Students arrived in my college first-year writing class not as bad writers, but as people who both disliked (or worse) and feared writing, which was the worst part from my perspective. I'd experienced writing as liberating, a way to help me understand the world, and they'd just never been given the chance because of things like - as you …
Students arrived in my college first-year writing class not as bad writers, but as people who both disliked (or worse) and feared writing, which was the worst part from my perspective. I'd experienced writing as liberating, a way to help me understand the world, and they'd just never been given the chance because of things like - as you say - the AP test. These are students who are among the most "prepared" for college around, and yet they had almost no experience with the way of writing I was asking them to do in our FYW course. It baffled me at the time, which is why I went investigating. And now, here we are...I honestly wonder if things will change or we'll just get a doubling down on what hasn't been working for a long time.
I hope it prompts a better system in public schools, but there's also the worry that we could have something even worse. I know anecdotally (lots of grade school English teachers in my life) that they see the problem as clearly as you seem to in university. One teacher friend does scheduled free-writing, with the grade coming solely from participation. Another teaches International Baccalaureate students, where the focus is on much longer form writing, with written projects having a more mentorship-focused evaluation approach.
But the vast majority of US students are taught to 'the test', and it makes sense when you consider that (woefully underpaid) teachers get bonuses based on their school grades or even on the number of students that individually pass the AP exams.
Students arrived in my college first-year writing class not as bad writers, but as people who both disliked (or worse) and feared writing, which was the worst part from my perspective. I'd experienced writing as liberating, a way to help me understand the world, and they'd just never been given the chance because of things like - as you say - the AP test. These are students who are among the most "prepared" for college around, and yet they had almost no experience with the way of writing I was asking them to do in our FYW course. It baffled me at the time, which is why I went investigating. And now, here we are...I honestly wonder if things will change or we'll just get a doubling down on what hasn't been working for a long time.
I hope it prompts a better system in public schools, but there's also the worry that we could have something even worse. I know anecdotally (lots of grade school English teachers in my life) that they see the problem as clearly as you seem to in university. One teacher friend does scheduled free-writing, with the grade coming solely from participation. Another teaches International Baccalaureate students, where the focus is on much longer form writing, with written projects having a more mentorship-focused evaluation approach.
But the vast majority of US students are taught to 'the test', and it makes sense when you consider that (woefully underpaid) teachers get bonuses based on their school grades or even on the number of students that individually pass the AP exams.
There's some cool stuff happening outside of the school systems. David Perell runs a program called 'Liftoff' which exclusively focuses on teaching high-schoolers to be writers: https://writeofpassage.school/2022/09/12/our-vision-for-write-of-passage/
But things like that are obviously small scale and early days.