Response to Freeland and Johnson

In reading Freeland's article, I couldn't help thinking about my own writing experiences as an undergrad. Everything she described sounded familiar and I remembered my endless revisions, without even being aware of what was really expected from me. Also it reminded me of the annoying times when I waited for the professor to give feedback to my paper. I always did the changes they offered without learning anything at all. So, was the end product mine after all? I have almost always got good marks, yet I wouldn't say that my identity as a writer was affirmed. The control in my own writing process was never mine. The article led me to question the true nature of revisions.

I very much liked Freeland's suggestion that the teacher should be referred to as a reader and the student as a writer. This seemingly minor shift in the roles would definitely give a writer freedom and control over his/her own writing. As a teacher, I believe that it's not easy to disregard structure and control issues. Likewise, the use of collaborative language in responding to student writings is not something easy to accomplish. The responses end up being a monologue. As Freeland argues, using nonevaluative, open-ended questions might be a solution to this problem. And of course "generosity" should be the key. The writing conferences she also offer are very productive but at the same time very time-demanding and I don't know how to manage those given the limited time and the number of students. We can meet them individually as a group and in this way we'll also be a member of the group.

Johnson also stresses the importance of peer response groups as an effective way to introduce students to collaborative writing. He gives some good advice on how to guide students in the practice of peer revising. He suggests that students critique their peers under pseudonyms. In this way, the identities of students would be unknown to each other. The anonymity brings objectivity and the students would focus on the ideas, not on particular identities. The anonymity might also help them to respond one another purposefully and make them evaluate the responses more carefully. The interpersonal relationships do not play a role in commentaries, so I think anonymity helps students to overcome their confidence problems.