Since World War II, composition programs in America have successively embraced three distinct (though sometimes overlapping) models of how writing should be taught, reflecting, in turn, three different assumptions about the goal of student writing. The first, a traditional model that has roots in eighteenth and nineteenth century classical rhetoric, takes the goal of writing to be imparting knowledge. Accordingly, writers are trained to focus on the “product” they are generating, with the expected attention to details of written mechanics and style. This model has persisted throughout the second half of the twentieth century, although with decreasing popularity.
The second, so-called “process” model, emphasizes the act of writing more than the written result. Students are encouraged to do considerable preplanning (”prewriting”) as well as multiple drafts, but the prescriptive mechanics of written style are de-emphasized. In both the traditional and the process models, writing is seen as an individual activity. However, while the traditional model encourages objective presentation (”It appears that . . ,” “One might argue that . . .”), the process model allows for more individual expression (”I think . . .”). In essence, the process model embraces the self-expression component of progressive education.
The third model is more social/dialogic. The purpose of writing is no longer expression of objective information or self-expression but what has come to be called the social construction of knowledge (see, e.g., Clark, 1990: Chapter 1). Rather than being a solitary activity, writing is envisioned as a group conversation, utilizing not only peer review but even group composition. Conceptually, the social/dialogic model incorporates progressive education’s views of schools as social (and socializing) institutions which, in Dewey¼s words, lead children to use their “own powers for social ends” (Lang, 1898:9).