Home > Grade Six Teachers' Responses to Narrative and Persuasive Writing
Sixth-Grade Teachers’ Written Comments
Grade Six Teachers’ Feedback on Girls’ and Boys’ Narrative and Persuasive Writing
Abstract
This study extends previous work examining teachers’ written feedback on students’ writing from postsecondary into elementary contexts. The objective was to determine the influence of genre and gender on teachers’ written feedback to sixth-grade authors of narrative and persuasive writing. We considered the quantity of comments and corrections, as well as the focus and mode of comments written by 108 teachers on four pieces of writing composed by two students.
There were significant differences between comments directed to the two types of writing. Process, conventions, artistic style, and format were the focus of significantly greater numbers of comments directed to narrative writing than to persuasive writing. In contrast, meaning, organization, effort, and ideology were emphasized to a greater degree when teachers responded to persuasive writing than to narrative writing.
There
were also gender differences: Teachers tended to indicate and make greater
numbers of corrections on writing attributed to boys, and to provide
more criticisms and lessons, explanations and suggestions when the work
was attributed to a male writer. Female teachers focused on conventions
and organization in contrast to male teachers’ tendency to focus more
on artistic style. In addition, female teachers generally wrote
greater numbers of comments and tended to indicate and make more corrections
than did male teachers. Our findings indicated a correlation between
convention errors and the number and types of comments, as well as teachers’
reluctance to engage with the ideologies in students’ writing.
Commenting on student writing is a widely used method for responding to student writing. With the intent of helping students to become “questioning readers” who “evaluate what they have written and develop control over their writing” (Sommers, 1982, p. 148), teachers spend long hours writing comments to student writers and making corrections to the students’ written texts. Recognizing the important contribution of teachers’ written feedback to students’ developing writing competence, extensive research has been conducted in this area. This paper furthers existing work by examining sixth-grade teachers’ written comments to papers attributed to female and male writers of narrative and persuasive writing. Previous research, conducted primarily at the post-secondary level, examined how teachers read and responded to student writing, made suggestions for the kinds of comments that are most helpful to students, and determined how students used the comments to revise their writing.
Yet, it cannot be assumed that the findings of previous research are readily generalized to elementary teachers and their classroom contexts. The types of feedback that are useful to college students may not be appropriate when responding to elementary students’ writing. Because elementary students are in the beginning stages of their development as writers, the elements of writing that elementary teachers emphasize in their instruction and assessment are necessarily different from those highlighted by college teachers. Furthermore, elementary teachers’ feedback influences the skills, attitudes and perspectives on what constitutes good writing that elementary students carry into their post secondary courses and beyond into their work lives. As such, the research reported in this paper contributes to the field by examining the responses of elementary school teachers to student writing.
In addition, this research brings new understandings to questions of gender and genre in student writing. These questions arise from writing assessment studies, such as that conducted by Peterson (2001), in which sixth-grade teachers scored narrative writing significantly higher than persuasive writing. The significance of the present study is also indicated in research examining developmental characteristics of elementary students’ narrative and informational writing (Chapman, 1994; Donovan, 2001; Kamberelis, 1999). These studies showed that the genre knowledge that primary students demonstrated in their writing was related to their exposure to various types of text and depended on the discursive needs that they attempted to satisfy through their writing. Added to the students’ lack of exposure to informational texts is teachers’ paucity of knowledge about children’s genre development. Donovan (2001) claimed that most teachers “are still left to fall back on their implicit knowledge or on pre-established forms, rather than being able to draw on an understanding of the elements that must be learned and on a general sense of how that learning occurs” (p. 396). There has been little research on teachers’ instructional practices supporting students’ informational writing development, particularly at the intermediate level, to back up Donovan’s claim, however (Tower, 2003).
Our research also addresses questions about gender differences that arise from the results of national, state and provincial tests. In Canada, Great Britain and the United States, there are consistent patterns showing girls outperforming boys in large-scale evaluations of elementary students’ writing (Council of Ministers of Education in Canada, 1998; EQAO, 2000b; Office of Educational Research and Improvement, 1995; Ohio Department of Education, 2000). Our study examines gender differences in teachers’ written comments in an effort to understand this persistent trend. It adds to existing research by extending the study of teachers’ written feedback on student writing to the elementary level and by examining gender and genre patterns in the feedback. Specifically, the study addresses these research questions:
1. How are the indicated corrections and the foci and modes of sixth-grade teachers’ written feedback on student writing similar and different when directed to two types of writing: narrative and persuasive?
2. What are the similarities and differences in the feedback applied to writing attributed to male and female sixth-grade writers?
3. What are the similarities and differences between female and male teachers’ feedback on persuasive and narrative writing attributed to female and male student writers?
Our
paper begins with a review of the relevant literature in three areas:
teachers’ written feedback, elementary students’ genre development,
and gender issues in writing assessment. Following a description
of the methods, we report our analysis of the written feedback of 108
sixth-grade teachers in terms of the many significant differences we
found in the comments directed to the two types of writing, and the
gender trends that were evident in the comments. We conclude with
a summary of key findings in terms of genre and the gender, followed
by a discussion of the implications for research arising from the study’s
findings and limitations.
Literature Review
Much of the literature on teachers’ response to student writing categorized teachers’ written comments, their use of praise, and students’ assessment of the usefulness of the feedback, predominantly at the postsecondary level. We synthesize this large field, as well as the research identifying differences between elementary students’ narrative and nonfiction writing that informs our comparison of feedback directed to the two types of writing. Finally, because our research questions address differences in female and male teachers’ feedback on writing composed by a girl and a boy, we review the literature on gender issues in writing assessment.
Our study aligns with a body of research that categorized teachers’ written feedback in an attempt to understand what teachers identified for their students as elements of good writing and teachers’ perceptions of their roles as readers and assessors of student writing. In the following synthesis of the literature, we give greatest attention to a study that was conducted with elementary teachers and to a study that delineated both the content and the function of teachers’ written feedback; two features that we determined were most appropriate for analyzing our data.
