Making Their Voices Heard: Introducing the Joy of Poetry Writing in Foreign Language Classroom

Abstract

The use of poetry in the classroom is not an uncommon phenomenon in foreign language teaching. Many teachers believe that poetry writing can help students improve their language fluency and provide meaningful literacy. However, some language teachers are quite skeptical of the idea, by referring to the fact that students' limited linguistic resources will prevent them from performing the challenging task. This paper tries to show how poetry writing can be applied in EFL classroom, not only as a means to develop students' language competence, but also as a medium to create meaningful dialogue among students. Previously designed as an additional activity in a formal academic writing class, the poetry writing has become one of the favorite sections in the students' activities. By adding small but interesting features to the technique, poetry writing can in fact turn into an activity many students look forward to. During the process, the students are engaged in a meaningful exchange with their fellow learners, with language learning also happens along the way, sometimes quite unconsciously. Such process may help students to appreciate various forms of literary work, to improve the language fluency, and most importantly, to provide a sense of audience to students who want to make their voices heard