LITERACY IS SOCIAL
Why Teach Writing in a Group Setting?
"...linguistic learning is not solitary at all, but profoundly social, arising out of a rich and complex web of immediate, living needs, purposes, meanings, relationships. Young children learn how to speak, for example, not to prove their mastery of the abstract rule of grammar but to get real things done in their here-and-now world: to get talked to, fed, picked up, and loved - that is, to communicate in increasingly detailed and satisfying ways with people in their lives. By the same token, when we read, we don't do it to prove that we can decode a certain chunk of print, but to serve some real, usually socially constructed need that we have: to keep up on current events, to understand what a lease says, to enjoy a salacious anecdote about a celebrity, to learn how to operate a new appliance, to see what Grandma's letter says, and so forth.
Similarly, almost any piece of writing originates in some real social purpose and, after being composed, is sent to some audience in the real social world to accomplish its purpose...
These kinds of social contexts...are not just backdrops of language learning but their driving force. In other words, the social context is not just the setting for language growth, but its cause and its means."
- Stephen Zemelan & Harvey Daniels, A Community of Writers
Writing Myths...
*Writing should be done on an individual basis
*Students should only use teacher feedback to inform their writing
*Students do not know how to edit papers
*Students are disinterested in peer-review
*Students can not effectively review each others' work
*Students only need to have one draft of a piece of writing
*Writing is "essentially a solitary skill"**
*Only certain people are born with the ability to write well
*Writing is easy
Writing Facts...
*Writing can be done in community
*Good writing is recursive, it is constantly revisited and revised
*Anyone can learn to write well, it just takes practice.
*Both teachers and peer are capable of excellent feedback
*Student's can effectively review each others' work
*Creating multiple drafts is beneficial to students
*Writing is a process of listening, reviewing, reading, and editing
Social Writing & Social Literacy
Zemelman says that "almost any piece of real writing originates in some real social purpose and, after being composed, is sent to some audience in the real social world to accomplish its purpose." So where does student's writing originate?
-Facebook
-Notes to Friends
-Cards
-Thank-you notes
-Letters
-Emails
-Resumes
-Journaling
-Weekly Planning
