<p>In my French school, we did not write essays along the American five-paragraph model. The format was thesis, antithesis, synthesis, framed by an introduction and conclusion. But we had plenty of writing and style was an important component of the grade. A paper which contained five spelling mistakes was automatically flunked no matter what the subject matter.</p>
<p>mathmom: Both my Ss loathed reading journals where they were expected to record their reactions to whatever they were reading.</p>
<p>"Is the college application essay a good gauge of what constitutes good writing at the college level?"</p>
<p>No. A college application essay is a personal essay, a la Anna Quindlen, as opposed to a research paper, lab report or literary analysis, which is the type of writing done at college. Some colleges require the submission of a graded writing piece (not creative writing) with the application -- I think that's a great idea, and more colleges should do that. </p>
<p>I'm just guessing here, but I imagine that sometimes an amazing essay will push a kid into the "accept" pile, that horribly written essays could be a factor in denial, but that the vast majority of essays play little role in the final decision but just affirm the information in the rest of the application.</p>
<p>I've taught writing at many different educational levels, and have concluded that writing is very difficult for many kids. Some have the gift, but many do not. It is like many other skills (playing piano, tennis or knitting) -- you get much better with practice. But no matter how much I practice I will never play tennis as well as Serena Williams. </p>
<p>Since college is a place to learn, I would hope that kids learn to become better writers in college. </p>
<p>Of course, one could argue that the type of writing done at college does not always reflect the type of writing done after graduation.</p>
<p>Blahdeblah - no wonder the peer reviewers have little to say re your writing. You are one of my favorite writers here on cc. Clear, simple, alive. That is your writing.
[quote]
an overly pretentious essay by someone who has clearly been told they're a good writer one too many times, and probably should not be allowed to own a thesaurus
[/quote]
As a frequent essay reviewer, this is also my least favorite variety. Inevitably, the writer chooses a $3.00 word when a 10-cent word will do, and do better. Thesauruses really don't convey the nuances of connotation and denotation. Someone needs to tell college applicants that all listings in a thesaurus entry are <em>not</em> interchangeable.</p>
<p>Both kids weren't too fond of reading journals and reading logs, but the worst is when asked to relate something in the book to their own lives. Younger son loves the creative writing assignments.</p>
<p>I don't believe I have written a creative essay/story since 5th grade. The only option available at my high school is to take "Writing to be Published" as a semester elective during senior year...that would be the only exposure to creative writing someone could get at my high school. </p>
<p>I'm a sophmore, and until this year I have NEVER had a great english teacher. Not once had I actually learned HOW to write an essay. This was very dissapointing as I have always enjoyed writing and would have liked to have a good english teacher. This year's teacher is pretty good, but also gives so much work it is frankly impossible to complete all assignments to one's best ability. </p>
<p>I am really excited for next year (but also scared), because I'm taking AP Lang, with a teacher who is supposed to be THE best English teacher....ever...lol. She is extremely difficult, often mean, and very strict, but is also the most respected teacher in our school. Reviews of her teaching are always similar to: "The best teacher I have ever had," "You will NEVER have another teacher like her," "She prepared me for college unlike any other teacher," and "It was because of her that I was able to mock my college friends when they had difficulty passing their English 101 Classes and I was pulling A+s." So I am really nervous for her class, but am looking forward to improving my writing skills. </p>
<p>I am REALLY happy, because apparently she and my current english teacher graded my English Regents last month, and she (the teacher I'll be having next year) LOVED my writing and demanded my current teacher to make me take her class next year! I ended up with the only 100 out of all the sophmores and juniors taking it at my school, lol. So hopefully that is a good sign.</p>
Creative writing? What's that? DS2 was in a humanities program for highly gifted kids (they had to write to be accepted), and not once in three years did they write anything creative. I was sorely disappointed. Now he's a freshman in an IB program -- I fear he will never have a chance to get back to the amazing short stories he used to write.
I went through the IB Middle Years Program and am finishing my IB Diploma, and I've had the same experience. At parent-teacher conferences in middle school, my teachers said I did wonderful work, but that I was "too creative" and needed to work on following directions (catering to the rubric). I haven't written anything creative since eighth grade; my current English teacher (a wonderful man) says the IB sucks the creativity out of people. I'm thinking he might have a point. To its credit, I did learn to write analytically--more or less.
In my French school, we did not write essays along the American five-paragraph model. The format was thesis, antithesis, synthesis, framed by an introduction and conclusion.
