Topic 3.1: Peer Review and Writing Communities
Topic 1: Peer Review and Writing Communities
In this module, you will work for the first time in groups of three or four for the purpose of peer review and revision of the Narrative Essay Drafts submitted at the conclusion of Module 2. For every formal essay in this course, students will participate in a peer review of their rough drafts. The writing communities that develop as a result of this practice will help you become a more compelling and confident writer.
As outlined in Module 1, Topic 2, writing communities are support groups for writers, and the goal of the group members is to help one another improve their written work. The vehicle that members use for improving their writing is the peer review. Your full participation in the review process is usually reciprocated by your classmates and goes a long way toward establishing an energetic and enthusiastic learning environment. The more time and energy writing community members spend editing and proofreading one another's work, the more likely it is that all group members will show marked improvement in their essays and attitudes about writing.
Before leaping into the peer review process, however, make sure you have read Donald Murray's essay "Making Meaning Clear: The Logic of Revision Links to an external site.." Murray looks at revision as a process of discovering meaning in writing—it's a process that "is fairly simple. The writer cuts, adds, reorders, or starts over" (88). But when a writer turns over the work to teachers and editors, as Murrary points out, they often pounce on the first draft; writers and editors may function in a corrective mode that overlooks the writer's struggle for meaning (89). Please avoid pouncing into corrective mode as you work in peer groups. Instead, participate in an informed mode as you engage in the peer review process.
You should practice revision strategies on your own work before you work with the members of your writing community. Murray’s essay offers a number of strategies and techniques, and you have been given a separate assignment to print out and read aloud a copy of your Narrative Essay Draft. This exercise is simple—it requires a writer, an essay draft, and one audience member. It allows you and your audience to hear how the narrative reads. You can hear your voice (literally) and consider its authenticity; you can hear which sections sound awkward or need more information.You can also pick up on grammar, syntax, and style problems as you see the words you read and hear them being delivered. This exercise is an excellent self-revision technique, but it's also a perfect segue to the peer review assignment. When you read the Narrative Essay Drafts of classmates in your assigned group or writing community, use the techniques you have practiced on yourself: Read the essays aloud to yourself, taking notes as you read.
Assignments
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