Studies Explore Whether the Internet Makes Students Better Writers - Chronicle... - The Diigo Meta page

• 04 Aug 09
  

  Ronda Wery

  The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.\n\nSome scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.\n\nA new generation of longitudinal studies, which track large numbers of students over several years, is attempting to settle this argument. The "Stanford Study of Writing," a five-year study of the writing lives of Stanford students - including Mr. Otuteye - is probably the most extensive to date.

  literacy

• 24 Jun 09
  

  Rhondda Powling

  "The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.\n\nSome scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands*

  writing learning literacy study writers edtech

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  Paul Sally

  21stcentury writing literacy

• 23 Jun 09
  

  Mike Fisher

  writing learning teaching literacy ELA english

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  gabriela rosso

  writing learning teaching literacy study writers edtech ELA

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  Elizabeth Koh
  • 

    • 

      Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23

      Interesting. I agree that writing on social networking sites, messaging etc promotes short and crisp messages without much elaboration.
  • everal traits that were distinct from in-class work
  • 7 more annotations...
  • • self-directed
    • used to connect with peers, as in social networks; and it usually had a broader audience
    • often associated with accomplishing an immediate, concrete goal
    • Mr. Rogers believes from interviews with students that the data in the study will help show that students routinely learn the basics of writing concepts wherever they write the most
    • For instance, he says, students who compose messages for an audience of their peers on a social-networking Web site were forced to be acutely aware of issues like audience, tone, and voice.
    • The writing done outside of class is, in some ways, the opposite of a traditional academic paper, he says. Much out-of-class writing, he says, is for a broad audience instead of a single professor, tries to solve real-world problems rather than accomplish academic goals, and resembles a conversation more than an argument.
    • Writing for one's peers online, he says, encourages the kind of quick, unfocused thought that results in a scarcity of coherent sentences and a limited vocabulary
• 22 Jun 09
  

  Yann Leroux

  learning teaching literacy study writers edtech

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  adina sullivan

  writing research

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  skip zalneraitis

  writing learning teaching literacy study edtech writers ELA

• 21 Jun 09
  

  Rosie Diamond
  • Kathleen Blake Yancey, a professor of English at Florida State University and a former president of the National Council of Teachers of English, calls the current period "the age of composition" because, she says, new technologies are driving a greater number of people to compose with words and other media than ever before.
• 

  William Russo

  writing learning literacy edtech

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  susan van Gelder

  writing literacy ELA

• 20 Jun 09
  

  Molly Falconer
  • avoid creating a "fire wall" between in-class and out-of-class writing.
• 

  Allison Kipta

  The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.\n\nSome scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands

• 

  Anne Bubnic

  The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.\n\nSome scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands

  ad4dcss digital communication blog twitter

• 

  stacy rubis

  from peter friedman

• 19 Jun 09
  

  kim tufts

  writing learning teaching literacy study

• 18 Jun 09
  

  Sarah Heggen

  As a supporter of writing in ANY form, this article was a pleasing read. Debates are hot over whether writing on sites such as Twitter cause a student to improve overall. Does it count? Check it out!

  writing learning teaching literacy study writers edtech

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  Susan Nugent

  writing learning teaching literacy study writers

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  Karen burns

  writing literacy

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  Joan Cansdale

  writing edtech

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  Brian Shephard
  • But Mr. Otuteye hated writing academic papers. Although he had vague dreams of becoming an English professor, he saw academic writing as a "soulless exercise" that felt like "jumping through hoops." When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.
  • "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."
  • 6 more annotations...
  • • "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."
    • "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."
    • But Mr. Otuteye hated writing academic papers. Although he had vague dreams of becoming an English professor, he saw academic writing as a "soulless exercise" that felt like "jumping through hoops." When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.
    • "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."
    • But Mr. Otuteye hated writing academic papers. Although he had vague dreams of becoming an English professor, he saw academic writing as a "soulless exercise" that felt like "jumping through hoops." When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.
    • But Mr. Otuteye hated writing academic papers. Although he had vague dreams of becoming an English professor, he saw academic writing as a "soulless exercise" that felt like "jumping through hoops." When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.
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  Renee Howell

  student writing internet writing

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  Beth Phillips

  writing learning literacy teaching

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  Kim Watchorn

  writing online blog teaching

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  Emily Vickery

  writing trends future literacy

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  Danika Barker

  writing learning teaching study writers

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  Natalie Wojinski

  writing learning study

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  Bud Hunt
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  John Evans

  writing learning teaching writers ELA study

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  Lesley Reilly

  writing learning teaching web2.0

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  Samantha Morra

  writing article

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  Alice Barr

  writing Curriculum:LanguageArts

  • The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did.
• 

  Suzie Nestico

  Writing for academic purposes vs. writing for an audience on the web

  21st Century teaching learning student writing skills

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  Chris Jess

  the internet and student's writing

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  Luis Pedro

  conhecimento ensino aprendizagem

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  Steve Ransom

  Studies Explore Whether the Internet Makes Students Better Writers

  internet writers writing

• 

  Will Richardson

  The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.
  
