Exploratory problem solving that utilizes self-educating techniques such as the evaluation of feedback to improve performance can be put to use in the composition classroom. Quantitatively evaluated prewriting exercises can help students in two ways: first, students learn to use procedures that can prepare them for more sophisticated devices; second, students unfamiliar with peer critiquing can learn to evaluate one another's prewriting work before they are asked to critique either more complex prewriting exercises or finished essays. Through a series of exercises, students practice substantiating or illustrating generalizations through the use of particular details or examples, then critique one another's papers by an actual count of the number of details used. Versions of the exercise call for two evaluators per paper and for an author's response. Problems with this form of peer critiquing are that basic writers do not always feel competent or willing to judge their peers' work, students are often unable to differentiate between details that are really examples of the generalization and details that are tangential, and much more work is created until students become familiar with the peer critiquing system. (The paper includes three examples of students' writing and tells how they were evaluated.) (AEA)