. (I don’t advocate the use of simplified versions of books, but at the time they were all that were available to me.) Even though the story was simplified to about a 3^rd to 4^th grade reading level according to L1 standards, it presented a slight challenge to the students to understand all of the vocabulary and content, and it was just right for their instructional level. The response was very positive, and the students were attentive as I read. They looked forward to continuing the story each day, and when I forgot the book one day, they let me know they were not happy about it. Many had become involved in the story and would make comments regarding the misfortune of the main character and that they didn’t like her. The students indicated that they liked to talk about something they had opinions and feelings about instead of the "boring" workbook topics. They commented that no one read stories to them anymore and never had in English. Some said they liked to "just listen and try to understand."

I also encouraged them to visit a bookstore in Seoul and begin reading books in English themselves. Before I left at the end of the 6 weeks, a few students had taken my advice and had purchased some books such as a simplified version of The Wind in the Willows and a Disney story of Pocahontas. That was rewarding in itself.

CHAPTER FOUR

Results

The purpose of this project was to investigate the effectiveness of using an integrated reading, writing, and discussion literature-based (IL-B) program to improve the language skills of English as a Second Language (ESL) students. The results clearly showed a development of student interest and improvement in class participation as well as improved reading, writing, and speaking skills. Language acquisition was fostered by input that was comprehensible, developmentally appropriate, redundant, and involving. It had immediate effects on students?lives.

First, presented is a summary of the results from the Common Entrance Exam (CEE) given to all class 7, 8, and 9 students on Abemama. The CEE was given in September, during the break between the 2^nd and 3^rd terms of the 1994 and 1995 school years. The results of the Common Entrance Exam are included here, not as any definitive measure of the effects of students being involved in an integrated literature-based approach to ESL, but simply as a positive rather than negative outcome that followed students changing to a new approach to language learning. However, if the results had been the opposite of what they were I would be more apt to attribute it to the failure of the IL-B and my presentation of it.

The progress made by a group of five class 5 students is discussed. These students were already involved in the daily school program. When working with students separately, it may seem that they simply get more personalized instruction. However, I believe other factors are at work that influence any outcomes whereas the classroom setting is the authentic setting where the true results are to be obtained. Nevertheless, it was attempted. Unfortunately, students?journals that had been maintained throughout the study as well as my own daily journal of procedures, impressions, and evaluations of students?oral participation and writing skills improvement were all destroyed in the fire I indicated earlier.

Common Entrance Exam (CEE) Results

There were three primary schools on Abemama who participated in taking the CEE: Barebutanna, Tekatia, and Tetongo Primary Schools. Twenty-two class 7, 8 and 9 students from Barebutanna School took the CEE in September of 1994. Of those sitting the test, fifteen (15) passed (approximately 70%)and would be able to attend a secondary school the following school year. Of the three schools, Barebutanna School had the highest percentage of students passing, and also had the highest number of students passing -- more than the school with the second highest. The following year, 1995, I moved to and worked at Tekatia School as all of the teachers at Barebutanna had completed the inservice program. The procedure and emphasis on literature at Tekatia was essentially the same as at Barebutanna. Tekatia School this year had the highest percentage of students passing the exam. Actual student scores of the students on Abemama or of all Kiribati students sitting the exam were unobtainable from the Ministry of Education.

Class 5 Group

The five class-5 students were selected randomly and asked if they wanted to participate in a special class after school. I wanted to see if they would make more use of English in daily conversation, at least with each other during our sessions, and to see if their writing would show any significant improvements. I intended to document their daily writing with their journals.

I met with the group daily for 30 minutes after school. A story was read to them, or they read a story themselves. There was some general discussion about the story, and the students then wrote in their journals about anything they wanted related to the story. The group itself was only moderately cohesive and seemed less prone to participate than in the regular classroom setting.

They showed moderate improvement in the areas of reading, speaking, and writing, though their writing was the most noteworthy improvement I found. Their journal entries as a whole included more complete sentences and attempts to use a wider variety of vocabulary. Pictures with captions seemed to be a favorite inclusion.

The students gradually became more involved in the discussions and were more capable of forming answers; however, most answers were short, and seldom did they use complete sentences. There was clearly a good attitude in the sessions and an enjoyment of the stories. They became more curious about situations and unfamiliar words in the stories, and, at times, they also began suggesting I read particular books.

The School

Many of the students were actively involved in checking out books after school. When given the opportunities to do so during class, students began sharing orally with classmates stories they had read. Students showed an eagerness to have stories read to them and to read new books themselves. There was notable improvement in their overall attentiveness in class and in participation in writing and discussion activities. (From my initial observations in the classrooms, I noted a number of students in various classes who seldom paid attention to what was occurring during English lessons). Along with the improvement in participation and reading there was increased ability to communicate more effectively in writing and speaking.

Another salient indirect result of using literature in the classrooms was that books began to disappear from the teachers?office and would be discovered in teachers?classrooms where they were making daily use of them, giving students opportunities to read and share the books. This had not happened before. Books that had previously sat dormant on a shelf were being put to use by teachers. This was possibly the most important result to me in light of the success the students were experiencing.

CHAPTER FIVE

Summary

This project was initiated to look at the effectiveness of an integrated reading, writing, and discussion literature-based (IL-B) program in improving ESL students?language skills. The beginning development and use of an integrated literature-based program was based upon my early review of literature and my personal beliefs regarding the use of literature in the classroom. The success in practice of an IL-B approach in my English speaking (L1) classroom was shown to have a direct impact on my pursuit of its use later in ESL classrooms.

