In the essay, Unteaching the Five-Paragraph Essay, Foley Marie expresses her discontent with the way that the five-paragraph technique hinders preparation for the real world. The five-paragraph formula remains alive and strong in many schools preparing students for college and even in some colleges. Teachers are forced to teach an overwhelming number of students in our overcrowded school systems. The simple formula that the format brings is too tempting to pass up when teaching such numbers. Professors, such as Foley Marie, must spend time on correcting the the misled student’s writing skills to not revolve around the format. The format handicaps a student’s growth in ideas. The widely taught ,”structure invites students to fill the five slots
According to Runciman, there are many plausible reasons that students and other people don’t enjoy writing. Evidence, assumptions, and language and tone are the basis for which Runciman makes his argument. Overall, this argument is effective because reliable and well known sources are used in a logical fashion. Also, the assumptions made about the audience are accurate and believable. Runciman used his assumptions wisely when writing his claim and in turn created a compelling, attention capturing argument. The article was written so that students and teachers at any level could understand and easily read it. This argument is interesting, captivating, relevant through its age, and can relate to students and teachers at almost every academic level.
In an excerpt of Unteaching the Five-Paragraph Essay," Marie Foley reveals how the Five-Paragraph Essay formula contradicts writing instructor's most basic goals. Foley shows that the formula deters from generating individual thinking. In today's society, essays are used by millions of people in order to express their different ideas. The Five-Paragraph Essay formula was originally developed to help retain the efficiency and clarity of the essay. Foley, however, believes that this process eventually separates the student from his or her written expression and should be used only as a first step tool for beginning student writers. Foley insists that the formula blocks discovery, squelches authenticity and undermines the reader's need for coherence. Foley shows that patterns of organization and more natural thinking can benefit the student.
“Unteaching the Five Paragraph Essay” by Marie Foley demonstrates how a five paragraph essay formula disturbs the thought process of the students and limits what they can write. A five paragraph essay is an introduction with the main idea, with three supporting topics showing the relationship to the main idea, and a conclusion summarizing the entire essay. Foley argues that this formula forces students to fill in the blank and meet a certain a word limit. She noted that this formula was intended for teachers in the education system to teach an overcrowded class how to write. While it is beneficial for the first-time students learning how to write. In the long run, this standard destroys any free style writing, new connections between a topic,
Essays are not just the standard five paragraphs and then done style that was taught to students in grade school. The article “The Sixth Paragraph: A Re-Vision of the Essay” by Paul Lynch, explains quiet well how essays are typically taught and why. It is basically because it is easy to grade and even easier to write. Even when talking about writing or giving an example to a person it’s quite typical to start using the five paragraph format. While writing the standard essay the guidelines are quite specific. BE precise, stick to the topic, and stay impersonal. However, the author states that this made her realize that essays can be confining instead of teaching. So instead the author decided to listen to her students and quit focusing on the
However, though John Warner’s argument is strong, Kerri smith’s argument is stronger. In Kerri Smith’s article “In Defense of the Five-Paragraph Essay,” She claims that the five-paragraph essay should stay taught in schools as a guideline for a well-structured essay. She explains the five-paragraph essay as an “introduce-develop-conclude structure” that even great expository writing follows this structure (Smith 16). She purposefully communicates to her audience this idea to show that this structure gives students the knowledge and capability to write a professional essay. The five-paragraph essay includes the three key points to have a well-structured and organized essay. By mentioning that other great writers use this form of structure, she creates a stronger argument as to why the five-paragraph essay is important to education. She continues her article by explaining her early stages of writing and how she was taught; over time, her teachers would show her new ways to improve her writing which, in the end, she was told to think “of those five paragraphs simply as a mode of organization” (Smith
In Downs and Wardle’s article, they argue and identify the flaws in teaching writing in college. Demonstrating the misconceptions that academic writing is universal, but rather specialized in each case. Citing studies and opinions from esteemed professionals, Downs & Wardle state their points and illuminate the problem in today’s many colleges.
In Patricia Limerick’s article “Dancing with Professors”, she argues the problems that college students must face in the present regarding writing. Essays are daunting to most college students, and given the typical lengths of college papers, students are not motivated to write the assigned essays. One of the major arguments in Limerick’s article is how “It is, in truth, difficult to persuade students to write well when they find so few good examples in their assigned reading.” To college students, this argument is true with most of their ...
After reading the “College Writing” article, I can compare myself to that article because the article actually tells me what my college professors expect me to do when I reach into that level. I feel like everything I learned from my previous classes and what I did in those previous classes had nothing to do with what college professors require me to do. For example, in the “College Writing” article it said, “The five paragraph theme is a good way to learn how to write an academic essay.” I realized that in college we go beyond the academic essay, so why am I still being taught the five paragraph essay? Shouldn’t we be prepared for the college five page, six page or even seven page essays? If the article tells me exactly why the five paragraph essay is not a good method to be used, than why am I still being taught to write a five paragraph essay? When it comes to writing, I wish I can just run away from it, because writing has been my least favorite thing to do.
