An interesting note: Mike Schmoker's book Focus addresses most of the points raised both in Seliger's and pg's essays; indeed, he comes to many of the same conclusions that Seliger does, recommending heavy doses of close readings of texts as a "jumping off" point for learning how to write. It also mirrors a lot of pg's thoughts in that it stresses the incorporation of argumentative writing as well.
I'd highly recommend Schmoker for anyone who's interested in these issues, whatever your opinion of these articles:
I use most of Schmoker's methods even in my music classes, where students are consistently asked to write about the music they are learning, as well as to learn how to take a position about that music (e.g., "the woodwinds are not properly used in this piece because...") in addition to the more "dry, academic" writing (research papers on the Baroque era, etc). I've had a lot of success by simply following Schmoker's recommendations, which are almost universally applicable across the humanities.
I'd highly recommend Schmoker for anyone who's interested in these issues, whatever your opinion of these articles:
http://www.ascd.org/Publications/Authors/Mike-Schmoker.aspx?...
I use most of Schmoker's methods even in my music classes, where students are consistently asked to write about the music they are learning, as well as to learn how to take a position about that music (e.g., "the woodwinds are not properly used in this piece because...") in addition to the more "dry, academic" writing (research papers on the Baroque era, etc). I've had a lot of success by simply following Schmoker's recommendations, which are almost universally applicable across the humanities.