Composition research consistently demonstrates that the social context of writing determines the majority of conventions any writer must observe. Still, most universities organize the required first-year composition course as if there were an intuitive set of general writing "skills" usable across academic and work-world settings.
In College Writing and Beyond: A New Framework for University Writing Instruction, Anne Beaufort reports on a longitudinal study comparing one student's experience in FYC, in history, in engineering, and in his post-college writing. Her data illuminate the struggle of college students to transfer what they learn about "general writing" from one context to another. Her findings suggest ultimately not that we must abolish FYC, but that we must go beyond even genre theory in reconceiving it.
Accordingly, Beaufort would argue that the FYC course should abandon its hope to teach a sort of general academic discourse, and instead should systematically teach strategies of responding to contextual elements that impinge on the writing situation. Her data urge attention to issues of learning transfer, and to developmentally sound linkages in writing instruction within and across disciplines. Beaufort advocates special attention to discourse community theory, for its power to help students perceive and understand the context of writing.
COLLEGE WRITING AND BEYOND
A New Framework for University Writing InstructionBy ANNE BEAUFORTUTAH STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 2007 Utah State University Press
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-0-87421-659-2Contents
Acknowledgments...............................................................................1List of Tables and Figures....................................................................31 The Question of University Writing Instruction.............................................52 The Dilemmas of Freshman Writing...........................................................283 Freshman Writing and First Year History Courses............................................594 Learning To Write History..................................................................695 Switching Gears: From History Writing to Engineering.......................................1066 New Directions for University Writing Instruction..........................................142Epilogue: Ten Years Later.....................................................................159Appendix A: From Research to Practice: Some Ideas for Writing Instruction.....................177Appendix B: Samples of Tim's Essays...........................................................207Appendix C: The Research Methodology..........................................................215Notes.........................................................................................223References....................................................................................230Index.........................................................................................240
Chapter One
THE QUESTION OF UNIVERSITY WRITING INSTRUCTION
Anne: What's your sense of yourself as a writer now, compared to four years ago?
Tim: Uh, well, shoot. Four years ago I would have said, you know, I've got ... I don't know ... Four years ago, before taking classes here, I would have said, well that's not really writing ... realizing that ... it's not like a particular genre that qualifies as writing. Okay, now you can use style or you pay attention to this, but it's like, you know, whenever you scribble something down, I mean anytime you sit down at the keyboard then that's writing. Even if it's one, two, three, four ... -Tim, senior year of college
Anne: Do think you grew as a writer?
Tim: In college? Oh yeah, yeah.
Anne: How?
Tim: Well, I grew to enjoy it and I think I enjoyed it because I was set free, and in being set free I think I found that I had some skill at it ... I had occasions that were handed to me (laughs). Write! Well, might as well make this fun. -Tim, two years after college
This book has two stories to tell: the story of Tim's somewhat limited growth as a writer (from this researcher's perspective) between the time he started a freshman writing class at a major US university until two years after he had graduated from school; and second, more argument than story, a case for a re-conceptualization of writing instruction at the post-secondary level. In an earlier ethnography, I examined the struggles of four writers to acclimatize themselves to the demands of writing in college and then in the workplace. Out of that work came a beginning articulation of the nature of writing expertises and a demonstration of why transfer of writing skills from one social context to another is a major issue as yet given too little attention in conceptions of writing curricula. In this work-a blended genre of both ethnography and argument-I draw on the data of a longitudinal case study of one writer bridging from high school writing instruction to freshman writing and then to writing in his two majors, history and engineering, to answer the fundamental question college administrators, college professors in disciplines other than composition studies, and business leaders ask: why graduates of freshman writing cannot produce acceptable written documents in other contexts? At the same time, for those readers who are well acquainted with the scholarship that answers that question, I provide additional empirical work and pragmatic suggestions (in the final chapter and appendices) that may aid the effort to build more coherent writing instruction at the post-secondary level. And for theorists and critics who have not focused on these issues, I hope to provide food for thought on the nature of writing expertise. I see the issues I raise here as relevant to all venues for college-level writing instruction: freshman writing programs, writing-in-the-disciplines programs, programs to train teaching assistants and tutors in teaching of writing, and writing center pedagogies.
We know that writing is a complex cognitive and social activity and that the mental processes involved as well as the contextual knowledge bases that must be tapped are enormous. Writing skill is honed over a lifetime. A ten or a fourteen-week college course in expository or argumentative writing is only a small step on the journey. But given that that step is costing universities in the US (and ultimately, taxpayers) billions of dollars in their collective budgets every year and that there are major industries (publishing, testing) associated with these programs, the question, more finely tuned is, "Could these expenditures of dollars and human capital be made more wisely?" What has recent research in literacy studies or composition studies told us about why Dick and Jane cannot write documents of use to employers or colleagues at the end of college? And how could this research be applied to re-conceptualizing writing curricula and teacher training and tutor training?
The biggest, most costly aspect of writing instruction at the post-secondary level is the compulsory writing course offered in the freshman year to most college students. Some in the field of writing instruction (Petraglia 1995) have already suggested that freshman writing as an enterprise in US institutions of higher education should just close shop: the "products" (i.e. graduates of freshman writing) are unfinished, the gains are too minute to show up in most assessment processes, and the cost-benefit ratios are too small. I have a different view based on my research, my understanding of colleagues' research, and my reading in fields that speak to the transfer of learning problem. Freshman writing, if taught with an eye toward transfer of learning and with an explicit acknowledgement of the context of freshman writing itself as a social practice, can set students on a course of life-long learning so that they know how to learn to become better and better writers in a variety of social contexts.
You may ask what qualifies me to set such a bold agenda for a single book, based on a single case study. I make my argument humbly, with great respect for those many teachers (including those who taught Tim) who work arduously, with great dedication to their students' growth as writers, whose insights may render my views flawed and limited. But I base my views on my own teaching of college writers, my experience mentoring teachers of writing and directing two writing programs at two universities in the US with very different student populations, my work on state-mandated assessment of writers, and my research. In the spirit of numbering my days, I am willing to take the risk to...
