Understanding and Supporting Emerging L2 Writing in Adults with Little to no L1 Literacy

UNDERSTANDING AND
SUPPORTING
EMERGING L2 WRITING
IN ADULTS WITH
LITTLE TO NO L1
LITERACY
BY LISA GONZALVES
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS
1

STUDENT PROFILE: “LUCIA”
2
“Lucia”
Country: Eritrea
Language:Tigrinya
Age: 50s
No L1 schooling
Upon entry:
• Did not know letter names, sounds
• Difficulty in manipulating pencil
• Attunement to shapes a challenge
• No oral English beyond “Hello”
Lisa Gonzalves, UC Davis,TESOL 2019

BROADER RESEARCH AGENDA
 How do you formally teach second language without using/relying on
literacy?
And….
 How do you teach first time literacy as part of your second/foreign
language instruction?
3

SNAPSHOT OF ADULT LITERACY
 750,000,000+ adults worldwide lack literacy –10% world population
(UNESCO Institute for Statistics,2017)
 Many may migrate at some point in their lives:
• need to acquire new languages
• need to acquire first-time literacy – not in L1, but in L2
 3-15% percent of incoming immigrants to the U.S. are not literate in L1
(Tarone, Bigelow, & Hansen, 2009)
 Research on adult emerging literacy in L2 context relatively unexplored
(Bigelow &Tarone, 2004; Strube, 2009; Ineke van de Craats, Kurvers, &Young-Scholten, 2008) 4

LOW-LITERATE L2 ADULTS & TESOL
 TESL programs do not include how to teach non-literate students
(McCluskey, 2012;Vinogradov & Liden, 2009;Young-Scholten, Peyton, Sosinski, & Cabeza, 2015)
 Nearly all SLA research, conducted on literate students, does not directly apply
to L2 learners with emerging literacy (Bigelow &Tarone, 2004;Tarone, 2010)
 Lack of:
• Materials and resources
• Assessment measures to track learning gains
• Standards (often start at levels above this population)
 As TESL practitioners, where do we turn to understand literacy development? 5

SCHOLARSHIP ON CHILDREN’S EMERGING LITERACY
 An L1 child:
• Putting L1 to print (not L2)
• Already has a wealth of L1 oral
language skills which they are
applying to print form
• Linguistic knowledge:
vocabulary, word parts,
grammar, etc. 6
L2 adults w/o literacy often
don’t have this knowledge

CHILD LITERACY: READING SEPARATE FROMWRITING
BuildingWriting Skills
Active: Scribbling and drawing
Motor skills and orthographic
standards often developed before
schooling/reading/phonetics
Scribbles to wavy lines to ‘letter’
shapes, left – right directionality,
spacing etc. (Gombert & Fayol, 1992)
Little literature on children’s writing
development
Building Reading Skills
Passive: StoryTime (w/adult reading),
‘playing’ with books (pretend reading)
Far more literature on children’s reading
development
7
Separate processes sharing considerable amounts of reciprocity
(Bloodgood, 1999, (C. Silva & Alves-Martins, 2002; Sulzby,1992)

2TRAJECTORIES OF CHILDREN’S L1 WRITING DEVELOPMENT
1. Acquisition of orthographic features - Puranik and Lonigan, 2011
8
Universal
writing
features
Language
specific
features
Linearity, concepts of
spacing, forms
English: left to right, spacing
between words, margins, roman
alphabet shapes

Writing
nonsense
Syllabic
writing
Syllabic
writing with
pertinent
letters
More
adherence
to alphabetic
writing
Alphabetic
writing
2TRAJECTORIES OF CHILDREN’S L1 WRITING ACQUISITION
Stages of Children’s Spelling Development
Vernon and Ferreiro,1999
9

L1 ADULTS & L2 ADULTS – WRITING DEVELOPMENT
L1 adults w/emerging literacy
 High command of language – lexical,
semantic, syntactic, (etc.) knowledge
 Order of writing acquisition?
L2 adults w/emerging literacy
 General lack of command in these
areas
 Order of writing acquisition?
10
▪ Adults use more logographic strategies (vs. phonetic) than children
(Kurvers, 2007; Smyser & Alt, 2017)
▪ Adult have higher levels of print awareness (i.e., functional purpose)
(Boon & Kurvers, 2008; Greenberg, 1998; Kurvers, van Hout, &Vallen, 2009)
▪ Aren’t likely to go through the same stages of ‘play’ writing
▪ Models designed for children aren’t applicable for adults
(Comings & Soricone, 2007; Mellard,Woods, & Fall, 2011).

