Watermarks Comments and Communication: Using Written Comments to Create an Ongoing Dialogue between Teachers and Students by Jennifer Johnson

Feedback. Evaluative comments. Written response. Whatever you call it, teachers' written comments are a part of every student's experience when writing a paper. And there are just as many ways of evaluating students' work as there are ways to name the process. Some teachers prefer to focus primarily on grammar and mechanics, leaving content behind, while others zone in on the students' ideas as the focus for their examination. The types of comments vary, too. Some are what are known as directive, specifically telling a student how to revise, while others are more facilitative, allowing the writer to explore different options on her own and choose a final process for revision (Straub 1996). Finally, some teachers do not comment on student papers at all, leaving the student without a clear idea of the paper's merit, whether good or bad.

As an education major and future composition teacher, I am greatly interested in the issue of written comments and how to use them. It occurred to me that, because I have worked primarily with students in a peer group setting, I will be bringing with me a style of response based in collaborative theory, an evaluation that uses verbal response rather than written comments. As a teacher, I will need to respond to students' work on the page and will not always have the luxury of working with a student one-on-one throughout multiple tutoring sessions. Of course, I will not be able to abandon written response as part of my evaluation of students' work. So, how will I be able to bridge the two methods of response? Will I be able to apply what I have learned in peer group tutoring sessions to the classroom setting? Will those strategies be appropriate, or will I need to modify my ways of responding? Through my research on written comments, I have found that, as a classroom teacher, I will need to change my response style. Already in place are ways to incorporate one-on-one teacher/student dialogue about an essay. This paper explores some of the theories behind written response methods and gives ideas for incorporating written response to mirror the ongoing relationship between a tutor and student.

Regardless of the type of response a teacher uses, students have come to expect teacher comments as part of their education and the writing process itself. By extension, those who enter the field of education expect to, at some point, evaluate students' work. I learned to respond to and evaluate student writing by working as a peer tutor in a university writing lab. As a peer tutor, I was taught to remove any sense of authority I might have over a student's paper and simply work as what Peter Elbow refers to as a "sounding board" for students' writing (Straub, 1996, p. 244). I was not allowed to mark on the paper, except for a few checkmarks here and there to mark the places I wanted to go over with students. Erika Lindemann (1995) suggests a similar strategy when evaluating her students' work. Instead of making notes on the essay, Lindemann (1995) keeps notes on a separate sheet of paper that the student will never see. She keeps these in a file so that she will know what to work on with the student and to keep up with the students' progress throughout the term.

In addition to marking students' essays, writing lab tutors were not allowed to make evaluative comments regarding the writing. Even as we kept records of our tutoring sessions, tutors were not allowed to say whether the paper was good or if it needed more work (although we were all guilty of doing so at some point). We could say that we worked on organization or development, but could not express whether the paper was well written or if it had any negative qualities.

At the time, I believed this philosophy of zero control was based on the idea that, as peer tutors, we were not qualified to make evaluative judgments on students' writing. That was a job for the teacher. After reviewing some of the literature on response methods, however, I now believe that there was a deeper purpose to this practice. Perhaps writing center theory relied on nonevaluative or nonjudgmental response because it wanted students to experience writing in a setting where they would not be graded and where they would have the opportunity to explore their own writing styles and experiment with different revision strategies. If tutors were to mark on a student's essay, for example, it would be a form of direct control over the student's purpose in the paper. A tutor's job is to be a "sounding board" for the student as to how the audience might react to the writing. The idea of the tutor's authority dominating the student's essay, telling him where to put a comma or how to reword a sentence, takes control away from the student who is the one to make revisions. The paper then becomes a reflection of the tutor's beliefs and not a true example of the student's original meaning.

The same holds true for a teacher, although a teacher is in more of a position to exert his or her authority. And while teachers have to grade a student's work using evaluative comments, they can design the comments to promote learning and not simply exert authority. Richard Straub (1996) writes that the amount of control a teacher exerts over a piece of writing depends upon "the way he frames his comments--by the modes of commentary he employs" (p. 234). Directive comments, as Straub (1996) defines them, exert the most control by literally telling the student what is good, bad, or needs revision. Straub (1996) even notes that praise comments, while necessary for students' growth as writers, still control because they are essentially the teacher's own opinions.