  Some scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.

  connective_writing writing shifts higher_ed

  • The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.

    
    
    

    Some scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.

  • The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.

    
    
    

    Some scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.

  • 17 more annotations...
  • • "What was interesting to us was how small a percentage of the total writing the school writing was," says Jeffrey T. Grabill, the study's lead author, who is director of the Writing in Digital Environments Research Center at Michigan State. In the diaries and in follow-up interviews, he says, students often described their social, out-of-class writing as more persistent and meaningful to them than their in-class work was.

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        This isn't surprising, is it?
      • 

        L Butler on 2009-06-24

        However, it would be awesome if there was a crossover ... we know students enjoy posting and texting. Instead of fear and hate, teachers should appreciate the informal style and encourage students to continue their education outside of the classroom.
    • "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."
    • Mark Bauerlein, a professor of English at Emory University, cites the reading and writing scores in the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which have remained fairly flat for decades. It is a paradox, he says: "Why is it that with young people reading and writing more words than ever before in human history, we find no gains in reading and writing scores?"

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        I just find this so disingenuous. First of all, what are we assessing in order to find out if there has been improvement? Second of all, I just hate how he blames the kids.
      • 

        Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18

        NAEP measures "academic writing." Wouldn't it be useful to have assessments of non-academic writing? I suspect we'd see big gains in active readers/writers/thinkers.
      • 2 more sticky notes...
      • • 

          Steve Ransom on 2009-06-22

          It's not just about writing more words. There lots of room for very bad, uninformed, misinformed, and naive prolific writing.
        • 

          Jo Hawke on 2009-06-23

          My husband always says practice only makes perfect if one practices perfectly. :P
    • Students in the study "almost always" had more enthusiasm for the writing they were doing outside of class than for their academic work, says Andrea A. Lunsford, the study's director. Mr. Otuteye submitted about 700 pieces of writing and became the study's most prolific contributor.
    • In looking at students' out-of-class writing, the Stanford researchers say they found several traits that were distinct from in-class work. Not surprisingly, the writing was self-directed; it was often used to connect with peers, as in social networks; and it usually had a broader audience.
    • "When you talked to them about their out-of-class writing, they would talk about writing to coordinate out-of-class activity," says Mr. Rogers, an assistant professor of English at George Mason University. "A lot of them were a lot more conscious of the effect their writing was having on other people."
    • students who compose messages for an audience of their peers on a social-networking Web site were forced to be acutely aware of issues like audience, tone, and voice.
    • "Everybody was writing in class, but the people who were writing out of and inside of class, that was sort of critical to accelerating their growth as writers."
    • The implications of the change in students' writing habits for writing and literature curricula are up for debate. Much of the argument turns on whether online writing should be seen as a welcome new direction or a harmful distraction.
    • to help students become better academic writers, and to help them become better writers in the outside world. The second, broader goal is often lost, he says, either because it is seen as not the college's responsibility, or because it seems unnecessary.

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        I agree.
      • 

        Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18

        Is it lost, or rarely considered, particularly when the assumption is that all future writing will also be "academic"?
    • Much out-of-class writing, he says, is for a broad audience instead of a single professor, tries to solve real-world problems rather than accomplish academic goals, and resembles a conversation more than an argument.
    • Rather than being seen as an impoverished, secondary form, online writing should be seen as "the new normal," he says, and treated in the curriculum as such: "The writing that students do in their lives is a tremendous resource."

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        I love that: The new normal.
      • 

        Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23

        This new media writing is more about communicating rather than academic writing. I had a communication skills class in University which was useful and similar to these styles of writing.
    • In one exercise she uses, students are asked to trace the spread of a claim from an academic journal to less prestigious forms of media, like magazines and newspapers, in order to see how arguments are diluted. In another, students are asked to pursue the answer to a research question using only blogs, and to create a map showing how they know if certain information is trustworthy or not.

