If there is one thing that Fernando Vásquez Rodríguez has consistently demonstrated, it is that writing does not improve through exhortation but through mediation. It is not enough to ask students to “write an essay” or “produce a report.” The process itself must be intervened. This is why his notion of writing protocols remains so relevant: explicit sequences of actions that make the craft of writing visible. They are neither rigid recipes nor vague intuitions. They are designed instruments.
Read in the current context, these protocols can be understood as an early form of what we now call prompts. Not in a strictly technical sense, but in their cognitive function: guiding planning, drafting, and revision. In other words, making thinking operational.
At this point, it is useful to bring in Tim Fawns. His work on educational design challenges a persistent illusion: there is no neutral technology and no pure pedagogy. What exists instead is an ecology in which tools, practices, and values are deeply entangled. From this perspective, the question is not whether to use artificial intelligence in education, but how its use is designed.
The convergence is difficult to ignore. Vásquez proposes protocols to teach specific discursive forms of writing; Fawns insists that any tool must be embedded within a situated pedagogical design. Prompts, therefore, are not shortcuts. They are—at least potentially—devices for instructional design.
The distinction matters.
A poorly constructed prompt reproduces the very problem Vásquez has long criticized: vagueness. “Write an essay about…” teaches nothing. It does not define the discursive form, clarify the cognitive operation, or establish evaluative criteria. It is merely the digital version of “write one page on this topic.”
A well-designed prompt, by contrast, functions as a protocol. It specifies role, audience, task, structure, and conditions of quality. It does not replace writing; it frames it.
Put differently: it does not automate thinking, it disciplines it.
This shift opens a productive reconfiguration in higher education writing instruction. Traditionally, students move from summaries to essays, from reports to articles, as if these were natural progressions. Vásquez has shown that such transitions require explicit teaching of discursive forms in their specificity. Today, we can add: they also require carefully designed mediations.
This is where prompts can play a serious role.
Not as generators of text—that is their most trivial use—but as organizers of the writing process. A well-crafted prewriting prompt helps delimit a problem, identify key concepts, and formulate researchable questions. A drafting prompt structures argumentation and organizes evidence. A postwriting prompt enforces revision, coherence, and clarity.
Seen this way, the parallel with Vásquez’s protocols is evident. The difference is that prompts can now be dynamic, interactive, and responsive in real time.
However, Fawns’ warning remains critical: no design is neutral.
If prompts are used to produce “correct” texts without understanding, they reinforce superficial pedagogy. If they are designed to make processes explicit, they strengthen academic literacy. Technology does not decide this. Educators do.
The relevant question, then, is not whether artificial intelligence writes better than students. That is a secondary concern. The real question is whether we are using these tools to conceal the writing process or to make it visible.
Vásquez would remind us that writing is a craft learned through practice, feedback, and linguistic awareness. Fawns would add that all practice is mediated by design and technology. Together, they lead to an unavoidable conclusion: integrating AI into education is not enough; the teaching of writing itself must be redesigned.
And that, it must be said, requires more work, not less.
Very much present in these lines, with enduring intellectual respect and sincere regard, wishing him a prompt and full recovery.
References
Fawns, T. (2022). An entangled pedagogy: Looking beyond the pedagogy–technology dichotomy. Postdigital Science and Education, 4(3), 711–728.
Vásquez Rodríguez, F. (2017). Pregúntele al ensayista (11th reprint). Kimpres.
Vásquez Rodríguez, F. (n.d.). El protocolo: una ayuda didáctica para ordenar las acciones al redactar diversas formas discursivas. https://fernandovasquezrodriguez.com
