Collaborative Learning

In "Collaborative Pedagogy" Rebecca Moore Howard provides a blue print for constructing a group writing assignment. Howard not only gives specific guidelines on choosing an assignment and collaborative methods, but also puts in place a contingency plan for the probable difficulties a collaborative writing team will face. As one who has experienced first hand the pitfalls and eventual collapse of group writing, I would say that Howard's insight in teaching such an assignment is absolutely vital. Had the students in our class been empowered through collaborative brainstorming and peer review (as Howard suggests before assigning group writing projects), I think the experience would have been much more productive and rewarding.

Interestingly, Howard examines writing as being collaborative in foundation, theorized by Charlotte Thralls. According to Thralls, active readers function as collaborative partners; the writer's sense of anticipated audience constitutes a form of collaboration; the community in which it is aimed contributes constraining (and enabling) conventions such as word choice, tone, organization; and sources that the writer has read exert their influence (55). All of this, Howard explains, is not an alternative form of composition pedagogy but an accurate reflection of the true nature of writing (55). These ideas are tough to argue against. I have read more than once in the selected essays thus far that audience is key in the development of composition in regards to content, organization, and word choice. The reader, therefore, unknowingly acts as reviewer, editor, and judge of content before anything has been written.

On the other hand one might say that all writing is self-contextualized through a traditional hierarchy of instruction. Never mind for a minute the idea of mental conversation with a collaborative audience. Once students are put into a group, a leader will emerge (usually the most knowledgeable person) who will impose their skill that the others lack yet will learn from. The professor, though encouraging group output, is still mandating the methods of the assignment while relying on the brighter students to teach the struggling ones. I guess I'm getting into the semantics of collaborative learning/writing because I feel that all learning is both collaborative and self-realized.