WRA 495: Working with Multilingual Writers

ATTENTION:

Graduate Students

Course description

This course is designed for undergraduate and graduate students who engage with multilingual writers in university contexts, either as a consultant with The Writing Center @MSU or in similar one-on-one writing development context. The purpose of this course is to raise awareness of how people develop written and digital literacy skills in an additional language and how we might apply this theoretical knowledge to our consulting practices with multilingual writers. You do not need to be a multilingual speaker or writer to take this course.

This course recognizes that “students have a right to their own language” (CCCC Position Statement on National Language Policy, 2015) yet acknowledges the tensions of writing within conventions and expectations that elevate a writer’s position as a valued voice in the classroom, workplace, community, and society. Topics, materials, and activities of this course raise awareness of these tensions and provide students with strategies on how to navigate the complicated space of multilingual writing development.

Credits hours: 3.0
Course times: Tue/Thu 5 p.m. – 6:20 p.m.

Course learning outcomes

At the end of this course, students will:

  1. Have a theoretical understanding of how multilingual writers develop writing and digital literacy skills in additional languages
  2. Differentiate and synthesize macro- and micro-level environmental factors that influence writing and digital literacy
  3. Select appropriate writing strategies to use when teaching or consulting with multilingual writers
  4. Apply feedback strategies that strengthen multilingual writers’ written and digital literacy development
  5. Recognize the role of language identity in written discourse and communities of practice

  6. Honor the language identity(ies) of multilingual writers in ways that maximize their writing skills and motivate them to write within and across contexts they live in

Instructors

  • Carol Arnold, English Language Center

  • Monique Yoder, Second Language Studies

Go to student.msu.edu to enroll.

Questions? Contact carnold@msu.edu or yodermon@msu.edu.