In High School, I was "taught" to write five-paragraph essays (and when I say "taught," I mean "forced.") The five-paragraph essay was the only form allowed in Sophomore English class. Any deviation from the five-paragraph essay form was punished with a low grade. For example, the parenthetical aside in the first sentence of this paragraph is not specifically on-topic and would have resulted in a half-grade reduction on the essay. As a result of the instruction I received in writing essays, I concluded it is a very stupid way to teach young people to structure their thoughts.
Each paragraph of a five-paragraph essay must contain at least five sentences. The sentences may be as long or as short as you want to make them, but they must all relate to the same common theme. Even if you have nothing more to say about a particular idea, you may not end a paragraph until you have written five sentences. If you end your paragraph before you have composed five sentences, you will receive a negative red comment and a lower grade. I know; I tried.
Shapes are very important in the five-paragraph essay; specifically, funnels, hourglasses, and pyramids. You see, the essay itself must have a shape, and each paragraph within the essay must also have a shape. Funnels take a broad idea and then get progressively specific. Pyramids, on the other hand, start with a specific and then get broad. Based on those two descriptions, you can probably figure out what an hourglass essay does; I always thought there should also be a Santa-shape.
Every paragraph in a five-paragraph essay must have a topic sentence, because a reader will never know what you are writing about if you do not come right out and state it explicitly. In the case of this paragraph, the topic of the topic sentence is the topic sentence itself--how meta is that? (I just lost points for going off-topic, and also for using a dash, which my English teacher hated for some reason and would have circled in red; I also just lost more points with this parenthetical aside, but it's a sentence, an therefore it counts toward this paragraph's sentence quota). All sentences following the topic sentence should relate directly to the topic sentence, or you are not writing right. This paragraph, about topic sentences, does not have a shape because it went off-topic, and with all the other deductions piling up, my grade on this essay will therefore be no higher than a C.
Finally, of course, a five-paragraph essay must contain five paragraphs. Even if you think you are finished writing about your essay topic (which does not get its own topic sentence), you cannot simply stop writing. What you must do in that case is summarize your main idea for the reader. If you follow the reliable old tell-em-what-you're-gonna-tell-em, tell-em, tell-em-what-you-told-em structure, you really only have to write three original paragraphs between your introduction and your conclusion. In conclusion, the five-paragraph essay form is a really awful exercise in rigid form for its own sake which sucks all the joy and creativity out of the act of writing, and which should be relegated to the compost pile of instructional history forthwith.
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Nicely done BTW.
If I'd had the means I would have countered her trite with my own word. Brevity.
Teaching methods for so many subjects are so lacking, squashing the curiosity and joy for learning out of our children like an unwelcome arachnid beneath a shoe.
Let me tell you I didn't learn to write because of some pedantic English teacher. I learned to write, because people were depending on me to communicate clearly with them and others. My grade was "you get to keep your job." Highly motivating, isn't it.
I live in a professional world where everyone is a copy editor. The fact that you need to change something I wrote is not an indication that you write better than me. It just means you are a "contol freak" who has to put your fucking fingerprints on everything other people do to justify your existence as a medicore manager.
Sorry, please excuse me for highjacking your rant and substituting mine. A thousand pardons.
I too used to chafe at the standard format for essays when I was a student, and I used to think exactly like you do until I became a teacher. Unfortunately most students are just not proficient at organization. Nor are most students proficient at using and manipulating language, thus the need for structured writing strategies. The challenge for me is in recognizing the students who do have a gift with language, and allowing them to experiment with form and structure.
I’ve got to run—class in 20 min. Still have to finish lunch---
Tell them what you're going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them.
Rules suck the creativity out of writing. Except for maybe two that I lightly adhere to, both courtesy of William Strunk's Elements of Style:
"Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell."
And:
Rather, really, very, little, pretty: These are the leeches that infest the pond of prose, sucking the blood of words."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHIo4VruGZY
And PLEASE tell me the photo is of a REAL pencil sharpener.
but Jesus, what really appalled me was your illustration, yikes!
You brought back painful memories of being stifled!! Yet, one must learn some rules of writing.... or so I thought, until I read James Frey and Augusten Burroughs.
But, to be able to write like Isabel Allenda or Kathleen Kent (The Heretic's Daughter) would be a miracle!
If as you contend that some 9th graders and some adults can't communicate effectively, what's the root cause?
Please help me understand how some outdated, and in my opinion, questionably effective pedagogy, achieves this goal?