RATIONALE FOR THIS STUDY
➢ Add to knowledge base re: writing development in L2 adults with
emerging literacy
1. What types of writing events do adult L2 learners with little to
no L1 literacy engage in while in their ESL classroom?
2. What can these literacy events tell us about the developmental
sequence of orthographic ability in L2 adults with emerging
literacy?
11

METHODOLOGY
 Beginning ESL Literacy class
 Mid-sized adult school (~ 400 students) – Northern CA
 Weekly observations, Oct 2017 – March 2018
 Field notes
 Pictures of writing
 Classroom handouts
 Meetings with teacher
12

PARTICIPANTS
Name Language Country Years of Formalized
Schooling in L1
Time at Adult School
Fakhira Pashto Pakistan 0 years Began in 2015;
attendance off/on
Apana Pashto Afghanistan 0 years Began Oct 2017
Samira Arabic Yemen At older age learned to
write a little Arabic
Began Aug 2017
Asmaa Arabic Yemen 0 years - children taught
some Arabic
Began Sept 2015
Sarah Arabic Yemen 3 years Began in 2017
Lulia Tigrinya Eritrea 1 year Began Jan 2018
Fiona Tigrinya Eritrea 0 years Began Jan 2018 13

Findings
• Writing Events
➢ Prompting
➢ Engagement
➢ Attunement to Detail
• Insights
➢ Trajectory of writing development
14

Writing Events Teacher-prompted? Student-elected?
Copying text from the board Yes Yes
Copying text from a hand out Yes Yes
Copying previous class text from a peer No Yes
Writing on the board Yes No
Writing on individual whiteboards Yes No
Using pre-made worksheets Yes No
Writing answers to a prompt in one’s
notebook
Yes No
Practicing with scantrons Yes No
Circling certain words or parts of words Yes No
Writing in L1** No Yes
15

PROMPTING:
STUDENT ELECTED “AGENTIVE” LITERACY EVENTS
 Generally board based, copying what teacher wrote:
• Text showing spelling/differentiated spelling (‘buy’ $,‘bye’ with hand)
• Text showing pronunciation (30 = ‘thir dee’)
• Word bank
• Images/drawings
 Occasionally participants would copy this text (fully, partially); usually not
16

PROMPTING:
EXCEPTION: FIONA
17
• Understood few English words
• Could not differentiate between
teacher-prompted & non-teacher
prompted activities
• Given low language/literacy abilities,
copying was often only way to engage
Fiona, January 2018

ENGAGEMENT:
TEACHER PROMPTED ACTIVITIES
18
Perhaps she didn’t fill in blank because:
1. she didn’t understand the text
2. she hadn’t been socialized into
representation of blank
3. she didn’t care to fill in the blank
4. she didn’t know how to spell word
she neededBoard, 11/28/17
Apana: 1 month in class

ENGAGEMENT:
TEACHER PROMPTED ACTIVITIES
19
Fakhira: 2 ½ years in class
Filled in blank before lesson started
Board, 11/28/17
Strong engagement representative of
literacy development and socialization:
• Understood meaning of words on board
• Understood semiotic nature of ‘blank line’
• Understood task to personalize dialogue
• Able to recall key words from memory
• Able to recall spelling of such words

ENGAGEMENT:
DEGREES OF ENGAGEMENT
20
Sarah
• Extremely low speaking skills
• Incredibly shy about practicing her
spoken English
• Copying peers instead of engaging
on her own
Samira & Fakhira, 11- 28-17

ENGAGEMENT:
SOME REASONS FOR LACK OF ENGAGEMENT
= Lack of literacy skills
• Write letter, spell word
= Lack of language comprehension
• Write what you hear
• Not understanding prompt/modeling
= Lack of socialization into task/semiotic meaning
• Scantrons, word search, circling letter clusters/morphemes
21

ATTUNEMENT TO DETAIL
22
Fiona, 2nd week of instruction
Fiona, 3rd week of instruction
Orthographic norms:
• Letters ‘floating’ above line, diagonal
• Paper upside down (bottom pic)
• No spacing between words
Motor skills/Letter level:
• Letters mis-shaped
Word level:
• Missing/extra letters
Sentence level:
• Missing/ combined words

For a student new to
Roman Alphabetics,
circles =
1) lower case ‘o’
2) upper case ‘O’
3) the null number ‘0’
“Binder paper circles”
not part of this
exemplar set 23
Lulia, 1-30 -18
Board, 1-30 -18

