Research+on+Writing+Feedback

= Feedback for Writers = Sommers, (1982, May). “Responding to student writing.” //College Composition and Communication//.33,2. 148-156.Retrieved February 27, 2009, from ERIC database.

Sommers and her colleagues spent one year researching the way instructors of college writing comment on their students’ writing, as well as which comments students use and ignore. They asked thirty-five teachers from New York University and the University of Oklahoma to write comments on three drafts of three student essays. Afterwards they submitted the student essays to the “Writer’s Workbench,” twenty-three computer programs that provided feedback on spelling, punctuation, wordiness, usage, sentence structure, sentence openings, and sentence length. In addition, the computer identified the “Kincaid readability score” (p. 149). The article includes excerpts from the student essays that include some of the comments that the instructors wrote. Sadly, the author’s findings showed the instructors often give students mixed messages, telling them to both eliminate sentence-level problems and correct paragraph or whole text-level issues. The author argues that if the meaning and content of the paper are unclear, commenting on sentences or words that are likely to be changed any way is a waste of the teacher’s and student’s time. Many of the comments were so vague that the author said they were unhelpful and could have been “rubber-stamped” on any number of papers (p. 152). The author argues that if the meaning and content of the paper are unclear, commenting on sentences or words that are likely to be changed any way is a waste of the teacher’s time and completely confusing to the student. Sommers closed by explaining, “The challenge we face as teachers is to develop comments which will provide an inherent reason for students to revise” (p. 156).

Because it does such an excellent job of illustrating the steps of the writing process, I think this article would be an excellent training tool for teacher and peer tutors. The excerpts show just what not to do when commenting on student essays. Sommers’ point about considering full-text level revisions on the early drafts echoes North’s thesis. Writers and instructors should consider higher order concerns like content, argument, and organization first, and lower-order concerns like punctuation, grammar, and spelling later.

With regard to my own application, the students' background knowledge of the Six Traits should certainly help them to grasp the concept of higher order concerns in the writing process and the writing center.

Straub, Richard. (1996). “The concept of control in teacher response: defining the varieties of ‘directive’ and ‘facilitative’ commentary.” //College Composition and Communication//.47, 2. 223-251. Retrieved February 27, 2009, from ERIC database.

Richard Straub, associate professor of English at Florida State University, asks the question of how directive teachers should provide feedback on student papers. He cites experts like Robert Probst who advises instructors to give students feedback that encourages them to take greater responsibility for their writing, rather than “making pronouncements from on high” that “encourage submission…” (Probst, p. 76, qtd. in Straub, p. 224) Straub compares and contrasts directive and facilitative feedback, giving helpful examples of teacher feedback on actual student essays along the way. He criticizes the instructors who act too much like editors, handing out imperatives. He prefers comments written in full statements, rather than “terse, editorial marks and phrases” (p. 236). He recommends framing comments as questions to better engage the student in the revision process. End comments should be encouraging, not judgmental. Straub makes an interesting point that a writing instructor must decide whether s/he wants to create a better final written product or help develop a better writer. This decision ultimately frames the comments. Rejecting the idea that only one or two styles of feedback exist, the author urges writing teachers to consider the greater goals of the class and decide what to emphasize and how much to intervene. In his conclusion he writes, “Even if there is not one right way to respond to student writing, even if successful response is a matter of individual style, surely there are better and worse ways to respond—and even wrong ways to respond” (p. 247).

Because a writing center aims to be non-directive in the feedback it provides to students, the argument and examples provided in this article could be very helpful in training potential tutors and teachers. The goal of a writing center is similar to that of a writing class: to make better writers, not better papers. Carefully considering the decisions we make in our writing and in our feedback can help us—writers, tutors, and teachers—to achieve that goal. Back to reference list Back to home page