Small Steps for Students Who Are Feeling Discouraged

I realized that I could apply the principle behind this story to a category of students who are sometimes in the composition classes that I’ve taught. They are the ones who are feeling discouraged about their seemingly inability to progress in their skill- development. Many of them have failed courses, and in some cases, more than once.

Some of these learners don’t feel like trying any more.

Like the way the mother helped her shy son, Jason, we can set up conditions in which our discouraged students can begin to experience success through a sequence of small, manageable steps. And best of all, this does not mean the teacher needs to make extra lesson plans and exercises for those students.

To illustrate how this can be done, I’ll use the example of one of my former students, Ryan. After having to repeat Level 3 Writing, Ryan was finally able to pass to Level 4. Unfortunately, he failed during his first term at that level, so he was assigned to my Level 4 class the next term. On the first day of class, he sat in the back looking dejected. I could tell from the sample writings that I got from his previous teacher and from the first-day’s writing task what his weak points were:

• His grammar broke down when trying to write complicated ideas.

• The ideas in his paragraphs tended to be just a list of ideas without clear connections. In other words, they lacked cohesion.

1) Reduce the number of items in an exercise. I assigned an exercise showing students how to add details from their experiences to an essay. Since Ryan had done this the previous term, and I knew that he understood the technique, instead of having him write the two paragraphs that the directions called for, I told him that he could write only one paragraph. To help him with his cohesion, I told him to use at least one conjunction (and, but, so, or) and at least one subordinator (when, who, because, after, etc.) And I reminded him to check his grammar carefully before handing it in.

However, for Ryan, I focused specifically on his weak points of comma splices and run-ons. I ignored the one or two preposition mistakes and some other minor ones. Like all the students, Ryan showed me his corrections, so he and I were able to zero in on those specific mistakes.

When I conferenced with him, as we were looking at the corrections that he had made, I would occasionally point to a sentence where I had written a positive comment and say, “This is really good!” or “I like what you wrote here.” or “This is a good improvement.”

5) Assign only part of an essay. This is somewhat related to Item 1 above. All the students were assigned an essay which included an introduction, some paragraphs in the body and a conclusion. Privately, I told Ryan that he could first just write the introduction and first paragraph of the body and show me. That way, we could easily focus on the mistakes and strong points without him feeling overwhelmed. Once he was satisfied with and confident in that first part, he then wrote the rest of the essay.

6) Offer to conference. Writing teachers typically provide opportunities for students to conference with them about their writing assignments. For students like Ryan, I have found it helpful to remind them directly that I am available to talk to them about how to complete an assignment, and how to correct mistakes and improve the work.

7) Acknowledge them as they leave. At the end of class, if at all possible, I try to make eye-contact with each student as they leave and smile or say something brief. I make an extra effort to do this with students like Ryan.

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