poster for Romeo and Juliet play
Writing is not something someone can learn and know every thing about. Writing is a skill that can not be perfect, but one that needs constant practice in a variety of different contexts, genres, and audiences. Shirley Rose express this sentiment in her article “All Writers Have More to Learn” . Furthermore, in “Learning to Write Effectively Requires Different kind of Practice, Time, and Effort” by Kathleen Blake Yancey, goes further into depth about how practicing writing in one genres does not correlate to all other genres of writing. For example, writing a research essay about how the Mitochondria is the power house of the cell would give the writer practice in academic writing, but it would not help the writer practice the rhythm and figurative language of poetry.
In my high school career I took four years of English literature , and during those classes the style and genre of writing varied drastically. One unit would be on mythology, one on analyzing the United State founding documents, and three units analyzing the play Romeo and Juliet. I enjoyed most of the class, but once I had to read and analyze a play made at the end of the 16th century I stop being engaged for three units. I do not think English classes should completely ditch teaching these writing genres. However, only teaching young writing student how to analyze and write classical literature deprives of getting excited about all other genres of writing. Right now, high school teaches 21st century students a 19th century curriculum. In Shirley Rose article she talk about how a teenager learned about writing outside of school though writing and getting advice on the internet about their fan-fiction.
If we want to teach student how to write in different genres in the modern day we need to update curriculums. So, they include teaching students to practice writing new modern writing situations. For example, making a web page, writing an important work email, texting concerns about a bill to a representatives.
Since, writing is a broad skill with many different facets the education system should either divide writing courses into multiple different much smaller courses focusing on much more specific genres of writing, or update the writing curriculums to focus on individual learning of students own writing interest. Have writing classes where students could decide what kind of writing to practice would let more students get be able to engaged in their writing.
