Comments on Teaching Techno-Writing

• but good writing is good writing
• Posted by Theron on February 24, 2009 at 8:45am EST

• But, writing to a teacher, for a grade IS writing to a specific audience. As an ex- composition instructor (admittedly in the old days), I want to think that syntax, that unity and coherence etc. all still count. After all, writers use the logic of the langauge (grammar) to connect thought. Even if writers bend the syntax or create disunity, they do so on purpose, using the lanaguage to communicate new ideas, new forms, new conceits. Teaching technical writing, I found myself teaching passive voice (much to my initial discomfort) but learning quickly that there is good passive voice and bad passive voice. And the audience features in that definition! So 21st Century writing still uses language, still needs to communicate, still needs to provide the structures necessary for readers to follow. So what's new? Read Walter Pater's elegant prose...and know that it sounds stilted to most people. Now read Garcia Marquez or Roberto Bolano or, or.....OMG!

• OMG! U R So tru!
• Posted by Peter Copeland on February 24, 2009 at 8:45am EST

• OMG. U R so tru. So often teachers make students right essays on topics they don't pick themselves. I don't C how that could be used 2 teach anything?

  It is so GR8 that the NCTE is now video blogs as evidence of righting.

  A commitment to the process is so much more important than the process itself.

  ;-)

• Not to fear
• Posted by Robert on February 24, 2009 at 9:00am EST

• Nowhere in the article is it asserted that traditional writing will be slighted, ignored, or discouraged. The syntax, unity, and coherence Theron notes still count very much. The "old-time religion" of composition still remains strong at its base; it is nonetheless aware of additional modes and realities.

• Teaching Writing
• Posted by Mitch Weisburgh at Academic Business Advisors on February 24, 2009 at 12:30pm EST

• There are free tips on how to teach writing, by teachers, writers, trainers, and academic researchers at The Writing Teacher: http://www.thewritingteacher.org.

  Writing is a critical 21st Century skill, since it builds on so many of the cognitive skills the we must build in our students.

• Not getting it
• Posted by michael on February 24, 2009 at 1:30pm EST

• As a business school instructor who requires every class to write at least one if not several critical essays, I can safely say that either English teachers no longer stress composition, structure, grammar, etc. or students refuse to learn it.

  Either way, students are not getting it. The essays I receive remain littered with sentence splices, incorrect verb tense, subject-verb agreement among other errors. These essays hardly reflect what should be considered evidence from functioning literate citizens.

  On the other hand, these students know how to update their Facebook page, twit their friends, and text their buddies.

• Digital Literacy
• Posted by Maryanne Donovan , Professor, English at SUNY Brockport on February 24, 2009 at 2:45pm EST

• When I use the term "digital literacy," I am referring to what Elizabeth talks about relative to students writing for the Internet and I do believe that "rhetoric" and writing for that medium is different from traditional writing and rhetoric. First, traditional writing is uni-dimensional. It is linear. It exists in the context of time where you start at the beginning of the page (paragraph) and end at its end. Second, the writer is the authority! The writer determines the story, the sequence, and the message received by the reader. Third, it is far easier for the reader to focus, and therefore easier for the writer to achieve the rhetorical point.

  Onward to digital writing and rhetoric. Parallel point one: the "writing" is multi-dimensional, and it includes a lot more than text. In the digital environment, text is just one piece of the total rhetoric. It is augmented by image, sound, hyperlinks and video, not to mention flashing javascripts. Second, the writer is NOT the authority -- the "users" determine their own experience based on the path they pick. The rhetoric then must be couched in a realm of space where there the writer has no control over beginning, end, or in between. Third, it is very difficult to focus on the rhetoric at hand, espcially given the multi-tasking audiences on the Internet today.

  Thus, my take on it is writing is writing is not...

• Techno writing
• Posted by Binnie Williams , Former student at U of Chicago, U of Illinois on February 25, 2009 at 11:30am EST

• If you're going to teach techno writing, then do that, especially with the students who are majoring in technical subjects. Just imagine how much easier life would be if you could buy a piece of digital electronic equipment, be it tv, remote control,converter box, printer, scanner, computer, take it home and be able to understand the directions. They're so full of technical terms that any reasonably intelligent human being has to hire an interpreter to do the simplest task, like programming a remote control. But I suppose you'd have to teach it in China, India and the Phillipines to really be effective. But think of how many jobs could be created if there were a category for "interpreters of techno-speak".

• multi-dimensions?
• Posted by Theron on February 26, 2009 at 5:45pm EST

• I would argue that the act of reading any text is not a simple decoding of words on a page. And certainly, readers of any text bring their own places in space and time to the text. The text is not a simple authority, whether in print on on a screen. I would also argue that photos, footnotes and, dare I say it, additional print sources, add dimensions to written text.