Assistant professor of English Jennifer Eidum Zinchuk chronicles and assesses a pre-college transitional writing course that focuses on building students’ metacognition, confidence, and fluency in writing.
Jennifer Eidum Zinchuk, assistant professor of English, studied the creation of the Writing Ready course at the University of Washington as an alternative to traditional remedial writing courses. Then, after describing the course curriculum at present, she analyzed course program assessment materials such as student course evaluations, instructor reflections, and a student follow-up survey to understand why the students and instructors alike found it to be a valuable course for students entering the university.
The peer-reviewed article, “Getting ‘Writing Ready’ at the University of Washington: Developing Metacognition at a Time of Academic Transition” was first published in the journal Composition Forum on November 27 in its Fall 2017 issue. Through program assessment and instructor interviews, Zinchuk found that teaching for metacognition, confidence, and fluency supports students’ transition to the university. Moreover, teaching metacognitive practices creates a more active, engaged classroom environment.
Composition Forum is a leading journal in the field of composition and writing studies that specifically focuses on articles that explore the intersections of composition theory and pedagogy, and that theorize practice in sophisticated and provocative ways. The journal publishes articles of interest to scholars and teachers of college composition.