I fulfilled all of my goals and am getting a good handle on first language writing development research.  I was amazed that Richard Haswell had done some really complex quantitative studies since I had thought that most recent first language writing development research was qualitative.  I read about one such qualitative study and found some others.  Tomorrow I will look for reviews of Chiseri-Strater's study and read the life span articles (not really empirical research) of the first-language second language team of authors. I'm enjoying this process because it's enabling me to catch up in my field.

Today, I'll finish reading the article I was reading correlating first language writing development with personal development and read summaries or reviews of two books mentioned in the article.  If time, I'll try to find articles on any articles about writing development from a writing center perspective, the next topic in the outline.

Outcomes: Goals accomplished, but I learned I'll need to do more reading than I thought at first, which is OK since I'm not in a hurry.  I made an outline of topics for the intro, reread 2 articles and took notes. Then I found some good sources on the first topic in the outline--first language writing development.  Tomorrow I'll finish reading the first article I found on that first topic. 

Goals for Tuesday, May 30:


Re-familiarize myself with articles on issues in second language writing development and make an outline of topics for the Intro/Lit review for our project: International Undergraduate Students' Perceptions of their Second Language Writing Development and the Role of the University's Writing Resources in It.

Welcome to Summer 2017 Dissertation Camp! I'm looking forward to working with you.   I've been a prof. in the Rhetoric Dept and a Writing Center director for 27 (!) years.  In my recent research I've been using writing center data, as well as my own second language learning experiences to illustrate and explore concepts in second language writing and more recently second language acquisiion.  I also write creatively, especially about travel, and teach a travel writing course every fall as a first-year seminar.


In this Dissertation Camp, I'll be working on a combination of academic and creative projects.


1) A draft of the Intro and Review of the Literature for our writing center survey study of international undergraduate students' perceptions of their second language writing development.  The survey stays up until November, so we don't have the final results yet.


2) A draft of a semi-academic, semi-creative article about what I learned this semester from helping out in my granddaughter's first grade class about helping college students with their learning and writing in the writing center.


3) A draft of a travel essay about my first solo travel experience in the Galapagos.