Brown Ch. 20 & 21 and Myth #5: Students Must Learn to Correct all their Writing Errors

The Ferris article was one that I could relate to very closely being that I am an English teacher. As an English teacher I am constantly teaching, reading, and responding to student writing. Throughout my experience I found that when I place the biggest emphasis on correcting student writing often times it does not help to better the student writer.  Upon teaching writing and giving students feedback to writing it is very important to actually teach. I love that in the Ferris article one of the main points in the what can we do section is to “teach students to take the time to write,” which seems like a no-brainer.  Writing is not a simple lesson—writing is a process, and it is important for our students to see that. It is not all about correcting so that students’ writing is 100% accurate, but instead it is about progressing as a writer holistically so that a student can achieve accuracy in the big picture. Knit picking each error will not help students develop any confidence as a writer, or foster autonomy in student writing which should be a goal any writing teacher has for her students.  It is important for a teacher to praise the student for their writing and nurture ideas before going about the writing in a “what’s wrong with this paper” type manner; a student must be comfortable and confidence enough to receive corrective type criticisms to their writing.