Searle and Dillon (1980) examined 135 pieces of students’ classroom writing on which 12 teachers of grades 4-6 had written their usual comments. They found that teachers responded to a much greater extent to the form of the writing than to its content. Almost all teachers tried to correct all of the convention errors (spelling, language usage, punctuation). The researchers concluded that teachers saw writing “as a practice in mastering forms of writing, beginning with a master of mechanics and developing a mastery of large structures. . . The message about language which seemed to be communicated was that it doesn’t matter what you say; what matters is how you say it” (p. 239-240). This study did not consider the influence of the type of writing, nor the gender of the teachers and the student writers in its conclusions. Because Searle and Dillon dichotomized the teachers’ comments in terms of their content, but not their function, their findings contribute to our understanding of teachers’ perceptions of good writing, but not to teachers’ views of their contributions to students’ writing development through their assessment.
Researchers who classified postsecondary teachers’ comments on student writing found “an accepted, albeit unwritten canon for commenting on student texts” (Sommers, 1982, p. 153). In these studies, teachers highlighted three features in their written feedback: those arising from the conventions of writing, those related to the use of register in a particular field, and those related to the students’ grasp of the subject (Anson, 1989; Connors & Lunsford, 1993; Freedman, 1979; Sommers, 1982).
The frequency of teachers’ use of praise was examined by many researchers who felt that praise was motivational and helped to temper students’ apprehension about writing (Bardine, Bardine & Deegan, 2000; Connors & Lunsford, 1993; Straub, 2000). In Connors and Lunsford’s (1993) study, teachers gave negative comments with more than twice the frequency that they gave positive comments. Positive comments tended to be the shortest and friendliest, often given to papers with A-level grades. In Smith’s (1997) study, 80% of the judging comments were positive, regardless of the grades that were assigned to the papers. Half the time, teachers used references to “the paper” or “organization”, etc., lessening the impact of the evaluation because the focus was not on the student. Teachers used “you” as the subject in 58% of the positively-worded statements, showing, perhaps, a desire to heighten the praise and the student’s active role in the achievement. Teachers wrote “There are” in 43% of negative evaluations of mechanics.
In their sample of 3000 papers that had been marked by college teachers, Connors and Lunsford, (1993) found that 77% had global comments (general evaluative comments found at the end or the beginning of the essays). Many teachers gave an initial critique of writing or genre conventions and then moved into positive commentary on successful elements of the writing. A number of teachers used comments in the margins to draw attention to specific elements of the writing. Only one-quarter of the comments argued or refuted any content points made in the paper. Teachers seemed “conditioned not to engage with student writing in personal or polemical ways” (p. 215).
Straub
(1997)’s study provided a useful protocol for analyzing our data.
He analyzed the focus and the mode (purpose) of the comments that first-year
university students thought were most helpful in their efforts to improve
their writing. In terms of focus, students in this study felt
that comments providing suggestions for improving the organization and
development of their writing were helpful. They were wary about
comments that questioned/criticized their ideas, however. They
appreciated the teachers getting involved with the subject and they
preferred specific, elaborated comments. In terms of mode, they
preferred advisory comments, praise, and open questions rather than
closed questions and criticism. They appreciated being advised
of errors if they also received recommendations for improving their
writing. Straub’s analysis framework allowed him to draw conclusions
about students’ perceptions of the roles that teachers should take
when responding to students’ writing, as well as the features that
they felt contributed significantly to good writing.
Genre Development in Elementary Classrooms
Early research on children’s writing development concluded that young children had a natural ability for narrative writing, but that further maturation was required in order for their informational writing abilities to be developed (Moffett, 1968, Britton, Burgess, Martin, McLeod, & Rosen, 1975). Britton et al., for example, proposed that children first learned narrative forms because stories were part of a child’s experience from a very early age. Indeed, Egan (1988) asserted that children could only make sense of their experience through story. Instructional implications arising from this research led to a proliferation of story reading and writing in elementary and preschool classrooms.
Researchers examining the writing of older elementary children confirmed that the children’s narrative writing development outstripped that of their competencies in writing informational text (Kamberelis, 1999; Langer, 1985). These researchers questioned, however, whether there were developmental explanations for these patterns, or whether the patterns indicated the lack of experience in writing non-narrative in the early grades of their schooling. Chapman’s (1994) research indicated that the latter is the more likely explanation. She found that young children integrated exposition, description and narrative into their writing, although not with the conscious awareness of adult writers. Similarly, kindergarten children in Pappas’s (1993) research on the elements of genre used in their pretend readings of narrative and informational texts exhibited their knowledge of features of both types of text. Correlating elementary students’ relatively lower competence in informational writing with the lack of opportunity to write in genres other than narrative, researchers in this field proposed that elementary teachers must begin to assign more informational writing in their classrooms.
Donovan (2001) attributed students’ difficulties in developing control of genres to the knowledge of children’s writing development that underpins writing instruction. In her study of students’ narrative and informational writing in grades K-5, the level of sophistication of students’ writing did not increase substantially after second grade. Donovan explained her findings in this way: “without a developmental understanding of all of the components of writing, teachers must simply rely on what they think makes writing better” (p. 439). In her view, educators need to know more about the development of children’s genre knowledge and about how they use this knowledge to write in a variety of contexts. Our study contributes to the field through identifying the features of two genres, narrative and persuasive writing, that sixth-grade teachers highlight in their feedback to students on their writing.
Previous research studies of grade 6 teachers’ writing assessment (Peterson, 1998) and grades 3, 6 and 9 teachers (Bainbridge, Peterson & Sumner, 1998) showed that teachers’ assessments of the quality of the writing were often influenced by their perceptions of the writer’s gender. There were no consistent gender patterns in teachers’ scoring of five narrative papers written by students at the grade level they taught, but there were significant differences in the scores for one sixth-grade paper. Teachers who thought the writer was a girl scored the writing significantly higher than those who thought the writer was a boy. In their identification of gender markers in student writing, teachers explained that girls used more descriptive words and phrases, more detail, wider vocabulary, and correct mechanics to a greater degree than boys did (Peterson, 1998). In the present study, we move beyond teachers’ scoring and identification of gender markers to their written feedback to writers identified as girls or boys.
