Bringing Life into the Essay

[Carol]

I first started thinking about essays when my son was applying for scholarships and completing college applications during his senior year of high school.  I was surprised at how often the questions he was asked to answer in essay format were looking for responses that seemed more personal in nature than expository.  Next, we found out that the 8th grade writing exam was going to be changed to an expository prompt using a holistic rubric.  After looking at the possible expository prompts for this 8th grade test, I started seeing connections between the test and the essays my son was writing for college.  I wanted to go beyond the 5 paragraph essay and discovered how much there reallly was to writing in expository style.  The essential questions for my presentation are: 1)How would our thesis statement be different if we made it personal? and 2) What interesting structures can students use to create an organized and personalized essay?  I have also gathered a few student samples to help illustrate how an essay can be personal and expository.  I plan for you to have a few take aways after my demonstration.  For example, strategies for changing our personal narrative assignments to expository and using text structures from Gretchen Bernabei's book Reviving the Essay.  See you soon!

[Melissa LiCon]

Hi Carol:

Your description of how you arrived at your idea for your project really connected for me. I had one of those experiences that we all go through from time to time last fall when my daughter was writing her college personal essays. You know, those turning points when you realize how little you know about something? There I was, reading her essays and trying to offer some useful help and feedback - in other words, trying to be a writing coach, but feeling pretty unskilled! I began trying to coach myself about writing, so I could be more useful to her... As a recent graduate of the IB program (she just got that precious IB diploma yesterday!) she had lots of skill & experience with critical analysis and persuasive writing, but little practice or confidence about doing the more personal and full-of-writer's-voice writing needed for the college app. essays. We went back to basics, she and I, and had lots of good discussion about taking the time to generate good, meaningful personal ideas before you even begin writing, about really trying to vary your sentence style, about sometimes being willing to break a rule or convention to make things interesting, about avoiding cliches and overused words. I realize now that I couldn't have had those conversations with her if she didn't have such a strong background in reading, in literature. We could each cite lots of writers and specific writings that achieve those very objectives we were discussing. We had enough knowledge about what good writing is to have "fluency" in our conversation. How do you do that same thing with emerging readers, with emerging writers? How do begin to build that same fluency? I can't wait to see your presentation! I feel that I haven't offered much help to you here - in fact, I've raised more questions than I've answered! Perhaps we'll have a chance to converse more about this whole college application essay thing at the retreat... I was so glad when those applications were sent off and the stress was over!

[Natalie Russell]

Hi Carol,
I'm so interested in your presentation because I struggle with this concept for my college students as well. I want to have them transition into the writing class wih an "easier" personal essay, but as we're working on it, I realize that I have very high expectations for it in terms of a strong thesis (more of an overall message versus a point), organized and well-developed ideas, and other essay conventions like engaging and effective introductions and conclusions. The personal essay still has to make a point, which is sometimes a difficult thing to teach while they're trying to just retell events from a particular time. If they can do these things well, they can move into different modes of expository writing relatively seamlessly, but sometimes I still have a hard time helping them distinguish between telling a chronological story and making a point with supporting evidence. They're both challenging writing tasks, but I always wonder, does one (expository) have more academic value than the other (narrative)? Some writing teachers think that there isn't a place for narrative writing in college because this is a skill that the students should be able to already do and have mastered. But after seeing what a worthwhile assignment it can be, helping students to develop ideas and create a rich, authentic story for a variety of audiences, I don't agree. I see great academic and personal value in both kinds of writing, and sometimes especially narrative writing, for less experienced writers.
I'm looking forward to your presentation!
Natalie

[Christy]

Hi Carol,
I am currently teaching sixth grade in a middle school. Our focus is on preparing our students for eighth grade and the expository piece of writing. I am new to expository writing and am looking forward to your presentation. I like your title of bringing life into the essay. We need to help students find a way to connect with expository writing. It sounds like you feel the same way. I am looking forward to sharing your ideas with my students next year!
Christy