Using
“Writing to Learn”
Informal and short writing
assignments to get students involved
OUE Writing Workshop, Emory University, Joonna Smitherman Trapp (2014)
Action and Motion
Action~
• Expresses the will and intention of the actor
• In legitimate actions we make for ourselves a new
character—a new person
“The agent is an author of his acts, which are descended
from him, being good progeny if he is good, or bad progeny
if he is bad, wise progeny is he is wise, silly progeny if he is
silly. And, conversely, his acts can make him or remake
him in accordance with their nature. They would be his
product and/or he would be theirs.
~Kenneth Burke
Using Writing as Action
"[Language] can move us toward what is good; it
can move us toward what is evil; or it can, in
hypothetical third place, fail to move us at all
....
But any utterance is a major assumption of
responsibility."
~Richard M. Weaver, The Ethics of Rhetoric (1953)
“As teachers we can choose between
(a) sentencing students to thoughtless mechanical
operations and
(b) facilitating their ability to think.
If students' readiness for more involved thought processes
is bypassed in favor of jamming more facts and figures into
their heads, they will stagnate at the lower levels of
thinking.
But if students are encouraged to try a variety of thought
processes in classes, they can, regardless of their ages,
develop considerable mental power. Writing is one of the
most effective ways to develop thinking.”
"Writing to Learn Means Learning to Think" Syrene Forsman. (p. 162)
Consider
Write for a few minutes about a time when you
were asked to write or do something in a class and
you realized that the action of writing or speaking
changed you or taught you about yourself as a
thinker or as a person. How did you “act” yourself
into a new way of being?
• Grade school or High School?
• College?
• Grad School?
• Outside of these schooled places?
picture--http://www.penparadise.co.uk/prodzoomimg165.jpg
Ways to Create Meaning
Transactional:
Writing to Learn:
(Writing to communicate
to others)
(Writing for ourselves,
expressive)
Helping readers to
Ordering and representing
experience for understanding
•
•
•
•
•
•
Reconsider
Inform
Instruct
Persuade
Accomplish something
Act
• As a way of knowing
• As a tool for discovering
• As a way of shaping
meaning
• As a way to reach for
understanding
Fulwiler & Young Language Connections: Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum, James Britton (x)
Writing to Learn
Britton’s vision of how expressive discourse works—
“…the form of language in which we ‘first-draft’ our
tentative or speculative ideas. In other words, it is an
essential mode for learning—for the tentative exploration
of new areas of knowledge” (26).
Britton, James. “How We Got Here.” New Movements in the Study and Teaching of English. Ed.
Nicholas Bagnall. London: Maurice Temple Smith, 1973.
Writing to Learn
• calls out the internally persuasive voices of the
self to engage with the more authoritarian voices
of the course.
• provides a record to aid memory (a kind of notetaking), to think, work out problems, discover
ideas, engage with readings, and converse with
each other.
• invites the student to collaborate in making
meaning in the classroom.
Writer
Writer’s Research
Class notes
and Discussions
Writer’s
Experiences
Course Texts
Teacher
Consider
What activities are already present in your class(es)
which fall into this “Writing to Learn” category?
• Writing?
• Speaking?
• Exercise on Blackboard/on the web?
Take a few minutes and write about one exercise that
you think works well. Theorize a bit about why it works
well. What does it do for student learning? For
forwarding the goals of that class?
Peter Elbow~
Writing without Teachers
Posits a “place where there is learning but no teaching. It is
possible to learn something and not be taught. It is
possible to be a student and not have a teacher” (ix).
Teachers are “more useful when it is clearer that they are
not necessary” (x).
Writing to Learn activities allow the students to make their
own understanding in the context of the space created and
supported by the teacher.
