Abstract:

In modern public education we consider it as an established fact that text comprehension has to be emphasized; that it is closely related to general language knowledge and skills; and that it plays an essential role in communication. The importance of the topic is confirmed by numerous research projects and papers, what is more, international tests being integrated into modern pedagogical culture also pay close attention to the field of text comprehension. The effective improvement of text comprehension, however, is unimaginable without the improvement of text production skills, since if we interpret text comprehension and text production as the elements of communication, then the notion of text production can be considered as the answer and reaction of the process of comprehension and interpretation. In my presentation I introduce an innovative project based on the basic principles of Freinet pedagogy and the methodological experience of creative writing, in which I present to the audience the phases of an intensive writing program. The basic hypothesis of the project is that it is easier to motivate the students for text production if instead of practicing style, they purposefully work on producing a unique product, specifically on the organization and publication of a classroom newspaper. While creating the classroom newspaper the students get familiar with different genre styles and topics, and while working on thematic issues they monitor how texts are arranged and how they become parts of a dialogue. Furthermore the students acquire stylistics, spelling, graphic, formatting knowledge, that is, they gain an insight into the phases of the process of text production.

Keywords:

Text production, improvement, classroom newspaper, project, innovation.