Cross talk in Comp

This weekend we read a few different selections from the Cross-Talk in Composition book. In the prefaces to the book explain how writing has evolved. The preface to book II explains the changes that have happened in the field in the short time between editions. We have heard from many theorists that writing is a process and this shows how quickly writing has evolved.
It was interesting to read the introduction section 1 about writing being a process. In class we discussed the conference where teachers from England and from the United States discussed the different approaches to teaching writing. This section gave a more concise explanation of what exactly happened at the Dartmouth conference.
Donald Murray's article described a fresh approach to evaluating writing. Murray criticized the way that he believes teachers evaluate writing today. One thought I particularly liked from Murray's article was when he described writing as "the process of discovery through language". Looking at the title of the next section I assumed that this would be a theme that would take hold throughout the assigned readings. The claim that Murray made that I was most uncomfortable with was when he assigned percentages of time to the various stages of writing. As a student I now feel a little uncomfortable if I take more than 1% of my time to publish a first draft of a paper. Maybe Mr. Murray's idea of prewriting/writing and my idea of prewriting/writing are a little different. Murray concludes his article by listing ten implications of how writing will be conducted in a class room if a person follows his rules. Reading the list I found that I liked the way many of his implications sounded but I wondered how pracitcal they really were.
Janet Emig's essay on writing as a mode of learning had a slightly different topic than what I expected. Emig began her article by arguing that writing was a unique mode of communication and learning. She really worked hard to convince her reader that writing was different than talking and I found myself wondering why she was trying so hard to establish something that seemed so simple. When the article finally focused on what writing contributed to the learning process I learned some new things. The author drew on several historical theorists to give support to her argument but also brought science in when pointing out that the right side of the brain contributed three or four times to the writing process. One argument I really agreed with was the idea that successful learning was engaged, committed, personal learning. Emig and Murray both seemed to agree that it is important to let a writer produce work at their own pace.