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        Great information literacy exercise.
      • 

        Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23

        agree with Will. Great idea.
    • "If we don't invite students to figure out the lessons they've learned from that writing outside of school and bring those inside of school, what will happen is only the very bright students" will do it themselves, Ms. Yancey says. "It's the rest of the population that we're worried about."
    • Students must be taught to home in on the words they write and to resist the tendency to move quickly from sentence to sentence, he says. Writing scholars, too, should temper their enthusiasm for new technologies before they have fully understood the implications, he says. Claims that new forms of writing should take a greater prominence in the curriculum, he says, are premature.

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        Not sure why we can't do both.
    • Some of the resistance to a more writing-centered curriculum, she says, is based on the view that writing without reading can be dangerous because students will be untethered to previous thought, and reading levels will decline.

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        Interesting observation
      • 

        Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18

        Yancey says that one of the reasons we're often more reading centric in our curricula is that there are control issues at play - easier to control consumption than creation - and what happens when people create things we don't "like?"
      • 1 more sticky notes...
      • • 

          Steve Ransom on 2009-06-22

          I would agree. Certain kinds of writing require a foundation of understanding in order to build logical arguments and demonstrate an understanding of underlying issues/concepts. Writing can be spontaneous and creative, but it must also be a natural reaction to learning.
    • But that view, she says, is "being challenged by the literacy of young people, which is being developed primarily by their writing. They're going to be reading, but they're going to be reading to write, and not to be shaped by what they read."

      • 

        Will Richardson on 2009-06-18

        Yes, Yes, Yes.
• 

  Martin Lindner

  empirical study, pros & cons. ... "Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write." ...
  
  

  skywriting skywriting_star5 digital_literacy _skywriting deli

• 

  Brooke Lester

  writing education study internet academia Web_2.0 teaching learning

• 

  Carrie Ann Gehringer

  writing

  • he saw academic writing as a "soulless exercise" that felt like "jumping through hoops." When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.
  • Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.
  • 7 more annotations...
  • • Kathleen Blake Yancey, a professor of English at Florida State University and a former president of the National Council of Teachers of English, calls the current period "the age of composition" because, she says, new technologies are driving a greater number of people to compose with words and other media than ever before.
    • The immediacy might help explain why students stayed so engaged, he says. "When you talked to them about their out-of-class writing, they would talk about writing to coordinate out-of-class activity,"
    • "A lot of them were a lot more conscious of the effect their writing was having on other people."

    • students who compose messages for an audience of their peers on a social-networking Web site were forced to be acutely aware of issues like audience, tone, and voice.

      
      
      

      "The out-of-class writing actually made them more conscious of the things writing teachers want them to think about,"

    • Much out-of-class writing, he says, is for a broad audience instead of a single professor, tries to solve real-world problems rather than accomplish academic goals, and resembles a conversation more than an argument.
    • Rather than being seen as an impoverished, secondary form, online writing should be seen as "the new normal," he says, and treated in the curriculum as such: "The writing that students do in their lives is a tremendous resource."
    • Ms. Yancey, at Florida State, says out-of-class writing can be used in a classroom setting to help students draw connections among disparate types of writing. In one exercise she uses, students are asked to trace the spread of a claim from an academic journal to less prestigious forms of media, like magazines and newspapers, in order to see how arguments are diluted. In another, students are asked to pursue the answer to a research question using only blogs, and to create a map showing how they know if certain information is trustworthy or not.
• 

  Tammy Gillmore

  Internet and Writing

• 

  Ms. Rowley

  The Chronicle of Higher Education: June 15, 2009

  assessment Pedagogy teaching writing

• 17 Jun 09
  

  Karen McMillan

  writing 21stcenturyskills

• 

  Marion Walton

  writing online

• 

  Jason Wehmhoener

  twitmark delicious

• 

  Howard Rheingold

  The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.
  
  Some scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.
  
  A new generation of longitudinal studies, which track large numbers of students over several years, is attempting to settle this argument. The "Stanford Study of Writing," a five-year study of the writing lives of Stanford students — including Mr. Otuteye — is probably the most extensive to date.

  literacy

  • The rise of online media has helped raise a new generation of college students who write far more, and in more-diverse forms, than their predecessors did. But the implications of the shift are hotly debated, both for the future of students' writing and for the college curriculum.