Research
examining secondary and post secondary teachers’ evaluation of student
writing indicated a privileging of the linear, impersonal style traditionally
attributed to men’s persuasive writing over the contextual and committed
style typically attributed to women’s persuasive writing (Barnes,
1990; Haswell & Haswell, 1995; Roulis, 1995). When Barnes
(1990) and Roulis (1995) asked postsecondary writing instructors to
comment on essays written by male and female students, female teachers
wrote more comments than male teachers did. In Barnes’ (1990) study,
when the author was a male, female teachers requested information four
times more often than male teachers, but equally often for female authors.
Male teachers asked for more information from writers in Roulis’s
(1995) study. In both studies, male teachers were critical of
emotional writing, particularly that written by female writers.
Female teachers tended to be more focused on language, mechanics and
form. Furthering this body of research, in the present study we
compare and contrast the types of written feedback that female and male
teachers provide to sixth-grade writers identified as girls or boys
by the researchers.
Methods
We recruited sixth-grade teachers in schools from 17 public and Catholic school districts in the Canadian province of Ontario. After contacting principals to explain the project and to request the names of grade six teachers in their school, we telephoned teachers from each school, inviting their participation in the study. We sent packages containing the two narrative and two persuasive papers and a feedback form that had space for teachers’ comments to the students. We asked teachers to identify their sex, to indicate the number of years they had taught, and to mark or comment on the papers as they would had a student in their own class submitted the writing to them. The overall response rate was 52%. Of the 108 participants, 76 were female (70.4%) and 32 were male (29.6%). Almost a third (29.6%) had taught for less than five years, 39.8% had taught between five and 15 years, and 30.6% had taught for 15 years or more.
We assigned pseudonyms to the writers of each paper. Half of the participating teachers received a set of papers in which Melissa had written the soccer story and Andrew had written the environmental story. The other half of the teachers received surveys in which the two names had been reversed. Similarly, half of the teachers received surveys in which Jeremy had written “Home Sweet Home First Nations” and Kathryn had written “Native Case” and vice versa.
Two narrative papers and two persuasive papers served as the sample materials for this study. We selected papers from the assigned writing of sixth-grade students in one elementary classroom of 22 students. To ensure that the 108 teachers participating in the study would accept that a girl or a boy could have written the four papers, we asked 11 classroom teachers to read the narrative and persuasive papers from the selected grade six class and to guess the gender of the writers. The two narrative papers we included in the study were the ones for which most teachers showed great uncertainty in identifying the writer’s gender and/or for which there were very mixed perceptions of the writer’s gender. We then added the persuasive writing samples from the same two students to our research sample because the 11 teachers found it difficult to determine the gender of the writers of all of the persuasive papers. We selected a paper of each type written by the same boy and the same girl in order to compare the scores and evaluative comments given to two types of writing composed by one student. Although we did not edit the papers, we did have them type-written to control for the influence of girls’ and boys’ handwriting styles and the neatness of the writing on teachers’ assessment.
The narratives were about a dream and the persuasive papers considered the ongoing value of the Reserve system for First Nations people in Canada. The girl’s untitled narrative is about a dream in which the first person narrator plays on a school soccer team in a metal uniform. The inevitable injuries that result convince the coach that new uniforms are in order. Her persuasive paper is entitled, “Home Sweet Home First Nations.” The boy’s narrative, entitled “The Dream,” is about a group of children who win environmental awards on the last day of school. The next day they clean up a polluted creek, restoring the habitat of a family of ducks. His persuasive paper is entitled, “Native Case.” The students’ writing is found in the Appendix.
We tallied all the corrections that teachers made on the students’ writing, as well as the corrections that they indicated should be made. In addition, we counted the number of comments that each teacher wrote to each student.
We analyzed all of the comments twice using categories from a previous study (Straub, 1997, p. 98-99): focus and mode. Each comment was first analyzed in terms of its focus: meaning (comments referred to issues of communication and its clarity), conventions, organization, artistic style, effort, process, ideology, and formatting. We then categorized all the comments in terms of the following modes: correction and criticism, command, closed question, praise, open-ended question, reader response, and lesson, explanation or suggestion. Although Straub’s classification scheme was used to determine the types of comments that postsecondary students found most helpful, we used it to classify teachers’ comments because it was the most comprehensive of all the schemes previously used—focusing on the content and the function of the teachers’ comments. In addition, Straub’s focus categories matched most closely the provincial writing assessment criteria that teachers in Ontario use in their classrooms, so it contained terms that Ontario teachers were likely to use.
All comments were grouped according to the sex of the teacher writing the comment, the indicated gender of the student writer to which the comment was directed, and the type of writing—narrative or persuasive. Throughout the analysis process, we worked independently and then compared our analyses, clarifying rationales for particular categorizations when disagreements arose until we reached consensus. We coded the comments in terms of the identified gender of the writers to which the comments were directed and the type of writing, calculating percentages of comments directed to writers identified as girls and those identified as boys for each of the pieces of writing.
We then used a two-way ANOVA by teacher gender and ascribed student gender. To pursue our question about teachers' different responses to narrative and persuasive writing, we collapsed the variables for the two papers within each genre. We used paired-sample t-tests to compare the variables describing teachers' marking of narrative and persuasive texts. Our results of the t-tests are reported using Wilcoxin z scores.
As indicated in tables 1-5, there were numerous significant differences in the feedback that teachers directed to the two types of papers, narrative and persuasive and some gender patterns in the feedback. We report our findings using our three analysis categories: (1) numbers of comments and corrections indicated and made, (2) focus of comments and, (3) mode of comments. Within these three categories, we identify significant genre and gender differences and trends.
