Summary of Articles by Wolcott and Strong on Teaching Composition

Terri Tims
Dr. Brent Lynn
Teaching College Composition
13 November 2013
                                    Wolcott and Strong’s Articles on Writing
            Though both Wolcott’s “Writing Instruction and Assessment: The Need for Interplay between Process and Product” and Strong’s “Language as Teacher” were published in 1987 in the same issue of College Composition and Communication, it would be challenging to find two more dissimilar texts on the subject of writing.   One article explores timed writing assessment and the way that the nature of writing assessment prevents students from being able to utilize all of the aspects of the writing process, especially revision.  The other article explores writing as a learning process and an interior dialogue between the writer and the text.  While both views are meaningful to writers and writing educators, one article is more pragmatic while the other is more idealized.  Unfortunately, in the world of high stakes testing in education, pragmatism will always win out, and less importance will be placed on writing to learn, and more emphasis will be placed on writing as a means of assessment.
            Wolcott’s main point in her article is that timed writing assessments do not function as a tool to help students develop understanding but are instead a method of eliciting student writing in a testing situation that does not allow students the time to practice the writing method as it has been taught to them.  Though the time allowed for most writing assessments may allow for some brief and hurried pre-writing, there is usually not enough time for consideration of any audience other than an evaluator, and definitely not enough time for any serious revision.  Wolcott proposes a shift to a portfolio method of evaluating student writing or perhaps providing students with the needed information before the assessment as possible solutions to the testing problem.  Wolcott concludes by stating that, of course, writing educators are most concerned with teaching students the writing process so that students can use “writing as a means of thinking and learning” (43), but that objective and writing assessments should be approached in such a way as to ensure students’ success in both arenas.
            Strong’s article, on the other hand, focuses not nearly so much on product as on process.  The writing process is important, but that process serves to bring students to the point where the real learning happens: revision.  According to Strong, in writing and revising, writers subject their work to two different aspects of their own consciousness.  Writers think about their own work in terms of how their audience would perceive the work.  Another internal reader that a writer utilizes is the consciousness who is inquisitive and eager to seek connections between ideas.  This is the aspect of the self that lets a reader know if his or her work is boring or substandard.  On the other hand, this is also the self who lets the writing is effective.  Along with these interior consciousnesses that evaluate a writer’s work, there is also present the human mind’s drive to either make connections or make distinctions.  All of these mental conversations that go on over the task of writing must be given time to flourish and blossom into the completed work.  The writer learns from the experience of writing, revisiting and revising the text and learning from each reading and each experience of writing.
            Wolcott’s article is the one of the two that would be preferred by school administrators across the United States today.  Wolcott tackles the issue of writing assessment, an issue that is even more sensitive to educators today than it was 26 years ago when her article was written.  Wolcott confirms the importance of the writing process but states that unless some way is found to modify assessment to more closely match the true writing process, then the way the writing process is taught will have to change.  Strong, on the other hand, is apparently unconcerned with writing assessment but more concerned with students’ learning experience as they write.  Strong recognizes the writing process as a learning process and not just as a demonstration of student ability.  Both viewpoints have merit and have a place in education today, but Strong’s article would appeal much more to the idealist who sees writing as learning than the pragmatist who sees writing an activity in which a student’s timed writing assessment can be used to determine that student’s writing proficiency (and the teacher’s teaching skill).
                                                             Works Cited
Strong, William.  “Language as Teacher.” College Composition and Communication. 38:1 (1987): 21-31. JSTOR. Web. 13 Nov. 2013.
Wolcott, Willa. “Writing Instruction and Assessment: The Need for Interplay between Process and Product.” College Composition and Communication. 38:1 (1987): 40-46. JSTOR. Web. 13 Nov. 2013.


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