At the Classroom Level:
Writing in the Disciplines and Writing to Learn

With or without a schoolwide writing across the curriculum program, many middle and high school teachers regularly use writing in their classrooms to initiate discussions, reinforce content, and model methods of inquiry common to a particular field. Publications on WAC-based practices tend to break these classroom uses of writing into two categories: writing in the disciplines and writing to learn.

• Writing in the Disciplines (WID): Writing in the disciplines is premised on the idea that students become better readers, thinkers, and learners in a discipline by working with the forms and conventions specific to it. A biology teacher might ask students to write lab reports, for example, while an art teacher might assign artists' statements or gallery reviews. Journalistic articles, business plans, memos, and oral histories are additional examples of genres common to particular fields.
• Writing to Learn (WTL): Rejecting the notion that writing serves primarily to translate what is known onto the page, advocates of writing to learn suggest teachers use writing to help students discover new knowledge—to sort through previous understandings, draw connections, and uncover new ideas as they write (NWP & Nagin, 2003). WTL activities may also be used to encourage reflection on learning strategies and improve students' metacognitive skills. Examples, described further below, include journals, learning logs, and entrance/exit slips.

Clearly, many writing activities serve overlapping purposes: writing a field report for an earth science class may help students better understand subject matter at the same time it engages them in valuable science writing practice. The key to using activities like these effectively, researchers assert, lies in matching the activity with the learning situation. Different kinds and lengths of assignments may be more valuable than others in different contexts (Bangert-Drowns, Hurley, & Wilkinson, 2004; Cantrell, Fusaro, & Dougherty, 2000). As with any other type of assignment, teachers should think carefully about how well a task lines up with learning objectives, with students' needs and abilities, and with the way students will be assessed on the material later on (Barr & Healy, 1988).

A few classroom activities commonly associated with writing across the curriculum efforts are described below.

Short in-class writings

Entrance and exit slips: Entrance slips, often taking only a couple of minutes at the beginning of class, ask students to make a list of questions or write a few sentences describing what they already know about the day's topic. They may be collected and read anonymously as a way to begin class. Exit slips, done at the end of class, ask students to summarize what was discussed that day or reflect on strategies they used to learn new material (Gere, 1985). Ideally, these short writings serve two purposes: they give teachers a quick means of assessing what students know about a topic, and they give students an opportunity to process new ideas, identify trouble spots, and review, which may also help activate long-term memory.

Written conversations: By asking students to write for five minutes about a topic to be discussed in class that day, teachers give students time to explore what they think about a topic before being called on to contribute to the discussion. In some cases, teachers ask students to share their initial ideas with a partner, and then write a collaborative response to the question before moving into a whole-class conversation (see Daniels, 1994, for example). Other teachers use these five-minute writing prompts to model prewriting for students, helping them get started on papers by writing in short increments about related topics.

Self-assessments: Often taking no more than a few minutes, students write short assessments of a project they are currently working on or are about to turn in: What was the most difficult part of this assignment? Why? What part are you most satisfied with? What will this project show me that you have learned? The purpose of self-assessments may be teacher-based, student-based, or both. Teachers may use them primarily to gauge students' understanding of a topic, or to help students monitor their learning themselves.

Ongoing projects

Journals and learning logs: Probably the best-known of the WTL strategies, journals and learning logs ask students to explore course content in writing. An ongoing collection of writing that can be designed to achieve multiple purposes, journals are often used to summarize newly-learned information, dialogue with peers or teacher about areas of confusion, and generate questions for further investigation. A common use of learning logs in math and science classrooms is to have students explain problem-solving processes in writing.

Double entry journals: A variation on learning logs, double entry journals are typically used to help students better understand course readings. On one side of the page, students copy or summarize important passages from the text. In an adjacent column, they may explain the significance of the passage, draw connections to other readings or experiences, or discuss how the idea might be applied in real life (see Bruce & Mansfield, 1994).

Scrapbooks: Scrapbooks are another low-tech twist on learning logs that can be done either individually or collaboratively. In addition to their own writing about course material, students weave in pictures, excerpts from fellow students' writing, teacher and peer feedback, and other "artifacts" of the learning process. Like class portfolios, they provide multiple opportunities for review, reflection, and revision, ostensibly helping students to monitor learning strategies and develop stronger metacognitive skills.

"Blogs," chats, and online discussion forums: While some educators hesitate to use live online journals ("blogs") and discussion forums for their classes due to the difficulty of intercepting inappropriate posts, others have found ways to use these formats successfully. Depending on available software, students may use Web-based learning platforms to post comments to online discussions, brainstorm ideas for group projects, generate and exchange review questions for tests, or provide one another with written feedback on drafts of assignments.

Pen pals: Long a staple of elementary classrooms, pen pals have found a place in many secondary classrooms as well. Whether students exchange letters or e-mail with students in other classes or other countries, a major advantage of these assignments lies in providing an authentic context for communication. Again, assignments can be designed for a number of purposes. Two Wisconsin middle school teachers, for example, used a letter-writing exchange between students from different towns both to improve writing skills and to promote discussion about racism in their communities (VanDerPloeg & Steffen, 2002). Other teachers have used e-mail exchanges between high school and college students to teach revising and editing skills at the same time students are learning about college admissions and expectations (Jennings & Hunn, 2002; Stuckey, 2002; Washington State K–20 Network, n.d.).