Thanks for helping me understand.
"In conclusion" made me snort.
I'm observing a charter school right now for some research I'm doing, and just today I read three essays that were the grossest examples I've ever read regarding that "Tell 'em what you're going to say" crap. I'm talking about an entire introductory paragraph filled with "In this paragraph, I'm going to be telling you about my charter school. I will say what I like about it and I will compare it to my old school. In this paragraph I will also let you know about the friends I've made here." etc. etc. etc. OMG, I didn't know where to begin. The problem is that the teacher who probably taught this little trick to them was standing right there, so I really sort of looked at things like spelling and tense and so forth and just moved on. When I saw that they all did their introductions that way, I knew I was dealing with a teacher issue, not a student one. (I left before I could read their conclusions, thank god. And we all know what they would have looked like: "What I just told you is why I like my charter school. And I told you that I have made some friends here." AAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH.
Thanks, Verbal, for letting me get all that out. (oops--lost point for the "get.")
And to JessBabbling: Oh, but I can't help but love it when someone sticks the word: "rather" in a sentence. Not like, "I'd rather have sex with a rabid orangutan," nor "Rather than hit myself with a hammer, I'd like a piece of cake," but rather (!): "He was a prig, rather."
By the time I see a student (in college), kids should know what a thesis sentence is, right? Well, they don't, and it's a big problem. Someone who is unable to articulate a main point in their own writing is less likely to be able to identify a main point in someone else's writing--which makes them poor readers as well. Imagine a persuasive essay written by someone tripping on LSD--that will give you a sense of what reading these things is like (as well what a difficult job it is getting students to talk about and understand various essays that they read--essays NOT in 5 para form). Most of the kids, when confronted about it, say things like, "No one ever said this to me before," and "I always got A's in high school." In theory, kids should learn this stuff in HS so that we are able to do more interesting things in college. Instead, teachers just move students on through regardless of merit. It happens in college too. None of this answers your question, however. It's just my rant.
I treat the 5 paragraph BS like a tool--we have lots of "tools" in our toolbox. Some are more useful than others. I certainly don't require students to write in the 5 paragraph form, but we talk about it, and, I assure you, it's useful. The form is a template, not a straight-jacket.
Does that answer?
Too rigid, like you said. I had long forgotten this and was an English major! I give you big points for even remembering this essay style in such detail.. and the pencil sharpener is the the perfect beginning and ending, making a very good point! But I hate it when you sharpen your pencil just perfectly and smooth off the grit from the tip and the whole point of lead just falls out, leaving a hollow in the pencil head. Now if that isn't just the most symbolic piece of...
Seriously.
Well, would you believe it was a couple of house cats then?
Thumbed. Especially for beating BBE to the punch. :-D
Those who argue for the stifling rules just want to teach the lowest common denominator. Actually I used the form alot in school, because I am a weak writer, but some of my classmates took risks and that was good too.
I asked, 'You don't like Marcel Proust then?'
He said,'I don't know who you are talking about'.
Yup, go figure. Some people are dying to pay for bad writing.
I, on the other hand will write a post called "How to Post Blogs and Alienate People." :-D
Rated
So much time is wasted on the what and the how, without an explanation of why you're learning this skill.
Using this pedagogy, while not holding a student accountable for its mastery, isn't going improve the student who comes to you in college. I understand your point, and sincerely thank you for replying.
When I taught freshman comp in grad school, I refused to teach formulas like the 5-graf abomination. I DID work with students who had major structure issues with things like scissors and tape, cutting apart sentences and shuffling them around on the desk in conference, looking at logical flow, etc.
I do understand that some BASIC WRITERS might benefit from the 5-graf form.
Sadly, however, I was enrolled in Accelerated English. This was the GIFTED class. We all wanted to hang ourselves by the end of the year. It was also in this class that I learned to fake notecards and fabricate outlines after the fact.
Blergh.
It is still taught. My 3rd and 4th grade sons use it in their time writings.
Perhaps.
Doubt it.
(thumbified because writing should be fun)
The above is not an apology.
My favorite story is when a 5th grade class staged a revolt (of sorts) on a day they had a sub - when the teacher returned the next day, they had papered the walls and boards with posters - NO MORE BCRs.
egads! my middle school child only mildly complains - she seems to know it's b.s. - "well, I have to write x number of paragraphs and a summary paragraph even if I have nothing else to say."
A teacher who uses it as a place to start is up to good.
