Lindemann, Chapter 13

I found this chapter on developing writing assignments very helpful. She begins by saying “Because each composition represents a response to a specific “invitation” to write, the problem in many papers may be the fault, not of the writer, but of the assignment” (213). This point cannot be emphasized enough. For me, when I was teaching high school it was a trial and error process. I wished I had Lindemann’s advice back then, as it would have saved me a great deal of grief. For me, I was always in a rush to get my students to start writing that I did not often give my assignments the meticulous thought and preparation that it required. When this happens, as Lindemann also remarks, it causes confusion and does not yield the type of products the teacher wants. The most important aspect of developing writing assignments is to “encourage students to define progressively more complex rhetorical problems” (215). Hence, students should not be given the same types of assignments over and over again. I agree that when we don’t give students a rhetorical problem to tackle, that we are indeed wasting students’ time as they grapple with instead a “paper-writing problem” (215). Even though a knowledge of process pedagogy is important, I feel that this chapter is also of paramount importance because without effective writing assignments, students would not get practice in rhetoric and composition.