Question, Research, Experiment, and Write

In a recent article, published on Mooresville Tribune’s website, an experimental system is underway in the North Carolina public schools.  For this school year 2008-09 state writing assessments have quadrupled, requiring students to undergo an aggressive writing program.

As a result of changes adopted by the State Board of Education in June, fourth and seventh grade students will complete four writing assessments – two on-demand, prompt-guided tests following the same format as the previous examination and two content-specific assessments, which will take several days and examine the entire writing process – during this school year’s pilot program. (Skutnick, Melinda. Local schools not sure what to expect from pilot testing program.  Mooresville Tribune.  28 Nov. 2008)

This pilot system encourages teachers to focus on the writing process.  However, this will mean more work for teachers but they aren’t expecting that it will cost them any more classroom time.  Another change being implemented this year for seventh graders is the use of a word processor.  Seventh graders are required to type their responses according to the MGSD’s Digital Conversion.

After reading this article I was thrilled to find a pilot system was underway.  However, the results won’t be published until next year but it will be interesting to see what affect this has on students.  Oddly enough I did notice that their main focus would be on the writing process which really made me question whether or not this system will work.  If students are encouraged to pump out five paragraph essays including:  an introductory paragraph with thesis, three supporting body paragraphs, and a concluding paragraph restating the thesis, then how on earth will they learn to be creative?  I understand the necessity to learn the basics of writing, because without knowing the rules you can’t properly brake them.  Unfortunately, for these student I feel they will become some of the best robotic writers by the end of this pilot system.  Sadly enough, their scores will more than likely rise as this writing process is exactly what the state assessments are looking for.

Although this is a wonderful way of incorporating writing across the curriculum in a school system I really hope these students learn to become better writers, not just regurgitators.  It is easy to write a five paragraph essay, but can these students easily switch to an argumentative essay or a scientific research paper?  In fact even now that I am in college the five paragraph essay has become obsilete.  Just recently I wrote a scientific paper disproving Walley’s theory; the Gulf Stream Current is the reason Western Europe has milder winters than that of Eastern North America.  In this thirteen page paper I had to figure out how to construct an abstract, followed by an introduction, followed by data, resuslts, graphs, text, and lastly a conclusion.  I think it’s important to understand that the writing process for every subject changes.  After all I had to figure out exactly what an abstract was composed.  I also had to teach myself how to neatly incorporate data and graphs into my text without taking away from what I was trying to prove.  It is this simple notion, that not every subject uses the five paragraph essay, that I hope will be taught in the school systems.

Full Article:  kutnick, Melinda. Local schools not sure what to expect from pilot testing program. Mooresville Tribune. 28 Nov. 2008.