Rewriting and our students

I read an interesting article recently that is quite relevant to the things we’ve been discussing and reading: “More than just error correction: Student’s perspectives on their revision processes during writing”, by Debra Myhill and Susan Jones (_Written Communication_, V. 24, N. 4, Oct. 2007). Basically the authors argue that revision happens throughout the writing process rather than at one point (the draft). One of the first important distinctions made by the authors is that between editing and rewriting. They argue that editing is focused on fixing errors and surface-level problems, while rewriting actually “involves alterations to the meaning” (p. 324).

The authors reference problems that occur with novice writers and students, as opposed to “expert writers [who] change text level and meaning features” (p. 325). Students may have problems with revision and rewriting because they are not well-versed in self-monitoring their writing, and while they may notice problems with their writing, the students may not know ways to deal with those issues (p. 325). A reference to a text we’ve read before, Myhill and Jones argue “they engage in the process without the necessary cognitive, metacognitive, and social understanding to make appropriate changes” (p. 325). Now, this is definitely not to say the students do not have the abilities to do so, but may not be aware of those abilities, or have not yet mastered them. I think this is where we as teachers come in: We can help the students become aware of the abilities they possess, and learn to master their writing with those skills. In addition, Myhill and Jones argue, “writing is a process that demands self-monitoring” (326). Again, I think this is an important argument, because of the power it gives to the writer regardless of age, class, race, etc. Authorship involves power on a variety of levels, and in order to make the most of their voices, students will need to learn ways in which they can ‘monitor’ their writing and meaning-making activities.

The authors, after setting up the critical context, discuss the methods and results of their research. They observed writers in the classroom, did interviews, etc. in order to better gauge how the students understand their own writing processes. Finally, the authors discuss pedagogical implications of this study, which I think might be very helpful for us as teachers.
1) Teachers should “recoceptualize” revision and rewriting into an event that occurs throughout the writing process (p. 340).
2) We need to learn how to teach students to better understand their own metacognitive abilities with respect to writing and rewriting. This will, hopefully, give students better access to writing and rewriting strategies (p. 341).
3) “Fostering explicit metalinguistic discussion of texts, linguistic structures, and the ways in which linguistic choices can create different effects and different meaning-making possibilities might support writers in developing both a language and cognitive structures to solve their ‘dissatisfaction’ problems” (p. 341).

I encourage everyone to read this article; it’s not that long or dense, and I think it has some valuable information for us to use in the classroom.