General ideas about W2L
• Usually shorter assignments
• Impromptu-like feel; “doing”
• Informal and often not-graded
• Can be done out of class or during class time
• Used to help students think through key
concepts or ideas presented in a course
• Used to reinforce with practice important
concepts or learning
• Can be used to foster discussion
W2L—Student perspective
A good writing assignment:
• Addresses me as an active participant in
discourse
• Helps me form and reform my own
attempts to understand and think
http://www.teachingcollegeenglish.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/line-drawing-computer-student-300x257.jpg-
W2L—Student perspective
A good writing assignment:
• Is given in receptive conditions
• Channels of communication are open
• Others care about what I have to say
• There’s a chance for response and
feedback
• Listening happens from all participants in
discourse community
W2L—Student perspective
A good writing assignment:
• Is provocative—it gets me going!
• Lets me say something meaningful to me—the
questions of the assignment should become my
questions as I write
• Relates to purpose of course, and I should be
able to identify with that purpose
• Lets me do something meaningful for myself and
with others
W2L—Student perspective
A good writing assignment:
• Helps me focus or explore an idea or
concept
• Allows me to practice and learn the
important forms of understanding in the
course
• Allows me to stumble without affecting my
final evaluation in the course or the
teacher’s good opinion of me
Samples of Writing Activities
(see handout for fuller listing of ideas)
1—Shorter, more informal activities
2—Shorter, more formal activities
Samples of more Informal
Writing Activities
(on handout)
The WAC Clearinghouse is an
amazing and constantly growing
resources, including assignment
ideas for W2Learn.
http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/pop
2d.cfm
More Informal Writing
Activities
Short in-class writings—5-10 minutes
• Use as a way to begin discussion (can be directed with prompt
or not)
• Use to spur lagging discussion—help them think of what to
say
• Use to give for questions or expressions of confusion
• Use at end to sum up lecture or discussion
• Use at end to set goals for a research project or some other
project for the week or weekend
• Use at end of peer review session to set revision goals on a
paper or project
More Informal Writing
Activities
Out of Class Writings. Ask for x number of pages weekly—
open ended, but related to class—suggest that they might
• summarize lectures or readings,
• wrestle or explain why something in the reading is hard,
• disagree with something in class,
• raise a question,
• make connections with learning out of class or in other
classes,
Sometimes teacher will be more directive and suggest
sometimes a prompt or task. These can be kept in digital
forum or a traditional journal, or handed-in each time.
More Informal Writing
Activities
• Double-entry journals (dialectical journals)
• Contemporary Issues Journals or “Sightings”
journals
• Exam prep journals (early in semester hand out
essay exam questions for the semester—have
students use journaling time to explore answers to
questions)
• Writing one sentence only—a thesis writing
exercise, summary of an essay’s point. Have them
write it in a Question, a statement, or elaborated in
a paragraph
Ideas for Informal Writing
Activities
• Call these writings something—Biologist’s Journal,
Reader’s Logs, Thought Experiments, Short
Assignments, Small Writings, Musings, blog posts—but
something that will imbue them with a sense of
importance in your class
• You might give an overall grade for this category based
on the checks you assign or the 1-10 grade you give
• Explain in the syllabus and remind students during the
semester why these small writings are important and
what they are learning from them
More formal W2Learn:
The Micro-Theme
• Short formal assignments, usually less than 250
words
• Quick and easy to grade
• A small amount of writing built on a great deal of
thinking
• Provides much provocation!
• Problem-based rather than task-based
• Sets up rhetorical context for problem
• Allows some freedom for choice in student
response
The Micro-Theme (Psych)
Prof. X opens cat food every morning. His cats run into the
kitchen purring and meowing and rubbing his legs. What
examples of classical conditioning, operant conditioning,
and social learning are at work in this scene? Note that
both the cats and the prof might be exhibiting conditioned
behavior here.
You and fellow classmates have been arguing over this
problem over coffee, and you are convinced that your
colleagues are confused about the concepts. Write a one
page essay (250 words or less) to set them straight.
