Idea Control, Part 2

It might be futile to pinpoint what constitutes a great idea in a piece of writing. Like in teaching, so many factors are at play that to narrow down the multitude of possibilities to fit neatly into some eye-catching title (Five Ways to Improve Your Writing! or The 47 Things You Didn't Remember to Do Today that You Should've!) seems fraudulent.

But how do we know that we're on the right track in guiding ourselves and our students toward a more intimate understanding of how to generate compelling ideas in our writing? How do we know that we're pushing ourselves toward writing with more authority--and ultimately--with more meaning?


In Idea Control, Part 1, I wrote about the kinds of questions we want our kids asking about their writing--questions that are idea-focused rather than turn-in/teacher focused. Akin to those kinds of questions, these questions push us toward a more challenging and effective process as we're developing our ideas. In addition, deeper into the writing process, they help us self-assess, peer-review, and assess for idea control.

Here they are:

• Is the piece built around a bold claim?
• Does the piece convey an intimacy with the topic?
• Does the piece provide compelling and thorough evidence?
• Does the piece take intellectual as well as craft risks?
• Does the piece take us somewhere new?
• Does the piece convey a truth that matters beyond the borders of the page?

It is important that students understand that the terms "claim" and "evidence" do not only apply to academic writing, but to any kind of writing. A novelist presents claims and evidence through character, plot, theme, etc. No matter what form of writing my students are engaged in--poetry, fiction, business communication, academic papers--I ask them what their claim is because I want them to know the point--the truth--they are trying to drive home with their piece.

You might argue that craft risks (in question 3) belongs more comfortably in the arena of "Stylistic Control," but I feel it is an important question to begin asking early on in the process because students start to make important rhetorical decisions about how they can execute their idea on paper. Decisions such as, What motif could I use? What metaphor might capture this?

Come peer review and grading time, if the answer to most of these guiding questions is "yes," then we know we have an author who did what was necessary to not only expertly (and perhaps even artfully) convey an important idea--but to grow as writers.

Thanks for reading. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

Steve

This article on Writing Control is the introduction to the series.

Idea Control, Part 1

In the realm of writing instruction, if we have failed our students (if it can even be called a failure), it is not because we haven't prioritized writing--because we have. It is not because we haven't spent countless hours commenting on papers--because we have. Not because we haven't been diligent in our planning, our reflection, our assessments, our adjustments, our pep talks. Because we have. It is not even because we haven't modeled our own writing because we have been brave enough to do this time and time again.

Where we have potentially failed them is here: we have emphasized form/genre over substance.

We have to teach form. Of course, we must. There are expectations that we do so from our colleagues, college professors, the world of work, the world of writing. Though they resist at times, our students also have expectations that we teach them certain forms--the academic essay chief among them. I will never argue against the necessity of this.

 But what I will argue against is that we often distort writing for students when we emphasize form over idea. We start to lose writers here because they are now destabilized from what they intuitively know to be important, which is the idea, the point, the moral of the story.

Writing makes sense when it is in pursuit of clarity and depth of understanding. When we unravel the deeper significances of the topics that have chosen us, and perhaps even the ones that have been assigned to us. But when we say to them that the paramount mission of a writing assignment is not the idea, but the form, their natural writing and linguistic abilities and talents are suddenly invalidated. The process of writing no longer makes sense to them, and this often leads to temporary paralysis and worse, including a long term disdain for writing.

When students ask the wrong questions, we know that it is the result of what we, their teachers, have emphasized. How long should the paper be? How many paragraphs? How many sentences do I need in each paragraph? Do I need to use quotes? Do I need three body paragraphs? Do I need to use transition sentences at the end of every paragraph? Can I get an A if I write more than I have to? Do I need to have a Works Cited page? And on and on. And while the question to many of these might be "yes," these questions should never precede the more important questions that help them focus on the real work of writing which is the development and pursuit of an idea.

It's a paradigm shift for many students because their writing careers have been form-focused. And as such, their shifts toward more meaningful writing efforts will be filled with a lot of trepidation. They know how to trust in a form of writing because the form doesn't betray them. It is nice and tidy and usually undaunting.

Ask these students to write--to just write--without strict dictates of word length and sentence or paragraph requirements, and they balk, they grow wide-eyed, they grow fearful that they might do the assignment incorrectly. That they might be wrong.

The irony is that they have been doing it "wrong" all along. They have been writing what has amounted to rote, barely-inspired, and usually forgettable stuff. Why? They don't want to write it any more than we want to read it. They're worried more about trivial things than interpretation and revelation.  

The Solution
One way I help them shift their thinking about writing is to not mention form at all for the first few months of school. This unnerves many students, but it also sends the unequivocal message that I don't care about anything except really good ideas. I do not address questions of length, sentence requirements, or any other misguided and fear-based questions they are so apt to ask. I simply ask them to write, to share, to listen to each other read, to comment, to question, to read good mentor texts, to listen to and respond to my writing, to write more.

Simultaneously, we're working to build a community based on trust, respect, high-expectations, love, family.

And more than any modeling or mentor texts I provide, their own writing and the writing of their peers drives this revival of their voices. They rediscover the inherent power--and even joy--that writing provides. They begin thriving as writers in this new clarity and confidence.

