Our recent blog entries have been focused on helping students develop confidence in their writing. By now you should know your students well enough to encourage peer feedback. I would suggest beginning with peer to peer before you move to creating writing groups. Here is a handout that might be helpful:
AS THE READER –
1. Be an interested and sensitive reader. BE TACTFUL. Think, talk, and write about the writing seriously.
2. Be willing to take the time to make the effort for good feedback. REMEMBER – peer feedback is not just for the other person’s benefit. You will find many ways to improve your own writing from analyzing what works well and what doesn’t work in someone else’s writing. The more time and effort you put into analyzing and critiquing others’ writing, the more ways you will discover to improve your own writing.
3. Make specific comments in the margin of the paper. Be sure to write a paragraph at the end. Make the effort to be specific about the paper’s strengths and weaknesses. Tell the writer exactly what you like about a part or what you think could be even better.
AS THE WRITER –
1. Listen with an open mind. Be willing to accept others’ input/advice. Don’t ignore good advice because you’re too stubborn to change. Try very hard to put aside your fragile ego. Accept that ALL WRITERS need criticism as well as praise – in order to write even better.
2. Of course, you have the right to disagree with someone’s advice. You are the writer. But even if you disagree with someone’s suggestion, maybe you should look closely at that part, to find your own way of improving it.
3. Above all, don’t waste good input by being too lazy to revise! Revision takes a tremendous amount of time and effort, but it’s the KEY to good writing.
SOME WAYS YOU CAN USE PEERS’ RESPONSES
• to help you clarify what you want to say
• to see what works in your writing
• to extend your ideas
• to gain perspective or distance
• to help you organize and clarify your ideas
Micki’s last entry had links to great resources for educators; I hope you took some time to investigate them. Also since so many of you are working online, NWP had an interesting session about designing breakout rooms; check it out at http://chippewariverwp.org/2020/10/22/
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