Mark Shea
Assignments & Activities Archive
Activity Description
In my writing classroom, I want students to approach revising and polishing with the idea that there is benefit to trying different phrasings and sentence structures. Even if their current writing works, the only way to know if there’s a better version is to try new versions and see how they feel. Many students are hesitant to engage in this type of work, and when they reflect on why, they express concern that their new versions might not be an improvement, and may even undo the acceptable work they’ve already accomplished. In response, I have tried to cultivate an approach that frames sentence-level revision as a form of linguistic play, rather than a process of correction or improvement. Playfulness can still benefit from structure, and this activity provides students with an inventory of English clause patterns. Before they apply these patterns to their own work, students identify these clause patterns in course readings, and explore how these grammatical structures contribute to meaning. This language-focused activity does not aim to push students toward a standard, but rather to identify space for creativity and linguistic difference. In Whitney Gegg-Harrison’s essay on “playful, productive curiosity about language,” she connects the use of language play in the writing classroom with an ethos that celebrates linguistic diversity. For instructors interested in similar approaches, the learning outcomes for this activity are organized within a Critical Language Awareness framework (Shapiro).