Or, depending on how nit-picky you are: Writing-Tutors’ Discussion.
I recently began tutoring a HS student. I earn my living as a writer, but am not a teacher. Other than editing my own children’s papers, I’d never taught a student how to write. I thought I’d start this discussion to compare tips and tales.
I usually start with any school assignments that the student is working on. I find it’s easier to teach writing in context, rather than to give lessons. So we review the writing assignment, he works on it in my presence, I help him when he gets stuck, and I show him how to improve it.
But I always have a prepared activity in case he isn’t working on a school assignment. Last week I taught him how to make his writing less choppy by combining two or more thoughts into one sentence. This is the example I gave him:
I’d love to hear about how others teach or tutor writing.
(Well, though, the second version has a somewhat different meaning. I would take from the first one that they both “went up the hill” meaning they succeeded in climbing it. While in the second, it adds the idea of “valiant” which we don’t know from the first (maybe they just cavalierly went up the hill) but more to meaning, the second one says “attempt” which is an implication that they didn’t actually make it up the hill, whereas “went up” implies they did. )
I teach writing, though to college freshmen, not HS students. I don’t spend much time on sentence level lessons in a vacuum. Mostly because I find those tend not to stick. If they showed up without something to work on, I’d have them do brainstorming and freewriting exercises to get words on paper. I’d talk about what their purpose was, who is the audience, etc. If they have something they’ve worked on, we’d talk about revision techniques, organization, flow of ideas, where things can be cut, where more can be added. Vague language vs concrete language, overuse of passive voice, and general clarity of prose. Often I ask them to read their words out loud–that generally leads them to hearing where the writing has run into trouble.
I work professionally with students on their college essays. For me, it’s all about helping them use fewer words to say what they want to say. So many kids add unnecessary words to their writing. Edit edit edit.
I teach adult ed ESL. So it is mostly about subject-verb agreement, and using a period instead of a comma. Yes, my friend, you have four separate sentences there, not just one.
I agree. Better to teach within the context of of a real writing task. But if my student doesn’t have one to work on, I like to have a short lesson ready.
Good idea. I’ve been modifying college-application essay prompts. Yesterday my student learned how hard it is to write just 35 words.
. Yes! I’d like to take a scalpel to some of these essays.
In general, the most frequent issues I see are:
–Wordiness
–Redundancy
–Over-explaining
–Attempts at erudition
I work a lot with college students and masters level students for professional or technical writing and my discussions are at the level of the paragraph. Every paragraph has a topic sentence (often the first sentence) and all the other sentences serve to explain or expand on that sentence. I went to a writer’s workshop once where the speaker suggested the idea of summarizing a paper by just listing the first sentence of each paragraph. The idea is that it would be a bit awkward to read but the main gist of the paper would be there.
@CheddarcheeseMN Does that method work for your students? Does their writing improve? The reason I ask is that, as a professional writer, I wince at formulas. The best writing is rarely formulaic. A well-written essay can have one-sentence paragraphs. Or sentence fragments. Good writing can defy formulas. Infinitives can be split, and passive voice can be used. Sparingly.
Students tell me that their teacher wants the class to write a five-paragraph essay in which each paragraph has a topic sentence followed by three supporting sentences, and the opening graf has to convey ABC, second graf DEF, third graf, XYZ, etc. I have to work within those confines instead of teaching the best way to write the essay.
Anyone else find it helps to create rules about topic sentences and paragraphs? Or other rules? Maybe I need to impose a structure.
I’d also give the some grammar reading assignments. Strunk and White. Grammar for Dummies. The Grammatical Lawyer (short paragraphs on mistakes often found in writing, not only legal writing). Only a page each on things like the difference between further and farther, and kind of fun (for grammar nerds like me).
Antonin Scolia and Bryan Garner wrote some fun books on how to write a sentence and word choice. Again, if you really care about whether Just Deserts or Just Desserts is correct… (hint, nothing to do with cake)
I tend to focus on effective word usage and varied sentence structure. In my opinion good writing is not enhanced by either brevity or verbosity. Asking students to articulate their intentions regarding communicating content via style, voice and tone seem like solid techniques to bring to their consciousness what might otherwise be overlooked.
On the other hand, I might have no idea what I’m talking about.
I am not a writing tutor, but am a retired project editor (college textbook publishing). I think every high school kid needs to get a copy of Strunk and White (Elements of Style) and memorize it. It won’t teach you how to write, but you won’t make cringe-worthy mistakes. I think the kind of creativity @brantly mentions above comes when someone has command of the language. Also, I’m a big believer in writing and rewriting and rewriting.
Helpful to impose rules about structure? No. But it’s important that students understand what the expectations are regarding 5-paragraph essays, intact infinitives, conjunctions in their places, and all that fun stuff. I like to organize lessons around those expectations, with short examples of great writing that breaks each of the rules. Nearly all native speakers are aware that these conventions exist, but few understand them well enough to control the structures.
Instruction is different, of course, for non-native speakers. And I don’t think anyone believes in formal instruction separate from functional context anymore. That’s so old school.
@brantly, we used to play the telegram came. How few words could you use to convey your thought? Winner had the cheapest telegram! From there, you could augment for color, style, and elegance. We found this game (bizarrely) fun and fiercely competitive.
Maybe the most important thing I need to remember in my daily business communications is the audience I’m addressing. Would it be worth it to develop exercises where the same subject is conveyed to a target audience of different levels of education or understanding? You could do the same with changes in perspective or elements of style, depending on the type of writing you’re focused on. It seems like my kids and those who report to me learn well when they create or see alternative methods and ultimately develop their own style based on personal preference and external feedback.
@brantly , you can make your own rules. It can start with anything (including your nursery rhyme.) Goal is to have the shortest telegram. You can count by letters or words. What ultimately made it a great teaching tool was that it forced an understanding of sentence structure and it also generated discussion about whether what had been cut altered the meaning/interpretation. I love your game as well. I think NPR recently had a contest that was similar. Really fun to see what people can do with 5-6 words.
Hey Strunk and White has lots of good advice, but it’s totally fine to split infinitives. No grammar rule there, just some attempts to weirdly graft Latin onto English.
Also, it’s a shame when schools spend so much effort on the artificial structure of five paragraph essays, as students will then likely go to college where that will be knocked out of them. But I get that old school high school teachers and standardized tests expect them.
One of the most common issues I see in my students’ writing is the repetition of a particular word, phrase, or idea throughout an essay or even throughout a single paragraph. So, something like,
“I am very motivated to achieve the highest level of success in this program. I’ve participated in other programs before, but I’ve never experienced the same level of motivation to succeed. I’m confident that participating in this program will lead to the achievement of my goal to be a [doctor/engineer/vet/environmental scientist]”
Having the student read his writing out loud is effective in helping him hear the tedious repetition of words and phrases. Additionally, the student should be taught that each sentence in a paragraph should build upon and further develop the concept of the prior sentence, not simply repeat the same idea by shifting some words around. Most students’ writing I see could be cut in half, not so much because of flowery or verbose language use, but because many of the sentences are redundant.
I had the great fortune of being taught writing by the brilliant Bryan Garner ( Dictionary of Moderm American Usage). His best technique was to provide lots of bad writing and work with you to fix it. Never ever ones own writing. It’s practically impossible to see the problems with ones own writing. It very easy to see the problem in the writing of others.
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