AUTONOMOUS ACADEMIC WRITING GROUPS FOR UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS

Innovative Methods and Practices of Academic Writing and Writing Instruction

AUTONOMOUS ACADEMIC WRITING GROUPS FOR UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS

Dzifa Vode¹, Erika von Rautenfeld²

¹Writing Center, Nuremberg Institute of Technology, Nuremberg, Germany ²Writing Center, Nuremberg Institute of Technology, Nuremberg, Germany

Writing a bachelor thesis is a challenge for undergraduate students. Not only are they required to show content knowledge and writing skills, but they are also expected to develop an academic identity (Ivanic 1998), e.g., work independently, make decisions, and think critically. Often students tackle this challenge on their own.

Research with doctoral students indicates, however, that participating in writing groups helps develop an academic professional identity and enhances productivity (e.g. Boud and Lee 2005; Aitchison and Lee 2006; Bosanquet et al. 2012). Girgensohn (2009) showed that students participating in autonomous writing groups – albeit when writing non­academic­texts – strengthen their writing motivation and identity as authors.

Autonomous writing groups are not facilitated by faculty or writing center professionals. Instead participants work independently to support each other in their academic writing by giving each other text feedback and discussing challenges within the writing process. A systematic, empirical investigation of autonomous academic writing groups for undergraduate students has not yet been carried out. Our research investigates how students who participate in such groups develop an academic identity and improve their writing skills. As a first step of this larger research project we present the results of a pre­study consisting of observations and interviews. It aims at answering two questions: 1) What can participants, faculty and writing specialists tell us about the benefits and challenges students experience in academic autonomous writing groups? 2) What development of student writing skills have they observed as a result of the participation in those groups?

References

Aitchison, C. and Lee, A. (2006) ‘Research writing: problems and pedagogies’. ​ Teaching in Higher Education 11 (3), 265–278

Bosanquet, A. McNeill, M., Huber, E., Cahir, J. and Jacenyik­Trawoger, C. (2012) ‘Reflection, Speed Dating, and Word Clouds’. ​ Compendium2​ 5 (1), 9–18

Boud, D. and Lee, A. (2005) ‘Peer learning’ as pedagogic discourse for research education’. ​ Studies in Higher Education​ 30 (5), 501–516

Girgensohn, K. (2007) ​ Neue Wege zur Schlüsselqualifikation Schreiben: Autonome Schreibgruppen an der Hochschule.​ VS Research, Wiesbaden

Ivanic, R. (1998) ​ Writing and identity: The discoursal construction of identity in academic writing​ .

Amsterdam: Benjamins