To avoid value-based judgments and focus on more facilitative comments necessary for revision, Straub (1996) suggests teachers follow the strategies that Peter Elbow uses when evaluating students' work. Describing Elbow's commentary style, Straub (1996) writes:

[H]alf of these comments give a kind of summary transcript of Elbow's reading of the writing as an everyday reader, one who is reading for the meaning and interest it holds for him. They are among the least controlling modes of response since they do little more than dramatize how the words are being understood by an individual reader. (p. 243)

Elbow's style of response, then, is to give the student a clearer understanding of how the audience might respond to the essay, rather than only the teacher's response. The purpose of this response is to get the student to think about the essay, about what is or isn't working, and to make any necessary changes. Elbow does not tell the student where to make revisions; instead, he tells the student where he found trouble with the logic, or tone of voice, or organization and then steps back to let the writer decide for herself where and how revision should take place. Straub (1996) writes that Elbow's response style "provide[s] only enough ideas to think about that will nudge the writer to initiate certain lines of revision on her own... . They are designed to engage her in making her own writing choices and developing her experiences as a writer" (p. 245). Nevertheless, giving students a slight "nudge" still steers them in a specific direction, and it would be difficult for the teacher to point out any direction other than that which he or she expects for the writing.

Taking Straub's (1996) modes of commentary one step further, Anne M. Greenhalgh (1992) suggests that teachers should use the same voice they use in class while writing comments on students' essays. She argues that teachers should avoid "prefabricated phrases" and instead let their own voices come through in their responses: "The hope is that the teacher's personal, individuated responses would engage students and motivate them to take control of their own writing" (p. 403). The teacher's voice, according to Greenhalgh (1992), is what the student has become accustomed to throughout the term; to write anything that strays from what that teacher might actually say in class might appear phony to the student and therefore not worthy of his or her attention. While it may appear that Greenhalgh (1992) is calling for teachers to avoid writing standard comments such as "needs more development" or "too wordy," she is in fact asking that teachers place these types of comments in a language close to what they would use in their classes, creating a dialogue between the student and the teacher that otherwise might take place in a writing conference session with that student. Voice is also important for understanding the teacher's purpose in making specific comments. When discussing his use of verbal response to students' writing, Alan Rose (1982) writes, "I can gauge what [the student] is understanding of my comments and so can make myself understood more fully" (p. 326). Not only will the teacher become an authentic voice to the student, but the student will be better able to understand the point the teacher is trying to make.

In addition to using the teacher's authentic voice while writing comments, Lindemann (1995) suggests that teachers take care in the types of comments they place on a student's paper, being careful not to insult or frighten a student with highly negative or critical comments. Lindemann (1995) wants her students to learn from her comments, not simply read them and toss aside the paper. Communication between the teacher and student is the basis, she argues, for creating an atmosphere conducive to productive revision practices. Peter Elbow (1981) shares the same views. Commenting on the potential destructiveness of feedback, Elbow writes, "Probably [students] have been burned in the past. Most people experience feedback as painful, however they get it" (p. 237). Elbow (1981) goes on to say that writing should be the main focus of the student and that feedback, if it is painful to them, should be avoided.

Unfortunately, students can never really get away from feedback, whether they want to or not. And while Elbow (1981) suggests students disregard feedback if it is not helping them, he also says that good, reader-based feedback is essential to productive revisions. Similarly, Rose (1982) argues that "the give-and-take of discussion sometimes uncovers problems that might have gone unrecognized" (p. 326). Brooke K. Horvath (1984) agrees and to promote more teacher/student dialogue suggests that student essays be seen as works in progress and not final drafts:

[W]hen an essay is treated as a finished product, comments will tend to judge, to describe, and to correct; but when an essay is treated as a draft to be revised, comments will tend to be suggestions, questions, reminders, and assignments: responses placing learning where it belongs--with the student. (p. 209)

Though many composition teachers might agree with this premise and would like to be able to have their students work on multiple drafts throughout the school year, they simply do not have the time to devote to so much writing. This situation is ironic, considering that most professionals who discuss teacher comments also note that only when students write more will they learn to write better.

Ultimately, the writing conference appears to be the best method for encouraging an active dialogue between teachers and students toward writing projects. Bardine, Bardine, and Deegan (2000) discuss the teacher's role while responding to student writing. A teacher, whether she is aware of it or not, develops specific roles through which she interacts with her students in the classroom. The authors suggest that conferencing with students helps to create an authentic dialogue between the student and teacher, one that mirrors the teacher/student relationship played out daily in the classroom. Quoting the practices of Donald Murrary, Bardine, Bardine and Deegan (2000) discuss the teacher/student conference and suggest some ways to make the sessions productive for the student:

[T]he questions in the conference should always look toward the next draft. [Murray] discusses how he at one time marked everything on students' papers but gradually learned that within the conference teachers need to listen first and respond to the students' comments and concerns. In short, let the students direct the dialogue. (p. 95)

Again, the question comes down to whether the teacher has the time to devote such attention to each student, especially considering the class sizes and course loads high school teachers, and even college professors, are faced with. Despite teachers' heavy workloads, there are those who promote the use of conferencing to teach writing and who claim that the practice is no more time consuming than writing comments on a student's paper: "I generally devote a half-hour to each student, which is only about ten minutes more than I would spend writing comments on his paper. Though the work in individual conferences is taxing--both intellectually and emotionally--it is nonetheless satisfying" (Rose, 1982, p. 329). It may be more work for teachers and students, but the benefits perhaps far outweigh the extra effort.

