How do secondary school students write poetry?

How creative writing processes relate to final products

Abstract

Do different creative writing processes lead to qualitatively different writing products? In this study we examined how Dutch speaking secondary school students (16-years old, 11th grade) wrote two poems. Students' on line writing processes were recorded by a keystroke logging program: Inputlog Text production, pausing and several types of revision activities were coded. Each poem was rated holistically for quality by seven judges. Next, we examined the relationship between students' writing processes and the quality of their poems. We found that much text production in the beginning of the writing process and many high level revisions towards the end of the writing process, influenced the final text positively. Pausing and other types of revision were negatively related to the quality of the poem, at least in some of the phases of the writing process.