We can no longer rely on a quick fix to teach student writing any more than we can use the excuse that we are poorly trained to keep us from teaching it.  Students must be taught how to write and teacher ed programs have got to rise to the occasion to make sure all teachers are aware of what the teaching of writing entails.

Many of us were taught to write by using the five-paragraph essay: introduction, 3 body paragraphs and the conclusion that many times restated the introduction.  This formula did offer a framework and some structure and was easy for the teacher to grade since it basically departmentalized the information. Was there a thesis? Were there topic sentences?  I suppose formulaic writing did and does, as it is still alive today, help students who struggled , but it didn’t give students any help in knowing what an essay looks like or how to actually put one together without the five-paragraph method.  Also, students do not like to move away from this and writing becomes stagnant. In the real world, students must learn how to make choices about genre, content, structure, organization, and style (Mark Wiley 2000) so formulaic writing does hinder this process.

When I broach this subject, I see the nervousness in teachers’ faces and hear the concern in their voices as they ask why it matters because that was how they were taught and they have done ok.  Could that be why we are many times reluctant as writers ourselves? Could we and our own teachers have been so consumed with structure that we failed to have any sustenance to our writing?  It is afterall about the content which is what we have to say and what we are thinking.

Mark Wiley says that “formulaic writing short-circuits the discovery process” for students.  It is our job to teach students different strategies that can be an arsenal of information for them as they choose their purpose for writing and the audience to whom they are writing.  Students need to know when to use certain strategies in different writing situations not just rely on the five-paragraph quick fix.  Relying on this approach stifles ideas, organization, style and conventions, as it limits the variety seen in effective writing.  Students are not able to display their understanding of transitions and organization when they are limited to the five-paragraph essay.

I am not saying to never use this approach.  It might be what some struggling students need for structure, but they have to be given the chance to advance beyond this.  We owe all students more than the teaching of the five-paragraph essay.

Next: Formulaic Writing: Take 2