Article: Making editing useful for young adolescents
July 2008
All it took was one look at his students' face during editing exercises for Jeff Anderson to realize that the traditional method of correcting errors in sentences was not working. Teaching editing "looked like a series of half-baked attempts to solve a problem that we were not sure how to fix," he wrote in a recent article in Voices from the Middle.
Instead, Jeff wanted his students to realize what a powerful tool editing was for writers and he wanted editing to be an important part of the writing process. He set out to embed editing into his writing curriculum. "I began to really think about what could make editing instruction more useful to my students, so they would have something they could apply in their other classes and in years to come."
Using "Express-Lane Edits" to narrow down areas his students need to focus on while editing, Jeff has found a way to make the process manageable. "I want my students to remember there is really only one occasion when they have to edit their writing—when we want to be understood."
You can read Jeff's full article here. Also check out our webcast with Jeff, where he demonstrates an alternative to daily oral language.
Read more about Jeff Anderson.
