Tracing Discursive Resources:

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Tracing Discursive Resources How Students Use
Prior Genre Knowledge to Negotiate Writing
Realities Anis Bawarshi, Cathryn Cabral,
Jennifer Halpin, Megan Kelly, Shannon Mondor,
Angela Rounsaville Researchers Not Present
Sergio Casillas, Rachel Goldberg, Melanie Kill
University of Washington
Conference on College Composition and
Communication New Orleans 2008
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Motivations for Inquiry
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Research Questions

• Why do students draw on some genres over others
  when traversing the boundaries between high
  school and college?
• Based on what they report in open-ended
  interviews, how do students use prior genre
  knowledge when they encounter new writing tasks
  in first year writing?
• What can facilitate the acquisition of genres
  across activity systems and domains?

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Research Design Methods
Phase One Survey of First Year Composition
students re past literacy experiences (reading,
writing, digital literacy), both in and out of
school Phase Two Discourse-based interviews
asking students to reflect on how they called on
previous discursive resources in order to write
both high and low stakes papers in FYC Phase
Three Collection and analysis of interviewees
writing produced in FYC, as well as syllabi and
writing assignments from instructors (in
progress).
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Student Sample
Surveys distributed to all students enrolled in
33 sections of English 131 Expository Writing
during Fall Quarter 2006 (N748) Number of
students responding to the survey 64 Number of
follow-up interviews 18
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Phase One Survey

• Part I
• Demographic Information (gender, race, class,
  educational background, intended course of study)
• Part II
• Access to technology at home and school
• Part III
• Identification of types of communication written
  in school, at work, and outside of school and work

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Phase One Survey
Part IV Reflective Questions (open-ended) 1.
What types of writing do you most enjoy? Why? 2.
What types of writing do you least enjoy?
Why? 3. What do you consider to be your most
successful piece of writing? Why? 4. What do you
consider to be your least successful piece of
writing? Why? 5. Considering the syllabus you
have received for English 131, your first week
preliminary essay, and your work towards your
first major paper, what high school writing
experiences (if any) do you think will help you
succeed in the course?
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Phase Two Interviews

• Basic Interview Questions
• What did the Preliminary Essay assignment ask you
  to do?
• From the kinds of writing youve done in the
  past, what did the Preliminary Essay remind you
  of?
• From the kinds of writing youve done in the
  past, what did you use or draw on in writing the
  Preliminary Essay?
• What did the Major Paper assignment ask you to
  do?
• From the kinds of writing youve done in the
  past, what did the Major Paper remind you of?
• From the kinds of writing youve done in the
  past, what did you use or draw on in writing the
  Major Paper?

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Preliminary Findings Overview

• Hidden Riches
• Locked in Domains
• Boundary Crossers vs. Boundary Guarders (as
  indicated in 3 ways)
• Genre research is appallingly hard to design when
  we think of genre as social action

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Findings in Context

• Student Sample Demographics

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Findings in Context

• To demonstrate an awareness of the rhetorical
  strategies that writers use in different writing
  contexts.
• To read, analyze, and synthesize complex texts
  and incorporate multiple kinds of evidence
  purposefully in order to generate and support
  writing.
• To produce complex, analytical, persuasive
  arguments that matter in academic contexts.
• To develop flexible strategies for revising,
  editing, and proof-reading writing.

• Shared Learning Outcomes

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Findings in Context
Preliminary Essay (shared across sections)

• Shared Curricular Structure

Sequence 1 culminating in First Major Paper
(5-7 pages)
Sequence 2 culminating in Second Major Paper
(5-7 pages)
Portfolio Revision Sequence (70)
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Hidden Riches in Student Discursive
Resources Genres Written Most in School
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Hidden Riches in Student Discursive Resources
Genres Written Most at Work
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Hidden Riches in Student Discursive Resources
Genres Written Most in Other Domains
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Prior Experience with a Genre in Any Context
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Reported Genres in Survey Reflective Questions
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Finding 1 Hidden Riches
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(Lack of) Domain Overlap
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Finding 2 Locked in Domains

• Students have written in many diverse genres
• Theyve written in all three of the domains we
  supplied--school, work, and outside of school and
  work--although they wrote most extensively in
  school and outside of school and work
• Their writing did not tend to cross those
  domains, except for a select few genres, most of
  which represent correspondence-type writing

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Finding 3 Boundary Crossers vs. Boundary
Guarders

• Interviewees responses suggest that they tended
  to either cross (vigorously adapt) or guard
  their prior knowledge, as indicated in the
  following three ways
• Markers of confidence in describing task
• Talk of whole genres vs. talk of strategies
• Emergence (or lack thereof) of NOT talk

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The Boundary between the Preliminary Essay
the Major Paper