Genre differences
The
number of corrections indicated and made by teachers was significantly
higher for the narrative papers than for the persuasive papers: (Wilcoxon
z=8.30, p<.001 for the number of corrections indicated and z=7.80,
p<.001 for number of corrections made.) The Soccer story contained
many more convention errors than the other papers, so this finding is
not surprising.
Gender differences
There was a pattern of teachers making greater numbers of corrections on the two persuasive papers and the Soccer story when boys were identified as the authors. With a few exceptions, female teachers indicated and made more corrections than male teachers made on the student papers. Female teachers generally provided greater numbers of comments to writers, regardless of their identified gender, than did male teachers.
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Insert Tables 1 and 2 about here
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Overall,
teachers wrote the most comments about the meanings communicated in
the narrative and persuasive writing and the fewest comments about formatting
for the persuasive papers and about ideology for the narratives. Significant
gender interactions occurred in comments written to authors of the
Ducks story in three categories and for the Home Sweet Home
persuasive paper in two categories. In addition, significant differences
occurred in all focus categories when the comments written for narrative
and persuasive papers were compared. Table 3 shows the average
number of comments within each focus category written by female and
male teachers to writers identified as girls and boys. Table 5
highlights the significant differences within the focus and mode categories.
________________________________
Insert Tables 3 and 5 about here
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Genre differences – greater numbers of comments for narrative papers
The narrative papers received significantly more conventions comments than the persuasive papers [z=5.67, p<.001]. Most frequently, teachers wrote the following comments related to students’ use of writing conventions: “Keep consistent verb tense,” “Proper use of quotation marks,” and “This is not a sentence.”
The
number of comments regarding formatting was very small. Writers of the
narrative papers received significantly more formatting comments than
did writers of the persuasive papers [z=2.38, p<.05]. The Soccer
story received the greatest number of formatting comments, as teachers
wrote: “Incorporate header into the body of the story,” “good
use of bold,” and “try to link paragraphs together instead of subheading.”
Genre differences – greater numbers of comments for persuasive papers
Persuasive papers received significantly more meaning-focused comments than narrative papers [z=3.22, p<.001]. The most frequently-written comments about meaning were: “Does this support your position?” and “What do you mean?” Other comments included: “How do you know this?” and “Your ideas need further development as many details are left out.”
After meaning, artistic style was the focus of the greatest number of comments. The narratives received significantly greater numbers of comments about the writer’s artistic style (z=2.20, p<.05). The most frequently-written comments were: “Inappropriate language” [for the student’s word, “sucks”] and “Be positive!”
The persuasive papers received significantly greater numbers of comments with an organization focus than did the narrative papers [z=2.79, p<.01]. Most often, teachers wrote to students about the organization of their writing using these phrases: “You must keep one idea in each paragraph,” “solid progression of ideas,” and “Your opening needs a lot of work.” In addition, teachers wrote significantly more effort-related comments, such as “Well done” and “Good job,” to writers of the persuasive papers (z=2.04, p<.05).
Ideology
as a focus of teacher comments was practically non-existent for the
narrative papers, in spite of the environmental message within the
Ducks narrative. There were significantly more ideology-focused
comments for the persuasive papers [z=5.58, p<.001], but the commentary
rates were low. Comments tended to take these forms: “They had
problems before the Europeans arrived – just different ones,” “demonstrates
your awareness and sensitivity towards the environment,” “Is it
fair to speak for all First Nations People as one,” and “You’re
stereotyping.”
Gender differences
For the Ducks story, male teachers wrote significantly fewer meaning-focused comments than did the female teachers: [F(1,102)=4.53, p<.05]. When the writer was identified as a girl, teachers gave more comments related to meaning with the exception of the Soccer story, where the male teachers wrote more meaning comments when the writer was identified as a boy. The Ducks story elicited significantly greater numbers of organization-related comments from female teachers than it did from male teachers, particularly when the writer was identified as a boy: [F (1,104)=2.28, p <.05].
The Soccer story, with a much greater number of convention errors than any of the other papers, received more comments about conventions from female teachers whether it was attributed to a female or male writer. For the Ducks story, the number of conventions-related comments written by female teachers was significantly higher than that of male teachers. The number of comments that male teachers addressed to writers identified as boys was lower than those written to writers identified as girls. Female teachers wrote significantly fewer comments about conventions to writers identified as girls: [F(1,102)=4.23, p<.05]. This example of same sex appreciation is reversed in the Home Sweet Home persuasive paper. When attributed to a boy writer, this paper received more comments about writing conventions from male teachers. The number of conventions-related comments written to writers identified as boys by male teachers was significantly higher than those written to writers identified as girls: [F(1,99)=6.99, p<.01]. This is an example of same sex appreciation, as female teachers wrote slightly more conventions comments to writers identified as girls.
There were no gender patterns in teachers’ writing of comments within the Effort category. Another example of same sex appreciation occurred in the comments written to writers of the Home Sweet Home persuasive paper. Writers identified as girls received significantly more effort-related comments from female teachers and writers identified as boys received significantly more effort-related comments from male teachers [F(1, 99)=4.71, p<.05].
Teachers’
comments served a number of functions; to correct, criticize, command,
ask questions, provide an emotional (reader) response, or to explain,
suggest or teach. Table 4 shows the frequencies of comments
that we identified with each mode. With the greatest frequency,
teachers wrote comments that corrected or criticized students’ writing.
The mode that teachers used least in their feedback on the student writing
was reader response.
Genre differences – greater numbers of comments for narrative papers
Authors of narrative papers received significantly more suggestions, explanations or lessons than did authors of persuasive papers (z=2.98, p<.01). Such comments often took these forms: “Remember that when you write dialogue you must identify the speaker each time the speaker changes,” “To improve, use evidence from textbooks or newspapers to support your arguments,” and “You have two very different ideas here. Perhaps the second sentence could be incorporated into the next paragraph.”