We would do research on a subject or a person, and write about them. We, once again, were not allowed to be unique in our writing or think creatively or critically. This is the time when I was taught the five paragraph essay. As stated in Gray’s article, the five paragraph essay is detrimental to students’ writing. This format for writing is damaging because it doesn’t allow students to express their own ideas about a topic. It does not allow for any creativity or uniqueness in a paper. In tenth grade, I wrote many papers for my English class, but I never once got an A on them. I was led to believe that my writing was weak because I could not relate to what I was writing about. I did not have any emotional connection to the research papers I had to write, and it made it harder for me to write them. I had grown up not being allowed to think critically, and therefore, my papers in high school lacked creativity and deeper
At the beginning of the semester, I had a different idea of what is considered as good writing. In my first rough draft for my first essay, “Post-secondary education and cultural backgrounds”, I demonstrated mostly of my preconceived idea of what good writing is suppose to be. I tried to sound intelligent by asking rhetorical questions and using big words improperly. I noticed that there was no harmony and organization on my essay as a whole. I had no idea what MLA was. With the help of the Writing Center and my determination on continually revising my essay, my scattered ideas developed into cohesive statements. I learned the use of topic sentences, thesis, reference page, page number, and other given structures on writing a paper. As I tried to develop my skills to becoming a good writer, my writing and knowledge has slowly grew into the accepted academic text.
As I shoved my notebook into my backpack, I heard my writing fellow murmur something about an essay. I wasn’t worried. After taking every Advanced Placement English class my high school offered, I felt equipped to handle a simple essay until received Dr. Carver’s email with the prompt and instructions. I blinked at the screen and rubbed my eyes; thinking I had misread the message, I read it again. I was supposed to have the essay finished in approximately 42 hours, but I had never written a decent essay in less than four days. I was in a state of panic; all of my ideas had evacuated my imagination leaving me with a painful case of writer’s block. To me, most of good writing is good editing and proper editing requires having a window to forget your writing before returning to it: a window that 42 hours just couldn’t provide.
In “The Ill Effect of the Five Paragraph Essay” written by Kimberly Wesley, Wesley explained that there was an assigned essay of five-to-seven pages long. The student, mentioned by Wesley, had difficulties comprehending how to incorporate the five-paragraph essay into her assignment. Many students face this problem throughout their academic years and although teachers began by teaching an excellent organization method, the students still had a form of missing information. Students of all grade levels faced different problems from the others, especially if they were taking remedial or advanced classes. Students are all taught one way in the beginning, but when more options are presented to students everyone begins to learn differently. Such as, a dual enrollment, student is being taught at the college level so they have a better understanding of how to write a well-organized essay before actually attending the university; however, a student in a remedial or regular course does not know quite the same thing. A dual enrollment, student learns slightly more than students not taking the same course perhaps because dual enrollment students are taught about research papers and content within their writing, but not all students take an AP course; therefore, very few students are taught the strategy needed to help them easily advance once they enroll into
Over the past semester, I have found the most challenging part of this course to simply be the transition from high school composition classes to college. Because writing expectations are so different in college than in high school, even with AP and Dual Enrollment “college level” classes, I first found myself being overwhelmed with the pressure to write the perfect first draft. The pressure came from knowing how much a final draft of a paper contributed to my grade. This left me sitting in front of my computer for hours at a time with thoughts of what I wanted to say racing through my head, but unable to deliver these thoughts into organized, structured sentences. I learned, through writing my persuasive essay, that instead of trying to write the paper start to finish and already in its perfect form, it is easier for me to look at the paper through its different components and focus on them individually, then work to best organize my ideas fluently.
I have learned many things throughout the course of the term, including such things as: how to write an essay and how to improve on essays that I have already written, how to locate and composite better research through the use of numerous resources found at the campus library, the internet, and the “Common Sense” textbook, how to cite research, examples, and quotations properly within the contents of my research paper as well as document it accurately according to MLA standards. Through the exploration of the “Subjects and Strategies” textbook, I have learned nine different methods used when writing an effective essay and how the different writing styles affect the overall theme and tone of the essay when used properly. This past semester, I have encountered many difficulties when trying to write these essays, but through the use of the textbooks, the aide of the instructor, and once I was able to classify the different types of essays and styles, I found them possible to overcome.
Dr. Shook’s critiques directed me to revise for the lack of transitional phrases between main ideas within my essay, as well as my tendency to compose run-on sentences. Accordingly, I inserted transitions that connected the major points that my essay touched upon. In order to do so, I used phrases such as “furthermore” in order to create a better flow without compromising the important ideas that were essential in regards to properly communicating the context to my audience. By commencing the process of revising my first essay, I developed the understanding that one of my shortcomings as a writer at the beginning of the semester included compiling numerous ideas into one sentence, consequently making it too “heavy.” By taking corrective action, I separated sentences that surpassed three lines into two entities. I found that Informal Assignment 10: Writing with Clear Style, assisted in improving my understanding of how my style of writing assists in communicating to my audience. Initially, I failed to realize that clear communication is of the utmost importance in regards to becoming an astute college writer. I entered English 101 focusing on incorporating words with over three syllables to intelligently convey my argument instead of focusing on how clearly my argument will be received by my