The FINANCIAL — Digital tools such as the internet, social media, and cell phones “encourage student creativity and personal expression,” said some 78% of the 2,462 advanced placement (AP) and National Writing Project (NWP) teachers surveyed by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project.
Students’ exposure to a broader audience for their work and more feedback from peers encourages greater student investment in what they write and in the writing process as a whole, say the teachers.
At the same time, these teachers give their students modest marks when it comes to writing and highlight some areas needing attention. Asked to assess their students’ performance on nine specific writing skills, teachers tended to rate their students “good” or “fair” as opposed to “excellent” or “very good.” Students received the best ratings on their ability to “effectively organize and structure writing assignments” and their ability to “understand and consider multiple viewpoints on a particular topic or issue.” Teachers gave students the lowest ratings when it comes to “navigating issues of fair use and copyright in composition” and “reading and digesting long or complicated texts.”
“These results challenge in many ways the notion that students’ writing skills are being undermined by their increasing engagement with digital tools and platforms,” said Kristen Purcell, Associate Director for Research at the Pew Internet Project. “Teachers do have concerns that digital tools are blurring the lines between formal and informal writing and see writing skills that need improvement, but they also see the benefit of students having more people respond to their writing and the increased opportunities for expression these digital tools offer,” Purcell added.
Half (50%) of these teachers say digital tools make it easier to teach writing, with just 18% saying digital tools make the process more difficult. In particular, teachers value interactive platforms which allow them to work alongside a student on a piece of writing, and allow students to edit and view one anothers’ work, according to Pew Research Center.
At the same time, teachers expressed concerns about the “creep” of informal grammar and style into “formal” writing, as well as students’ impatience with the writing process and their difficulty navigating the complex issues of plagiarism, citation and fair use.
Reflecting these latter concerns, a majority of these teachers spend class time “discussing with students the concepts of citation and plagiarism” (88%) and “discussing with students the concepts of fair use and copyright” (75%), according to the report.
“Teachers, writing teachers especially, do not view good writing and the use of digital tools as being at war with each other,” added Judy Buchanan, Deputy Director of the National Writing Project and a co-author of the report. “When educators have opportunities to integrate new technologies into teaching and learning, they are the most optimistic about the impact of digital tools on student writing and their value in teaching the art of writing. They gave countless examples of the creative ways they use emerging digital tools to impart writing skills to today’s students,” Buchanan added.
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