I am teaching English in a Romanian High School and according to part of the curriculum I am supposed to teach creative writing . Do you think teaching idioms and fixed expressions would help improve my students' creative writing styles ? Are idioms really useful in developing a style?
What's your opinion? How does knowing idioms and fixed phrases affect someone's writing style, especially when considering creative writing? Are idioms a useful thing to learn? Do you teach creative writing? any tips or advice? Contact us
This question is from Radulescu Rocsana, Romania
Comments
rebecca2
I think using idioms is very useful. As an African, they are used in most of our writing. Our students are also encouraged to used them especially in creative writing. It makes it 'richer'.
Marcelo F. L. Nobre, Brazil
I wouldn't go as far as to say learning idioms and fixed expressions will help your students perform better in the 'creative writing' activities you set. What I do believe is that they will be able to write - better yet, use the language - more naturally, thus improving the overall quality of their texts. See Lewis on teaching collocations, and Nunan (if I'm not mistaken), who said that learning pre-fabricated chunks of language will enable learners to 'outperform their competence'.
Harrow English School, England
We heartily endorse these words of Senhor Marcelo F. L. Nobre, Brazil, on 'Learning Idioms', to which we can only add "Claro, hombre!"
Marcus, Korea
If you are teaching creative writing, why not study it too? That's got to be the best way to get ideas! Try the distance creative writing course run by the National Extension College. I'm taking it and, I can tell you, it's wonderful. All the best. Marcus
Adam Gyenes, Japan
This is just my opinion/ idea and shouldn't be taken as authoritive as I don't get the chance to teach writing much.
My classes are focussed on spoken english, but I really like to use elements of storytelling in my classes. I think it's a good idea to start with an oral storytelling activity.
One idea is to give students in small groups (ideally 3-4) cards with simple pictures on them (e.g. a house, a man running, a dog, a fire) 4-5 (different) cards per student. get them to tell a story, going round in a circle, each student adding the next picture. Perhaps try this 2-3 times with different results, so they get the idea.
While they are doing this, monitor, particularly for correct us of past tenses. Perhaps follow with some drills...
Then, get each student to draw their own 5 cards, and tell another story in the group.
Then, perhaps for homework, get them to write up the stories, perhaps
presented together with the pictures.
When you are marking the results, see if you can find sentences which can be said in an idiomatic form, or with a phrasal verb.
In the next class, present the original sentences and the idiomatic expressions on a worksheet, and see if the students can match them correctly. for further written work, get them to write another short story, using one of the new idioms as a title.
Well... think I've come up with a lesson plan or 2 off the top of my head... and all without using an idiom myself! If you try any of these ideas, I'd be interested to hear how they went, as I probably won't have the chance myself...