The narrative papers received greater numbers of criticisms and corrections, and commands, mostly related to the great number of convention errors in the Soccer paper. Typical comments of this mode were “obviously a very rough draft that needs to be corrected” and “no apparent plan or purpose.” Teachers also wrote more commands to authors of the narratives than to authors of the persuasive papers. The command comments that teachers used most frequently were: “Rethink your ending,” “Be more specific,” and “Proof read and edit for spelling and grammar errors.”
Teachers
wrote few reader responses for any of the papers, although the rate
was marginally higher for the narrative papers than for the persuasive
ones. Responses in this category were dominated by “I liked …”
kinds of comments such as : “I like the way introduced your characters,”
“I thought you showed a strong commitment to this issue” and
“I enjoyed reading your story.”
Genre differences – greater numbers of comments for persuasive papers
The persuasive papers garnered significantly more praise then the narratives (z=2.56, p<.01). Most frequently, praise took these forms: “Your story is funny” and “An interesting story idea.”
Teachers
wrote very few closed questions. They asked the persuasive papers’
writers more open and closed questions than they asked narrative papers’
writers. Typical open-ended questions were “What is the point
of having the armor?” and “What does this mean?” Closed
questions most frequently took these forms: “Is this a new paragraph?”
and “Did you hand this in as a good copy?”
Gender differences
Writers identified as boys received significantly more corrections and criticisms on their Native Case persuasive paper than did writers identified as girls [F(1, 96)=4.25, p<.05], particularly from male teachers. For each of the four papers, male teachers wrote more correction and criticism comments to writers identified as boys.
Teachers frequently wrote explanations and suggestions, and provided short written lessons on particular elements of the writing. After corrections and criticisms, this category of comments appeared most frequently. Female and male teachers gave more explanations, suggestions and lessons to writers identified as boys than to writers identified as girls on all papers. This gender difference was significant for the Soccer story: [F(1,102)=7.92, p<.05].
The numbers of comments praising students’ writing showed same sex depreciation. Female teachers gave more praise to writers identified as boys for all four papers and male teachers tended to give more praise to writers identified as girls. For the Home Sweet Home persuasive paper, the differences were significant: F(1, 100)=6.13, p<.05.
There were gender patterns, as well. Papers attributed to male writers received more commands from male and female teachers for all papers except the Soccer story, where male teachers wrote more commands when the writer was identified as a girl. With one exception, female teachers wrote more open-ended questions when writers were identified as girls. Male teachers wrote more reader response comments to writers identified as girls than to writers identified as boys for all papers.
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Insert Table 4 about here
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We found significant differences in the number of errors identified and corrected in all of the focus categories and in two of the mode categories when conducting t-tests of the types of comments directed toward narrative and persuasive writing. Although we found few significant differences in the comparison of numbers of comments written by female and male teachers to writers identified as girls or boys, we found some interesting gender trends. These results provide some insight into the gender and genre questions outlined earlier.
Key Findings
Genre differences.
Teachers’ perceptions of “good writing” as applied to narrative writing were different from those applied to persuasive writing. Process, conventions, artistic style, and format were the focus of significantly greater numbers of comments directed to narrative writing than to persuasive writing. As explained later in the Limitations section, the abundance of process and conventions comments may have been affected by the large number of convention errors in the Soccer story so these results may be somewhat skewed. In contrast, meaning, organization, effort, and ideology were emphasized to a greater degree when teachers responded to persuasive writing than to narrative writing. These emphases, particularly the organization and ideology foci, are consistent with the communicative, rhetorical and structural demands of persuasive writing (Kamberelis, 1999).
The
mode of the commands did not vary as greatly in comments directed to
the two types of writing. Teachers’ significantly greater use
of praise for the persuasive papers and of suggestions, lessons and
explanations for the narrative papers could be attributed to the imbalance
of convention errors in the one narrative paper, as readily as it could
be attributed to the differences in genre. The influence of the
convention errors extended to the number of errors identified and corrected,
as the numbers were significantly greater for narrative papers than
for persuasive papers.
Gender differences in comments directed to writers identified as boys or girls
Although there were few significant differences in the comment modes when compared by the perceived gender of the students, there were trends in the data. Teachers’ perceptions of girls as better writers than boys (Peterson, 1998) correlated with teachers’ tendencies in the present study to indicate and make greater numbers of corrections on writing attributed to boys, to criticize, to give more lessons, suggestions and explanations and to issue more commands to writers identified as boys. Male and female teachers may have noticed the errors in writing attributed to boys more often because they were expecting to see them. Similarly, teachers may have written more explanations, suggestions and lessons to writers identified as boys because they felt that boys were more likely to need the additional support for their writing.
Gender differences: Teachers
Female and male teachers highlighted different features of students’ writing in their comments. Roulis’s (1995) finding that female teachers focused on conventions and organization in contrast to male teachers’ tendency to focus more on artistic style was consistent to some degree with our findings. In addition, as in Barnes’ (1990) and Roulis’s (1995) study, female teachers generally wrote greater numbers of comments than did male teachers. Female teachers tended to indicate and make more corrections than male teachers made, as well.
In terms of teachers’ use of praise and criticism, there was a pattern of same-sex depreciation, similar to that of previous research (Etaugh, Houtler, & Ptasnik, 1988; Haswell & Haswell, 1996). Male teachers corrected and criticized writing attributed to boys to a greater degree than that attributed to girls. They tended to praise writing attributed to girls more than writing attributed to boys. In contrast, women praised writing attributed to boys more than they praised writing attributed to girls.
Limitations
The paucity of information about the student writers and the restricted context for the teachers’ assessments presented limitations to this study. The teachers participating in this study were not the two students’ classroom teachers, so they did not know the students. They also were not aware of the circumstances surrounding the students’ writing of each piece, nor the authors’ intentions for the writing. A number of teachers asked the researchers if the Soccer story really had been handed in to the teacher as a final draft, for example. In addition, teachers were at a disadvantage because they did not have a real-life context for providing the feedback—a perhaps unavoidable issue in any study as the special circumstances of a research study inevitably create a false environment in which the participants act.
