Crossing Institutional Boundaries: Writing Strengths and Weaknesses
Julie Lumpkins
Columbia State Community College
Author and scholar of English literature, Austin T. App once said, “Three things are necessary for writing: a good head, a thick skin, and a soft heart.” Good writing requires an acknowledgement of writing strengths and weaknesses by both student and instructor. According to Erika Lindemann, writing allows us to “understand not only the world but also the self. We discover who we are by writing” (7). Since writing is not only a utilitarian function, students should be encouraged to discover “meaning, form, and self” in their writing (7). What I discovered during the first initial days of our collaborative project was that my students at Columbia State were fearful of how their writing would measure up with students from Bryan College and Middle Tennessee State University. I wanted my students to think of this project as a means of exploring, meeting new people, and sharing their ideas with a new set of peers. One student remarked on a post-it note on her first draft: “I know this is not up to par with the rest of the MTSU and Bryan College classes, but it is a start, and I am willing to work harder.” What my students were unaware of at the time was that all writers have strengths and weaknesses regardless of geographic location, age, gender, race, or writing facility. (For a discussion of the theory that informs this project, see Theoretical Backdrop)
For this assignment, we asked our students to profile a subject and narrow it to a manageable topic, citing an example of how a student recreation center might be too much to cover in a 650 word essay; thus, we instructed students to cover perhaps part of the student recreation center, such as the weight room. We also instructed our students to make at least one observational visit to the site if appropriate and take notes before interviewing a knowledgeable source. Then students were instructed to interview at least one individual and when available collect descriptive materials, such as pamphlets or newsletters. We also required our students to quote the interviewee at least once in the essay and to use MLA documentation style by including a Works Cited and by quoting and paraphrasing sources appropriately in their essays. Students began the assignment by creating a 550 word discovery draft that profiled a community or campus event or location Next, students created their peer drafts, a typed revision of their original discovery drafts. For the peer draft and subsequent drafts of the essay, we asked students to complete an essay coversheet to address global writing issues in their papers. These issues included identifying a target audience, a writing purpose, a thesis statement, a writer’s role, and speculating how their intended audience would respond and how their audience would benefit from reading their profile. Next students formulated what is called the teacher’s draft, a draft collected by us to address how well they were able to create a profile essay that both fit the needs of the audience and in which they invested serious editing and proofreading time. Using a model feedback sheet designed by Ayne Cantrell and Sushil Oswal from Portfolio Composition: A Student’s Guide and Reader for English 111 Portfolio Sections, six specific criteria were outlined on a teacher feedback sheet to note students’ writing strengths and weaknesses. In addition to audience, these areas were examined in the students’ papers: purpose, thesis, development, organization, and language usage.
For
purpose, we requested that our
students use “information gleaned from an interview but without referring to
him/herself and to the interview itself in the essay” while profiling
a place or activity and offering an interpretation of the subject as
required by the essay genre assignment (Cantrell and Oswal 166).
On the handout given to students, we listed additional requirements which
directly related to purpose including:
Do not refer to the interview in the essay, such as “She said in the interview . . . ."
Do
not refer to yourself as the interviewer in the essay, such as “When
I asked him . . . .”
Do not present a hodgepodge of unrelated information about your subject.
Do have an “angle” for your profile.
Your goal is to create an interesting focus for your profile.
Your angle/focus will be expressed as a thesis, a central, overriding
idea to which everything in your essay relates.
Identifying
a writing purpose was a challenge for all of our classes, and I think the
students soon learned that regardless of what school they attended, all first
year writers shared similar weaknesses and strengths in dealing with purpose.
Some of the mistakes with purpose were identified by peer
groups as one MTSU student
comments: "All
my members of my peer group commented [sic] on my use of ‘first person’ in
my essay, which I quickly corrected, and in turn made it sound, and flow better.
According
to Rise B. Axelrod and Charles R. Cooper in The St. Martin’s Guide to Writing
Sixth Edition (2001), a profile writer’s main purpose should be “to inform
readers about the subject of the profile” (151).
Furthermore, readers of profile essays should be engaged, informed, and
surprised in an unusual matter about the reading material (151).
Not all of our students believed their profiles engaged and surprised
readers. A majority of students
felt they all shared one strength in common as far as purpose was
concerned—they created profiles that were unique and interesting as one
student comments:
Another area of writing that produced both weaknesses and strengths included the thesis statement. One goal of this paper was to produce “a clear, specific, and appropriate thesis that gives a dominant impression or interpretation of the subject being profiled.” One of the most difficult areas of thesis writing that we identified among all of our students was explaining how the placement of the thesis was just as important as what the thesis statement said. For most profile essays, the thesis statement is not a typical statement that reads explicitly as in an argumentative essay. We suggested that students write a thesis that offered their dominant impression and insight about the subject, not merely a statement that introduced the topic. This was difficult for our students as many tried to create a thesis statement that merely named the subject matter such as “Betty’s Parkway is a well known restaurant in Columbia, Tennessee.”
