Teaching the Process of Writing

are insisting that we concentrate on the process of writing itself, a process that our traditional approaches have not directly treated. In most classes, teachers deal with what takes place before and after the student writes his paper. Much attention focuses on the principles of rhetoric and the rules of grammar as matters the student must master before actually writing. Class discussions also deal extensively with exemplary models in anthologies that the student is supposed to emulate in his own writing. During the actual process of writing, however, the teacher retires behind his desk, leaving the student to practice his new knowledge about writing. Only when the student fearfully presents his completed paper to the teacher for judgment does the teacher again step forward. He elaborately decorates the paper with marginal comments, returns it to the student with a ritual show of authority, often analyzes its weaknesses in class and, if he has time, discusses it further in an individual conference with the student. The