24
‘Copying’ from board:
• Mix upper-/lower-case
• Missing letter (‘t’ in ‘there’)
• Switched letter position (‘xe’)
• Misshapen letter? (‘y’ in ‘you’)
• Wrong letter? (‘t’ in ‘week’)
Copying “Errors:”
Orthographic? Spelling/Phonetic? Samira, 12-19-17

SEQUENCE OF LITERACY DEVELOPMENT:
AUTONOMOUSWRITING
• Not engaging in inventive spelling nor
‘syllabic’ writing
• Spelling from word banks or memory,
(less frequently) phonetic decoding
• All or nothing spelling - either null,
‘placeholder’ or near correct, rarely
‘in-between’ stages
• Avoided writing if they didn’t know
how to spell (left blank vs. attempted) 25
Asmaa, 12-5-17

SEQUENCE OF LITERACY DEVELOPMENT:
AUTONOMOUSWRITING
 Not one linear trajectory of writing, but multiple, simultaneous
trajectories
• Students could spell words despite having low command of phonics
• Orthography and spelling developing simultaneously
 L2 knowledge hurdle in the sequence
• Generally only spelling words they’ve been exposed to and understood
• Engagement based on understanding/familiarity 26

PROPOSAL:
PARALLEL WRITING TRAJECTORIES OF L2 ADULT LITERACY ACQUIS.
27
Acquisition of
Orthographic
Norms
(motor skills,
letter shapes,
directionality,
detail, etc.)
Acquisition
of Phonics
Acquis. of Semantic Meaning:
L2 words (written/spoken)
Understand semiotic symbols
(lines, grids, circles)
As with L1 Children: Additional framework for L2 Adults:
++
Acquisition
of Spelling/
sight words
Socialization of Writing:
Interact w/semiotic symbols
Personalization of task
React/engage w/prompts

PROPOSAL:
PARALLEL WRITINGTRAJECTORIES OF L2 ADULT LITERACY ACQUIS.
28
 Orthographic Norms
(L2) Phonics
Spelling/sight words
L2 Semantic Meaning (words, symbols)
Socialization of Writing Practices
• Simultaneous development
• Varying rates of
development per trajectory
• Individualized starting
points and development
• Pedagogical approach: all 5
Adult L2 Emerging Writing Development

ONGOING QUESTIONS
 What is the role of transliteration in writing/literacy development?
 What do students who ‘copy to copy’ (without contextual meaning) gain
from this practice in their orthographic acquisition?
 What further steps are involved to get such students to become
autonomous writers?
29
No literacy
(plethora of skills!)
Writing
compositions

AN EVER-CRITICAL ISSUE FOR OUR FIELD
 FollowingTardy and Whittig’s (2017) call to advocate for our L2 writers,
an incredible amount of research is still needed to:
• Recognize L2 adults with emerging literacy within SLW/SLA scholarship
• Recognize their classroom needs
• Contribute to critical professional development
• Rewrite standards to acknowledge wealth of skill acquisition
• Ensure such students are acknowledged in educational policies
30

