The Right Way to Write?
Reading, and reading problems, get lots of attention. But writing, and writing problems, which are equally important receive far less time and effort. The consequences of this neglect are serious—as many discover once they leave college and try to move up the career ladder. Skilled writing is an enormous advantage for both academic and job success. It is also in enormously short supply.
To deal with the problem, schools have placed one technique into center stage. It goes by the name of “journal writing.”
A product of the whole language movement, daily or near daily, journal writing occurs in the primary grades in schools throughout the nation. The idea is that children’s interest in writing would be increased and their skills would be enhanced if they were to write about their own experiences—experiences that were meaningful to them.
Practice with this type of writing occurs even in the earliest years such as kindergarten. There, children will be encouraged to draw a picture of something in their lives and then put down whatever words they can to go along with it. (For those who are familiar with invented spelling, it’s easy to see the compatibility between the two systems. The topic can be anything that comes to the child’s mind and the spelling can also be anything that comes to mind.) The seeming lack of constraint is thought to be a boon to the child’s expression and confidence.
As many a parent knows, it frequently doesn’t work. Many children, dreading the daily assignment, begin to rely on simple repetitive formulas that they hope will allow them to get by. Often, for example, not knowing what else to do, a child will write about his pet. The end product, repeated with slight variations from day to day, is something like “I have a pet. His name is Charley. I like him. We play together.” After a few days, the teacher will respond with a message such as “I love hearing about your pet but I would love to hear about something else. Can you think of something else in your life that really is important to you.” The child has been anticipating—with butterflies in his stomach—the moment when this message would come. It always recurs after a certain number of repetitions on the same theme. All the child can do is hope he can get away with his ploy for as many days as possible.
The irony is that even when a child writes journal entries well, they do little or nothing for the writing skills that he or she will need both in higher grades in school and in jobs in adult life. Why is that the case?
Well, think about it for a moment. What is the essence of journal writing? What is its message? The answer is that it is a form of personal diary writing where a written record is made that reports on something meaningful that happened to the writer over the course of a day or other period. But for whom is a diary written? Or put another way, who is supposed to read a dairy?
Generally it is only for the writer. It is the self-expression of someone who wants to get his or her ideas down—just because that expression leads to a better sense of well-being or release. They are not designed to be read by anyone else. So when a teacher reviews, edits and comments on them, it is basically an invasion of privacy. And when the teacher, seeing the repetition, requests new content, he or she is essentially making an inappropriate demand. It is a violation of a diary writer’s rights.
From a purely pragmatic view, the practice is also mired in difficulty. The demands of journal or diary writing have little or no similarity to the major set of demands that individuals face in the later school years or in their careers. The type of writing that is required is termed “expository writing.” Basically in this form, the writer is “exposing” or “illuminating” a theme about a subject of importance in the society—whether it is the causes of the Civil War in a middle school class; a critique of the United Nations in a high school class or an analysis of business practices of competing organizations in a job setting. Journal writing offers little if anything in the way of training for this type of writing.
None of this should be interpreted to mean that I am against a child keeping a diary. If a child independently selects that activity, it’s great. Any reasonable activity that a child ELECTS to do should be encouraged. But journal writing in school does not fit this category. It is not an activity that the child has chosen to do. It is an IMPOSED activity that uses up time and fails to teach what the children need to learn.
So what is a parent to do? It is, of course, neither feasible nor realistic for parents to create the writing curriculum that schools have failed to create. But there are a number of things you can do that are manageable and have enormous payoff.
It is well known that artists learn a tremendous amount about their craft from (intentionally) copying other artists. The same is true of writing. Imitating the construction of well-formed ideas is invaluable. So here is one activity to try with children from about third grade on.
Take a newspaper that the child can read. It might be something as esoteric as the New York Times or the Los Angeles Times or it might be something like New for You http://www.news-for-you.com/ --an excellent paper for young children. First have the child read an article--or a good percentage of an article. Then take a few minutes to discuss the ideas with him or her and use the time to go over any points that are unclear. Following that, select one of the paragraphs. At the outset, it should be a relatively short paragraph of no more that three to four sentences.
Ask the child to read the paragraph again. Then cover it and ask him or her to “recreate” the set of ideas. This need not be a word for word recreation–but all the key ideas need to be included in well-formed sentences.
If, in the middle of the writing, the child needs to go back and look at the paragraph, allow that to happen. However, when it does, the child has to start the writing again—from scratch. In order for these writing skills to develop, it is essential that the child be able to mentally hold and manipulate a set of ideas. If you allow him or her to deal with one sentence at a time, a key element in effective expository writing will be eliminated.
If you do this activity twice weekly for a sustained period of time (e.g., six months), you will begin to see major changes in your child’s writing abilities. Of course, the atmosphere has to be supportive. If it ends up as a yelling bout or with lots of preaching, it will just add to a child's negative feelings about writing. But if you can put the time aside and commit yourself to this, the effects are amazing. Not only do your child’s writing skills flourish, but the regular interactions lead to interesting, illuminating exchanges which enhances your relationship with your child.
