Writing to Learn
Theoretical Rational:
Writing to communicate means writing to accomplish something — to inform, instruct, or persuade. Writing to learn is different. We write to ourselves to objectify our perceptions of reality; the primary function of this practice is not to communicate, but to order and represent our own understanding. Generative language provides us with a way of knowing and becomes a tool for discovering and shaping meaning.
Writing to Learn Classroom Prompt #1: The Learning Log
- What is one idea that we talked about today that most interested you and why?
- What was the clearest point we made today? What was the foggiest point?
- What do you still not understand about the concept we've been discussing?
- If you had to restate the concept in your own terms, how would you do that?
- How does today's discussion build on yesterday's?
Such questions can provide continuity from class to class, but they can also give solidify student metacognition. In other words, students will come to know, exactly what they do not know.
Some teachers pick up the learning logs as a single response — particularly after introducing a key concept. If wanted, teachers can then tailor the following class to clarify and elaborate most helpfully for students. Other instructors just allow students to perceive their own learning through the logs. These occasional snapshots of students comprehension help teachers and students themselves quickly gauge comprehension of the material.
The Problem Statement
Ask individuals or groups to analyze a real problem—gleaned from industry reports, scientific journals, personal experience, management practices, law, etc. Students must write about the problem and a solution they could implement.
An alternatives to this standard procedure will give students practice with both framing and solving problems:
After you introduce a new concept in your course, ask students to write out a theoretical or practical problem that the concept might help to solve. Students can exchange these problems and write out solutions, thus ensuring that they understand the concept clearly and fully.
Project Notebooks
Project notebooks have proven to be invaluable in many courses because they capture write-to-learn activities, false starts, and drafts of chunks of a final report on work-in-progress, among other things.
In a senior-level engineering design course, students make the following kinds of general write-to-learn entries:
- Process Analysis - As students collect information, build models, and test hypotheses, they record the process they go through in as much detail as possible.
- Problem-solving - When students encounter problems, they write about the problem, possible solutions, and attempted solutions.
- Descriptions - Students record key points from class sessions or conversations with advisors, peers, teachers. Any questions that come up can be recorded in these entries.
- Literature review - When students read printed material on their project topic, they summarize the material fully.
- Pre-conference - Before students meet with advisors or teachers, they organize the questions and issues they plan to discuss in the conference.
- Writing problems or questions
Letters
Students can write to explain professional concepts, positions, or policies in letters of application or letters to politicians.
Students can also write business letters of introduction and research gathering, introducing their projects and plans for approval. Another version of an introductory letter could have students try to persuade an interested party (e.g. a foundation, the NSA, etc.) to provide funding or approval for their research. Or have them write a letter after completing a project which tries to persuade someone interested in the project to accept their recommendations.
What Counts as a Fact?
Select two or more treatments of the same issue, problem, or research. For example, you might bring in an article on a new diet drug from USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and the Journal of Dietetics. Ask students to write about what constitutes proof or facts in each article and explain why the articles draw on different kinds of evidence, as well as the amount of evidence that supports stated conclusions.
Alternatively, ask students to look at a range of publications within a discipline—trade journals, press releases, scientific reports, first-person narratives, and so on. Have them ask the same kinds of questions about evidence and the range of choices writers make as they develop and support arguments in your field.
GAPS: Genre, Audience, Purpose, Strategy
Because cases provide students with a complete writing context, they can be exceptionally useful for student writers.
A simple use of the case is to set up a single scenario which notes the audience, purpose, and focus of a brief writing task. For example, a student might encounter this scenario:
You are a water molecule in the hot water heater just hanging out with your friends (fellow water molecules). All of a sudden, you’re violently expelled from a shower-head. While attempting to recover, you find yourself alone for a short time, until you meet up with a group of your friends on the surface of the bathroom mirror.