    
    
    

    Some scholars say that this new writing is more engaged and more connected to an audience, and that colleges should encourage students to bring lessons from that writing into the classroom. Others argue that tweets and blog posts enforce bad writing habits and have little relevance to the kind of sustained, focused argument that academic work demands.

    
    
    

    A new generation of longitudinal studies, which track large numbers of students over several years, is attempting to settle this argument. The "Stanford Study of Writing," a five-year study of the writing lives of Stanford students — including Mr. Otuteye — is probably the most extensive to date.

  • Digital technologies, computer networks, the Web — all of those things have led to an explosion in writing," Mr. Grabill says. "People write more now than ever. In order to interact on the Web, you have to write."

    
    
    

    Kathleen Blake Yancey, a professor of English at Florida State University and a former president of the National Council of Teachers of English, calls the current period "the age of composition" because, she says, new technologies are driving a greater number of people to compose with words and other media than ever before.

    
    
    

    "This is a new kind of composing because it's so variegated and because it's so intentionally social," Ms. Yancey says. Although universities may not consider social communication as proper writing, it still has a strong influence on how students learn to write, she says. "We ignore it at our own peril."

  • 2 more annotations...

  • • The Stanford study is trying to collect as much of that material as possible. Starting in 2001, researchers at the university began collecting extensive writing samples from 189 students, roughly 12 percent of the freshman class. Students were given access to a database where they could upload copies of their work, and some were interviewed annually about their writing experiences. By 2006 researchers had amassed nearly 14,000 pieces of writing.

      
      
      

      Students in the study "almost always" had more enthusiasm for the writing they were doing outside of class than for their academic work, says Andrea A. Lunsford, the study's director. Mr. Otuteye submitted about 700 pieces of writing and became the study's most prolific contributor.

    • Mr. Rogers believes from interviews with students that the data in the study will help show that students routinely learn the basics of writing concepts wherever they write the most. For instance, he says, students who compose messages for an audience of their peers on a social-networking Web site were forced to be acutely aware of issues like audience, tone, and voice.

      
      
      

      "The out-of-class writing actually made them more conscious of the things writing teachers want them to think about," the professor says.

• 

  Chris Andrews

  writing pedagogy teaching blog online

Public Stiky Notes

• 
  Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23
  Interesting. I agree that writing on social networking sites, messaging etc promotes short and crisp messages without much elaboration.
• 
  L Butler on 2009-06-24
  However, it would be awesome if there was a crossover ... we know students enjoy posting and texting. Instead of fear and hate, teachers should appreciate the informal style and encourage students to continue their education outside of the classroom.
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  This isn't surprising, is it?
• 
  Jo Hawke on 2009-06-23
  My husband always says practice only makes perfect if one practices perfectly. :P
• 
  Steve Ransom on 2009-06-22
  It's not just about writing more words. There lots of room for very bad, uninformed, misinformed, and naive prolific writing.
• 
  Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18
  NAEP measures "academic writing." Wouldn't it be useful to have assessments of non-academic writing? I suspect we'd see big gains in active readers/writers/thinkers.
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  I just find this so disingenuous. First of all, what are we assessing in order to find out if there has been improvement? Second of all, I just hate how he blames the kids.
• 
  Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18
  Is it lost, or rarely considered, particularly when the assumption is that all future writing will also be "academic"?
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  I agree.
• 
  Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23
  This new media writing is more about communicating rather than academic writing. I had a communication skills class in University which was useful and similar to these styles of writing.
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  I love that: The new normal.
• 
  Elizabeth Koh on 2009-06-23
  agree with Will. Great idea.
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  Great information literacy exercise.
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  Not sure why we can't do both.
• 
  Steve Ransom on 2009-06-22
  I would agree. Certain kinds of writing require a foundation of understanding in order to build logical arguments and demonstrate an understanding of underlying issues/concepts. Writing can be spontaneous and creative, but it must also be a natural reaction to learning.
• 
  Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18
  Yancey says that one of the reasons we're often more reading centric in our curricula is that there are control issues at play - easier to control consumption than creation - and what happens when people create things we don't "like?"
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  Interesting observation
• 
  Will Richardson on 2009-06-18
  Yes, Yes, Yes.

Page Comments

• 
  Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18
  Recognizing the difficulty of the task is the first step towards actually meaningfully addressing it.
• 
  Bud Hunt on 2009-06-18
  That assumption - that academic writing is the only writing worth studying - is an example of the paradigm problem - assuming that we want students to all succeed at our task, and not their own. We'd better define our, and their tasks, and study both of them. (Or all of them - both is a limiting word.)

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