A Note to Teachers: In Defense of an Audience
The education system debates often occur on a macro scale, where the relationship between the university, professors, students and sometimes government-at-will is scrutinized on a high, overarching level. The audit is appropriate and expected, because the disconnect between the primary stakeholders is what will ultimately be realigned to balance and satisfy the best (i.e. financial) interests of all affiliated parties.
Clive Thompson wrote a column in the latest Wired called The New Literacy. In the piece, Clive argues that students of today are writing more than any other period of history due to the consistency and magnitude of socializing that takes place online. Cited in the article is Andrea Lunsford, professor of writing and rhetoric at Stanford, who professes:
“I think we’re in the midst of a literacy revolution the likes of which we haven’t seen since Greek civilization.”
The reasoning is backed by the proposed affects that social technology has on students’ every day lives, and the respective writing it produces. Prior to the social Internet, the average American student rarely wrote anything that was not an assignment specifically for a teacher or class.
The conclusionary evidence reached in Clive’s article is fascinating, but the main takeaway for me is that the quality and effectiveness of writing yields higher when a specific, real audience is kept in mind. When people socialize online, they are writing for a specific person or group, whether it’s a friend on Facebook, followers on Twitter or readers of the their blog. When students write an assignment for one of their classes, they are writing for no audience other than their teacher, even if it’s faked. 1
This is a problem for both the teachers and students. Socializing digitally, even texting, is more audience prone than most course work in a given class. If one of the most vital aspects of modern rhetoric is understanding who you are writing for and why, then classroom assignments are certainly missing the mark.
I’m a big believer in micro-strategies. And, in light of the supposed, macro level educational meltdown, there are small steps–learning maneuvers–that can be implemented to provide a necessary boost to apparent lags in learning effectiveness and educational output.
It’s an maneuverable fix, and one that can be easily solved. The goal should be to create an actual audience for your students, instead of the audience being a rubric:
1. Have students write to a third-party, besides the professor, with the intent to persuade, educate, debate, etc.2 Grades should be assigned depending on the actions or reaction of the third-party, and if the results, if any, are aligned with the student’s argument.
2. Have students measure the effectiveness of the writing they are already producing. Students can share pieces of their everyday writing, including text messages, instant messages, emails and blog posts. Assuming they are writing for themselves, and not just for a teacher, the audience issues will be immediately alleviated.
Will these micro-strategies solve the issues in education? No. Will it make certain aspects of cognitive learning and classroom writing more relevant? Absolutely.
- Example: Write a letter to your local government! This is where most students argue in favor of a lower drinking age or the legalization of Marijuana. [↩]
- This depends on the goal of the assignment. [↩]
Related Essays
- « Welcome to the Machine: The Tactics of an Obsessive
- » What Books are Worth Reading Once Per Year? (2)
blog comments powered by Disqus
Add a Comment