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| Laura Lanwermeyer is the friendly face of learning@bucknell.edu. |
What writing project(s) are you working
on right now?
Like many
writing projects, those in my job involve clearly communicating a purpose and a
rationale to a specific audience and require a lot of reflection. For instance,
at Susquehanna University, I teach an education course for science majors who
are planning to become certified teachers that they take before student
teaching. For that class, I write curricula that need to function as a model
for how I want my students to learn to write curricula. How can I clearly
communicate to my students exactly what I expect? Can I anticipate problems and
revise my materials to prevent them? How can I teach my students to do that in
their own writing of assignments, labs, tests, etc.? One way is by showing them
drafts of my course materials, and discussing and evaluating the changes that
I’ve made over time. I also ask them to reflect with me after each assignment,
“how could that have been written better to make it clearer to you what you
needed to accomplish to be successful?” This interaction leads naturally to a
workshop-type environment with their own work as well, where we read and write
to clarify our purpose to our audiences, whether it’s a principal or a middle
school science student.
I also run
the Student Learning Support programs at Bucknell. In that role, my writing
projects are focused around communicating with professors, my student staff,
and the students who participate in my programs. Balancing a welcoming tone
with serious content can be a challenge.
What do you love about it?
I love that
while my materials probably won’t ever become “perfect,” they almost always get
better as I continue to reflect and work on them.
What kind of feedback on your writing
do you find most helpful?
I really
appreciate both emotional and technical feedback on my writing. If I’ve made a
grammatical or spelling error, I definitely want to know! But more useful in
some ways, and harder to gauge, is the emotional impact. Was information
presented in a clear and relevant way to increase interest? Were connections or themes, as well as details or examples, both obvious and significant? Was the
assignment’s purpose and structure clear enough to make you feel empowered to
do what was asked of you? Was it encouraging and helpful? Did it make you want
to continue working and/or communicating? Those are some of my most important
goals.
What would you like students to know
about you as a writer?
When I worked
as a full time teacher, I considered myself only a writer of curricula, not a
“real” writer. But in my job now, I sometimes write 10+ document pages of email
content every day to students, staff, faculty, and administrators. I want that
writing to be useful, clear, and positive. Everybody writes, and so everybody
is a writer. It doesn’t have to be something destined for publication to be
important, and it is all worthy of continued reflection.