• Preliminary Essay
• first assignment
• low stakes
• not for credit
• no established classroom community
• no framing
• uncertain purpose in course context
• audience unspecified

• Major Paper 1
• culmination of sequence
• high stakes
• significant part of grade
• greater sense of classroom community
• scaffolded assignments
• clear purpose in course context
• sense of audience

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First Indication Confidence Level

• All interviewees identified the key tasks of the
  Preliminary Essay with confidence
• (e.g. Katrina evaluate whether the Common Book
  is a good idea or not)
• Most interviewees exhibited a loss of confidence
  in defining key tasks of the (more complex) Major
  Paper
• (e.g. Sonya hard to know its so broad or
  Kate make a claim about a subject)
• A handful of interviewees expressed great
  confidence in identifying the complex new task
• (e.g. Katrina developing a claim and arguing
  one side or how you present, you thought of
  something versus just like explaining or
  guiding)

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Second Indication (Whole) Genres to Strategies
Uhm, just like a general book review, uhm, like
you do like in a typical standard uhm, you know,
literature class in high school, you know, like
in American literature class You read a book,
analyze it, you know, write a five-paragraph
essay about, you know, a theme or a symbol or
something specific about the book and then you
know... uhm, so just, it seemed pretty
standard. Uhm, it reminded me of a personal
narrative, because the question in the prompt was
asking you to draw on your experience. Uhm, and I
have written, in high school I wrote a lot of
personal narrative type things for scholarships,
I applied for a lot of scholarship... ...
uhm, you know, like introductions, like I had
never used like a road map beforeUhm, the
objection and response, I had never done that
before. So I remember the second prompt, uhm,
I just thought a lot of my AP classes, especially
the history ones where definitely they ask you to
come up with a stance and to defend it And one
of the things that I always did when analyzing my
quotes is, I use a quote and then two sentences
analysis, at least two sentences, if not more...
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From Genres to Strategies
Preliminary Essay
Major Paper
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Crossers Strategies/ Guarders Genres

• Pattern 1 (Crossers)
• Students drew on few whole genres BUT many
  strategies
• (need e.g.)
• Pattern 2 (Guarders)
• Students drew on many whole genres AND many
  strategies
• (need e.g.)

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Third Indication NOT Talk
Just because the claim changed it and it is not
a five paragraph essay anymore, it is different,
different style and so Yeah, it was not like
literary analysis but uhm, like just how to make
my argument like clear and not like ambiguous or
anything like that Uhm, well the prompt was
kind of on the lines of, if you were writing a
review about a chosen topic, and I chose uhm, the
man in my basement by I think Mosley, Walter
Mosley. So I wrote it kind of in a new format so
not particularly essay, but I put in like the
kind of review aspect for like, this author wrote
these books before, you know, like kind of giving
a background of the author, but more then I would
in an essay. I never written a paper like this
before really, uhm, I wrote a term paper in my
junior year, uhm, about a novel, but I mean that
was a lot different because she gave us a paper
about what every paragraph was supposed to be
like. I guess it made it a little harder just
because like my term paper was based on one work,
one like a book, and then this was based on four
main things. So I kind of used the same strategy
a little bit, uhm, just when you are doing it on
one book it is easier to focus because you only,
you are only drawing from one thing, but uhm,
here I had to kind of integrate it more
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NOT Talk, cont.

• The emergence of NOT talk by category -
• 4 cases of NOT asked to do
• 9 cases of NOT genres reminded of
• 1 case of NOT strategy reminded of
• 5 cases of NOT genres used/drawn on
• 8 cases of NOT strategies used/ drawn on
• The emergence of NOT Talk by percentage -
• Preliminary Essay 57 use NOT Talk
• Major Paper 83 use NOT Talk

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Guarders Crossers Defined

• Prior Knowledge Boundary Guarders
• Type A No Not talk and maintenance of known
  genres regardless of task
• Type B Some strategy-related Not talk and
  modification of known genres (by adding
  strategies)
• New Knowledge Boundary Crossers
• Express uncertainty about tasks
• Have many more instances of Not talk in all
  categories
• Tend to shift away from whole (identifiable)
  genres toward strategies

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Adapting Prior Genres Strategies
Miles The exposure to diverse types of
writing I received in high school gives me
confidence that I will know how to approach each
assignment. Also, my previous teachers emphasis
on varied use of language and the elimination of
passive language (to be verbs) will help insure
that my writing is not bland or boring. Emphasis
on how to construct a thesis was helpful, even as
we break away from that basic construct into
producing more complex claims.
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Discussion Questions
How do we tap into students hidden riches? Do
outcomes facilitate or hinder transfer of
discursive resources? What role can explicit
teaching play in helping students negotiate
writing realities? How do we study genre? To
what extent does this research contribute to the
study of transfer?