Prospective ESL/EFL Teachers’ Perceptions towards Writing Poetry in a Second Language: Difficulty, Value, Emotion, and Attitude

Abstract

The study aims to explore how 18 M.A. TESOL students, who are prospective or experienced ESL/EFL teachers, perceive poetry writing in a second language. A qualitative interview-based design was utilized. Following Iida's (2012a) analytical framework in examining EFL students' perceptions toward writing haiku in English, this current study investigates 18 prospective ESL/EFL teachers' perspectives through the lens of difficulty, value, emotion, and attitude. In order to validate the coding of the interviews, the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) test was computed among three interview coders including the primary researcher, which yields a great agreement rate at .86. The results indicate that while these prospective ESL/EFL teachers understand writing poetry in a second language involves various difficulties, they acknowledge the values of utilizing poetry writing in second language classrooms. The results also show that writing poetry in a second language contains both positive and negative emotions, but positive ones are more frequently addressed. Most importantly, the data suggests that writing poetry in a second language is considered as an applicable practice in ESL/EFL language classrooms.

Poetry for EFL classroom: students’ self-expression and the creative process behind its creation

“…Unfortunately, poetry was not favored because it was considered too difficult for students (Chamcharatsri, 2013;Dilidüzgün, 2015). Interestingly, a study by Liao and Roy (2017) found that the more exposure students had to poetry, the less their interest and confidence in poetry writing. However, in another context, Liao (2018) found that the negative feelings toward poetry surfaced only at the beginning of a course.…”

“…Interestingly, a study by Liao and Roy (2017) found that the more exposure students had to poetry, the less their interest and confidence in poetry writing. However, in another context, Liao (2018) found that the negative feelings toward poetry surfaced only at the beginning of a course. The longer students dealt with their emotions through poetry, the more positive they viewed it.…”

“…Empirically, the use of poetry in foreign language classrooms has been investigated in various studies focusing on differing aspects. The studies focused on the students' perception, attitude, and emotions (Iida, 2012), perception, reading habits and motivation (Larsson, 2022), voice in free poetry writing (Hanauer, 2014), difficulty, value, emotion, and attitude in writing poetry in a second language (Liao, 2018), emotions written in first and second language (Chamcharatsri, 2013), and also focused on teacher as a writer (Locke & Kato, 2012). Another focus is on how poetry influences an autonomous class (Vk & Savaedi, 2014), EFL learning (Mora et al, 2020), and how its writing is influenced by educational background and belief (Liao & Roy, 2017).…”

Students' perception on the use of poetry for teaching speaking

“…The use of poetry in EFL classroom is able to maintain students' interest to read and write (Beymer et al, 2020;Freyn, 2017). Poetry is able to provide emotion in language learning which give significant effect on students speaking and writing skills (Hirsch & Macleroy, 2020;Liao, 2018;Seltzer, 2020). By exposing students with poetry, it makes students become more creative in composing their own poetry (Cushing, 2018;Iida & Chamcharatsri, 2020).…”

“…Speaking is considered as challenging language skills since it requires the development of other language aspects such as vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation as well as other aspects such as confidence (Burns, 2019;Husnu, 2017;Tomak, 2021). Therefore, the use of poetry is effective in developing the language and non-language aspects that contribute to the improvement of students speaking skill (Hirsch & Macleroy, 2020;Liao, 2018). It is motivated by emotion and expression provided in the poetry which enable students to enjoy the learning process (Iida & Chamcharatsri, 2020;Sigvardsson, 2020).…”