An Interesting Observation I thought I'd Share
Hi All,
I just finished grading a set of papers, where I asked my students to discuss their writing habits. As part of that assignment, nearly all--I'd say about 40 out of 43 or 44 (90-91%) in two different sections of 101--said that they were a procrastinator when it comes to writing. I thought it was fascinating that such a large percentage of students would identify that as a "writing habit." (The ones who didn't say they were procrastinators were fantastic writers, by the way, with an advanced understanding of their composing process).
From reading these essays, I think that in most cases "procrastination" means "I don't know how to begin writing," although in others, it's just plain ol' procrastination. But here's an interesting example of when procrastination seems to be something more: As part of the course, students are asked to give a presentation that summarizes and responds to a text on writing. One student stated she wanted to present as soon as possible so that it wasn't hanging over her head. And yet, when she was writing this paper, she identified herself as a procrastinator. When I gave her my comments and her grade today (Friday), she said that she would have revisions to me by Monday. Clearly this student is a self-starter and not a procrastinator. She has some other habit or tendency that is hiding behind the term "procrastination."
So what do you think? I'm wondering if this is some sort of statistical anomaly, or if this is true of a much larger population.
I just finished grading a set of papers, where I asked my students to discuss their writing habits. As part of that assignment, nearly all--I'd say about 40 out of 43 or 44 (90-91%) in two different sections of 101--said that they were a procrastinator when it comes to writing. I thought it was fascinating that such a large percentage of students would identify that as a "writing habit." (The ones who didn't say they were procrastinators were fantastic writers, by the way, with an advanced understanding of their composing process).
From reading these essays, I think that in most cases "procrastination" means "I don't know how to begin writing," although in others, it's just plain ol' procrastination. But here's an interesting example of when procrastination seems to be something more: As part of the course, students are asked to give a presentation that summarizes and responds to a text on writing. One student stated she wanted to present as soon as possible so that it wasn't hanging over her head. And yet, when she was writing this paper, she identified herself as a procrastinator. When I gave her my comments and her grade today (Friday), she said that she would have revisions to me by Monday. Clearly this student is a self-starter and not a procrastinator. She has some other habit or tendency that is hiding behind the term "procrastination."
So what do you think? I'm wondering if this is some sort of statistical anomaly, or if this is true of a much larger population.
posted by Brad Smith @ 3:09 PM
2 Comments:
At 4:36 PM,
Susan said…
Sounds like a research project and a conference presentation to me!
At 6:05 PM,
Rachild said…
Brad, when I signed with BSB i got added to their author's web group. It has been very busy with e-mails coming every few minutes at times (everything from how hot Helen Mirren is to whether as is really just a number). When another new author asked if the list was always this busy one of the veteran authors responded that the group was only this busy when people were working on something, not becuase that is when the need the help of other authors, but because it is a favorite procrastination tool.
These people are all professional writers but they are still looking for distractions and they seem to really revel in it. I'm not sure why, but the trend you noticed isn't just confined to students.
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