Another
major area of weakness in thesis writing was directly connected to a lack of audience
awareness as far as the thesis was concerned.
Before creating a “dominant impression” about a subject, audience
demographics such as age, gender, race, and economic level must be considered.
Several students did not offer “a dominant impression” about their
profiled subject. Occasionally,
students forgot that their audience would not be aware of their subject matter
as one of my
students failed to mention that Sam Hills was a restaurant in his
thesis, “Sam Hills has a good
social atmosphere.” While
Columbia State students were aware that Sam Hills is a popular restaurant in
Maury County, MTSU and Bryan students were not and identifying Sam Hills’ as a
restaurant only became clear in the third paragraph of the paper as menu items
were discussed. However, peer
members were able to make positive suggestions and corrections on the thesis
statement as one
MTSU student notes, “my final peer however, was clear and precise
on how to make my thesis fit into my paper.”
And another
student was relieved to know that all first year writers experience
trouble with the thesis statement--"I noticed that some of the problems that
my peers were encountering were the same problems I was having in the context of
the thesis development and relevance.” (These and many other student
observations can be found in their reflective
comments.)
Organization
and development
played another major role in this project as students overcame their weaknesses
and created writing strengths. We
asked our students to “provide plenty of concrete information (including
details, examples, definitions, illustrations)” and to “choose an
organizational pattern that logically follows from the thesis” while using
reader cues and adequate transitions among paragraphs (Cantrell and Oswal 166).
While audience,
purpose, and thesis (the major global issues) were taught relatively the same
(with an audience assigned and the like), organization differed in a unique way.
Since instructors teach development and organization in different ways,
students discovered multiple ways of organizing.
However, our students commented on similar problems with organization as one
MTSU student remarks:
My main problem was using transitions. I have a great deal of difficulty with it. They suggested combining sentences to make the paper flow smoother. One of them also told me the paper did not sound right in a few places. He suggested that I read it aloud and I would find these areas. I was surprised to see the ideas of the other member. I thought I was clear about everything, but some things may have been unclear.
Like organization, with development, new challenges were met by all of the students. Since this paper required an interview, students had yet to face another challenge: what questions to ask, how long to conduct an interview, and how to interpret interviewed material in the context of their papers. Using a living source introduced students to a new way of researching. Their perceptions of only finding material in a book or journal dissipated.
Students
also found weaknesses and strengths in correcting “language
that expresses an appropriate tone toward the subject and audience and avoid grammatical
and mechanical errors that detract from the essay’s message”
(Cantrell and Oswal 166). Some students
found it difficult to respond to grammar errors via e-mail.
Likewise, some students
commented they were afraid to point out grammar errors since they were unsure of
the mistakes themselves as one
student claims: “Maybe I’m wrong, I don’t like giving my
comments knowing that they are incorrect and do my peers more harm than help.”
Another
student remarks, “. . . I’m not a very good English and grammar
guy. . . .” However, students
soon learned that being a peer respondent was a task that got better through
practice. One
student comments that discovering grammatical problems is not solely
the responsibility of the peer respondent since “you must constantly be
questioning your own work, looking for small errors on description and
content.” She offers this advice:
“Read your paper as if you were a person from another country, having no prior
knowledge of your topic. If it
doesn’t make sense then editing is in order.”
On a positive note, students were able to recognize the importance of
revising both lower and higher order concerns in their paper.
Overall in this project
perhaps one lesson that all of our students learned was that despite ability or
experience, a goal was met, and learning did in fact occur.
One student
notes: “Collaborating with other students taught me that even though someone
is critical about your writing, they are just trying to help you do better in
writing a paper.” Another
student learned a lesson of humility--“I’ve learned that not everyone
will praise your paper. I believe
also that I shouldn’t take that personal.
That’s what I’ve learned.” But
perhaps a student from
Bryan College said it best when he commented, “I liked the challenge
that was involved in writing Essay 3 because it stretched my mind and patience.
I think that with more practice and refinement, this project will be very
helpful to each student involved because [it] gives us the opportunity to look
beyond the confinement of our own schools.”
(These and many other student
observations can be found in their reflective
comments.)
I must admit during the final correspondence between peer groups, I was sad to see the project end, but I realized that what the students gained (writing ability and experience) was not the end of the project, but the beginning of writing maturity. As I collected folders on the last day of class, I noticed the folder on top of the stack with a quotation written in the left hand corner; it said--“Writing is a design, often a portrait, nearly always a revelation.” Suddenly the revelation was all too clear--the joy of accomplishing the task of writing is what we all share in common, despite age, race, gender, geographic location, and most of all experience. (See Conclusions)
Works Cited
Axelrod,
Rise B., and Charles R. Cooper. The St. Martin's Guide to Writing. 5th
ed. New York: St. Martin's P, 1997.
Cantrell,
Ayne, and Sushil Oswal. Portfolio Composition: A Student's Guide for English
111 Portfolio Sections. New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc. College Custom Series,
1996.
Lindemann,
Erika. A Rhetoric for Writing Teachers. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford UP,
1995.