When there’s obviously something on a particular student’s mind it’s often worth asking them on the spot what’s wrong – and perhaps getting them to share their problem with the class. Often commiserating with the student in the public forum of the language class is enough to make them feel better – temporarily at least – and enables them to focus their attention on what is to be learnt. If we don’t do this, they may continue to look glum, sigh or mutter under their breath in such a way that the atmosphere of the whole lesson, and everyone’s learning, is compromised.

Sometimes there are more deepseated and less obvious reasons that affect the ability of students to concentrate in class. Unbeknown to us, individual students may have any of a variety of personal anxieties or concerns, particularly if they’re living and studying overseas in an unfamiliar environment where everything is new and strange. Although it isn’t our job as teachers to function as counsellors or social workers, sometimes it is useful to give students the opportunity to share with us aspects of themselves and their personal circumstances – if they so wish. Knowing that they have a teacher who is aware of their situation and who empathises with them can be enormously reassuring to students.

One way we can learn more about the students in our classes, and give them the opportunity to develop their writing skills at the same time, is to have them complete learner journals. Learner journals are like diaries in that students write in them on a regular basis, putting down whatever they feel like writing about, and expressing themselves freely with whichever words spring readily to mind. They are also like diaries in that what’s important is the content of what is written, rather than how specifically the writer’s thoughts are expressed. However, learner journals are unlike normal diaries in that they aren’t simply a record of private thoughts: they’re a means of communicating privately with the teacher.

When we introduce the idea of learner journals to our classes, we need to explain the goals and procedures carefully, so that everyone is absolutely clear of their purpose. We need to emphasise that, although we expect all students to complete their personal journals (which should be in a special notebook) on a regular basis, we don’t regard journal writing as normal homework, but as something extra that should be done in a relaxed frame of mind. To get our students started on journal writing, we might have everyone write the first entry in their journal during class time, perhaps to the accompaniment of background music. We need to make it clear that we’re not interested so much in the linguistic accuracy of what our students write (and will not be getting out our red pens to correct their errors) as in the thoughts, impressions and feelings that our students choose to share with us.

In order to develop trust between our students and ourselves we must make it absolutely clear that we’ll treat whatever they write in strictest confidence. The way we ‘mark’ their journals is to give a personal response in a natural way to whatever they’ve chosen to share with us, making a comment that’s both supportive and genuine at the end of the most recent entry. (Marking in this way is both quick and pleasurable – and sometimes leads to ongoing dialogues with certain students.) We shouldn’t wield the big stick if students don’t write much in their journals, or fail to hand them in regularly. Some students jump at the opportunity to communicate with their teacher through a personal journal, while others regard any kind of writing as something of a chore.

If you have a class that you think will benefit from journal writing, why not give it a go, and see if you can make it work both for your students and for yourself? Teachers who’ve experimented with learning journals regularly report highly positive results. Not only do they see the quantity and quality of their students’ writing improve dramatically over even a relatively short period of time, they also develop a fuller understanding of the circumstances and concerns of certain students, and report feeling privileged to have developed bonds with those students. These teachers also consider that an indepth knowledge of their students enables them to customise their teaching in subtle ways, by selecting topics and themes that they know will meet hidden needs