To help foster an ongoing dialogue between teachers and students, various writing conferences need to take place; a teacher will not always be able to conference with a student during the prewriting stage, but she could work with students on existing projects, especially those that have been graded and could be revised. Strategies such as "post-commenting conferences" allow students to sit down with the teacher and ask questions about what the paper needs for revision. These conferences need only be a few minutes, but should be designed to allow the student to bring forth any questions she might have about the paper or the assignment, for example.

When discussing post-commenting conferences, Bardine, Bardine, and Deegan (2000) acknowledge the lack of time available to devote to student conferences. As a solution, they suggest a method Kathleen Blake Yancey refers to as a "talk back." With talk backs, students respond to teachers' comments using the following questions: "What did the teacher like about your paper? What did the teacher not like? and What questions do you have regarding the comments?" (Bardine, Bardine, and Deegan, 2000, p. 98). By answering these questions, students are forced to look at the comments on their papers and think about what they mean. In doing so, the student would hopefully be able to identify what she likes or doesn't like about the paper and would then know what steps to take in order to make any necessary revisions.

Such strategies, while still time consuming, are perhaps more manageable than face-to-face student conferences and would hopefully continue the teacher/student dialogue throughout the term. Unfortunately, the idea of the teacher/student dialogue goes against what most composition teachers are trained to do, argues Connors and Lunsford (1993): "the most widely accepted idea was that teachers' jobs were to correct, perhaps edit, and then grade student papers. Now and then someone attacked this approach, but it seems to have held wide sway through the first half of this century" (p. 201). Even if teachers had the time, they were not taught to work individually with students on writing skills; it was believed that students would learn how to write better by reading the directive comments the teacher wrote on the paper and then following through with the corrections.

However, correction of grammatical, even structural, errors does not always constitute good revision. Content analysis, some believe, is more helpful to students than simply focusing on structure or mechanics. To discover if teachers' content analyses created helpful teacher-student relationships, Connors and Lunsford (1993) studied the effect of teachers' content analysis of papers, rather than structural analysis. Their findings support what has been widely held by many researchers, that the main purpose of comments is to justify the teacher's grade or to point out problems that need to be fixed. However, research suggests that such comments do not help students learn to write better. Lynn Holaday (1997) supports the idea of encouraging revision for the sake of developing ideas instead of only correcting mistakes: "One can talk forever about style and word choice and syntax and flow, but improvement does not come until a student actually works with these abstractions in a paper he or she has constructed" (p. 35). Ultimately, Connors and Lunsford (1993) support content analysis instead of, or in addition to, comments on grammar and mechanics because they believe the ideas of the writer are the necessary components to a good essay.

As I enter the teaching profession, I hope to be able to take what I have learned from my experiences in the writing lab and apply them to the classroom setting. My peer tutor philosophy dictates that I relinquish control of an essay to the student and allow him or her to explore the writing and determine what work it needs, if any at all. My role is as a facilitator, not a judge, of the quality of writing. My philosophy of teaching, however, dictates that I will need to evaluate student writing so that I can determine if the student is learning required concepts and is ready to proceed to the next level in his or her education. I believe that, when I begin teaching, I will be able to combine these two philosophies to create a learning environment in which students work collaboratively with myself and other students to improve their writing. As with any new teaching pedagogy, conferencing in the classroom will need more research and practical applications to determine if the idea is possible. The current research on conferencing techniques and collaborative learning environments, however, promises that the idea is worthy of further consideration.

Throughout all the research on teacher comments, communication appears to be the guiding principle as to whether or not students will find teacher response useful. A student will not even begin to think about how he might further develop an idea in an essay if he does not know what it means to develop. In the legal world, laws can be made void if they are too general or are vaguely written; so too it must be for teacher comments. No student will follow the rule of developing an idea further if no guidance is given as to how an idea can or even should be developed. The teacher, therefore, needs to communicate with the student throughout the writing process to assure that the writing improves. This dialogue would also be useful for teachers who are dealing with students who are at different levels of proficiency with their writing. It would be naive to assume that all students, once they reach a particular grade level, are all at the same point in their educational development. Creating a dialogue with students ensures that teachers will be able to meet the needs of students and help them grow as thinkers and writers.