NCTE Beliefs about the Teaching of Writing

Patrick Higgins's personal annotations on this page

Pjhiggins bookmarked on 2009-06-27 writing ncte english ELA metacognition

More fodder for writing as embodying many different forms.

Often, in school, students write only to prove that they did something they were asked to do, in order to get credit for it. Or, students are taught a single type of writing and are led to believe this type will suffice in all situations. Writers outside of school have many different purposes beyond demonstrating accountability, and they practice myriad types and genres. In order to make sure students are learning how writing differs when the purpose and the audience differ, it is important that teachers create opportunities for students to be in different kinds of writing situations, where the relationships and agendas are varied. Even within academic settings, the characteristics of good writing vary among disciplines; what counts as a successful lab report, for example, differs from a successful history paper, essay exam, or literary interpretation.
- Pjhiggins on 2009-06-27
  
  This is such a loaded statement--in a great way. I feel that our teachers are scared away from teaching any type of writing that is not academic or testable. Likewise, I feel our students are often robbed of original voice because they are not allowed the freedom to explore other media, or the opportunity to see other forms of writing as legitimate.

This link has been bookmarked by 19 people . It was first bookmarked on 25 Feb 2009, by Anthony Armstrong.

13 Dec 09

margie nunez
explains how teachers have to change their aims for teaching writing.

mywritingcourse
09 Dec 09

Jason K
704
18 Nov 09

Wendy Commons
composition
16 Oct 09

Heather Brown
writing ncte english
- the development, through extended practice over years, of a repertory of routines, skills, strategies, and practices, for generating, revising, and editing different kinds of texts. Second is the development of reflective abilities and meta-awareness about writing.
- Students should become comfortable with pre-writing techniques, multiple strategies for developing and organizing a message, a variety of strategies for revising and editing, and strategies for preparing products for public audiences and for deadlines.
- 3 more annotations...
- - evaluating the processes students follow -- the decisions they make, the attempts along the way -- can be as important as evaluating the final product.
  - strategies for audience and task analysis, invention, revision, and editing.
  - Published texts, immediately available, that demonstrate a wide range of writing strategies and elements of craft.
07 Oct 09

KM Anderson
ncte white.papers teaching.writing writing
04 Oct 09

Andrew Munoz
writing education English teaching resources
28 Jul 09

John Carman Zoccola
Guideline on NCTE Beliefs about the Teaching of Writing" /><meta name="keywords" content="NCTE Guideline,NCTE Position Statement" /><link id="ctl00_lSubPageRSS" rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="NCTE - NCTE Beliefs about the Teaching of Writing - News Feed" href="/positions/statements/writingbeliefs/rss

writing ncteposition
21 Jul 09

Jenny Gridley
an interesting article on writing

writing for:bwillis64
30 Jun 09

casey mayfield
Writing
29 Jun 09

Katt Blackwell-Starnes
CCCC composition writing NCTE dissertation english
- Purposes for writing include developing social networks; engaging in civic discourse; supporting personal and spiritual growth; reflecting on experience; communicating professionally and academically; building relationships with others, including friends, family, and like-minded individuals; and engaging in aesthetic experiences.
- Writing with certain purposes in mind, the writer focuses her attention on what the audience is thinking or believing; other times, the writer focuses more on the information she is organizing, or on her own thoughts and feelings. Therefore, the thinking, the procedures, and the physical format in writing all differ when writers’ purposes vary.
- 10 more annotations...
- - teachers need to understand:
    The wide range of purposes for which people write, and the forms of writing that arise from those purposes.
  - People who read a lot have a much easier time getting better at writing. In order to write a particular kind of text, it helps if the writer has read that kind of text. In order to take on a particular style of language, the writer needs to have read that language, to have heard it in her mind, so that she can hear it again in order to compose it.
  - Additionally, reading is a vital source of information and ideas. For writers fully to contribute to a given topic or to be effective in a given situation, they must be familiar with what previous writers have said. Reading also creates a sense of what one's audience knows or expects on a topic.
  - Students should also have access to and experience in reading material that presents both published and student writing in various genres. Through immersion in a genre, students develop an internalized sense of why an author would select a particular genre for a particular purpose, the power of a particular genre to convey a message, and the rhetorical constraints and possibilities inherent in a genre.
  - How writers read in a special way, with an eye toward not just what the text says but how it is put together.
    Katt Blackwell-Starnes on 2009-06-29
    
    Diigo!
  - The ways writers form and use constructs of their intended readers, anticipating their responses and needs.
    Katt Blackwell-Starnes on 2009-06-29
    
    Social Bookmarking aids this by allowing more research in a synthesized location than previously seen.
  - Writers need to be able to think about the physical design of text, about the appropriateness and thematic content of visual images, about the integration of sound with a reading experience, and about the medium that is most appropriate for a particular message, purpose, and audience.
  - What does this mean for teaching?
    Writing instruction must accommodate the explosion in technology from the world around us.
  - Teachers need to understand at least the following in order to be excellent at teaching composition as involving multiple media:
    A range of new genres that have emerged with the increase in electronic communication.
  - How to navigate both the World Wide Web and web-based databases.
28 Jun 09

susan van Gelder
writing ncte ELA
Karen McMillan
writing NCTE
27 Jun 09

Patrick Higgins
More fodder for writing as embodying many different forms.

writing ncte english ELA metacognition
- Often, in school, students write only to prove that they did something they were asked to do, in order to get credit for it. Or, students are taught a single type of writing and are led to believe this type will suffice in all situations. Writers outside of school have many different purposes beyond demonstrating accountability, and they practice myriad types and genres. In order to make sure students are learning how writing differs when the purpose and the audience differ, it is important that teachers create opportunities for students to be in different kinds of writing situations, where the relationships and agendas are varied. Even within academic settings, the characteristics of good writing vary among disciplines; what counts as a successful lab report, for example, differs from a successful history paper, essay exam, or literary interpretation.
  - Patrick Higgins on 2009-06-27
    
    This is such a loaded statement--in a great way. I feel that our teachers are scared away from teaching any type of writing that is not academic or testable. Likewise, I feel our students are often robbed of original voice because they are not allowed the freedom to explore other media, or the opportunity to see other forms of writing as legitimate.
skip zalneraitis
writing
26 Jun 09

Boyd Logan
writing
05 Mar 09

Bill Schreiter
ncte writing
- Just as the nature of and expectation for literacy has changed in the past century and a half, so has the nature of writing. Much of that change has been due to technological developments, from pen and paper, to typewriter, to word processor, to networked computer, to design software capable of composing words, images, and sounds. These developments not only expanded the types of texts that writers produce, they also expanded immediate access to a wider variety of readers. With full recognition that writing is an increasingly multifaceted activity, we offer several principles that should guide effective teaching practice.
  Everyone has the capacity to write, writing can be taught, and teachers can help students become better writers
26 Feb 09

Ryan Bretag
writing english
25 Feb 09

Anthony Armstrong