Article Analysis

Minchew, S. S. and McGrath, V. R.  (2001). Lasting benefits of cooperative editing for remedial freshman composition students: A follow-up study.  Community College Journal of Research and Practice 25. 591-606.

Minchew and McGrath (2001) highlight what they see as “[a] growing problem in higher education,” a challenge I face each semester as writing teacher of “the increasing number of students entering college underprepared for college-level work” (591).  At Parkland many of these underprepared students enter college writing through a series of developmental courses, one that I often teach.  It is with this teaching in mind that I sought out research specifically focused on community colleges.  Minchew and McGrath (2001) have focused on developing an editing approach for community college students to use.  Although the statistical analysis completed by the authors is encouraging, the tools they developed to analyze their students’ writing errors are what I find most interesting.

As a part of their first study, Minchew and McGrath (2001) developed a set of charts that they used to track the types of writing errors students made as a class and individually.  They recommend that instructors use these charts to help tailor both their instruction and the focus of cooperative editing groups.  In my instructional practice I often identify common errors to discuss with the class.  However, Minchew and McGrath (2001) offer a more systematic approach for tracking errors and structuring cooperative editing around these errors.  Being able to form peer groups based on these errors seems like it could be a powerful way to structure cooperative feedback.  I have often thought about grouping students based on writing strengths and weaknesses so they can more effectively help one another.  Minchew and McGrath (2001) offer a clear way to create such groups.