6. Short but powerful writing tasks to give to students

Included in How to Use Your Reading in Your Essays

· Writing a paraphrase of the assignment title

· Writing down some questions of a text before starting to read

· Making notes on and then questioning, evaluating and locating a text

· Writing an informal and more formal critical reflection on a text

· Writing a one-sentence, then a two or three-sentence summary of the text

· Writing an annotated bibliography entry

· Writing source synthesis notes

· Writing a literature review

Other powerful student writing tasks

· Asking the students to use the last five minutes of a lecture or seminar to write a one or two-sentence summary of what they have heard

· Writing a short definition of key terms and concepts

· Paraphrasing a key sentence you have highlighted in a text

· Editing a poorly written essay with other students via a wiki

· Keeping a ‘Writing Journal’ and reflecting on any/all parts of their writing process

· Keeping and collecting the results of stages in the writing process to produce a portfolio

· *Discussing their written work and the process it took them to produce it, as the focus of a seminar

· Writing a paragraph on the usefulness (or otherwise) of the written feedback they have received on their work

· *Peer reviewing the written work of other students and adding their own written comments, counter claims and questions

· Giving written comments on their own essay and giving it a mark

· *Specifying one or two aspects of their work they would like tutor comments on

*These tasks are taken from the excellent website of the Writing in the Disciplines Project at QMUL, developed by Sally Mitchell and team at http://www.thinkingwriting.qmul.ac.uk/ This online resource gives lecturers resources, ideas and examples for successful writing in in different subject areas.