At least for philosophy students. Without a five panger paradigm, the arguments undergrad philosophy students write trend toward gibberish at best and working agianst their own point at worst.
For technical writers and writers of arguments, it is a good form. And when it is not ham fisted, it can be elegant.
Guess I was lucky. We had an heroic English teacher in upstate NY who scared the shit out of freshman, but brought true beauty to the art of teaching by the time we were sophomores taking Expository Writing, Creative Writing, yada yada. She drummed rules into the ones who needed a clue, and cultivated a real appreciation for writing in the rest. I loved Mrs. Witkowski! (Sorry for going off here, but she was great).
And I’ll 2nd VRs call for Cartouche’s penis and balls blog!
a five paragraph essay is one of the surest ways to get a perfect score on that SAT essay. That, and using words like bloviate.
I'm sure it's necessary to teach writing structure, particularly to all those non-readers, but to hold to all rules inflexibly, suffocates not only creativity, but expression. This method is sure to make deadly dull, over-wordy writing. And it's sure to make still another subject boring that could be lively and satisfying.
I do remember one thing from those eons ago - Whenever I was required to write something with a minimum number of words, I always wondered why I should I use more words than it took to make the point or impart the information.
In law school, I learned to write one-sentence paragraphs with incomprehensible sentences. The latter was far more fun and far more challenging.
Okay, rant over.
Cartouch: I laughed out loud.
BUT
as a former English teacher I have to say that this really is a good exercise that teaches young people some rudimentary fundamentals of composition
(Although the essay as haiku might offer some interesting, if anally-rentive, challenges.)
Rayted. Pic was great too~
and since I wrote concisely
the teacher was pissed
I teach math and science now. I'm much happier!
Teaching writing is intense. The best way is working with kids one-on-one to help them work on their writing. On rare occassion I'd have a student read what they'd written aloud for the entire classand then I'd ask questions to elicit different ways to express ideas when I thought the writing was unclear (or just bad).
Readers make better writers than non-readers. You can learn all you need to know from reading.
Flashbacks to catholic school!
The nuns! The priests!
I repeat "waterfalls, waterfalls" as I rock back and forth.
Pretend each point above was a paragraph, santa shaped, along with this one.
The principal of my daughter's school says that different teachers will teach you to write in different ways, the idea is to practice until it comes naturally.
Some parents object if they can't figure out why something was graded. So rather than grading for something intangible, like coherence and a good argument, they grade for number of sentences in a paragraph. One can argue that a poor essay is coherent, but one can't argue about the number of sentences in a paragraph.
I compare and contrast that to my stint at a tony prep school where, when we came back from winter break, we knew we were headed into the dreaded period known as "comp-a-days."
We had to write a page and a half creative piece daily, and we had class six days a week.
So we had to write twelve things in the time these kids had to gen up a five paragraph essay.
I was utterly dumbfounded.
But, it explains how I could write my weekly -- or should I say weakly -- columns in a half an hour or so.
I do see the value in teaching the "shapes."
Still don't see why the shapes require 5 grafs and 5 sentences per graf.
Most readable online grafs are 1-2 sentences long. I wince at how dense those 5 blocks of text up there are, and I commend everybody for wading through them, because it's not easy to do so.
And since we're talking best/worst teachers, the one I had Senior Year, Miss Eileen Driscoll, was the one who combined reading and writing effectively. Each week a 5-PAGE essay was due (notes, outline, rough draft, and final draft). It all had to be written in class--so, 5 hours. Again, I always faked the notes and outline posthumously. But churning out 10 pages of handwritten essay based on a literary prompt (with no idiotic form requirements) WAS a highly effective way to help us develop the idea to write quickly, tightly, and well.
(It goes w/o saying that I agree with the idea that readers make better writers, and that some people are "natural" writers who might benefit from the structure of the 5-Graf in third grade, but who've outgrown it massively by the time they hit Junior High.)
Look folks, just do what I do,...when in doubt, throw in too many commas, or three dots...
Rated.
My directors and editors throughout my 20-year writing career seemed to enjoy whatever I wrote--we had a few editing teams here and there for clarity and correctness among us. One director was an exception--she went into raging tirades about what a terrible writer I was. I stared at her, reported her, left her employ, and made her a chapter in my novel. (She was sort of a terrible person.)
My 15-year-old is following a few composition guidelines in school and is writing a graphic novel at home, stream-of-consciousness, late at night.