For students to become better writers, they must practice revising. Some teachers make the mistake of assigning writing tasks to students once, grading their work, and then moving on to the next task. It is more beneficial for students to practice revision. I assign my students a topic and then ask them to write a first draft. I don’t tell them how many drafts there will be, often students will have four or five drafts before their writing assignment is complete. After the students write their initial draft, they turn it in. Once all students are done I shuffle the papers and pass them out so that every student has someone else’s paper. They then read another classmate’s essay and complete a peer editing worksheet that I’ve also given them.
Depending on the particular writing assignment, there are several different versions of the peer editing sheet I give them. Prior to this lesson, students have been instructed on the difference between constructive criticism and negative commentary. Once they have read and commented on one essay, they staple their comment sheet to the essay face up (on the other side of the paper is another blank commentary questionnaire) and turn the essay back in. Once all of these have been turned in, I repeat the previous step. Every student should read and comment on at least two essays.
Students work at different paces, so it is important that there is another assignment on the board for students to work on when they are not reading and commenting on essays. Peer editing helps students in several ways. They receive feedback from others like themselves, and they also benefit from reading the essays of their peers. When students get their essays back, they have the comments and constructive criticism of two peer writers. They then write another draft of their essay. Fostering a writing community in the classroom is important.
