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Why Should I Incorporate Writing into My Course?

"The most intensive and demanding tool for eliciting sustained critical thought is a well-designed writing assignment on a subject matter problem. The underlying premise is that writing is closely linked with thinking and that in presenting students with significant problems to write about鈥攁nd in creating an environment that demands their best writing鈥攚e can promote their general cognitive and intellectual growth" (xiii).

鈥溾��integrating writing and other critical thinking activities into a course increases students鈥� learning while teaching them thinking skills for posing questions, proposing hypotheses, gathering and analyzing data, and making arguments鈥� (1).

John Bean, Engaging Ideas

• Bean and his book Engaging Ideas

When students are asked to produce a piece of work that articulates their position on a topic, they become more invested in it. Writing requires active, engaged learning. As students explore their ideas, they learn more about what they think. In 鈥淲riting as a Mode of Learning,鈥� Janet Emig explores the idea of using writing as a tool. She says,  鈥淲riting involves the fullest possible functioning of the brain, which entails the active participation in the process of both the left and right hemispheres鈥� (Emig 10).  Working through one鈥檚 ideas on paper provides an interaction with meaning that is not found in any other way. Through writing, students are forced to work through their ideas and make them understandable for themselves and for others, and as they struggle, they learn.

• So...How Do I Incorporate Writing into My Course?

This page was created by Meghan Swanson.