Peer editing is a method used by English teachers to actively involve students in the writing process and to facilitate the development of the final draft of an essay. Controversy regarding the effectiveness of peer editing is prevalent for both instructors and students. The purpose of this paper is to share results of a classroom study that focuses on the effectiveness of peer editing practices in 2-year college composition classes. This review reveals the outcomes of several methods of peer editing, addresses both the difficulties and benefits of this process, and examines how to adapt the experience to meet the individual needs of each classroom environment. Peer Editing: A Single Review Peer Editing Worksheet Peer Editing Workshop: Groups of Three

The life of an adjunct is never slow. This essay looks into the professional and personal life of a community college teacher working at multiple colleges who wonders, like many others, how she will hold it all together and provide the quality of teaching that her students deserve.

Although response to student writing often consumes the majority of a writing instructor’s time and energy, studies of teachers’ philosophies and practices with regard to feedback have been relatively rare in the response literature. In the study described in this article, college writing instructors from six community colleges and two four-year universities in Northern California (N=129) were surveyed, and volunteers from this group (N=23) gave follow-up in-depth interviews. In addition, each interview participant provided 3-5 samples of student texts with their own written commentary. Based on the findings, our analysis focuses on two questions: 1. How do the participants (college-level writing instructors in Northern California) perceive response to student writing? 2. In what ways might the participants’ own practices be causing or adding to their frustrations? We found that although most of the participants value response and believe it is very important, they are often frustrated and dissatisfied with the task itself and with its apparent lack of impact on student progress. Our data analyses suggest some possible underlying explanations for these teachers’ complex attitudes toward response. The discussion concludes with suggestions of ways writing instructors can adapt or focus their response practices to increase the efficiency and quality of their feedback, to reduce frustration, and to increase satisfaction with this aspect of their teaching practice.