The research was a narrative of my experiences using an IL-B approach in a unique setting where ESL students previously had little contact with books. I discussed the pre-existing conditions on the atoll of Abemama, the overall use of the IL-B program at two schools, my experiences with a special intervention group, and the special work with classes 7-9. Books and "print" were new to these students, in or out of the classroom. They weren’t surrounded by books in the classroom or even by their own poster creations, nor by the print on cereal boxes, food containers, candy wrappers, or street and business signs that flood most people’s environment.

Weaver (1980) pointed out that not only must the text be meaningful for the child, but also that the child must be able to bring his or her knowledge and experience to bear on the text. It involves interaction between the mind of the reader and the language of the text (Vellender, 1989). In Kiribati, where experiences were limited, the meaningfulness of the literature was initially in the enjoyment the students derived from the newness of stories and knowledge gained from the stories, and the participation in the experience. The more students learned, the more they realized they could participate in gaining new knowledge and participate in experiences with English speaking people such as myself.

This study was about a vision being mapped as I went. The day by day student reactions, their involvement in language use, and their improvements supported its use. Reading and writing of literature allowed students to learn through participation in the language instead of merely memorizing rules through the drill practice previously employed. The creation of and personal interaction with literature by children allowed for a negotiation of meaning not possible through skill and drill activities (Halliday, 1975). Instead of trying to speak to me in I-Kiribati, they practiced what they knew and spoke to me in English. Instead of only looking at the pictures in books and the magazines, the students began to question and to read for answers.

In contrast, in Korea, students were taught primarily through skill and drill activities and only recently have some had the opportunity to have an native English speaking person as a part time English teacher. The reasons for the lack of language involvement are complex, but it has meant that students seldom have the skills to communicate effectively in English by speaking or writing, and their reading skills are far below those of L1 students.

Through the experiences I’ve related, I tried to make the reader more aware of the multiple connections that exist among teaching and learning, the children's responses, the classroom context, and the language skills development of the students. Teaching is something you do, and the doing is improved by reflecting.

Through reflection, the program and methods can begin to make sense and take shape in teachers?minds. Bateson (1989) said we do this by, "discovering the shape of our creation along the way, rather than pursuing a vision already defined""(p. 1).

Conclusions

The conclusions that can be drawn from this project are limited to what the reader discerns from the literature and from my experiences using an IL-B approach. It contains no quantitative data, and the qualitative data that had been collected was destroyed in a house fire.

Nevertheless, I believe the effectiveness of an IL-B program is shown from the many examples of student progress, involvement, and enjoyment from the use of literature in the classroom. The effectiveness of a literature-based program also lies in its versatility, i.e., being able to satisfy the interests and needs of ESL students. The ability to read is an important component in empowering students to achieve personal success, and the equation is simple; the more one reads the better one becomes at it.

There is through literature an interesting focus and authentic purpose.

It can be said that the integration of the components of an IL-B program is natural. People read, write, talk, and listen daily. The IL-B program is by its nature one involving interaction and reflection among students, and students and teacher. If reflective power in people cannot be increased, says Heathcote, then you might as well not teach because reflection is the only thing that in the long run changes anybody (Johnson and O’Neill, (1984). Interaction and reflection focuses on inquiry which is essential in creating a classroom atmosphere where learners take risks and mistakes are seen as part of the learning process. The sharing of ideas through writing or discussion facilitates children seeing each other as learning resources and students learn to value the diversity of what each person can bring to the group process (Short, 1990).

It is for each teacher, administrator, and curriculum planner to determine the viability of such a program, and it is up to the teacher to allow it to work. Literature is not a strategy, it is the foundation from which strategies can be erected. It is the context from which we begin to hear and enjoy a story being read to us, from which we begin to talk about and write our thoughts and ideas about the events and characters that make up a new world of experiences. Ultimately, it is up to the institutions training teachers and the administration who have the power to determine the direction the ESL program will take. I was fortunate enough through my graduate studies to work with a faculty who largely had a high regard for literature in the classroom.

After reviewing countless studies and theories, the conclusion is also drawn that there is a need for more long term narrative research to be written. Through it, a reader can be given a chance to "hear" the real story. Change occurs in small steps as it did in Kiribati, and it occurs over time. Reflection on the teaching and learning keeps what is taught in perspective with what and how students are learning. Through narrative research in the genuine classroom setting, the teacher/researcher has the option to change or amend what is being done, to adjust the input in relation to its effects rather than pushing through with the intervention to accomplish a measurement at the end. Narrative reflection measures continuously.

There is a definite need to determine an approach to ESL that will provide students and teachers with a process from which the greatest benefits can be obtained and educational goals can be achieved. Many countries today have English as a second language programs. Across the United States ESL programs abound. It is something that is here to stay, and the need for teachers and effective programs continues to grow. When students are involved in an integrated literature-based program reading books that they can first enjoy, and when they have opportunity to express themselves through writing and through discussion, integrating these processes will begin to provide the student the opportunities to develop skills needed to function effectively in English in this complex world.

Throughout the duration of using an IL-B approach, students made improvements in a range of language uses and in areas of language knowledge. Students read and their vocabulary grew. They grew more capable in communicating with me, with the teachers, and with each other in English. If nothing else, the IL-B approach gave teachers a direction for their teaching, and the teachers at my schools on Abemama saw what they considered qualitative results when a larger-that-usual percentage of students passed the Common Entrance Exams.

It is important to realize, too, that there are affective benefits as well. Success in reading and its associated skills of writing and speaking makes learners come to enjoy language learning and to find immediate value to their study of English. The benefits of an IL-B program do not only come in the short term, day to day, but I believe also will include substantial long-term benefits for students?success in learning English language skills.