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QUESTION: I am a parent and I 've often wanted to ask
"language arts" teachers (we used to call them English teachers)
how they went about teaching *good* writing. I'm not just talking about
good spelling and grammar. My experience (from back in the dark ages) was
we wrote something and the teacher marked what was "wrong" and
occasionally commented on something they liked. Then we tried again. And
again. Some of us had it and some didn't. What the teacher did had not much
effect as far as I could tell (the good writers stayed good, the poorer
ones perhaps improved their spelling etc. but their writing wasn't any more
interesting or powerful).
Most of our writing instruction consisted of being told what not to do.
How do you make that positive? How do you tell your students what to do
without doing it for them? How do you get your students beyond being merely
technically correct? What should a parent say (that will make a positive
difference) when asked to comment on a piece of writing (especially if there
are things that could be improved)?
ANSWER: I'm a journalist, not a teacher, but I'm married
to a middle school English teacher and the parent of a third grader. So,
I come at this issue from multiple perspectives.
In my view, the best thing that teachers can do to help students grow as
writers is help them understand that writing is a process. It involves a
series of revisions. Just as science requires many experiments to reach
a solid conclusion and art requires many erasures and adjustments, writing
also requires many different drafts. Yet, children (and adults) often believe
that once is good enough when it comes to writing. I believe that schools
are too eager to turn out sprinters; good writing requires endurance.
I also think that we're wasting too much time arguing about "the basics"
in writing instruction. Yes, children need to understand grammar and spelling,
but focusing on those discreet skills at the expense of reading and practicing
writing will get you nowhere. Some of the best "grammarians" I
know are also the most boring writers. Their work is as exciting to read
as a dictionary. On the contrary, some of the best writers I know are terrible
spellers. I'm much more interested in what they have to say than whether
their informal drafts include misspelled words. Computer spell checkers
and final drafts can correct those problems.
On a personal level, I spent 12 years in Catholic schools. I learned all
about phonics and grammar, but I couldn't tell you today how to diagram
a sentence. I became an award-winning writer by reading a lot of good writing
and practicing, practicing, practicing. I also had many people in later
years who helped me see the value of refining my work. In school, too many
teachers were impressed that I had an active and sophisticated vocabulary.
I got plenty of A's for essays that "sounded" good. It wasn't
until I was a junior in high school that my English teacher did me the great
favor of saying about one of my writing assignments: "You know, you
really write well, but you don't say anything." Great advice. It stung,
but it made me a far better writer and reporter.
In contrast, my eight-year-old son has spent the past four years in a multi-age,
multi-ability public school classroom in Kentucky with a teacher who has
showered the students with reading materials. These children write and edit
continually, in every subject. Their skills are nothing short of amazing.
My son writes far better than I did at his age. My husband says that in
terms of sentence structure, pacing and the development of ideas, my son's
work stacks up with the best writing of the seventh- and eighth-graders
in the elite, private school where he teaches.
As far as things you can say to your child or student to improve writing,
some general advice:
* Pay attention to audience -- In other words, what are you trying to do
with a piece of writing (inform, entertain, persuade), and who should get
the message? This is a missing element in so much writing, and it's really
the most fundamental piece. If you don't know where you're going, you'll
never get there.
* Use active, not passive, voice whenever possible. Despite President Clinton's
assertion that "mistakes were made," somebody is responsible for
the problem. Name him, her, it.
* Write to enlighten, not to impress. Some of the best words in the English
language are also the most simple ones. A sentence such as "Jesus wept"
is far more effective and enduring than one that includes a string of multi-syllabic
words that confuse the issue more than clarify it.
* Praise children for what they've done well, but make the praise count
for something. Honor genuine effort and achivement. Teach students to reach
higher and not be satisfied with mediocrity. That's how you learn to write
well.
Anyway, I guess I should get off my soapbox now. Hope this provides some
food for thought.
Holly Holland
Editor
Middle Ground Magazine
National Middle School Association
ANSWER: Warning! This is long and may provoke an argument.
As an eighth grade language arts instructor and a member of the Northwest
Inland Writing Project (a chapter of the National Writing Project), I'd
like to respond to this very important question.
First, writing does not lend itself to easy evaluation and assessment. Much
published writing is very poor. Some that is wonderful, we would not want
our students producing on a regular basis. Should an eighth grader try to
write like James Joyce? I've seen many sentences that sounded like the opening
lines of *Fennigan's Wake.* Should we encourage the run on sentences Faulkner
uses in "The Bear"?
Secondly, language arts instructors have as many students as anyone else,
yet are expected to teach writing. You observe that comments written on
papers have little effect. With eighth graders, a teacher may find himself
spending more time reading and responding to a paper than the child spent
in writing. Having done so, the teacher is rewarded with "that's just
the way I write" and a shrug. It is tempting to assign one essay a
quarter and spend the rest of the time doing mechanics and reading stories.
Third, other teachers, students, and parents (most of society) evaluate
writing by the degree to which a piece is free of mechanical errors. A thoughtful
idea is often ignored because of a spelling error.
Fourth, we live in a society obsessed with immediate gratification. We want
to be entertained and we don't like to work too hard for it. The extrinsic
rewards for writing are very few (Ever see a gym filled with parents cheering
the varsity writing team for a well-turned phrase?) and the intrinsic ones
come from the satisfication one gets from having solved a difficult writng
problem through often arduous revision over a long period of time.
Fifth, we try to teach writing in an environment that forces students to
pack up and move to the next room every 45 minutes. This means the student
has to fire up the creative juices all over again the next day; that is,
if we don't have a game, assembly, aids instruction video, early release
or some other important academic task to perform instead.
These are the conditions under which we are asked to teach writing. So how
do we try to do it?
Here are the principles by which I teach writing:
1. Every piece is a work in progress.
2. I value the rough drafts perhaps more than the final product.
3. Every page of writing gets some credit. No one is punished for producing
writing.
4. Students write for various purposes: A journal or piece of free writing
should not be red marked. A poem should be evaluated differently than an
essay, an essay differently than a short story. Sometimes you might want
to write like Joyce, sometimes like your text book.
5. Read every piece of student writing on its own terms. Does it set its
own parameters and then live up to them?
6. Never grade a paper; read it.
7. Find markets for student writing. Give the children a choice. Never assign
writing; invite it.
8. Throw away your deadlines; there is no late work. (This is not to say
that a market won't disappear. "That essay contest has a deadline and
your piece was not mailed on time, but this is really well done. I'll give
you project credit, but I can't give you publication."
(An A in my class is earned only if a given number of publication credits
are earned in the quarter. This allows me to credit lots of free writing
and drafts without giving A's to the prolific students who never revise
anything for publication.)
A parent should do the same thing: value the process more than the product
but make it clear there is a difference between the standards for a journal
and a letter to the editor of the communtiy newspaper.
A parent should read and respond to the ideas. If the parent is confused,
say so. Discuss what confuses you and suggest what might make it easier
to understand. Share your own writng and discuss problems you may be having.
Corrie C. Rosetti
Eighth grade language arts
Lincoln Middle School
Clarkston, WA
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