And then something beautiful happens: they start asking questions that actually matter. I'm struggling to bridge the gap between these two driving themes; can you help me think about where they might intersect? Is it unreasonable to have multiple subplots in a short story? I have to write about this idea because I can't stop thinking about it, but do you think it would be appropriate for school? I'm not sure if this motif is working for me; what do you think? I have four different ideas for this piece; can we conference to help me sort through them? Do you think this is publishable?

They start expecting each other to bring their best to page, and they soon begin to feel once again that sense of authority and authorship they haven't felt perhaps since early elementary school when they wrote with abandon.

And to create writing that is this good, it has to be writing that transcends what they have previously generated. This means they have to bravely develop and explore what is core to all writing: ideas.  

Potluck
In my classes, I share with my students a metaphorical image of our Authors' Circle as a potluck where everyone brings potato salad. And while I've had some darn good potato salads in my life, if everyone brought potato salad, it would be one sorry shared meal.

I then share with them the image of our metaphorical (and sometimes actual!) potluck as being brilliantly diverse and delicious, with main dishes and sides and desserts that we cannot get enough of.

Of course, their pieces are their contributions to our potluck, and if they have been brave in the writing kitchen, if they have pushed themselves to create the best piece possible, when they read from their pieces, we can't get enough.

Thanks for reading,
Steve

You might be interested in this Related Article: Writing Control

Writing Control

One of the most empowering things we can do for students is to allow them to make decisions about the course of their own learning. It instills a sense of ownership, increases engagement, and amplifies learning.
 

We know this.

Then why has so much of writing instruction been about removing decisions from students? We've told them in a variety of ways that they are incapable of making sound and effective decisions about their own writing, and then we chastise them for writing poorly and for not understanding the huge implications in their future academic and actual careers for not being able to write effectively.

Is there a solution to this? Yes, and it is something we're already experts at. When we teach kids to ride a bike, drive a car, dance, play an instrument, or dribble a basketball we're trying, ultimately, to teach them to control what they're doing. So, let's teach them to control what they're doing on the written page.

What "Real" Writers Do

If you look at what writers do, there are three areas they have to control if they're going to effectively communicate their ideas to their readers.

Whether it's a novel, a play, a poem, a scholarly article, an email, an essay, a letter, or a blog, these three areas need to be effectively controlled: Ideas. Structure. Style.
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First and foremost, is control of ideas. It has to be, for without an idea, there is no reason to write. And this is how students naturally come to writing because they have ideas bursting forth. They are enthusiastic writers of fantastic things, and we reward them for this. But too soon, we alter their conceptions of their approach to writing by proposing to them that they need to consider structure first and foremost.

As a classic example, consider how we teach them to write essays (three- or five-paragraph). We begin by handing them an outline of the structure and ask them to fill it in section by section--or even line-by-line. The hollow equivalent of a paint-by-numbers picture that looks pretty from a distance, but that possesses no originality or evidence of transferable skill.

Structure is important, but only in service to an idea worth writing about.

All three areas are vitally, vitally important. Without an effective structure, meaning begins to unravel. Without style, the writing will be lifeless and unread. But without an idea, there is no impetus to write.

But they have to earn a grade, isn't that impetus enough? Yes, for some. And these few will write dutifully, and without any real commitment--and most significantly, without any sense of control or authority.

Author-ity

The word "author" has its roots in the word "authority." In all writing endeavors, we must instill this in our students. We must allow them to make decisions about their writing so that they can begin to assert themselves, begin to sense and develop a sense of control over their writing.

So they can become authorities and authors.

Thanks for reading,
Steve

Upcoming articles will detail the pedagogical implications for the three areas of writing control, beginning (of course!) with Control of Ideas.

Please leave a comment or ask a question. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

On the Shoulders of Giants

When I began my career over twenty years ago, there were names that permeated the landscape--my landscape, at least--of the teaching of English:

Atwell.
Rief.
Ramano.
Fletcher.

It was a time in which Mrs. Atwell urged us to place ourselves literally In the Middle of our students. But she did more than that. Through her intimate journey into her classroom, she forced us to start asking many hard questions of ourselves. 

Ultimately these questions led us to one fundamental answer: student empowerment.

Which is sort of ironic because at its very core, isn't education innately about just that? None of us invite in our students and aim to lessen them by the time they leave our classrooms. None of us. It's not who we are.

But--and please believe I still find myself doing this very thing more often than I would care to admit--I make far too many choices for my students when they could be asserting their own desires. And I think for too long our profession has embraced this because it is how we were taught. We stepped into our classrooms that were mirror images of all the classrooms we'd ever stepped foot in. We embraced the status quo.

Atwell and others, though, provided another way to think about strengthening our students by giving them agency. By having them, through meaningful choices, find their voices.

And those of you brave enough to combat the pushback from what was once considered fairly radical recognize how empowering, rewarding, meaningful this paradigm shift has been. Once students trust that we are sincere in our approach--that we want them taking risks, we want them to defy our expectations, we want them all pursuing that which inspires and intrigues them--they begin to own what we had once owned for them.

*   *   *

My career's success--whatever it is--is not only due to those mentioned who are widely-famous, but to those who are more locally-famous to me. Those teachers who were still smiling and learning and loving what they did thirty or even forty years in. They inspired me when I first started out, and I find myself trying to emulate them virtually every day.

If I can see a slightly different landscape, it is only because I am still firmly seated on their shoulders.

Steve
December 1, 2016