Personally I love peer reviews. It gives me a chance to show my work to my potential audience and get input on how I can improve it. It helps me see any passages that might be confusing because a lot of the time, when I write I automatically assume the reader knows as much as I do about the subject, when in reality they might need a bit of background information. It also gives me a chance to see where I should expand and maybe add some more examples or details.
I think one downfall of peer reviews though is that a lot of times people don't give as much input as they could because they're afraid of being mean. It's ok if you mark up someones paper a ton, we're all grown ups here, we can handle a little constructive critism. You're not doing the writer any favors if you hand them back an unmarked essay. They need to know the areas they should work on. Everyone has things they could improve, but a lot of the time it's hard to see mistakes in your own writing.
You made such a good point when you brought up that sometimes people don't want to be mean, I sometimes hesitate for that reason but then I remind myself that it's going to actually help them...as long as it's constructive criticism. A new thing I learned from my peers though is that it doesn't just have to be pointers for error it can also be positive messages letting the writer know what really worked.
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