That's how I wrote my history papers in seventh and eighth grade; my school has a bilingual program in middle school where history and geography are taught in French or Spanish (I was in the French section), in addition to advanced language classes. I moved from Brussels when I was eight years old, but thanks to my school's language program, I'm still more or less fluent. :)</p>
<p>For whatever it's worth, except for one introductory paragraph that a few people looked over, I didn't have any help editing my essays (example: my</a> Common App essay), and it irks me slightly that admissions officers will probably assume I did.</p>
<p>S has had no formal writing class in college. From day one he was expected to be able to write and write well. A style of argument was described and students are expected to adhere to it. Most of his non-science courses relied on papers and essays for evaluation, no multiple choice tests, etc. This is pretty much required of all students no matter what one's concentration. After his first quarter, S said he understood why so much emphasis was placed on the admission essays, it is absolutely essential that students be able to handle ideas in print.</p>
<p>Here is a description of the writing style expected from the outset, which was posted by another student from S's school. </p>
<p>"Basically, you must always construct a careful, step-by-step argument, you must always define and thoroughly understand your terms and the terms of your text, and you must be willing to apply your ideas to hypothetical situations and difficulties in interesting ways. Arguments must be*characterized by a strict adherence to evidence and logic, with exploration via examples and questions. Making irrelevent points, trying to argue without strong evidence, and making assumptions without carefully defending them are all treated mercilessly."</p>
<p>S wholeheartedly agreed, especially with the "mercilessly" part.</p>
<p>Essays that show these characteristics are, I believe, what the admissions folks are seeking.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I went through the IB Middle Years Program and am finishing my IB Diploma, and I've had the same experience. At parent-teacher conferences in middle school, my teachers said I did wonderful work, but that I was "too creative" and needed to work on following directions (catering to the rubric). I haven't written anything creative since eighth grade; my current English teacher (a wonderful man) says the IB sucks the creativity out of people. I'm thinking he might have a point. To its credit, I did learn to write analytically--more or less.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Haha the almighty rubric. That's great. I have like 58473728 copies of that rubric. They attach it to everything. Sometimes twice. I can probably quote it. My favorite is "appropriate register."</p>
<p>Although we still do creative writing. Not really personal writing though. We did this character thing though that was basically writing a story about a character in the last book we read. Things like that. The World Lit 1 paper has to be analytical but the World Lit 2 can be one of the creative options. However (I don't know about your schools) they then go on in the next breath to tell us that if you do the creative option you probably won't score well because most people won't be able to pull it off. LOL. I went for the commentary on a poem. </p>
<p>We do all sorts of creative writing in French. Our teacher tries. But if she flunked us for five spelling errors, LOL, things would not be looking good. We just did a letter from an animal to the president about ecological issues and then we also did a conversation (aloud) with a partner with one person being an interviewer and one person being an animal.</p>
<p>
[quote]
"Basically, you must always construct a careful, step-by-step argument, you must always define and thoroughly understand your terms and the terms of your text, and you must be willing to apply your ideas to hypothetical situations and difficulties in interesting ways. Arguments must be*characterized by a strict adherence to evidence and logic, with exploration via examples and questions. Making irrelevent points, trying to argue without strong evidence, and making assumptions without carefully defending them are all treated mercilessly."
[/quote]
I think that this is a good description of what should be expected in college writing. I don't think too many HS students would be able to fully construct such a piece. Most of them seem to learn how to write a decent expository essay or research paper, but really constructing an argument seems to require more analytical ability than HS may have. I think they should learn that in college, however.</p>
<p>As far as the application essay is concerned, there is no way to really determine how much help a student has had. At least the SAT essay is written in controlled circumstances. Perhaps college admissions people should compare both in order to determine a student's true abilities. I don't think the expectations would be the same for each type of writing, but the essential abilities of the writer should be clear.</p>
<p>I think my son has been well prepared by his public HS teachers. AP English in junior year with a GREAT, very demanding teacher was invaluable. This year, he took a half-year creative writing course---loved it--and is now in Major American Lit. My husband and I attended the first class of the semester (shadow day) and it was clear the teacher was going to go for a "relating literature to our personal life experiences" approach, which I think is a highly valid one, though some don't like it. To me, anything that helps us to better understand ourselves and others and to express our feelings is good. The boys who don't want to do it may be the ones who need it the most. On another thread in Parent Cafe we're talking about emotional meltdowns and burnouts in early college years. Some parents have noted that the counseling experience has helped their kids to be more emotionally expressive.</p>
<p>I guess I went a bit OT here. Haha--that's never happened before--but I sometimes think parents are short-sighted when they criticize teachers for bringing real life into the classroom. "What does THAT have to do with learning to write (or read or whatever)?". It has everything to do with everything imo.</p>
<p>I guess my question really should be: "How can admission officers best gauge how well prepared applicants are for the kind of writing assignments they will encounter in college?"