Teachers gave greater numbers of comments about conventions to writers of the narratives than to writers of the persuasive papers. Because most of the process comments referred to the need to edit or proofread, it is possible that the skewed number of convention errors influenced this finding. In addition, the persuasive papers received significantly more praise and significantly fewer suggestions, lessons and explanations than the narrative papers. Teachers also wrote fewer corrections, criticisms and commands to writers of the persuasive papers, which had fewer convention errors. In this respect, the anomalous number of errors in this paper presents a limitation to our study. However, this anomaly in the sample papers also points to the strong influence that convention errors have on teachers’ feedback.
Implications
The limitations of this study, a preliminary look at gender and genre influences on teachers’ written feedback to student writers, indicate numerous avenues for further study. In this research, there was a correlation between the number of convention errors and the focus and mode of teachers’ feedback. These findings have turned our attention to new questions about the influence of convention errors on teachers’ writing assessment. If conventions are consciously or unconsciously given disproportionate weighting, it is important to investigate ways to address the imbalance.
Although large numbers of teachers participated in this study, all that we know about the teachers is whether they are male or female, their number of years teaching, and their perceptions of the four samples of writing as demonstrated in their scores and feedback on the writing. The research findings could be enriched with more information about the teachers’ views on writing and writing assessment, their perceptions of boys’ and girls’ writing, the types of writing they assign, and their typical assessment and feedback practices. Future research might provide teachers with information about the writing context and the student writers, as well. It follows, also, that future research should examine the impact of the comments on students’ self-efficacy as writers and on their future writing. Questions such as the following might guide this research: (1) How do girls and boys interpret their teachers’ written feedback? (2) How do students use the feedback in future writing? (3) What types of feedback do students find helpful for various types of writing?
Future research should also explore the differential ways in which female and male teachers respond to student writing. This study replicated Barnes’s (1990) and Roulis’s (1995) findings that female teachers write more comments and make more corrections than male teachers. It also replicated Haswell and Haswell’s (1996) same-sex depreciation patterns in terms of the amount of praise and criticism that teachers give to students of their sex, although we found evidence of same-sex appreciation in conventions and effort comments directed toward one persuasive paper, as well. A deeper understanding of these ongoing patterns could be the goal of further research.
Our research design did not allow us to examine teachers’ decision-making processes while they assessed the writing and wrote comments. We do not know why the predominant mode of the comments was corrections and criticisms, for example. Nor can we explain why many teachers attempted to correct all convention errors in each of the student writing samples; a finding also observed in Searle and Dillon’s (1980) research. An examination of teachers’ expectations for good writing of various types at their grade level, and what they see as their role in responding to student writing is indicated. In addition, further research into the range of genres students are expected to master, teacher expectations of student ability with various genres, and how assessment practices vary across genres would add insight to our understanding of writing assessment in elementary grades. Interviews with teachers to find out what motivated their written comments, and “think-alouds” recorded while teachers respond to student writing could provide a starting point for such research.
Although three of the four papers in the present study had strong ideological themes, teachers’ engagement with the ideologies in their comments was minimal, replicating the findings of Connors and Lunsford’s (1993) research with college instructors. In the two persuasive papers, a few teachers identified problematic content regarding stereotypes about First Nations people, but most teachers overlooked these issues. We wonder if teachers commonly disengage from the ideological content of student writing in an attempt to avoid bias in the subjective process of writing assessment. We speculate that, as teachers of young writers, participants may have been intent on ensuring that students master the rudiments of writing, prioritizing elements such as artistic style, organization, form, meaning, conventions, and process over the ideological content of the writing, but there may be other explanations for this pattern. These issues are central to teachers as they read their students’ writing and provide feedback to students, and to researchers in the field of writing assessment.
Our study brings together issues of gender, genre and writing assessment in new ways. Because of the study’s preliminary nature, its contributions to the field lie primarily in the questions it raises. Issues of interest to educators and researchers who strive for gender equity in writing instruction and assessment and for enhancing all students’ development as writers across a broad range of genres stem from this study: (1) the need for teachers to examine their responses to girls’ and boys’ writing, (2) the influence of convention errors on teachers’ responses to student writing, (3) the efficacy of correcting all errors in students writing, (4) teachers’ expectations for students’ writing within various genres, and (5) teachers’ engagement with the ideologies in students’ writing.
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Table 1: Comparison of Means of Comments by Type of Writing
