Save yourself work
Use authentic expository writing prompt

If your expository writing prompt doesn't accomplish more than one of your course objectives, you are working too hard.

Writing prompts on topics within your regular curriculum provide authentic assessment of students' knowledge of more than just writing. They can even facilitate student learning at the same time.

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Write across your curriculum

If you teach middle school or high school English, in during a school year you should have at least one formal essay prompt on a topic about

• grammar

• writing

• literature

• oral communication

These are all authentic topics because they are part of your actual curriculum. When students write on these subjects, they will find out how much they actually understood—or failed to understand—about what you attempted to teach them.

What's more, if you give them formal writing assignments dealing with these topics, they will be required to plug the gaps in their information by doing some study and research.

You may be tempted to skip over grammar, usage, vocabulary, and other parts of the English/language arts curriculum that are not as interesting to you as the literature component.

Bad move.

Students believe that topics that are not written about cannot be important. Think about it: aren't the questions at the end of the textbook chapter always on the major points?

Giving students an expository writing prompt about a topic makes that topic assume importance to students. In addition, writing assignments push students toward higher level learning that worksheets and multiple-choice exercises cannot duplicate.

Look for links to current events

Non-literature based topics may be more interesting to many students than literature. They often are topics that make news headlines. For example, consider

• The controversy generated by the inclusion of a timed writing sample on the SATs.

• The jokes made over President George W. Bush's question, "Is our children learning?"

• The debate over whether English ought to be the official language of the United States.

• The 2008 story about two University of Virginia students expelled for plagiarism while on a summer study program in Europe.

• Political apologies that say "mistakes were made" but never say who made them.

Once you open your mind to looking for those sorts of connections, you will find the "boring parts" of your class are tied to some pretty exciting controversies. They can provide not only a reason to write but also a reason to read, think, and debate.

Finding authentic writing prompts is only part of the battle. You also must develop the topics into writing prompts that give students context and directions for writing. That subject deserves a page all to itself.

Making a double- or even triple-pronged expository writing prompt is no more difficult than thinking up a prompt unrelated to class content. What's more, a multi-tasking writing prompt ultimately reduces your work load, an added bonus worth more than a set of steak knives any day.

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