Questions whether authors can authentically represent a culture of which they are not a part. Considers what kind of shifts will occur in preservice teachers’ understandings of the “right to write.” Finds that as preservice teachers learn more about the current debate through class readings and discussions, they move from straightforward statements to hesitations over the hard issues raised.

This is a piece about language and how we evaluate the work of young writers as they learn to express themselves in writing. The authors' focus is on current reforms in writing assessment, including the brief life of the California Learning Assessment System (CLAS) writing portfolios, and how they rarely address the vibrant role of language—the work and play of words—in students' writing. Through audio taped interviews with two elementary and two middle school students and their teachers, as well as the written artifacts in the students' portfolios, we analyzed the patterns of the students' writing and the comments of teachers and peers on their work. In this article, language in writing is metaphorically compared to “the clay that makes the pot,” emphasizing that young writers want to startle, want to engage readers with refreshing and surprising language—but few are provided the guidance for how to do it. The authors' central point is that writing revolves around criticism, but if the assessment stays on the surface and encourages word substitution over content revision, then the criticism may not be helpful in pushing the generative aspect of writing: the work of language.