Thank you!
31

REFERENCES
 Barton, D., & Hamilton, M. (2000). Literacy Practices. In D. Barton, M. Hamilton, & R. Ivanič (Eds.), Situated literacies:Reading and writing in context (pp.
7–15). London and NewYork: Routledge.
 Bigelow, M., & Tarone, E. (2004).The role of literacy level in second language acquisition: Doesn’t who we study determine what we know? TESOL
Quarterly, 38(4), 689–700. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588285
 Bigelow, M., &Vinogradov, P. (2011).Teaching adult second language learners who are emergent readers. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 31, 120-
136.
 Bloodgood, J.W. (1999).What’s in a name? Children’s name writing and literacy acquisition. Reading Research Quarterly, 34(3), 342–367.
https://doi.org/Doi 10.1598/Rrq.34.3.5
 Boon, D., & Kurvers,J. (2008). Learning to read Portuguese in Timor-Leste; strategies of adult literacy learners. In M.Young-Scholten (Ed.), Low-
educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition; Research, Policy and Practice, Proceedings 2007 (pp. 75–90). Durham, England: Roundtuit Publishing.
 Burt, M., Peyton, J. K., & Schaetzel, K. (2008).Working with adult English language learners with limited literacy: Research, practice, and professional
development. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics.
 Comings, J., & Soricone, L. (2007). Adult Literacy Research: Opportunities and Challenges.Washington DC. https://doi.org/research
 Gombert, J. E., & Fayol, M. (1992).Writing in preliterate children. Learning and Instruction, 2(1), 23–41. https://doi.org/10.1016/0959-4752(92)90003-5
 Greenberg, D. (1998). Betsy: Lessons learned from working with an adult nonreader. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 41(4), 252–261.
 Kurvers,J. (2007). Development of word recognition skills of adult L2 beginning readers. Low-Educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition:
Research, Policy and Practice, Proceedings of the 2nd Annual Forum, 23–43.
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REFERENCES
 Kurvers,J., van Hout, R., &Vallen,T. (2009). Print awareness of adult illiterates:A comparison with young pre-readers and low-educated adult
readers. Reading andWriting, 22(8), 863–887. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-008-9129-7
 McCluskey, C. (2012). Professional development to work with low-educated adult ESL learners: Searching beyond the program. The CATESOL
Journal, 23(1), 56–64.
 Mellard, D.,Woods, K., & Fall, E. (2011).Assessment and instruction of oral reading fluency among adults with low literacy. Adult Basic Education and
Literacy Journal, 5(1), 3–14. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0013262.
 Puranik, C., & Lonigan, C. (2014). EmergentWriting in Preschoolers:Preliminary Evidence for aTheoretical Framework. Reading Research Quarterly,
49(4), 453–467. https://doi.org/10.3174/ajnr.A1256.Functional
 Puranik, C., & Lonigan, C. J. (2011). From Scribbles to Scrabble: Preschool Children’s Developing Knowledge ofWritten Language. Reading and
Writing, 24(5), 567–589. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-009-9220-8.From
 Silva, C., & Alves-Martins, M. (2002). Phonological skills and writing of presyllabic children. Reading Research Quarterly, 37(4), 466–483.
 Smyser, H., & Alt, M. (2017). Developing mental orthographic representations in refugee spellers with low literacy: How much input is too much?
Journal of Research in Reading, 00(00), 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12118
 Strube, S. (2009).What DoTeachers Do? A Look at the Oral Skills Practices in the LESLLA Classroom. In I. van de Craats & J. Kurvers (Eds.), Low
Educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition - Proceedings of the 4th Symposium (pp. 49–62). Utrecht, Netherlands: LOT.
 Sulzby, E. (1992). Research directions:Transitions from emergent to conventional writing. Language Arts, 69(4), 290–297.
 Tardy, C. M., & Whittig, E. (2017). On the Ethical Treatment of EAL Writers:An Update. TESOL Quarterly, 51(4), 920–930.
https://doi.org/10.1002/tesq.405
33

REFERENCES
 Tarone, E. (2010). Second language acquisition by low-literate learners:An under-studied population. LanguageTeaching, 43(March 2009), 75–83.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444809005734
 Tarone, E., Bigelow, M., & Hansen, K. (2009). Literacy and second language oracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 UNESCO.(n.d.).Yemen. Retrieved January 30, 2018, from https://en.unesco.org/countries/yemen
 UNESCO Institute for Statistics. (n.d.). Education - Literacy - Adult Literacy Rate, population 15+ years, female. Retrieved January 30, 2018, from
http://data.uis.unesco.org/
 UNESCO Institute for Statistics. (2017). Literacy Rates Continue to Rise from One Generation to the Next. Unesco (Vol. 2016). Retrieved from
http://on.unesco.org/literacy-map.
 van de Craats, I., Kurvers,J., &Young-Scholten, M. (2008). Research on Low-Educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition. In I. van de Craats,
J. Kurvers,& M.Young-Scholten (Eds.), Low-Educated Second Language and Literacy Acquisition (pp. 7–23). Utrecht, Netherlands: LOT.
 Vernon, S., & Ferreiro, E. (1999).Writing Development:A NeglectedVariable in the Consideration of Phonological Awareness. Harvard Educational
Review, 69(4), 395–415.
 Vinogradov, P., & Liden,A. (2009). Principled training for LESLLA instructors. In I. van de Craats & J. Kurvers (Eds.), Low-educated adult second
language and literacy acquisition. Proceedings of the 4th symposium. (pp. 133–144). Utrecht, Netherlands: LOT.
 Young-Scholten, M., Peyton, J., Sosinski, M., & Cabeza,A. M. (2015). LESLLA teachers’ views of the knowledge and skills they need:An international
study. In I. van de Craats, J. Kurvers,& R. van Hout (Eds.), Adult literacy, second language, and cognition. LESLLA Proceedings 2014. Nijmegen: Centre for
Language Studies. Retrieved from http://research.ncl.ac.uk/media/sites/researchwebsites/eu-speak2/EU_Speak_Teachers’Views.pdf
34

THANKYOU!
35
By “Fakhira”

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