Whether the format be constructed response, research paper, essay, or digital discussion prompt, I have heard educators lament over students’ brief responses, casual style, and the influence of “texting” language. Students struggle to code switch toward communication in an academic register. How do we teach our learners to make this shift? The brain learns and sustains learning by making connections to prior context. If we seek to increase the ideation, stamina, and volume of students’ academic writing, we need to connect the experience to their world. In leveraging media rich tools as a starting point for the writing process, we can support our students toward becoming versatile writers who can succeed in both social and academic settings.
Student Expression in the Digital World
Students in today’s world express themselves using a variety of media platforms. Even when students use written language on social media platforms or via text messaging, they often include emojis, hashtagged phrases, animated gifs, and memes. The rise in popularity of platforms such as Instagram and Tik Tok further emphasize our students’ familiarity and preference for communication that incorporates multiple forms of media, including images and videos. Educators often complain about students who write LOL in academic papers or include emojis on digital written responses to a content-driven prompt. It is an easy out to place blame on students and their digital media use outside the classroom.
But we are educators. It is our job to get to know our students, reach them where they are at, and guide them toward improvement based on the context of the background experiences they bring when they enter our room. The moment we blame the student for bringing the influence of their world into the classroom, we devalue them. We are servants to our students, not dictators. Rather than tell them that what they bring to the table is wrong, let us learn about the table they sit at every day once they leave our classrooms. Let us acknowledge the creativity of our students in making videos on their personal devices, recognize their skills in connecting images and phrases to make humorous memes, praise the connected nature of their lives on social media. And then, let us build upon those strengths as we engage students in activities that foster the development of academic writing.
Gifs and Memes as a Hook
Many students and adults alike love to use animated gifs and memes on social media platforms in their daily lives. A first grade teacher I know projects a humorous gif onto the board for students each day as they enter the room. As these students enter the classroom, they grab their chromebook, login to Google classroom, and write about the image they see. This strategy hooks students in with a format with which they are familiar. At the beginning of the year, many students write a word or two. By springtime, some students are writing a few sentences. The animated gif engages students in a format they enjoy and sparks creativity. Educators tell me that when students write about a gif, they include more adjectives in their writing and display imagination in their narratives.
Students love to communicate using digital media. Educators create a question in Google Classroom for the daily writing prompts, thereby creating an interactive digital discussion forum. This provides the educator with a platform to teach students to differentiate between social and academic registers with digital communication. When introduced to this protocol, I have heard students say to their peers, “I sent you a message”, or “I texted you”. They soon learn that when we “text” or “message” at school, we use complete sentences and avoid hashtags or emojis. The protocol provides practice using an academic register for digital communication.
Recently an educator using this strategy took it a step further. Rather than give students a worksheet of sentences with grammar mistakes to “correct”, she projected student responses to the daily writing prompt onto the board for all to see. As a class, students discussed ways that this writing could be improved. The grammar lessons are in context, they are relevant and honor the work of the students themselves.
Educators can also use memes to encourage students to provide a written explanation as to how the graphic and phrase connects to the academic content they are learning. The meme is in a format familiar to students’ background, it sparks interest as they are asked to elaborate on the content to which it relates. Some educators encourage students to create their own memes, a strategy that fosters creativity and encourages students themselves to make connections to content.
Video Platforms in the Ideation Phase of the Writing Process
At a middle school, I was having a discussion with the principal. She spoke about how engaged her students were in Tik Tok, a platform for creating and sharing short-form videos in a social media environment. This educator remarked that she was amazed by the innovative videos students would create. She indicated that this encouraged students to express their individuality and share their unique ideas with their peers.
When we write about something we have spoken about and/or experienced, our written responses are much more robust and detailed. In a middle school class I was in recently, students created short videos on the collaborative platform, Flipgrid, regarding their claim and corresponding evidence for an argumentative writing piece for which they were preparing. In another class, students made stop-motion animation videos from a moment in history and then completed an informative essay about the event.
Our students bring the context of their personal lives into our classrooms. We cannot deny that there are influences outside our school walls that affect our students during the school day. Unfortunately, we often confuse the strengths that students bring from their personal lives as weaknesses. Get to know your students. Listen to their conversations. And use this information to not only connect content to student lives, but to aid you in guiding learners toward code switching from a social to an academic register.