Writing: Aspect of Other Things or a Thing Itself?

I used to think that swimming and running weren't actually technically sports, just strenuous aspects of other sports. You're only doing one thing for the entire duration. To my high school mind (and really, if we're being honest, to my current mind) it didn't become a sport until you had to run or swim while also doing something else. Running with a ball in your hand without dropping it while trying to not get hit by giant men (or while knowing full well that you will be hit and hit hard by those same giant men) is a sport. Running to catch something and throw it, running and not getting caught, these are what sports are made of.

This was a lengthy prelude to talking about Mike Rose's article. Like Sara and Laura I think that writing should be taught with a more whole language approach. Writing should be judged, or I guess evaluated to use a term with a less negative connotation, based on how well it does what it is trying to do. That is, if it is making an argument, then: how well is the argument structured? what is the central claim? what's the evidence to back it up? what's the evidence against the claim and how does it fit into the claim? how well is the ethos established? etc. Grammar correction should enter into it only when effectiveness of the piece takes a significant hit. Or something like that.

What I think Rose is railing against in the piece is the view by other academics, he mentions specifically a chemistry professor, who consider writing the way I consider running: as simply an aspect of other, more important tasks (like chemistry, or public policy or, like, I don't know, magazine ad copy). There should be, he's saying, more emphasis on the thing itself, as writing that's effective because it's good writing and not simply a "transcription skill" that gets what's in your head onto the paper and into other people's heads.

If we view writing as another language, then we can approach it the way we do in TESL. At lower, basic levels of confidence you do some drills to drive home specific points, but never more than 5 to 10 minutes at a time. It's mostly done through communication and using the new language (or writing) to try to accomplish a specific goal (like Sara's Ethical Dilemmas SI), and being corrected only to make accomplishing the goal easier or more direct. And as the competence level of the students increases, you can start using finer and finer brushes to work the details. I guess it's the difference between impressionism and photorealism, if we consider those two modes of expression to be on a kind of clarity continuum.

Lower Levels: not too much on details

 

Upper levels: sharp focus