If we start with the premise that a sentence is "a word or a group of words that expresses a complete thought" then it should stand to reason that several sentences together would create a larger, though more complex, complete thought. No matter how many sentences are added to a work, the fundamental idea of "complete thought" should still be important.
Just as we need to teach a student the functions of the parts of a sentence (through diagramming), to express a complex thought, it is necessary to teach a student the fundamentals of structured writing so that he can create a coherent argument. Quite simply, this means that good writing has a purposeful, clear beginning, an explanatory middle, and a thoughtful, relevant conclusion.
For a long time, teachers have been offering a model known as the "Five-Paragraph Essay". Some educators might tell you that this model was only created to help students pass a batch of state required tests that are now no longer issued. The five-paragraph essay taught students to include the following elements:
- An introductory paragraph.
- A clear, purposeful thesis that outlines the coming content.
- Three paragraphs, one on each detail of the essay.
- A topic sentence for each of the three paragraphs.
- A concluding paragraph that frames the argument with the introduction.
With this simple structure, students are taught to write with an orderly, logical process. The expectations are clear to the student and lay the foundations for future academic writing. By knowing the purpose of topic sentences, by structuring each paragraph with intent already described in the thesis statement, and by creating an introduction and conclusion, the student learns how to express information to the reader in a clear, meaningful way.
Those who teach educational theory scoff at this method of writing. In a course that, supposedly, was to deal with composition, our teacher open berated this method of teaching nonfiction writing. She said it was "boring" to read. She also claimed, "No one writes like that anyway." Who was she talking about? Not other students, but professionals, adults and published authors. Keep in mind that students who are taught the five-paragraph essay are usually somewhere between grades 5 and 7.
The five-paragraph essay is the first step a writer takes from single paragraphs before venturing further into multifaceted research papers. Based on this foundation, students can then learn more complex styles of writing. After learning the five-paragraph method, it is possible to teach a student how to take very long details and present them over more than one paragraph, or how to make dynamic sentence construction without sounding like an adverbial listing service (firstly, secondly, thirdly, finally).
When our teacher made this declaration against this well known writing method I thought, "The five paragraph essay is bad?" I explained how her argument regarding "nobody writes like that" was invalid and went on to point out that this method was not intended to be the end-all of academic writing.
"If the only form of writing students were taught was the five-paragraph essay, of course it would seem bad. The point, however, is that it is a starting point. It is then the teacher's responsibility to build on that knowledge and prepare the student for more complex forms of writing."
I was extremely pleased when other students, all of them education majors (in a rare moment of enlightenment), also took issue with our teacher's claim. When asked what we were supposed to do instead of the five-paragraph essay, our teacher suggested we simply do more interesting types of assignments.
Pardon?
Book reports are a big no-no for educators. They're boring, apparently. So, instead of teaching them a tried and true method of writing nonfiction, we were to have them write fictional letters, or pretend newspaper articles. While potentially amusing, these ideas do not actually prepare the student for writing research papers or critical analyses. What did our teacher have to say about that? "No one really writes like that anyway," as she pointed to our textbooks for reference.
Every single university student I know has had to write complex research papers or critical analyses within their major. Anyone who wants to go through the rigors of getting a Masters or a Doctorate had better be able to write coherent essays as well. Anyone who wishes to have a nonfiction book published (such as a textbook), should also know how to handle a large amount of information.
If educators no longer want to teach the five-paragraph essay, and recommend instead doing a "fun" project that does NOT encompass the same fundamental logical process, then they are actually saying, "Students do not need to know how to think about things with any order." The process of writing nonfiction essays IS the process of thinking logically. To do away with this crucial step in education is to deny the student the ability to think critically about the world, with his own words.
May 2, 2006 at 7:40 am
You make some interesting points. I agree with you that writing is thinking! I also agree that informational writing is dependent on rhetorical form and that the form embeds the logic of argument making clear thinking visible. Here is where we disagree. Teaching form prior to the development of voice, where voice is understood as the belief that one has something important to say, puts the cart before the horse. I am convinced that ALL writing is based on the personal experience narrative because in this form voice develops. Teach the personal experience narrative and expose students to other rhetorical forms and the task of teaching writing is not so boring.
Additionally, I believe you confuse the notion of “fun” with “easy” and “rigor” with “hard.” This is a fundamental category error. There is, so far as I can tell, no direct relationship between that which is rigorous and being tough or hard. Engaging students in the task at hand is far more important than teaching an abstract form out of context. Following Frank Smith, engagement is invitational; students must be invited to join the literacy club. The literacy club has a specific discourse that attaches to membership. That discourse (rhetorical form for one) is learned as one acquires membership in the club. Rigor develops as students learn the discourse of the club and are able to ask productive questions as well as make appropriate arguments. Membership in the club, however, will not happen unless students are invited to join through engaging (fun) strategic teaching.
May 2, 2006 at 12:28 pm
Mr. Passman,
Thank you very much for your thoughtful comment. While I would not disagree that the development of a narrative voice is an equally important step towards rhetorical writing, please note that the comments regarding the “fun” factor of writing was not made by myself or the other students.
This particular class attempted to cover all areas of writing and reading development. There was a separate section that covered short stories and novels, along with points made about poetry and other styles of writing. While the quality of the content of these segments is certainly up for debate, they were not the focus of my post.
During this particular session, our teacher was specifically talking about writing nonfiction, and specifically discounting the five-paragraph (5PE) form due to her complaint that it is “boring” and that “no one writes like that” while referring to writers at completely different levels than 5th graders. Her qualm with the method had nothing to do with it being difficult or rigorous.
I whole-heartedly believe that any type of writing assignment, whether fiction or nonfiction, should be presented in a meaningful, engaging manner. If the five-paragraph form is being taught as an end in itself, then the teacher is a very poor teacher. Again, her complaint was not that teachers were pushing the 5PE ahead of other writing development, (which I agree with you, contains several stages), but simply that it was not an interesting style of writing.
The larger problem, which my post was attempting to address is that if educators eliminate a practical and proven step in the development of writing due to illogical reasons, then the impression they are giving future teachers is that it is not necessary to teach critical thinking. Hands down, writing a pretend newspaper article is not on the same level of thinking as a simple 5PE, regardless of how engaging the activity might be.
May 2, 2006 at 11:23 pm
“I am convinced that ALL writing is based on the personal experience narrative because in this form voice develops.” This, I believe, is what Richard Mitchell – the underground grammarian – would have considered a magical incantation. Something that contains individually meaningful words placed in proper grammatical context, but when structured together become completely indecipherable.
Moreover, if you believe that all writing is autobiographical in one shape or form then perhaps you have confused just one form of motivation with the actual nature of the task of writing.
Finally, separating rigor from difficulty is a problem of definitions and accuracy (an essential component of rigor, mind you). My trusty Oxford Dictionary defines rigorous as that related to logical accuracy, exactitude and a strict observance of certain rules. All of these imply mental focus and concentration – which are in fact difficult and “hard”. Ask any student if they are able to focus seriously on some subject – even one the student absolutely admires – for anything more than a few hours. What you will find is that they become mentally fatigued, not bored.
I have a distinct feeling that Mr. Passman is very much of the modernist school of education: the post-Dewey school. I can imagine just the effect on his students, if any (students, that is).
-B.
June 11, 2006 at 6:04 pm
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