But writing skills and dealing with generative AI, is not something your students naturally learn their own. Therefore, as a teacher, you play an important guiding role in developing their writing skills.
The University of Antwerp developed a guide (Dutch only) for this, on which we based the ten tips in our article to help you guide your student's writing process.
Tip: looking for inspiration on what types of writing assignments to use as assessment? Have a look at the VU CTL database for assessment forms.
Tip 1: communicate the goal of the assignment
A good writing assignment starts with clear instructions, such as the purpose of the assignment: is it learning to write, processing insights and content, or a combination of those? With the assignment, you can let students work on their writing skills ('learning to write') or writing can facilitate content learning ('writing to learn' - Broadhead, 1999, cited in Carter et al., 2007). Include the learning objectives in the instructions so that students know what to expect and what they are working on. Also explain the relevance of the learning objectives for further study or later profession so that your students better understand why they are learning it, this has a motivating effect.
Tip 2: be clear about the type of text
Make it clear what type of text you expect your students to produce, and what characteristics that type of text should meet. This may in fact vary from one subject area or one teacher to another. Therefore, it is important to be specific and clear about this. Consider aspects such as: who the target audience of the text is, an appropriate style, the overall structure and the purpose or intention.
Tip 3: specify the assessment criteria
Communicate the assessment criteria before giving the assignment, so that your students have a clear framework to focus on. For example, do you assess on content, process, product, or a combination of those? Be specific about each aspect, such as: content accuracy, argumentation, structure, source references, spelling, and layout. When you provide detailed criteria on these, your students themselves will also look at their own work more critically.
Tip 4: offer guidance
Clearly communicate how the guidance and feedback process will be organized for the writing assignment. For example, will these be individual discussions, or will there be group guidance? Make sure your students have access to supporting materials and resources that can help them with the writing process. Consider manuals, writing guides, websites, workshops, and examples of good writing assignments. This will help them work independently on their writing skills.
Tip 5: adopt a coaching role
It is important to encourage your students to give their own input during the process. You do this by adopting a more coaching role yourself. Give them room to come up with their own ideas, questions or comments, so that they are actively involved in the assignment. You can encourage this, for instance, by asking open questions, giving suggestions, or providing sources where they can find the answers to their questions themselves. This way, they develop a critical attitude, problem-solving skills and independence in their learning process.
Tip 6: dose your feedback
Dosing your feedback and limiting it to the essential aspects, will save you time, and help keep your students engaged. If you give too much feedback, students become overwhelmed and unmotivated. Therefore, focus on the most important criteria. For example, for a paper, focus on argumentation and structure. Other factors such as spelling and layout should then only be mentioned briefly, without going into detail. Another way of dosing your feedback and encouraging independence is to highlight only a few examples of errors, explaining why and how they can be improved. The student can then identify and correct the same kind of errors themselves in the rest of the assignment.
Tip 7: encourage reflection
Encourage your students to reflect on the feedback given, for instance by having them ask questions about it, or guide them on how to apply the feedback. Peer feedback can also help for reflection. Let them ask feedback of each other or work on the feedback or assignment as a group, this way they receive different perspectives and points of interest to improve their writing.
Want to know more about how to apply peer feedback? Read this tip about peerfeedback.
Tip 8: give ample space and time to apply feedback
To really learn from feedback, it is essential that your students have the opportunity to actually process it. Therefore, give them space and time to revise and improve their writing assignment, based on the feedback given. Support them so they know how to implement the feedback. Let them describe how they incorporated the feedback point by point.
Tip 9: create a database of common mistakes
A useful way to support your students in the writing process, is to create a database of common mistakes. By categorising these mistakes and providing explanations and suggestions for improvement, students can learn from others' mistakes and can avoid them in their own writing. You can also expand the file with examples of well-written assignments for inspiration.
Tip 10: use AI tools and language control software such as Writefull or even ChatGPT
Your students may use Microsoft Copilot or ChatGPT only if you, as a teacher, give explicit permission for it. AI chatbots can be used in a variety of ways in the writing process, for example: help with brainstorming, searching for information, learning to analyse or review text, structuring or summarizing a text, and providing suggestions for improvement. There are some risks associated with using chatbots, such as: fraud, content errors or privacy sensitivity (although the VU license for Microsoft Copilot resolves the main privacy concerns). Therefore, it is important to guide students in this. As a teacher, do you not allow the use of ChatGPT or Microsoft Copilot, or are you looking for an alternative? Then, refer students to the Writefull program. This is a language checking program specifically for English-language academic texts. VU Amsterdam and Writefull have entered into a Processing Agreement and the application complies with the General Data Protection Regulation (AVG).
Want to know more about ChatGPT in education? Read more on the Canvas Tools for Education page.
Sources:
- Wie schrijft, die blijft! Begeleiden van schrijfopdrachten | ExpertiseCentrum Hoger Onderwijs | Universiteit Antwerpen (uantwerpen.be) - Dutch only
- Broadhead, G. J. (1999). Addressing multiple goals for engineering writing: The role of course-specific websites. Language and Learning across the Disciplines, 3(2), 19–43.