Practice makes perfect. Or so many of my students say when I ask them what they should be doing to improve their writing skills. Unfortunately, far too many student writers have learned and long been practicing some less than helpful writing behaviors that not only prevent them from perfecting their writing skills but also prevent them from even moving forward and growing as writers both in their classes and in their work environment.
Not only do we as their teachers have to reinforce the mantra that change is good, but we also have to show them how to change their writing behaviors. One of the hallmarks of a good writer is the willingness to change bad writing habits and learn new ones, even if at first they may seem foreign or impractical. WAC offers us an incredible opportunity as a learning community to help our students replace some of the harmful practices they have held on to with ones that will move them forward.
So what are some poor writing habits we can help them overcome? The three that follow by no means exhaust the list of habits I would like to see changed, but they give us a start, some place to begin helping students to truly become stronger writers.
POOR WRITING HABIT #1: EXPECTING THE “A” ESSAY TO HAPPEN THE FIRST TIME WE WRITE.
Student writers often get very frustrated if they encounter writing problems. They freeze when they encounter problems with researching a complex topic. They get writer’s block if they can’t immediately write a thesis. They panic and feel like failures when they see the comments on a paper that they thought was perfect but that actually has some writing problems, even in the final draft.
So, what can we do to help our students with this issue? We can begin by reminding them that writing is a process and that mistakes and problems not only occur but that these road bumps are part of that process. In fact, I think they are a central component of good writing. We learn from our mistakes, and if we are willing to at first let mistakes happen, we might actually learn how to improve. We, as their teachers, should also share with them the reality that writing is messy and that it doesn’t always go as planned. If we are willing to admit to them that we, too, have these same problems they encounter, they may be better able to cope with these problems when they arise, and if they are able to cope with them, they will hopefully be better able to overcome these problems. It also helps to show them ways you have overcome writing problems, like telling them about that time you shared your draft of a conference paper with a colleague so you could get feedback and apply those recommendations to strengthen your own writing project.
POOR WRITING HABIT #2: TRYING TO DO EVERYTHING AT ONCE.
Most writing classes reinforce the concept of writing as a process, reminding us that writers have to take it one step at a time and not try to do it all at once. But if my experience with students holds true, after they leave that writing class and are no longer “required” to practice the steps to writing well (if there is indeed such a thing-see Writing habit #1), they will revert back to “just writing” and waiting until the last minute to even begin writing. Students often forego the strategies they learn in their writing classes. They stop brainstorming. They forego outlining. They wait until the last minute to draft. They don’t bother with REALLY editing and revising their papers and instead hit spell/grammar check and call it a day.
We can help them with this as well. I know that we are all very busy teaching content, but what if we didn’t just assign them a topic and give them a deadline? What if we actually reinforced these effective writing habits by asking them to discuss their topic ideas in seminar or the discussion board, in advance of our assignment due dates? What if we assigned them to write a draft and had them complete a peer review exercise before they turn in the final version of a project and encourage them to truly revise their papers, to look at them critically and willingly get rid of the details or ideas that simply are not relevant or meaningful to their writing goals in that project? These assignments don’t even have to be graded. They can simply be a part of the process, and that will tell our student writers that those writing practices don’t just apply to when they are forced to do it in a writing class.
POOR WRITING HABIT #3: FORGETTING THAT THEY HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY.
I truly believe that most of our students don’t write well because they don’t believe in themselves as writers. I think, instead, that they do have something to say and that they can communicate effectively, if given the chance, but they often don’t. And that’s, frankly, partly our fault. I know how hard it is, for example, when grading my students’ papers, not to focus on the errors. We might instead engage in a dialogue with them and help them see not only what they have done well but encourage them even when we are pointing out weaknesses. This is critical to helping them see that they can become strong writers.
We also often assign them writing projects that ask them to regurgitate ideas from sources, rather than to critically think about and respond to the thoughts of others and to actively engage in the concepts that our courses are trying to help them learn. Is it any wonder, then, that they rely heavily on sources, that they avoid interacting with, arguing against, and advancing the ideas they are using from those sources, and is it any surprise that they instead wind up cutting and pasting and plagiarizing? Perhaps they have been taught that is the “way” to write and have had that behavior reinforced by the very assignments we create.
I have no answer for how to solve this problem entirely, since it is necessary sometimes to ask students to flat out repeat information, and summarizing is certainly a valuable skill. I do know, however, that assignments that go beyond asking them to tell us what experts say and that instead ask our students what they think about the topic, that ask them why they agree or disagree with the conclusions they are reading about in the sources they are using, for example, might just allow our writing students to say something original and might just show them that they do have something to say. In addition to helping them find their writing voice, this type of assignment might even help our students master the concepts that we are teaching them in our courses. Or at least I hope so.
Ultimately, by encouraging our student writers to let goof some of their old writing habits and instead learn and practice some new writing behavior, we can lead them to stronger writing and thinking. Practice does not make perfect if the practice itself doesn’t work. We, as teachers,might also learn that what we have been practicing doesn’t always make perfect either.
Did you know…
Josef Vice is a licensed auctioneer and raises chickens? Josef is a Composition Professor in the School of Business and Management at Kaplan University.
[This article was originally published in our September, 2009 issue.]
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