Writing Teachers Gather Round

[lunabee34]

I know a lot of my flist is in academia, and zulu and I have been talking about teaching and teaching writing specifically, and I decided to host a post about teaching writing.

So, if you teach or have taught writing at any age level, what are some of the strategies you use? Specific assignments? General thoughts about writing instruction?

If you have ever been a student of writing, what are some things your teachers did that worked? Failed abysmally? General thoughts about learning/teaching writing?

Recs for books, essays, or websites also appreciated.

Please feel free to share this around.

I'll put my thoughts in comments rather than the top-level post.

Comments

[lunabee34]

Yes!

I think you are very right. Conventions for essay writing and creative writing are very different.

I don't teach creative writing,but I do assign one narrative essay each class because in my experience, students feel more comfortable writing about themselves; it's a way to ease them into the more rigorous requirements of argument. They always struggle with paragraphing in terms of dialogue.

[the_rck]

I finally got an explanation last spring for why the local school system starts students with persuasive essays before expository essays-- The state of Michigan used to rely heavily on ACT scores to evaluate high schools and for admissions to state colleges/universities, and the essay required for that was always persuasive. Because of that, the school board decided that kids needed to start writing persuasive essays before any other type. 3rd-8th grade, my daughter didn't write any essays that weren't persuasive.

I still feel that it was the schools trying to teach a no-hands cartwheel before a forward somersault or bicycling before walking.

[lunabee34]

Ah yes. The explanation for why we do so much, because it's tested. *sigh*

I agree that persuasive should not be the first rung of the essay-writing ladder. I would always start with narrative.