| Type of Comment | Narrative Papers | Standard Deviation | Persuasive Papers | Standard Deviation |
| Total numbers of comments | 8.65 | 4.49 | 8.13 | 4.49 |
| Greater
numbers for Narrative Papers Number of errors identified* |
31.29 | 22.55 | 7.05 | 7.07 |
| Number of errors corrected* | 22.13 | 20.94 | 5.79 | 6.73 |
| Conventions focus* | 1.42 | 1.47 | .54 | .65 |
| Process focus* | .73 | .65 | .24 | .39 |
| Artistic style focus*** | 1.94 | 1.50 | 1.61 | 1.22 |
| Format focus*** | .17 | .35 | .07 | .25 |
| Suggestions,
lessons,
explanations mode** |
1.81 | 1.31 | 1.43 | 1.33 |
| Corrections/criticism mode | 2.76 | 2.64 | 2.64 | 2.39 |
| Command mode | .97 | 1.05 | .89 | 1.15 |
| Response mode | .28 | .55 | .22 | .39 |
| Greater
numbers for Persuasive Papers
Meaning focus* |
1.99 | 1.83 | 2.63 | 2.17 |
| Ideology focus* | .06 | .19 | .55 | .92 |
| Organization focus** | 1.31 | 1.22 | 1.67 | 1.28 |
| Effort focus*** | .14 | .30 | .21 | .35 |
| Praise mode** | 1.70 | 1.45 | 2.02 | 1.50 |
| Open questions mode | .79 | 1.14 | .85 | 1.23 |
| Closed questions mode | .33 | .56 | .43 | .69 |
* p<.001
** p<.01
** *p<.05
Table 2: Tallies of Comments and Corrections By Identified Gender of Student Writer and Gender of Teacher Responder
| Teacher Gender | Soccer Story | Ducks Story | Native Case Persuasive | Home Sweet Home Persuasive | |||||
| Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | ||
| Number of Comments | Male | 8.78 | 8.23 | 4.31 | 9.28 | 6.00 | 9.50 | 10.93 | 8.81 |
| Female | 10.10 | 9.15 | 7.06 | 8.44 | 6.08 | 6.94 | 8.88 | 9.76 | |
| Number of corrections indicated | Male | 40.39 | 29.08 | 16.46 | 27.11 | 5.87 | 4.86 | 8.21 | 6.69 |
| Female | 46.85 | 31.88 | 19.35 | 26.56 | 6.54 | 5.63 | 8.22 | 8.43 | |
| Number of corrections made | Male | 25.83 | 18.85 | 13.62 | 21.28 | 5.00 | 3.71 | 6.07 | 4.94 |
| Female | 30.51 | 22.71 | 14.12 | 21.39 | 5.49 | 4.91 | 7.13 | 6.81 | |
Table 3: Average Number of Focus Comments By Identified Gender of Student Writer and Gender of Teacher Responder
| Teacher Gender | Soccer Story | Ducks Story | Native Case Persuasive | Home Sweet Home Persuasive | |||||
| Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | ||
| Meaning | Male | 2.94 | 2.31 | .23* | 1.83 | 1.80 | 3.00 | 3.15 | 3.44 |
| Female | 2.46 | 2.53 | 1.44 | 1.51 | 2.10 | 2.16 | 3.00 | 3.07 | |
| Conventions | Male | 1.44 | 1.15 | .62* | 1.67 | .00 | .57 | 1.62* | .56 |
| Female | 1.51 | 1.71 | 1.53 | 1.07 | .18 | .31 | .72 | .83 | |
| Formatting | Male | .17 | .46 | .15 | .11 | .00 | .14 | .23 | .19 |
| Female | .17 | .29 | .09 | .07 | .03 | .03 | .03 | .10 | |
| Organization | Male | 1.22 | .85 | .46* | 1.17 | .93 | 1.64 | 2.15 | 1.88 |
| Female | 1.76 | .79 | 1.38 | 1.59 | 1.33 | 1.06 | 1.94 | 2.31 | |
| Artistic Style | Male | 1.39 | 2.08 | 2.38 | 1.61 | 2.07 | 1.57 | 1.69 | 1.94 |
| Female | 1.98 | 1.94 | 2.00 | 1.85 | 1.64 | 1.50 | 1.03 | 1.93 | |
| Effort | Male | .11 | .08 | .08 | .33 | .13 | .21 | .31* | .06 |
| Female | .07 | .21 | .09 | .12 | .26 | .09 | .16 | .33 | |
| Process | Male | 1.00 | 1.00 | .31 | .78 | .33 | .29 | .23 | .38 |
| Female | 1.10 | .88 | .24 | .49 | .23 | .03 | .18 | .38 | |
| Ideology | Male | .00 | .00 | .00 | .17 | .73 | .93 | .54 | .25 |
| Female | .00 | .06 | .12 | .10 | .31 | .75 | .66 | .48 | |
Table 4: Average Numbers of Mode Comments By Identified Gender of Student Writer and Gender of Teacher Responder
| Teacher Gender | Soccer Story | Ducks Story | Native Case Persuasive | Home Sweet Home Persuasive | |||||
| Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | Writer Identified as Male | Writer Identified as Female | ||
| Correction and Criticism | Male | 3.33 | 1.46 | 3.39 | .92 | 3.47* | 1.42 | 3.53 | 2.00 |
| Female | 2.83 | 2.74 | 2.80 | 2.97 | 1.66 | 1.60 | 3.00 | 4.06 | |
| Commands | Male | .67 | .77 | 1.00 | .38 | 1.24 | .75 | 1.24 | .46 |
| Female | 1.22 | 1.12 | 1.24 | .56 | .88 | .73 | 1.20 | .61 | |
| Closed Questions | Male | .44 | .62 | .11 | .23 | .59 | .50 | .59 | .08 |
| Female | .61 | .18 | .12 | .32 | .44 | .40 | .37 | .52 | |
| Praise | Male | 1.00 | 1.92 | 1.78 | 1.77 | 1.71 | 1.83 | 2.18* | 3.15 |
| Female | 1.85 | 1.38 | 1.76 | 1.65 | 1.88 | 1.43 | 2.73 | 1.67 | |
| Open-ended Questions | Male | .83 | 1.08 | .72 | .23 | .47 | .58 | 1.35 | .85 |
| Female | .73 | 1.26 | .61 | .59 | .73 | .40 | 1.29 | .88 | |
| Reader Response | Male | .22 | .46 | .17 | .23 | .12 | .25 | .29 | .38 |
| Female | .27 | .38 | .29 | .18 | .24 | .13 | .20 | .27 | |
| Lessons, explanations or suggestions | Male | 2.50* | 1.77 | 1.56 | .85 | 1.76 | .92 | 1.88 | 1.38 |
| Female | 2.71 | 1.47 | 1.63 | 1.24 | 1.68 | .80 | 2.02 | .82 | |
Table 5: Significant Gender Interactions: Focus and Mode of Comments
| Title of Writing | Focus/Mode Category | Teacher Gender | Number of comments for writer identified as boy | Number of comments for writer identified as girl | F Value | |
| More Comments for Writers Identified as Girls | Ducks story | Meaning | Male | .23 | 1.83 | 4.53 |
| Female | 1.44 | 1.51 | ||||
| Ducks story | Organization | Male | .46 | 1.17 | 2.28 | |
| Female | 1.88 | 1.59 | ||||
| More Comments for Writers Identified as Boys | Native Case persuasive | Correction & criticism | Male | 3.47 | 1.42 | 4.25 |
| Female | 1.66 | 1.60 | ||||
| Lessons, explanations and suggestions | Male | 2.50 | 1.77 | 7.92 | ||
| Female | 2.71 | 1.47 | ||||
| Same sex appreciation | Home Sweet Home persuasive | Conventions | Male | 1.62 | .56 | 6.99 |
| Female | .72 | .83 | ||||
| Home Sweet Home persuasive | Effort | Male | .31 | .06 | 4.71 | |
| Female | .16 | .33 | ||||
| Same sex depreciation | Ducks story | Conventions | Male | .62 | 1.67 | 4.23 |
| Female | 1.53 | 1.07 | ||||
| Home Sweet Home persuasive | Praise | Male | 2.18 | 3.15 | 6.13 | |
| Female | 2.73 | 1.67 |
p<.05 in all cases
Appendix:
Student Writing Used in the Study (typed exactly as students wrote the
papers)
Narrative
#1 (written by a girl)
Hi, I’m Melissa. I am 11 years old, I have brown hair, brown eyes and I love soccer. I play on a indoor soccer team called West-view. We wear blue shirts and black shorts. We have a well developed team. I casually play forefront. With Vanessa’s hard kicks, Max’s goal saves, plus Mario and Christian’s goals were sure to win the play offs.
