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Only 51% of all high school students who took the college entrance exam are prepared for college-level reading, according to a report released last month by the American College Testing Program (ACT). Essentially, anyone deemed "ready" has a 75% chance of earning a grade of C or higher and a 50% chance of a getting a B or higher in reading-intensive college classes.

But too often, undergraduates enter -- and leave -- B-school without the basic knowledge needed to write effectively, which can hinder their academic and job success. Now, spurred by low test scores and recruiter demand, some schools are taking action.

Strong writing skills are crucial for business majors looking to enter the corporate world. The ability to communicate topped the list of recruiting companies' desired traits this year among college candidates, according to the National Association of Colleges & Employers' 2006 Job Outlook.

And the main thing to keep in mind is that if you are not teaching a writing course, there is no law that says you have to comment.

There's a quick and easy form of "proto-commenting" that is remarkably effective--especially appropriate perhaps for think pieces: putting straight lines alongside or underneath strong passages, wavy lines alongside or underneath problem passages, and X's next to things that seem plainly wrong. I can do this almost as fast as I can read, and it gives remarkably useful feedback to students: it conveys the presence and reactions of a reader.

Two-fers:

You get no credit for asserting the existence of something we already know exists.

You must shape and focus that discussion or analysis so that it supports a claim that you discovered and formulated and that all of your discussion and explanation develops and supports.

In that sense, you might state the point of your paper as "Well, I want to show/prove/claim/argue/demonstrate (any of those words will serve to introduce the point) that "Though Falstaff seems to play the role of Hal's father, he is, in fact, acting more like a younger brother who . . . ."" If you include in your paper what appears after I want to prove that, then that's the point of your paper, its main claim that the rest of your paper supports.

The use of web logs (“blogs”) has become a popular addition to many college courses as faculty try to find new ways to integrate this popular technology into the classroom. (Beeson, 2005; Quible, 2005; Ducate, 2005, Glogoff, 2005).   By the end of 2004, 32 million Americans said they had read a blog, eight million Americans had created blogs, and almost half were created by people under age 30 (Reine, 2005).   In fact, Huffaker (2005) cites several studies that reveal that a significant number of blog authors are younger than 20.  Lenhart (2006) notes that by 2006, these numbers had increased to 12 million American adults who keep a blog, and 57 million American adults who say they read them. Thus, students come to the classroom with a facility for maintaining and communicating through blogs.  Beeson (2005) argues that it is an approach that is more in keeping with their way of thinking (29).  With the increased popularity of blogs, faculty members have been integrating them into their courses to enhance class discussion.  Past research has summarized findings from case studies involving the use of blogs in a single course (Glogoff, 2003; Quible, 2005; Ducate, 2005).  The authors of this study, conducted at a business university, assigned a similar blogging exercise in three different courses—expository writing, e-commerce, and government--in order to introduce students to the use of blogs in their respective disciplines and to help students prepare for meaningful classroom discussion. This study finds that by completing the required readings and then posting discussion questions and reflections on topics of interest to which their classmates can respond--essentially beginning the conversation prior to the class session--students become more engaged in the course material. This exercise requires students not only to read the required course materials but to engage with them critically in order to move beyond a superficial understanding of the materials.  By using the same assignment and assessment tool, the authors found that blogs can be effective in enhancing class discussion in a range of disciplines and in integrating liberal learning into professional programs.            Blogging in the Classroom

Like online threaded discussion groups, blogs are an easy way to engage in dialogue on the web outside the classroom. The availability of several blog providers such as Google’s blogger.com, LiveJournal.com, and WordPress.com make it free and easy to set up, manage, and update blogs frequently and without additional support.   By using blogs “students become familiar with blogging, a tool now used by an ever-increasing number of employers to support routine operating functions” (Quible, 2005, p. 76).

Since blogs are a fairly recent pedagogical tool, new scholarship has emerged that points to its benefits in the classroom.  The ability of students and faculty to easily update an online journal promotes blogging as a new form of communication to enhance class discussion and to create a community outside the classroom.  Flatley (2005) argues that the technological medium provides a space where students can interact with one another, and it can open up the classroom space "where discussions are continued and where every student gets an equal voice" (p. 77).  In addition, blogs can promote collaboration (Flatley, 2005; Williams & Jacobs, 2004; Oravec, 2002).

