Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Fanfic Related Deathfic Debate- love 'em, loathe 'em, and everywhere in between...

As a college composition instructor, Jackie, I tried to use the "positive feedback model" when I was commenting on students essays. What I discovered was that they continued to include the things I liked, but since I never commented on things to improve or correct, their essays never got any better. So then I added comments about things they could do to improve, and lo! Their essays got better. But while I didn't point out errors, those remained the same.

Finally, I turned to the model I currently use: explain what I liked about what the student did, follow that with suggestions to improve different parts of the essay, and then highlight errors in different colors (red for sentence errors like fragments, comma splices, or run-ons; blue for grammar errors in person, tense, case, or agreement; etc.). It seems to be the most effective way of helping students improve their writing that I have discovered in 20 years of practice.

My experience has been that people who have put effort into their writing assume it's okay--unless they are told otherwise. They are too close to the work to view it objectively and see the problems in it. Since none of them puts something out that they think is bad or wrong, their base assumption is that it is okay. Positive criticism encourages them to keep trying by acknowledging what they did well, but "negative" criticism (explaining what didn't work or could have worked better) helps them improve.

That said, I don't offer negative criticism on the boards because I don't feel it's my place. I may give the reader's reaction you mentioned, but that's about all. Similarly, it isn't my place to tell someone else what to write, whether deathfic, kidfic, next gen, or whatever.

BTW, Anna, I like the idea of a specific warning at the end of the story, which would work well on the archive. I have, after all, always flipped to the end of a book by a new author to make sure it ends well before I buy it. It just means that I would need to quit reading stories on the boards.