For this week's reading I found a few points worth explaining:
1. Variations of Imitation
2. Keeping a Writer's Sketchbook
3. Paint from a Family Photo
4. Search for a Personal Voice
5. The Visual Scaffold of Double Negatives

To start I want to start with a quote from Noden about Imitating Without Plagiarizing when he states "Used properly, imitation internalized writing techniques that students can later apply in infinite ways. However, imitation is a dangerous precipice above the abyss of plagiarism" (79). However, as Noden explains, it is very important for students to realize the difference between imitation and plagiarism. The Nora Roberts' example in the text fascinates me... first off that anyone would even think to duplicate Nora Roberts' work like that and think that they could get away with it and secondly, Janet Dailey basically COPIES Roberts' work but adds a few more words or changes the action but ultimately says the same thing as Roberts.

This leads me to my first point about the variations of imitation. I liked the idea that Noden presents by reading a passage for students to listen to and give them the important points about the reading. By the next day when the students are instructed to rewrite the passage the original reading is no longer a strong influence on the students. Therefore, by using the given notes the students can come up with their own ideas and effective ways of creating sentences. There are so many ways to rewrite sentences but even I can get caught up relying on the already said text that lies in front of me. Somehow I can't find the right way to reword something when something else says it so much better. It becomes very frustrating and I have to just come back to it later. By the time I come back to it, much like the students used in the example, I am no longer influenced by the original text and my notes help me contrive a new sentence.

I liked the strategy of keeping a writer's sketchbook. I know it sounds lame but I always find myself on bright sunny days wanting to write or read something inspiring. Even when it snows I find the beauty in nature and want to express myself about it through writing. I'm not sure what I would come up with in the end, but just as Noden explains "[artists] capture moments of inspiration for future reference" (92). I may not be able to finish a novel about the weather or how I am feeling on that particular day but the little moments that I write down may inspire me down the road and bring me back to that day and that feeling.

To further emphasize this point, my next point about the strategy, painting a family photo also can be used to inspire writing. From what I have learned in my Creative Non-Fiction Writing class, we have been taught all semester to choose ONE scene from our life. We are not to go off in a tangent about what this scene means to us or the history behind it. Rather, we are to explain through details and emotions this one scene in a creative way that even our readers can imagine themselves there in that scene as well. One activity that we did in my class that relates to this strategy was to explain a time  time that was no longer than five or ten minutes where something drastic happened. We were not to introduce any background information or what we look back at this scene now as. For example I write about the day my boyfriend asked to officially date. However, I did NOT explain the whole day or even where we went on our date. I simply described my emotions and the SHORT build up to the ultimate question.

This guides me to my fourth point; Search for a personal voice. Again, another strategy I have learned from my non fiction writing class. Personal voice helps the reader relate better to the reader by what Noden says the "conversational tone" (97). By the example from Cathleen Conry, the reader can tell that she is very dramatic. Her use of dialogue shows a conversation between friends while also inviting her own interpretations of the conversation.

Moving on to my final point about Anderson's visual scaffolding of double negatives. First of all, I did not realize that "barely" and "hardly" are considered negatives. However after coming up with an example such as "The food is not barely there" it in fact does not sound correct. Something that I found interesting from this chapter is when it talks about how "Some languages, such as French and Spanish, use the double negative" (Anderson 77). I took a French class and that always confused me because I am so used to NOT using double negatives that now I had to, but only because that is how French is structured. As Anderson adds "This is an opportunity to teach students about the formal and informal registers of language, and how they are handled differently in other languages, without disrespecting student dialect" (77). And just as Anderson goes on, he begins to explain these different registers and the uses of language between family in one way and how we are expected to talk in school as the other. Which is correct and what does this mean about how we are being taught?

Relating to Grammar

After reading chapter four in Weaver’s book on “Teaching Grammar Throughout the Writing Process” I became intrigued because of the similar process I am going through in my Non-Fiction writing class. In my class we are taught to simply look at writing for the words on the page. When doing this, we as readers are forced to mentally picture what is going on in the piece whether its fiction or non-fiction. An example that I found in Weaver’s chapter was when she states that “Connie presented a number of examples of how words ending in –ing can add details after a noun as well as before” (59). By doing this, “it illustrates grammatically the concept of an –ing word describing a noun” (59). I find that adding –ing words before or after nouns intensifies the writing, doing exactly what Weaver describes as illustrating. The visual picture while reading is very important for the reader to feel connected to the writer.

Another thing I found interesting was the idea of organization. Weaver states on the same page about –ing words that “Connie also talked about organization and the idea of leading up to those items that are most important, so they are the final images in the reader’s mind” (59). Again, mental imagery is significant to the reader of the piece. We also talk about this concept in my non-fiction class while trying to develop an appropriate way of jumping into an action without excessive background information. However, something I found new was Connie’s idea of the colon to further describe “that something is coming—in this case, descriptive phrases modifying the previous noun” (59). I really found it interesting that such a simple punctuation could be so useful and powerful in writing, especially while describing something in more detail.

