Comments on: Student writing is getting worse– or wait, it’s getting better! http://stevendkrause.com/2009/08/25/student-writing-is-getting-worse-or-wait-its-getting-better/ School, work, life, and everything else Sun, 14 Mar 2010 04:48:55 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Cat Ennis http://stevendkrause.com/2009/08/25/student-writing-is-getting-worse-or-wait-its-getting-better/comment-page-1/#comment-4880 Cat Ennis Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:01:30 +0000 http://stevendkrause.com/?p=567#comment-4880 Hah, thank you so much for this post! I'm getting ready to start teaching freshman composition at Emerson College for the first time. I read Stanley Fish's article and felt that I should revise my syllabus because we spend time discussing outsourcing, graffiti, generational gaps...a lot of stuff other than grammar and rhetoric. But I could not figure out how I could teach just grammar and rhetoric. What would I use as examples? Some kind of ethereal Platonic pure form of rhetoric? And how could I get the students interested in writing without having something to write about? Then I realized Fish's evidence that students aren't as good as they used to be is sort of fishy. I do not believe him when he says that his grad students could not "write a clean English sentence. They could manage for about six words and then, almost invariably, the syntax (and everything else) fell apart." How could it even be possible that grad students could only write six words? Thanks for your post! Hah, thank you so much for this post! I’m getting ready to start teaching freshman composition at Emerson College for the first time. I read Stanley Fish’s article and felt that I should revise my syllabus because we spend time discussing outsourcing, graffiti, generational gaps…a lot of stuff other than grammar and rhetoric. But I could not figure out how I could teach just grammar and rhetoric. What would I use as examples? Some kind of ethereal Platonic pure form of rhetoric? And how could I get the students interested in writing without having something to write about?

Then I realized Fish’s evidence that students aren’t as good as they used to be is sort of fishy. I do not believe him when he says that his grad students could not “write a clean English sentence. They could manage for about six words and then, almost invariably, the syntax (and everything else) fell apart.” How could it even be possible that grad students could only write six words?

Thanks for your post!

]]> By: Felicia Steele http://stevendkrause.com/2009/08/25/student-writing-is-getting-worse-or-wait-its-getting-better/comment-page-1/#comment-4879 Felicia Steele Wed, 26 Aug 2009 10:47:44 +0000 http://stevendkrause.com/?p=567#comment-4879 A wonderful post! And as usual, the best representations of a two sided debate represent a middle path as possibility: if we actually talk about what constitutes good writing, we might learn how to teach it better! Thank you. A wonderful post! And as usual, the best representations of a two sided debate represent a middle path as possibility: if we actually talk about what constitutes good writing, we might learn how to teach it better! Thank you.

]]> By: Joyce Walker http://stevendkrause.com/2009/08/25/student-writing-is-getting-worse-or-wait-its-getting-better/comment-page-1/#comment-4875 Joyce Walker Tue, 25 Aug 2009 16:30:49 +0000 http://stevendkrause.com/?p=567#comment-4875 Krause -- I love you and this post both. Excellent work. Funny, pointed, full of useful stuff. Thanks. Krause — I love you and this post both. Excellent work. Funny, pointed, full of useful stuff. Thanks.

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