Using Writing in the Classroom

One way to get a general idea of your students’ writing abilities up front is to use an interview form during the first week of class. We use one in the Writing Center for non-native speakers, but professors could use a similar format for all students. Introduce students to the form by explaining that you want to know how to best help them become better writers. The sample form we’ve included asks questions about linguistic background, past writing experiences, and personal writing habits / processes. Students’ responses could reveal quite a bit; maybe that Vietnamese student taught himself English by watching television; maybe the straight-A student suffers from paralyzing writer’s block; maybe that quiet woman in the back has published her own book of poetry; maybe the bilingual student loves writing in Spanish but has never written a research paper in English.

What do you do with this information once you get it?
“Sounds very interesting,” you may say, "but what then?" Obviously you can’t tailor every assignment to each individual student’s needs. But you can get a picture of the varying levels of experience and how much writing support may be required from you or the Writing Center. Here are some accommodations or alterations you may consider making after you’ve assessed your class’s responses:

• Include more detail in your syllabus regarding your expectations of student writing and your grading system.

• Provide more model essays. Feel free to put them “on reserve” in the Writing Center.

• Be very clear about your requirements for documentation. If you prefer a certain style (MLA, APA, or other), list it in the syllabus or on the assignment sheet. If students have options, list those as well. If you require students to adapt a traditional style to your own specifications, create a document explaining those anomalies. The Writing Center can also keep copies of these course documents for the convenience of the students and our tutors.

• Be sensitive to students from different cultural/ethnic backgrounds, especially when assigning topics about religion, politics, gender, etc. Offer more than one option, or encourage students to speak with you if they’re uncomfortable writing on a certain subject. In addition, be careful of asking international students to analyze or evaluate aspects of American culture / life that they may have never encountered (e.g. the public school system, dating practices, medical care, etc.). Imagine yourself in a foreign country receiving a similar assignment.

• Create assignments with your discourse community in mind; very little good writing occurs in a purely “academic vacuum.” Give students opportunities to write for real-life contexts common in the field or profession. Students and future employers will thank you for it.

• Read “Assignments from Hell” for more ideas about what NOT to do when assigning topics and writing prompts. (Hopefully you’ll laugh out loud at some of these!)

• View our PowerPoint presentation or cousult with Dr. Chloé Diepenbrock in the Writing Center if you’d like help with the design or working of writing assignments.

• Allow students to submit early drafts and then revise before turning in papers for a grade.

• Personally “intervene” and respond at several points in the writing process.

• Consider giving students some sort of credit, motivation, or accountability for starting early and seeking feedback. The Writing Center is happy to serve them.

• Train students to revise content before editing or proofreading. To model this, when reading early drafts, ask questions and give direction rather than picking out mechanical errors.

• Make sure your comments are readable, and provide a “key” for any abbreviations you use.

• Avoid making broad comments in margins (e.g. “vague” or “needs support”) without drawing the student’s attention to the specific section of sentence which needs work. Use arrows, brackets, or underlining.

• Don’t use sarcasm or other language that shows exasperation or negative emotion (even though you may feel it!). If necessary, project that negative reaction onto the assigned audience (e.g. “Your readers may be personally offended by this example” or “Will your audience buy this generalization?”).

• Avoid appropriation of the text, or trying to get students to say what you think should be said; in other words, don’t read for or grade to an “ideal text” in your head. The student should always retain ownership of a paper’s content and voice.

• Always find something to praise in the paper and begin your evaluative comments with that.

• Use the following set of questions to guide your responses to texts (from Reid, 1994):

3. How can I respond to the student’s writing so that he/she can process the comments and apply the specifics of my response?

4. Which role(s) should I play in this response: responder, consultant, describer, coach, evaluator?

5. Where should I respond: in conference, in class? Directly on the paper or in a written memo at the end of the paper?

7. What form(s) of response (written, oral, individual, group, formal or informal) would be most successful for the student?

8. When should my response be global (i.e. focusing mainly on the major strengths and/or weaknesses) or discrete (i.e. focusing on local concerns—single items) in the discourse?

9. What are my objectives for this writing task? That is, what do I want the students to learn?