However, something that I have noticed and can relate with Weaver is that teachers need to learn to let their student’s writing become their writing, not the teacher’s. If the teacher is constantly editing a student’s paper, the student will eventually rely on the teacher to fix all of their mistakes and ultimately make their paper the teacher’s work. However, this does not make or teach the student to be a better writer. A quote that I picked from Weaver explains “At some point, idiosyncratic for each individual, we need to stop helping students revise and edit: Learning is our goal, not a perfect paper. Students need to consider the new things they have learned (or almost learned), bask in the glow of what they’ve accomplished, and publish the piece in some meaningful way” (61). Eventually, I believe students will become better writers by distinguishing their own style of writing within their own work without the constant correction from a teacher.  

Finally, another relatable topic to my non-fiction writing class is the writing workshop. Especially at the time during the semester, instead of reading other author’s published work, we are now able to fend for ourselves as we use what we have learned to create our own piece. However, in order to know how readers react we have established a writing workshop. This workshop helps the author in the class hear feedback from their peers and understand how they portrayed your writing.

 In Weaver’s chapter she presents three interesting ways of conducting a writing workshop; Minilessons, Focus Lessons, and Teacher conferences. I find teacher conferences to be most influential. Along with my peers (acting as the teacher) I also am able to see the perspective of my professor’s reaction to my writing. In other classes that the professor uses teacher conferences to look over papers, I have found those conferences to be the most memorable. Although initially I am nervous because of the idea that my work in the spotlight and my ideas are the main focus, I am also able to receive honest uninterrupted feedback about my skills in writing.

The fifth and final topic in Weaver’s chapter is the teacher’s act of demonstration. Weaver explains that “Teachers should not only talk about a particular grammatical issue and introduce a related skill; they should demonstrate that skill in their own writing” (67). I feel that by doing this, the teacher isn’t simply copying from a book but rather she is relating her own faults with her student’s, letting them know that grammar mistakes are common and can easily be fixed and detected. Weaver says that “it gives students a chance to conceptualize how the skill is being applied and includes the teacher in the writing community” (67).  By doing this, it shows students that grammar mistakes can happen at all levels, no matter how experienced or inexperienced the writer is. Grammar needs constant revision at every level of writing.

The Dreaded Red Pen

For this week’s article, the first sentence that caught my attention was “To us, intensive correction is the standard, responsible, professional way of responding to a piece of imperfect student work” (Zemelman 1). I instantly began to think about the activity we did last class period as well as our assigned homework to edit other student’s papers with (ironically) our own red pen. I felt as though my corrections were more negative than positive which is exactly what the article went on to explain. Teacher’s red inked corrections make students feel overwhelmed and they rarely go back to improve due to embarrassment.

One part of the article that I found interesting was that “most adults remember their English teachers as people who made them feel bad about writing and about themselves” (Zemelman 2). Although I could not personally relate to this, I know a few that can. I grew up loving English class for many reasons. However, I know that adults and even students today look negatively to their English teachers. From the time I began to notice this trend of “hating English and English teachers” I wanted to change that, helping others realize that there are positives to English. This article helped me realize how I can help establish that positive effect, even in my corrections to student’s papers.

On the teacher side of this issue a quote that stood out to me was “The stories are legion of teachers who pridefully announce their idiosyncratic and arbitrary rule: ‘I’ll read tour paper only until I get to the third error, then I’ll stop and send it back’” (Zemelman 2). This particular quote made me think about my hours of field experience at my former high school. I was shadowing a former English teacher I had had and realized that her grading was very similar to this concept. I remember her telling me that for the research paper drafts that her students were working on she would only go to the second page (of about 5 or 6 pages) and mark the errors only on those first couple of pages. My first thought was, okay maybe YOUR work load is getting done faster but are the STUDENTS improving from this method? Even I could suspect that the errors the student made on the first page may not be the same in the concluding paragraph.

A positive aspect that I found from this article was that “in real life we rely very little on external evaluation and much more on practice—unmonitored, unsupervised, uncriticized practice—as the key way of learning almost everything important” (Zemelman 3). I strongly believe that practice makes perfect and that the practice does not necessarily mean constant correction of errors. Therefore, using the example of the music teacher, “Even when the teacher is evaluation, she does not stop the student to point out and criticize every single misplayed note or passage. Instead, the effective music teacher is selective—she skillfully focuses the pupil on a few problems at a time, one that are within the student’s teacher to attend to and correct (Zemelman 4).

Ultimately, after reading this article I began to look at the student papers we had for homework more positively. I told myself to read completely through them rather than begin marking the very second I see a need for correction. Once I did that I added in suggestions rather than simply crossing out a section. Finally, at the end of each essay I made a list of about two or three suggestions or room for improvement ideas. This article definitely let me see error correcting in a new and more positive light.