by Stephen
Teens See Disconnect Between Personal and School Writing
April 29, 2008 in Education by Stephen
Did we really need a study to prove this?
Students see a distinction between the writing they do for school and the writing they do in their personal lives. While the vast majority of 12- to 17-year-olds (85 percent) engage in some form of electronic writing–IM, e-mail, blog posts, text messages, etc.–most (60 percent) don’t consider this actual writing. That’s one of the findings from a study released last week by the Pew Internet & American Life Project and the National Commission on Writing for America’s Families, Schools and Colleges.
The study, Writing, Technology and Teens, involved 700 students aged 12 to 17 and their parents, who were polled via phone in November 2007. It also included data collected from focus groups conducted in summer 2007 in four different cities in the United States.
According to the study, 73 percent of the teens surveyed said their electronic communications have no impact on on their formal (school) writing, and 63 percent said that “using computers to write makes no difference in the quality of the writing they produce” outside of school assignments. A full 93 percent of students do engage in some form of writing outside school, whether electronic or otherwise.
However, 57 percent of the teens surveyed said they do edit and revise their work more when they write on a computer–whether that writing be for school or not–and 64 percent admitted that conventions from their informal writing do creep into their formal writing occasionally (such as the use of emoticons and common abbreviations, like LOL).
Of course the problem with surveys (self report from teens and their parents) is that kids may not think that something is impacting them, when in fact it is.
It would have been interesting in this study to also talk to the teachers of these students to see what THEY have observed, comparing the students who are low/middle/high use with the teacher evaluation of writing. (But that would have been more expensive to conduct as a study.)
Other studies, of students who write emails in school two times a week as part of class assignments, show that student writing does improve on state standardized writing tests. (done in Newark, NJ with ePals as the student email system used)
The hard part in any of these studies is really measuring “how much” is being done when it’s being reported, not observed. That said, the Pew group does conduct some fascinating research that K12 teachers should know about.