The two additional chapters I read were: “When Responding to Student Writing, More is Better” by Muriel Harris and “Failure is Not An Option” by Allison D. Carr.

The piece by Harris discusses the expectations surrounding extensive written comments in response to their writing and the conviction that students learn from these comments. Harris argues that over-grading papers is both a waste of a teacher’s time and often not effective for student learning. The reasons she lays out for students not learning from these comments as much is assumed by teachers, administrators and parents are: 1) Students not understanding teacher jargon, i.e. words like coherence, transitions, sentence variety; 2) A lack of hierarchy to the feedback that results in students being unsure of what feedback is most important and then tending to what seems easiest vs more structural issues. Other reasons Harris gives for extensive feedback not being worth the time or effort are that often it is given online which has proven to be less effective for comprehension and retention and the fact that if revision isn’t required, there will be no effort to take in the feedback. Harris’s solution is to give fewer comments that can result in the student concentrating on specific aspects of their work to improve. Another solution Harris offers is to not grade all writing which she says takes the pressure off and allows the student to get feedback elsewhere such as peer groups and writing centers. I find Harris’s argument useful in that revision can be overwhelming and the more do-able it seems, the better. This piece seems to compliment Jimmy Butts’ piece, “The More Writing Process, the Better” in that Butts argues that “making writing achievable and real is the goal.” (112)

Allison D. Carr’s piece, “Failure Is Not An Option” argues that scholars and teachers should embrace the word failure and welcome it as a concept that provides “permission to make a mess, to throw something away, to try thirty different ideas instead of toiling away on one.” (79) She discusses the cultural roots and attitudes of the word failure in relation to social and economic power structures and offers an alternate view where failure is inherently connected to risk, innovation and resilience. Carr advocates for writing classrooms to be experimental laboratories where failure is an option and is normalized.

It is interesting to think about Carr’s piece in relation to Wardle’s piece (“You Can Learn to Write in General”). Wardle discusses how writers must think about the “context, audience, purpose, medium, history and values of the community” in each situation they are writing in. In arguing that “there is no such thing as writing in general,” Wardle concludes that this “gives all writers permission to keep learning, to fail, and to engage in new kinds of writing in new situations.” (32)

Wardle’s conclusion about the permission to fail is in the context of needing to engage in continuous learning about the context writers enter. Carr’s conclusion about normalizing failure is to encourage risk and innovation and perseverance. Both are distinct and valuable and resonate as helpful frames for how to think about writing.