Sharing content is not considered unethical; indeed, the hoarding of content is viewed as antisocial [9]. And open content is viewed not merely as nice to have but essential for the creation of the sort of learning network described by Siemens [10].

In a nutshell, what was happening was that the Web was shifting from being a medium, in which information was transmitted and consumed, into being a platform, in which content was created, shared, remixed, repurposed, and passed along. And what people were doing with the Web was not merely reading books, listening to the radio or watching TV, but having a conversation, with a vocabulary consisting not just of words but of images, video, multimedia and whatever they could get their hands on. And this became, and looked like, and behaved like, a network.

Blogging is very different from traditionally assigned learning content. It is much less formal. It is written from a personal point of view, in a personal voice. Students' blog posts are often about something from their own range of interests, rather than on a course topic or assigned project. More importantly, what happens when students blog, and read reach others' blogs, is that a network of interactions forms-much like a social network, and much like Wenger's community of practice.

In many courses that are not focused on writing skills, instructors might not provide detailed enough instructions on their writing assignments to convey to the student what the instructors’ expectations are

a badly written essay may be the result of the student author not understanding the subject rather than not being a capable writer.

On the question of how students are incorporating and acknowledging the sources they find through their research, Howard and Jamieson report that the vast majority of the first-year writing student essays studied so far are defined primarily by “patchwriting,” evidence that students are not really understanding or engaging the material they are reading for their essays.

Strategies for Fostering Reflection Hatton and Smith (1995) reported four activites that in in the process of reflection: Action Research Projects Case and cultural studies Practical experiences Structured curriculum tasks: Reading fiction and non-fiction Oral interviews Writing tasks such as narratives, biographies, reflective essays, and keeping journals. However, although these strategies have the potential to encourage reflection, there is little research evidence to show that this is actually being achieved. Obviously "fact" questions do not promote reflection (e.g., What are the functional areas of an air base?). But posing hypothetical situations produced similarly disappointing results (e.g., Assume you have inherited a significant sum of money and wish to buy land in an environmentally sensitive area on which to build. What factors will go into your decision and why?). In contrast, the most successful probe asked learners to write a one page letter to a parent, sibling or other significant person in their lives.

Extending evaluative feedback might have even more powerful effects. Providing probes may cause the learner to continue to think about the topic, such as: "Have you thought about how a skilled operator might do this?" "But how much does safety really get compromised when you don't use safety shoes?" Pointing out other possibilities may also result in additional thinking about relationships among factors not previously considered, such as:  "Another factor you might consider is how many different tools will be required if you use different size bolts in the design?" "But what if the rate of water flow is doubled?" Although such feedback may be provided via written comments, they are probably most powerful when used interactively in interpersonal dialogue. Carrying on a dialogue with one or more learners about the work they have submitted is probably the ultimate in promoting reflection via feedback. But the logistics of doing so and having discussion leaders who are skilled in the content and possess good interpersonal skills may be beyond the capacity of the system to provide; unless it is computer mediated in some way. Other hints for encouraging reflection include: Seek alternatives. View from various perspectives. Seek the framework, theoretical basis, underlying rationale (of behaviors, methods, techniques, programs). Compare and contrast. Put into different/varied contexts. Ask "what if. . . ?" Consider consequences.

The ability to think critically is arguably the most important skill for the 21st century person.

Instead of using the Five W’s for developing content (they’re the basics for writing a successful news piece), use the Five W’s to analyze any post/piece of writing.

it would be a serious mistake to look narrowly at such benefits and conclude that the Web is making us smarter.

Reading and writing gave me skills to create with and to act on the world... through assignments like these I was learning how to marshal evidence and frame an argument. And I was also becoming more adept at handling a sentence, folding information onto it, making a complex point without losing the reader. These skills played out again and again on different topics and in different settings, leading to the ability to write a research article, a memo advocating a course of action, a newspaper opinion piece, an essay like the present one... All of the forgoing helped me develop a sense of myself as knowledgeable and capable of using what I know. This is a lovely and powerful quality-- cognitive, emotional, and existential all in one. It has to do with identity and agency, with how we define ourselves, not only in matters academic but also in the way we interact with others and with institutions. It has to do with how we move through our economic and civic lives. Education gave me the competence and confidence to independently seek out information and make decisions, to advocate for myself and my parents and those I taught, to probe political issues, to resist simple answers to messy social problems, to assume that I could figure things out and act on what I learned. In a sense, this was the best training I could have gotten for vocation and citizenship.