A while a go I had a dream. It was so strange, we were playing a hard competitve game of soccer, in METAL!
My Dream Was The Future
We were in a bright yellow gym, it has basket ball nets on each side of the gym. It also contanied a lion print in the middle of the floor. There was a skinny red line at the top and bottom, that went around the walls. The team and I were standing in the far right corner and all you heard was “Haahaa”! “No, no I’m not wearing metal, you can’t make me!” I hollered has our coach was explaining the horafing news. “how are we sposte to run when were wearing gard glothes.””Melissa come down we want you to be saff. “The metal will protect you if you fall.” My coach constencly said. “It’s not going to protect us if it rains, we’ll rust.” Everyone craked up at Mario’s joke. “ Melissa please give it a chance today, PPPPLLLLEEEEAAASSSSEEEE.” My coach was on his knees I had to say yes. I went to the bathroom and changed.
There were four layers of silver armer and to top it off it fit tight. When I got back in the gym I was able to take off two layers. It was lighter.
“Let the Games Begin”
“Melissa, Christian forefront, Vannessa, Mario defence, Max net.” Coach screamed.
The spokes person started speaking and the game began. “Christian kicks the ball it hits the oppiste team Melissa get’s it she shuts and hits the goalies head in goes the ball.” “the new costumes seem to be better than ever!” “Switch!” yelled the coach. The next four went on. “Nice goal.” My friend Vanessa wispered in to my ear. Vannessa’s Portugal she has short brown hair & brown eyes. Her eye’s caputure people’s attention. “Ok” I wispered back.
“Melissa, Vannessa forefront now.” We were back in the game.
The Spokesperson started speaking again.
“Defence kicks it and wait a second he fell, he’s hurt.” “The coach came to the conclusion that the game was over!” “West-view wins a big one to nothing.” “Good bye till next time.” “Don’t say I didn’t but I told you so, does this mean it’s not safe “And we don’t have to wear if anymore? Said Mario in pain. “I guess so said our coach. “YYYYEEESS!” Everyone was happy.
That
was the end of my dream. Well that was the future not the present!
Gota go I have a big game bye.
Persuasive Paper #1 (written by a girl)
Home Sweet Home First Nations
In today’s world many First Nations people in Canada live on reserves. These First Nations speak different languages. They live in tribes. Each tribe has a different belief. The were the First to live in Canada. When the white Canadians came, the government gave the First Nations a bit of land where they will continue their lives. I believe they should have their own land in order to maintain their lifestyle.
Living on reserves, they experience what their brave, courageous ancestors went through, including the good and bad. They're teaching the young, curious children about their religion. First Nations believe that a religion is what a good, reliable family needs. While being the First on the Canadian land the First nations are used to the food, weather, and fresh air. Many people have questions as to who they are? And where they come from? On reserves the First Nations know the answers. When not on reserves these people are not treated with as much respect as other Canadians. That is wrong. They do this because they stereotype natives. On the other hand, when on reserves they are all treated the same. Being proud of who they are. Also on reserves their family members are buried, which makes it sacred to them. However, another reason reserves are needed is to avoid over modernization of the First Nation’s natural land.
These First Nations fish, hunt, and farm to receive their food. Knowing when it comes and where to get it. The First Nations enjoy fishing and hunting, which they cannot do in the city Because such an environment is not available. These reserves give the First Nations a place where they could be themselves by building a fire during the winter, and masked dancers participate in ceremonial dances. The First Nations should have control over their own affairs. Over 75% of Canadian Indian bands now administer all or parts of their education program. Preserving native language is an essential part of their education. Furthermore, on reserves they are not ridiculed for their beliefs and religion. These people think like us, they might have different beliefs, but they are human. Nothing is wrong with them. This land is, as you know, like a cemetery to them. Their families are buried on the land. Would you like someone to go the cemetery and dig up your family members? I think NOT! Just imagine what would happen to that land if they were to live like us. That land would be dug up and a city would be built. All the trees would be knocked down and the beautiful living land would be destroyed. Why are Canadians intruding in their space?
Never the less, some Canadians stereotype natives thinking all they do is drink and do drugs on the reserves. Furthermore, living in a normal Canadian society will provide greater employment opportunities.
This will lead to higher standards of living as they will be able to provide for and support their families. Moreover, the increased feeling of satisfaction about their lives will lower the suicide rate. With the support of the Canadian society their living conditions will improve to Canadian Public Health standards and decrease such health hazards when not on reserves. Furthermore, the education that all native children receive is and has been second-rate. Most First Nations who utilize Canadian government services should pay taxes like all Canadians and enjoy the benefits of tax programs.
First Nations have a choice to stay on reserves or to live in regular Canadian society. Their decision affects how they live and their desire to govern themselves. By knowing how important the First Nation’s culture is to them, I support the decision of keeping reserves. While staying on reserves they will be able to keep the First Nations’s traditions alive.
With reserves the First Nations’s
history may be lost.
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