All students must learn writing skills. The true measure
of a writing teacher's work is how well the entire class writes.
Achievements of few writing stars can conceal a teacher's incompetence.
That, however, is not the popular view.
If
you are teaching public school, unless three-quarters of your English
language arts students take AP English, participate in poetry jams,
or publish their first novels before their junior prom, you're made
to feel you are just another cog in the educational machine.
Homeschooling parents aren't entirely immune from the writing stars
syndrome, either. If her kids struggle with writing, people subtly
let the homeschooling mom know there must be something wrong with
her.
Let's be realistic here.
Few students have star quality.
The real challenge is teaching the typical talentless kids without
any interest in writing. I think they are a bigger challenge
than the truly learning disabled: there are so many more of them.
Remember the old story about the bank robber who, when asked why
he robbed banks, said, "Because that's where the money is"?
Well, the reason writing teachers need to focus their attention
on average kids who couldn't care less about writing is that is
where the majority of students are.
There are other reasons as well.
Competence is a requirement
For one thing, colleges
expect the same basic writing skills of all students, whether
those students are going into forensic science, or accounting, or
planning to be the next poet laureate of the United States.
Similarly, employers expect
all students to learn writing skills before they start
work whether they are coming into the management training
program or working on the factory floor.
Neither colleges nor employers will be impressed by a high school
graduates' accomplishments in poetry or fiction if they can't write
a paragraph in which sentences start with capital letters and words
of five or fewer letters are correctly spelled.
Basics are the starting point
Good English teachers insist that equipping students with just the basics isn't enough.
I agree.
You ought to teach students more than just basic literacy skills.
Go as far beyond the basics as your students' abilities and interests
(and your endurance) will allow.
created 13-Mar-2008; updated: 12-Sep-2008