Strategies for Teaching with Online Tools
Bedford Workshops on Teaching Writing Online
Nick Carbone, New Media Consultant
Bedford/St. Martin's
ncarbone@bedfordstmartins.com		  Workshop Home

Believing, then Doubting: Dueling Perspectives

Activity
You know the difference it makes when someone believes you or someone doubts you. When people believe you, you feel more cofident; when people doubt you, you might get more defensive. Believing and doubting works along those lines. When your peer reviewer reads with a believing eye, he or she not only agrees with you, but seeks to add to your reasoning, offers more examples that support your ideas, trys to extend your argument and line of thinking at key points. When your peer reviewer reads with a doubtful eye, he or she doesn't just become a skeptic, but offers counter examples that challenge your ideas, trys to undo your argument and line of thinking. Here's how that works:
  1. Have your reviewer read your paper once with a believing eye--even if they don't believe or agree with something. After doing so, ask your reviewer to write down or tell you reasons, ideas, stories, examples, situations, or any thing new that extends your point of view.
  2. After your reviewer has believed, ask them to read the draft again--or you can read it to them again--and tell them to doubt everything, even if they do believe or agree with something. Have them write down or tell you reasons, ideas, stories, examples, situations, or any thing new that counters or questions your point of view.

The Benefits
Getting multiple perspectives helps you to anticipate possible points of view that your potential readers might have. And, it also helps you to think of things to add--supporting details, an aspect of an argument you may have overlooked, possible disagreements that should be addressed in your piece, areas where you can develop your points more fully.

Using this Activity to Revise
How you use the ideas and information you learn from your reviewers depends a large part of the audience for you piece and what you want to get across to them. If you're addressing readers who considering the many sides of a complex issue, then anticipating counter arguments and addressing some of them might be a good idea. If you're addressing a group that already agrees with you, say to rally them to action, then you might be able to assume that they know the counter arguments and maybe need to hear more about what you all believe.

As you revise, experiment with the new ideas. You might copy a paragraph or two from your essay that elicited believing and doubting statements into a new window on your word processor. In that new window, work the statements into the graphs, seeing how they can be added as considerations. Think of the new screen as sandbox, and the paragraphs as sand, and the new ideas as shovels; use them to dig, sift, and sort the mix of ideas. You may not use them when you go back to your piece, but you might discover something, some new way of wording something or seeing something, that will help you to revise further.