Keywords: Error

"Constructing Taxonomies for Error (or Can Stray Dogs Be Mermaids?)" by Glynda Hull

"Error Analysis and the Teaching of Composition" by Barry M. Kroll and John C. Schafer

"Proofreading as Reading, Errors as Embarrassments" by Elaine O. Lees

Errors and Expectations: A Guide for the Teacher of Basic Writing by Mina P. Shaughnessy

"The Phenomenology of Error" by Joseph M. Williams

Hull, Glynda. "Constructing Taxonomies for Error (or Can Stray Dogs Be Mermaids?)." in A Sourcebook for Basic Writing Teachers. 231-244.

Hull notes that all studies of error in writing count only the errors of "finished" products and completely ignore errors that Basic Writers encounter and recognize while editing their writing. Therefore, Hull proposes her own taxonomy of error based on what the writer does while editing. These categories are Consulting, Intuiting, and Comprehending. Consulting errors are errors the Basic Writer changes correctly by using internal knowledge of rules. Intuitive errors are those errors the Basic Writer recognizes as wrong, but cannot state why. Such corrections can be haphazard because they are done without understanding. Comprehending errors are errors the Basic Writer recognizes apart from the taught rules of grammar and notices because of the discrepancy between what is said and what the writer intended to say.

Kroll, Barry M. and John C. Schafer. "Error Analysis and the Teaching of Composition." in A Sourcebook for Basic Writing Teachers. 208-215.

The authors encourage the use of hypothesis testing in teaching. That is, instead of just looking for error, the teacher examines the errors, looking for patterns that will allow the teacher to test a hyposthesis on why the student is making specific errors.

Lees, Elaine O. "Proofreading as Reading, Errors as Embarrassments." in A Sourcebook for Basic Writing Teachers. 216-230.

Lees sees error as the result of reading in a way specified by an interpretive community. This is similar to Joe William's "The Phenomenology of Error," where he argues that we see many errors only because we are trained to see them. Lees wants to get students to see their errors as a social embarrassment.

Shaughnessy, Mina P. Errors and Expectations: A Guide for the Teacher of Basic Writing. New York: Oxford UP, 1977.

College both beckons and threatens them, offering to teach them useful ways of thinking and talking about the world, promising even to improve the quality of their lives, but threatening at the same time to take from them their distinctive ways of interpreting the world, to assimilate them into the culture of academia without acknowledging their experience as outsiders. (Mina Shaughnessy Errors and Expectations Page 292)

When Mina Shaughnessy wrote Errors and Expectations in 1977, she was a pioneer in the field of basic writing research; her discussion of the types of errors common to basic writers, and her analysis of the teaching and learning that facilitates the reduction of those errors, is thorough and compassionate without being prescriptive or indulgent. In short, Shaughnessy's work describes those areas of difficulty commonly found in the basic writing classroom and offers in-depth analysis of those difficulties in order to help writing instructors work with students who, at first glance, appear to have been left hopelessly behind in the academic system. Shaughnessy also describes the status of the basic writer; she describes their placement outside of the culture of academia and their struggle to become comfortable within that culture while at the same time maintaining their identity with their culture of origin. It is this underlying philosophy that permeates Shaughnessy's work--a philosophy that cautions writing teachers against viewing students in a negative light based solely on their rather poor writing skills, a philosophy that asks us to consider the other, equally important, knowledge such students bring with them into the writing classroom. Shaughnessy divides her book into sections dealing with specific areas of error--Handwriting and Punctuation, Syntax, Common Errors, Spelling, Vocabulary, Beyond the Sentence--and offers abundant examples (collected from student papers) to illustrate the points she is making. Overriding this, however, is a philosophy of connectedness between these errors. She writes What I hope has emerged from each section of this analysis is both the "connectedness" of basic writers' difficulties in one area with those in another, all of them reflecting upon the quality and extent of the students' formal education, and the saving preparedness of these same students as thinking and speaking young adults to begin the hard work of learning to write for college. (274) Overall, Shaughnessy demonstrates a philosophy of the "teachability " of BW students. She notes that such students, while not writing at a level of "acceptable" formal written English, do have a grasp of the language. They write by the codes of their own dialect; what they need is an opportunity to learn the codes of formal written English. She emphasizes the need to help students recognize the patterns in formal written English--the use of capitalization, of punctuation, of correct spelling--and the need to explain the reasons for these conventions. There is an emphasis on grammar, but not in the "skill and drill" sense. The emphasis is on the need for some knowledge of the concepts of grammar so students and teachers can talk about writing with a common vocabulary. BW students need this basic knowledge in order to make the shift from their personal, native, or community dialect to the dialect of the academic community of which they are becoming a part. Part of her philosophy, then, is that grammar instruction is necessary, but more so the students become engaged with the language than for any formal instruction in grammar, spelling, and punctuation. In general, Shaughnessy promotes the process and practice of writing over direct instruction in grammar. This "process and practice" approach pervades the book, as Shaughnessy continues to point out the need to see writing instruction as a collaborative effort between the teacher and the students. She notes that teachers can motivate students to learn the skills they need by tuning into the students' reasons for resistance; if students are given reasons why they are being asked to learn a specific task, if they are given opportunities to debate the "rules" of the language, and if they are encouraged by the results of their attempts, they will be motivated to grow as writers. By allowing students to participate in their own education they will improve as students in general and as writers in particular. Students and teachers working together is the key to success in the BW classroom, according to Shaughnessy. She remarks that the maturity of such students allows them to develop metacognitive skills that help them to discover their own answers to their writing difficulties, and through this process they aid the teacher by alerting her to the immediate effects of instruction. Such work forces teachers, however, to move beyond their comfort zones and reach into other areas--such as psycholinguistics, learning theory, and discourse analysis--to find new answers; this, in turn, allows them to develop more dynamic teaching methods, methods that will move their students forward as writers. And, says Shaughnessy, this type of inquiry will have a kind of "trickle down" effect, expanding the knowledge of the writing process among instructors of writing at all levels. In summary, Shaughnessy outlines her philosophy in the concluding chapter of her book, entitled "Expectation." She writes, "But given the alarming state of their writing when they arrive at college, it is important to note . . . the fact that BW students do respond to instruction, often in dramatic ways, and that while matters at the outset are perhaps worse than anyone imagined, the prospects for improvement are better than most teachers expect" (276). Such a statement, that we can and do find basic writers mastering the basics of standard written English, is the philosophy of teaching Shaughnessy has left to Composition studies. Her underlying premise is that by working with such students, by teaching with them and not at them, instructors can make up for the deficits of earlier instruction and help basic writers move beyond their errors. That her final chapter is titled "Expectations" is indication of her belief in that ability.

Williams, Joseph M. "The Phenomenology of Error." CCC 32 (1981): 152-68.

Williams finds that error is located in five places: the student's paper, the Grammarian's handbook, and in the experiences of the writer who commits it, the teacher who catches it, and the grammarian who proposes it. Errors are either reflexive or preflexive. Reflexive errors are those errors we expect to find (and therefore find). Preflexive, or unreflexive reading of those same student essays would reveal fewer errors simply because we would not be looking for them.