First of all, ignoring the fact that the whole purpose of an educator is to give people the ability to write, you know, to teach them to do things they can't do--a teacher who complains about kids in need of instruction is like a mechanic complaining in the garage 'ALL THESE CARS ARE BROKEN!"--ignoring that, I don't think these teachers are lying or necessarily wrong, I just think they rarely finish their sentences.
"These kids today can't write in the very specific, unnatural, rule-driven writing style that we demand they write in without providing any reasons for WHY they should be writing like this except for a standardized test and the belief we perpetuate that this is all there is to writing."
Yeah, kids today can't write like that. They're smart.
An analogy: writing is an expression of thought and running is an expression of movement.
So, here is how I imagine writing is taught by educators who believe that children can't learn as explained by running.
Let's say you looked at the best, fastest runners in the world for 400 meters. The unforgiving one-lap race. And you watched their fastest races and studied the footage day and night and compiled a list of all the things these runners do.
You might get a list like:
-lands on balls of the feet
-long stride length
-great hip extension
-stable core
-arms swing freely, forward and back--no side to side motion
-no head movement
-drives knee directly up with leg bent at 90 degree angle
-lands with foot directly under center of mass
-on back kick, snaps foot up--almost touching the butt
So, really great logic, right? You're an expert now. You looked at all the features that all the great runners have and you labeled them and now you know exactly what to teach young runners.
You round up about 30 high schoolers and have them meet on the track and you pass out diagrams and show them videos on your laptop and go through each phase of the running cycle and you explain it crystal clear so that each student has a perfect image in their head of what the ultimate 400 meter runner should look like.
And you line 8 kids up on the starting line and you say,
"Are you ready to kill it?!"
And they say, "YEAH!"
And you yell, "GO!"
And they take off as fast as they can and within 100 meters you are screaming "NO! NO! NO! NO! GET BACK OVER HERE!" And you stop them right there because they are clearly doing this all wrong.
-some of these kids are landing on their heels
-some of them have little chicken strides while others are loping monstrosities
-they can barely drive their knees up to waist level
-their core is collapsing as they wobble around the turn
-the arms are swinging more side to side than up-and-down
-the head is flip flopping around and around like a ball of yarn duct-taped to something hilarious
-on the back kick--their feet are splaying out to the side and yet barely getting off the ground!
To make matters worse: their form seems to somehow be deteriorating as they go! How could it go from bad to awful in the span of 30 seconds!
As Milton wrote:
And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep, Still threat'ning to devour me, opens wide; To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven
Clearly there must be a problem, right? The kids have failed by EVERY MEASURE of good running! Maybe that first 8 was just a bad batch. You go through your whole speech again. You point out all the things the kids were doing wrong. Now they'll be able to compare what they did to what they should do. This next 8 will be perfect.
"Are you ready to kill it for real this time?!"
"YEAH FOR REAL!"
And you yell, "GO!"
And this group is somehow even worse than the first. You stop them 50 meters in because it is clear that something is deeply deeply wrong with these kids.
You line up the next 8--and it's awful piled atop horrible. You choke back the vomit and tears that have almost escaped you and line up the last 6. By the time these last 6 kids have hit the 200, you're already in your car and driving home.
What a horrible horrible day for the sport of track and field. Not a single child out of 30 could display running in any measurable way.
You crawl into bed and fall into a wild, vinegary, nightmare-ridden sleep. The next morning, as you claw your way out of bed and stare directly into the rising sun--you are struck with a vision! Inspiration! Epiphany!
Let's. get back. to basics.
The solution is clear. The act of running is made up of many individual acts. To ask students to run at full speed is too complex of a task. We have to break it down.
You chug a gallon of scalding hot coffee and are hard at work for the rest of the day--chunking and dividing running into motions so simple that anyone can do them.
The kids are surprised to see you in good spirits that afternoon. You've lost 10 already but that was to be expected. Not everyone can be a runner.
You apologize profusely to the kids and explain the new direction of the training plan. Instead of trying to run perfectly right away--the team will build up to a full running stride. The name of the game is
DRILLS, LUNGES, STRETCHES, AND STRENGTHENING!
Drive that knee forward! Stabilize those abs! Stretch those hips! Repeat! Repeat! Repeat! Once the kids can do all of these drills, stretches, lunges, and exercises perfectly--they'll be ready to take on the world.
For the sake of brevity in this already over-long post, I'm going to say that all of these "basics" are really boring and tiring and difficult and provide almost no satisfaction. And the kids are just as bad at these and uncoordinated and unmotivated and frustrated and confused.
How can that be possible? We made everything as simple as can be!
Conclusion: kids today are simply unable to run. Not only that, they can't even begin to try to run. Hopeless. Only the most talented and gifted and exceptional can participate in this sport.
NOTE: Stepping out of analogy. This is actually what many teachers believe kids need and this is frequently the conclusion they draw. THIS IS REALLY HAPPENING!
Let's fast forward a few weeks to the first local track meet and the one angry child who is still left on your team gets dead last in the 400 and he hasn't improved a bit since day one and you can't make eye contact with him or anyone else.
But then you hear...cheering? Laughter? Feelings of accomplishment? You look up and see a coach giving high fives to his athletes who just ran in the same race. How did this guy make all those drills and basics fun and enjoyable?
You approach him and ask how he gets kids excited about the drudgery and the grind.
He says, "Well, they seem to like racing each other and running around the field so we just do a lot of that and then they get faster for some reason."
End of analogy.
Running is movement. Writing is thought. The technique of the best runners is a product of their movement. Not the other way around. Removing movement from running to focus on technique is hollow. Removing thought from writing to focus on grammar and format is pointless.
In the same way that beginning runners can't always keep their stride smooth or keep their head from moving or keep their arms from going side to side, beginning writers can't always write in complete sentences or punctuate or spell every word correctly. And they definitely struggle to tell you about this process.
But the form of great writers is driven by the clarity of their thought. The rules come from the process--the rules don't drive the process. It would be stupid to stop a runner from running the second that their form falters. So why is not stupid that we think students can't write because they can't produce that single perfect stride? That's not how the process works. It doesn't go 'one perfect stride becomes two perfect strides becomes three and four and so on until you can finish the race.'
It's a bunch of ugly races that gradually become better races that become faster races that lead to a stronger runner with more efficient movements (better form). The race isn't the end goal. It's part of the process that refines itself. Going back to basics misrepresents the progression of excellence.
Anyone can move. Anyone can think. = Anyone can run. Anyone can write.
But you have to know what drives these expressions. And yeah, some people are lazy. They don't want to move. They don't want to think. That happens. It's happening now, it will happen in the future and it definitely happened all throughout history. But thinking and moving have inherent rewards. They must! I believe they are driven by real human urges. So work with that.
Don't confuse the "rules" with "the habits of the best" and marvel at the fact that students can't imitate the best people to undertake that activity on their first try. Look at what students can do and get them to do more of it. Because writing and running really do improve naturally from doing them.
That's all I have to say about that. More pictures to come today.
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