More formal W2Learn:
Believing & Doubting
• Teacher develops arguable propositions (not
having one answer but rather many variables) to
engage the students with disciplinary
controversies
• Students take these propositions and bring
evidence and reasoning to bear defending or
denying
• Can move into oral debate/discussion in class
• Can then ask students to take the other side
Believing & Doubting
Cultural Studies:
In recent years, advertising has make enormous gains in
portraying women as strong, independent, and intelligent.
Literature:
The overriding religious view expressed in Hamlet is an
existential atheism similar to Sartre’s.
Psychology:
Schizophrenia is a brain disease or Schizophrenia is a
learned behavior.
More formal W2Learn:
The Reflection Paper
Can take several forms:
1) Reader-response paper
2) Personal Reaction paper
3) Reflection on the journey of learning over a whole semester
or the course of the development of a project
• Exploratory, tentative, personal, subjective—exploring the
connections between course materials and the life
experiences and development of the student
• Also designed to help student find a way to speak back to a
reading or text when it is troubling or challenging
More formal W2Learn:
Other alternative assignments
Have students write a different genre than might
be normally required in the subject area
• a poem from the perspective of a schizophrenic
or other personality type that might seem
foreign to the student
• a dialog between two historical figures on
opposite sides of a conflict or debate
• A monologue from someone they might have
interviewed for a project for information
More formal W2Learn:
Other alternative assignments
• Have students rewrite the ending or beginning of
a novel or story and reflect on what that does to
the text
• A podcast in response to a scholarly essay the
class has discussed.
• A myth or parable to express a philosophical or
moral choice or cultural ideal
• An autobiography or process journal to show
development in thinking in an area
Handling the Paper Load
• Remember--informal and often impromptu!
• NOT about correctness—just them trying and doing—a check
or grade 1-10.
• Use them in class—don’t collect or do and use as an
attendance/participation record
• Pick up a few select students’ every day or every other day.
Don't read every word, but skim quickly to identify tasks
students might need help with--a reading that bogged down in
class discussion ,a page that has very little written, a page
which might be useful to use in a blog post or email to the
class, etc.
Handling the Paper Load
• Have students share in class—mark as a check because
they were there and participated—make it a writing and
speaking assignment
• Ask students to select their best or most provocative
WTL writing for you to review. Or include a few of their
best in a final portfolio.
• Ask students to post provocative questions or
summary/analysis of readings on an electronic bulletin
board or Web forum for class comment.
Handling the Paper Load
• Have students keep and turn them in with the project to
which the small writings are leading—part of the project
presentation. Can be evidence of a growth in a reflection
letter attached to their large project (process and metathinking)
• Make small writings part of their website for the class—
daily or weekly blog posts, praxis blogs, critical thinking
posts, reading posts that the teaching can count for
grading and simply respond in class to a select few (or
have the students responsible for responding in class
some way)
Consider
Take some time and consider one of your
classes. Perhaps one that students find
difficult.
• What small writings during the semester
might you offer to help build to that
assignment?
• How can you get them going?
• Provoke their thinking?
picture--http://www.penparadise.co.uk/prodzoomimg165.jpg
References
Bean, John C. Engaging Ideas: The Professor’s Guide to Integrating Writing,
Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom. 2nd Ed. San Francisco, CA: JosseyBass, 2011.
Britton, James. Language and Learning. Penguin,1970. And all his work.
Burke, Kenneth. A Rhetoric of Motives. New York, NY: Prentice-Hall, 1950.
Forsman, Syrene. "Writing to Learn Means Learning to Think.“
http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/index.cfm
Fulwiler, Toby and Art Young. Language Connections: Writing and Reading Across
the Curriculum. http://wac.colostate.edu/books/language_connections/
Parker, Robert P. and Vera Goodkin. The Consequences of Writing. Upper Montclair,
NJ: Boyton /Cook. 1987.
http://www.quinnipiac.edu/prebuilt/pdf/wac/wac-basic_principles.pdf includes a
bank of assignments in various disciplines
WAC Clearinghouse Bibliography on Writing to Learn:
http://wac.colostate.edu/intro/pop4f.cfm