This is assuming that admission officers and profs believe that whatever level of writing abilities students bring with them as they enter college will be raised during their four years there. Still, there must be some acceptable level upon admission. What should this level be, and how to gauge which applicant has reached it?</p>
<p>I think a graded writing sample, combined with ACT or SAT writing and a student's grades in English should give some indication, along with the essay. But only 2 of my son's 10 colleges asked for a writing sample. Vassar wanted an analytical essay and Reed wanted whatever the student chose to send. Of course a huge school wouldn't have time to review writing samples.</p>
<p>In my son's case, he's a skilled writer and the things I mention above all support that.</p>
<p>I'd disagree with the SAT writing part of your assertion, but otherwise, I'd agree that (if a college wanted to evaluate writing ability), a graded writing sample would do the job (and also give some perspective to the student's English grades).</p>
<p>I know of far too many brilliant writers whose SAT writing scores don't reflect this.</p>
<p>I was really talking about the mechanics portion of the SAT writing, rather than the essay. A lot of kids seem to get through HS knowing little or nothing about mechanics.</p>
<p>S applied to a couple of school that required a graded writing sample. Unfortunately, S throws everything away, he had none meeting the specifications described. If schools are going to require that, spelling it out well beforehand would be nice. Good writing is one thing, how one handles ideas is equally important. I have seen wonderful narrative writers fall apart (in their writing) when asked to provide a reasoned argument.</p>
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<p>Even when my daughter was attending a famous private school, she got very little actual writing instruction. <<</p>
</blockquote>
<br>
<p>We were just discussing this at our local high school. The kids at our high school do a lot more critical thinking/review than we did in our day, but they seem to write less. At our high school, the AP English class was known as the "Theme Every Week" class. And the teacher had the time to read every one and write helpful comments on them to help with writing.</p>
<p>The kind of writing that seems to be done in college is the multi-page (10-20 pages) report. I know that our high school doesn't prepare our kids for that!</p>
<p>I agree that a graded writing sample would be the best guage I can think of. SAT essay (which thankfully my S didn't have to do; "old" SAT for him) is not a good guage - good writing is NOT what you can do in 25 minutes, but what you can do when you have time to plan, think, organize, write, revise, etc. And if the prompt leaves a kid cold, it's just not an accurate assessment. Plus the "rubric" (hate that concept) which they are using to grade the thing leads the kids who have been trained to succeed on the test to write in a strange way, imo.</p>
<p>
[quote]
"relating literature to our personal life experiences" approach, which I think is a highly valid one
[/quote]
Agree. Some of the best writing DS did was in his post-Katrina writing intensive course at Tulane. They read a variety of literary pieces of different genres and from different eras, and related them to the experience of New Orleanians following Katrina. Led to great insight on his part, a huge leap in understanding of the human condition, and some very good writing. I'm sure, however, that this approach, as taken by some hs teachers, could also lead to inanity. Like everything, it has to be taught well to work.</p>
<p>The one good thing about the SAT essay is that it demonstrates how quickly a student can organize thoughts, develop an idea and come up with supporting data. It's not meant to be a "polished" piece of writing, but it's something that a college could evaluate for anyone taking the SAT. I think its use would be as a benchmark for comparing students to one another (everyone gets the same 25 minutes to put something together) and also as a check on the admissions essay. If the Admissions essay is truly wonderful -- elegant, persuasive, insightful -- but the SAT sample shows a student who can't write a complete sentence, then that's info for a college to evaluate.</p>
<p>One of my problems with the SAT essay is the scoring. I would hope the admissions officer would read it and judge for themselves if they are going to assign it a lot of importance. To get an 11, I got a 6 from one reader, and a 5 from the other. What if I'd gotten two readers who gave it 5? I'd have a 10. Two who gave it 6s and I'd have a 12. I think 10 and 12 are kind a fair difference. </p>
<p>Also I got a 9 the first time and IMO it was the better essay. But it was more complicated rather than simplistic unrelated examples (which is what I did on my second one after seeing from others what scored well). This scored better. It didn't really reflect much organized depth of thought. It was examples from my life about cooperation and competition. I feel like anyone could be coached to write the essay I did that time. I did it without coaching, or even preparation, but there's no way to know that. It seems like a very formulaic thing that could be drilled into someone. The prompts don't represent much. </p>
<p>I do think it has some value. In a case of obvious discrepancies where the essay is horrible, then okay. Something will be up. But an essay that's just below par the polished piece doesn't mean a lot, especially since some people are at somewhat of a disadvantage. 25 minutes is not a lot of time, if you want any planning time at all. This isn't all that realistic. Both times I had to just start writing and barely finished as it was. For someone who needs to edit after initially writing (luckily I don't), there is going to be some discrepancy between a finished product and their SAT essay, even though they may have great revision skills. You know what would be kind of interesting would be to have ten minutes after the initial writing period to switch to another color and mark changes. This could never be regulated and isn't realistic on the standardized testing front, I'm just saying it would be more practical writing process wise and interesting. Haha, I need "editing" time on my math section...</p>