3 Tips for Using Stories to Teach Writing to Multilingual Learners of English

During my childhood, I lived in the countryside, and we had unique local stories passed down from generation to generation. I like to remember when my grandparents told me those myths and legends about our community while we were gathering in the typical kitchen of the south of Chile. As a teacher of English as a foreign language, I, like many language teachers, included these wonderful tales into my own teaching practice. In my context, resources like Myths and Legends from Chiloé and The Mapuche Culture provide clear paths to include the identities of multilingual learners of English (MLEs) in the lesson as the stories are translated into English and adapted from the learners’ own roots and culture.

Now let’s imagine a classroom where learners with diverse backgrounds listen to their teacher, who explains that they must complete a task in which they describe a festival from their home country. A student from Azerbaijan writes about the Novruz festival, which commemorates the coming of spring. A student from Pakistan writes about the Eid al-Fitr festival, which marks the end of Ramadan, and a Chilean student writes about the Fiestas Patrias festival, where she describes cueca dancing, the empanadas (a typical dish), and children playing with kites. In activities like this one, MLEs will be completely engaged because their own roots are taken into consideration in the classroom.

In this post, I present three tips for using stories to teach writing to MLEs.

1. Select Culturally Relevant Stories

When incorporating stories in a culturally diverse classroom, select texts that resonate with your MLEs’ cultural roots and experiences. This will make the activity and topics more meaningful, engaging, and linked to the learners’ emotions. This will also open up possibilities for follow-up activities to promote the inclusion of more culturally relevant topics and materials in your classroom.

Sample Activity

Prepare a take-home assignment where learners interview an adult from their family or community and collect a traditional story. On the day of the class, have learners share their stories in groups, paying attention to the common elements in their stories and the messages they want to transmit. As a follow-up activity, have learners write a short comparison of two of their classmates’ stories and how they relate to their own stories and experiences.

2. Scaffold: Simplify Language Level and Add Visuals

The use of stories in MLEs’ classrooms often requires that we ease the language of the story to ensure that learners understand its core message. Similarly, visuals can be added to help learners understand the different elements in the story (characters, settings, events). These resources will help learners convey the meaning of more complex ideas by focusing not only on the language but also on the accompanying materials.

Sample Activity

Have learners read a local story with specific vocabulary that requires looking up the meaning of unfamiliar words. Include pictures connected to the main characters, the setting, and key events of the story. Learners, in small groups, match the pictures with the events of the story. After that, learners can draw a scene of the story and pair it with a written description that includes the new words learned during the class.

3. Include Storytelling in the Classroom

Incorporating multilingual storytelling, or using books and stories that utilize multiple languages, in the classroom is an effective scaffolding approach that allows for differentiation, and it also builds on students’ existing funds of knowledge. You can also allow learners to have access to the story through diverse options, such as mimicry, acting, drawing, and answering questions. Storytelling can include several activities before, during, and after the story (e.g., story dominoes, where learners tell a story by pairing words in domino fashion, or using pictures from magazines to create a story).

Sample Activity

Have learners choose a local story in groups and create a kamishibai presentation (“a traditional form of Japanese street theatre in the form of picture card storytelling”) for parents and the community. Learners draw the story events, and then write a description of the events on the back of each drawing so they can read them when performing their own kamishibai.

Because stories captivate and inspire both children and adults, they are a treasured resource in teaching writing to MLEs. The inclusion of cultural stories in the English classroom is a fundamental way to embrace the learners’ differences and connect their roots with academic content.