Writing Assignments? But This Is a Chemistry Class Not
David A. Stanislawski University of Cincinnati-Raymond Walters College. 9555 Plainfield Road. Cincinnati. OH 45236 Three years ago I introduced formal writing assignments into my First-Year Chemistry curriculum. First-Year Chemistry is a year-long chemistry sequence for preprofessional students. Anticipating considerable resistance on the part of the students, from whom I expected complaints along the lines of why are you trying to teach English in a chemistry class, I was pleasantly surprised when this resistance never materialized. However, I soon began to wonder what students actually thought about the writing assignments. The survey shown in the table was used to solicit student perceptions about writing in general and the First-Year Chemistry writing assignments in particular. This survey was administered to each class during the past three years. The responses for each of the three groups are given as percentages, and the response for all three groups combined is shown in the last column. Items 1 and 2 provide a striking contrast hetween the amount of writing the students are typically assigned and the amount they think would be appropriate. While about two-thirds of the First-Year Chemistry students have no writing assignments in their other courses, excluding English, only one-quarter of all the students responding think this is adequate. Although almost none of the students thinks that writing assignments should be required in all or even most of their classes, i t seems clear that most students think there should be more writing than they currently encounter in their classes. The number of writing assignments varies from quarter to quarter, but in general the students submit between seven and 10 written pages each quarter. During the first quarter, the assignments focus on the various components of the analytical process. These components are identified as collecting data, developing or recognizing relationships, and drawing inferences. During the second quarter, the focus shifts to critically evaluating the literature of chemistry in terms of the analytical process. Finally, in the third quarter, the students work on some topic or issue in the field of chemistry that is of interest to them. This is a researched topic and allows them to integrate the materials to which they have been exposed. When asked t o evaluate the usefulness of the writing assignments in First-Year Chemistry, over half of the students (from 56 to 76%) found them very useful or somewhat useful. A smaller portion (from 24 to 44%) thought the writing assignments were not very useful or useless. These opinions also seem to be reflected in the amount of writing the students think should be required in the course. Most of the students (65 t o 73%) think the number of writing assignments should stay the same. Only a small number of students (0 to 6%) would require more writing, and the remaining students (22 to 35%) think less writing is advisable. The comments solicited from the students in question 5 have been most helpful in refining my writing assignments. While most students comment favorably on the writing component of the course or discuss which assignments they considered to be most useful, two comments occur frequently enough to be worth discussing. First, about 15% of the stu-
dents mention that these assignments helped their grade. Several of them have reflected on this point enough to mention that their writing skills are better developed than their mathematics skills and therefore thev are not surprised that they do better on the writing componknt. The writing assignments thus provide another mechanism, which is considerably different from testing, for assessing student achievement. I do not want to diminish the importance of mathematics in a course of this type, but we also want our students to be able to convey their understanding of chemistry to others, frequently in nonmathematical terms, and this is one means of developing this skill. A second and more pervasive comment (from about 37%of the students) is that the writing assignments take too much time. In response to these comments during the first two years, this past year I decreased the length of papers but required more papers during each quarter. Thus, their writing efforts were more spread out rather than concentrated toward the end of the course. Students seem to like this approach better as evidenced by a decrease in the relative
Survey 01 Students' Perceptions of Chemlstry Wrnlng Assignments 1. HOWmany of your courses. excluding English, require writing assignments? 6/87
A. B. C. D. E.
all of them most of them some 01 them veryfewofthem none of them
-
26% 17% 55%
6/86
-
4% 4% 17% 75%
8/89
9% 27% 64%
combined
-
1% 12% 21 % 65%
2. In your opinion, how many of your courses, excluding English, should require wrling asslgnments?
A. B. C. D. E.
all of Ihwm most of them =me of them verytew of them none of them
6/87
6/88
6% 39% 39% 16%
38% 33% 29%
-
-
6/69 3% 3% 21% 48% 24%
combined 1% 3% 31% 41 % 24%
3. HOWuseful do YOU think me wrltlng asslgnments In Flrst-Year Chemistry were?
A. B. C. D.
very useful somewhat useful IMt very useful useless
6/87 11% 56% 22% 11%
6/88 8% 46% 29% 15%
6/89 9% 67% 15% 9%
combined 9% 59% 21 % 11%
4. Assuming that I will mmlnue requlrlng wrltlng assignments In the future, please Indlcate whether you thlnk I should requlre
A. more wrltlng B. aboutmesameamt C. less writing
6/87 6% 72% 22%
6/88
6/89
65% 35%
73% 27%
-
-
cmblned 1% 70% 28%
5. Indicate below and on the back of this sheet how lhe wrltlng asslgnments were most helpful to you. How were they least helpful?
Volume 67
Number 7 July 1990
575
number of comments on time (down to 32% for 1989 versus 40% for 1987 and 1988). I t is also easier to grade shorter papers several times during the quarter, rather than a single longer paper a t the end of the quarter. In summary, I have found that when students are presented witha philosophy that says writing is an important part of
576
Journal of Chemical Education
their education and an important component of the careers they intend to enter, they readily accept them. Most of the students also find them to be a useful component of the course and allow me to demonstrate and discuss critical thinking skills that are not easily handled in a typical exam format.
