For last
Friday’s Workshop, I came up with a solid lesson plan that included several
paired and group activities, including what I imagined to be a useful and fun quick-writing
assignment. I think it was inspired by a
comment by someone in a class – I no longer remember whom or in which class –
who said that most of our students will not need to write after college. I emphatically disagreed and came up with the
following:
Complaint Letter Scenarios
Choosing one of the
following scenarios, write a letter of complaint to your City Councilperson 1)
requesting action or offering your solution to the problem, 2) giving
logical reasons for your position, and 3) refuting likely opposing
arguments. Be sure your language and
tone are appropriate to your audience and purpose.
A.
There
is a deep pothole in the center lane of a major thoroughfare in your
neighborhood.
B.
The
sidewalk on your street is buckling in several places due to trees planted by
the city on the parkway, but not maintained.
C.
Your
street is being used as a staging area for construction trucks and equipment
belonging to a nearby commercial complex.
D.
A
rental house on your street is being advertised on Airbnb as a party facility.
My ultimate goal with the
assignment was to show that making logical arguments is a skill that stretches
beyond college into the real world. I
also thought that civic involvement might be of interest to the class. Before they began writing, I demonstrated how
to find their councilperson using lacity.org, and I projected a sample that
modeled how to organize the letter. We
talked about using a respectful tone and not writing angrily or making threats
to a public official.
Results were mixed. Two students chose their own topics, illegal
dumping and safe crosswalks, and I realized that I should have had a
choose-your-own option from the start.
With one exception, all of the letters lacked the detail and support
that students’ academic papers typically lack.
With all our previous discussions of providing evidence and concrete
examples, I was surprised at the vagueness of their writing.
So what went wrong? I feel the prompt clarified the variables
noted by Lindemann: student interest,
purpose, audience, the student’s role, form of discourse, and criteria for
success (217-8). Was there something
culturally insensitive in the prompt?
After all the personal writing that the class has done with me, I know
them and the neighborhoods in which they live.
Is this kind of civic engagement not relevant to them at 18 or 19 years
of age? Is there suspicion of public
officials? I welcome your thoughts.
Paula,
ReplyDeleteI can empathize with your frustration at "the vagueness of their writing." I don't have all the answers, but here's one thing I have done with complaint letters: after the students finish their drafts, and before the teacher views them, I have a partner comment on the paper for a grade. (If the partner can come up with more than two major suggestions, the grade from the teacher is higher than a simple credit grade.) To prevent partners from being too soft on a friend's complaint letter, I sometimes share an anonymous and flawed letter from another class and pretend that I am the official who has received the letter. I model close reading and point out why I am confused, or why there isn't enough detailed information for me to act upon the complaint.
The teacher should tell the partners: "Pretend that you are the owner, the manager, the official who receives the letter. What details are missing from the letter that you need to understand the nature of the complaint or to specifically address the complaint? What could the letter do better to persuade you to act promptly on the matter?" Usually, partners are quick to point out missing dates, invoice or receipt numbers, specific locations or other details. Often, partners cite an illogical sequence of details, or a lack of clarity regarding what the writer expects to be done to remedy the situation. Regularly, they point out a passage in the letter that displays ignorance of how bureaucracy works. Sometimes, partners note lapses in proper tone. If the partner notices flaws in usage or writing mechanics, he/she can identify these as well.
After this intermediate step in the process, the student must use this input to revise their letters and submit them to the teacher for a final grade.
It's frustrating when kids are lazy and want to cut corners. If a partner gets a chance to earn an additional grade, and if a partner exposes shortcomings in the letter rather than the teacher, everybody learns something and the teacher gets a better finished product. Did this help? Hope so.
Thanks, David. When I do this again, I will take two class periods to write the letter and add your peer review suggestion.
DeleteI suspect the City Councilperson audience might have been intimidating for some people. Maybe some samples would help here -- doubt many young students have done this kind of business writing to a perceived superior.
ReplyDeleteThis one gave me an idea:
" A rental house on your street is being advertised on Airbnb as a party facility."
What about a task which asks students to try to solve the problem through addressing a COUPLE of different audiences -- first, the owner of the house; then, the cops?
Your comment that students might consider their elected official "superior" is enlightening. I had not considered that possibility. From my perspective, Mike Bonin is there to serve the community. He's our employee.
Delete