WHAT WE DID
In 2018, Wesleyan began offering Calderwood Public Writing Seminars. All Calderwood students are asked to write at the end of the semester about what they learned. In 2021, students in the Assessment Lab conducted a content analysis of these reflections, using the cloud version of Atlas.ti, a qualitative analysis software package, to code the reflections.
WHAT WE LEARNED
One of the most striking things we saw in both the students’ reflections (and the alumni survey was also conducted) was how much these students learned about how to edit someone else’s work. For many students, this was the first class that focused so intently on peer editing, since students were asked to write so many drafts that they shared with a variety of people in the seminar:
A huge benefit of the Calderwood Seminar course was that we had to submit many drafts: first to a classmate, then to the whole class, and finally to the professor. This way, I could hear feedback about what my piece was missing and how I could make my work more compelling. This was a very useful feature of the course, and one that I’ve never experienced in other classes.
Student in ENGL 288, Spring 2019
Learning to be an effective editor was one of the most challenging parts of the course for me, but I also think it is now one of the most valuable skills I am taking away from the class. In a lot of my classes over my college career I have been able to get away with submitting my papers as first drafts, and, unless it was required, I did not have any desire to go back to something after I had finished it.
Student in SISP 213, Fall 2019
Calderwood seminars helped transform how some students went about editing both their own and others’ works. Editing, these students realized, is about more than proofing a piece for typos and grammatical errors.
I mostly focused on grammar rather than content in the first few weeks. Slowly, from both meeting with the professor and listening to others’ comments in the writing room, I learned to read the pieces holistically.
Student in CSPL 211, Fall 2020
Numerous students described their experience of writing in the seminars as one that was collaborative. Instead of writing solely for the professor, students knew they were writing for other students in the room who would be reviewing their work and whose own work would be reviewed.
Approaching the work around a table with your peers, in a respectful yet critical way, leads to successful re-writes and better work. I’ve learned to be a better writer by editing, offering advice, and hearing other’s analysis of the work. It truly is a collaborative experience I feel will only help me in the future.
Student in ECON 327, Spring 2018
I was constantly impressed and inspired by my classmates’ work, but never jealous. The format felt remarkably collaborative, though we were all doing exclusively individual work for a grade.
Student in ANTH 261, Spring 2020
A difficult part of the editing process for many students is receiving edits from other people. So often, it hurts! But in Calderwood seminars, it seems that for some students, the experience of receiving edits gets much easier. Instead of experiencing suggested edits as criticisms, these students were able to view these edits as a signal of hidden potential.
The feedback I have received from my peers has always been for the better, and most of the time, they have been able to see potential qualities of my writing that I couldn’t notice by myself. This way, I was able to learn from my mistakes.
Student in THEA 350, Spring 2019
Finally, a number of students described the reflexive nature of the editing process in these seminars. While editing someone else’s work, which seems like it would be any benefit only to the person whose work was being edited, these editors realized things about their own writing. In other words, reading someone else’s work helped them read their own work with a more critical eye.
Editing the work of my peers has helped me recognize flaws and weak points in my own writing. In reading everyone’s work, I noted how their weak points related to mine and the suggestions I made on their google docs. Sometimes recognizing your own problem in someone else’s work help identify strategies to fix it.
Student in CSPL 211, Fall 2020
Suggesting edits and then having others agree and accept them offered me so much validation. The process of editing others’ papers helped them become better writers, but also improved my ability to spot errors in my own creations.
Student in PHIL 285, Fall 2018
WHAT WE CAN ASK
First, why do so many students perceived edits that are offered to them as criticisms that hurt? Is this a carry-over from high school? Are there things we are doing inadvertently in the classes we teach at Wesleyan that continue to cause students to feel this way about the comments they receive on their writing?
Second, are there ways we can help students see the potential collaborative nature of writing, even in larger classes where a workshop format is impossible?
