Writing to Learn

Writing-to-learn asks students to use writing the way most professionals and academics do: to organize, memorize, digest, expand, simplify, connect and manipulate ideas, facts, concepts and systems. It is the informal, non-evaluated, "figuring things out" use of writing we all do, and usually is not graded -- or counts only as a small percentage of the overall grade.

Writing-to-learn techniques benefit students in two ways:

1. they improve students' general understanding of course content, encouraging increased class participation and enhancing exam performance;
2. students' improved understanding of specific ideas and concepts leads to better performance on formal writing assignments.

Writing-to-learn gives students room to play with unformed ideas. Writing-to-learn exercises work well when they are informally read by classmates and/or the instructor. They do not have to be formally graded by the instructor.