After screening the video, I listed Elbow’s four types of audience responses on a Powerpoint slide: 1) free-writing (no audience, private writing, lowest risk); 2) no response (someone reads your writing but provides absolutely no response); 3) response but no evaluation (someone reads your writing then echoes back what s/he thinks the piece is about: “I think you’re saying that...”); and 4) response with evaluation (someone, usually a teacher or an authority figure, reads your writing then evaluates it, highest risk).
The students were to submit their final essay proposal in two weeks so I asked them to bring their paper ideas to class this week to workshop it with peers, using Elbow’s audience response framework. I divided them into groups of similar topic areas (e.g. reproductive technologies, biomedicine, media & representation, surveillance technologies, video games) then asked them to do each activity in sequence. It wasn’t entirely successful. Students found it difficult to not respond and to respond without providing critiques or suggestions. Regardless, they seemed to enjoy the exercise for the most part and very much enjoyed the video. At least one student found the exercise uncomfortable, calling it “group therapy-like”, but I also explains that #3 and #4 audience responses is actually integrated into the peer review process in academic publishing... and so it is part of the “professional” process of writing.
A student came to see me during my office hour after class to discuss her paper and we chatted about writing in general. She really appreciated the exercise and the video, as English is her second language, and she felt that the undergraduate curriculum provides very little support and guidance for students when it comes to writing. I echo her concerns, particularly in the humanities and social sciences. Students are expected to have learned how to formulate arguments and to write an argumentative essay in high school but this skill is never fully developed in secondary education so that when students arrive at post-secondary institutions, they are expected to perform at a level that is unrealistic for them. They simply haven’t been taught... properly.
Beyond the academic, writing is a significant aspect of civic engagement: petitions, letters to government representatives, to newspapers and to corporations, and publishing on online forums, such as Facebook and other social networking sites are growing areas in which individuals contribute to thought development, governance and politics. Writing is also an important aspect of critical thinking, not only to express thought but also to develop and engage critical thought... which we all know is in dire need right now in public discourse. A simple exercise as this can help immensely to demystify the writing process and to make it more accessible and manageable for students.
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