Since taking classes within the Education Department here at MSU, I have heard countless times of the importance of cross-content curriculum implementation in the classroom. The hard facts reveal that students retain more material when they are expected to access the information in a variety of ways within a variety of different contexts. Therefore, we can conclude that writing, as a means to reflect upon and communicate information is of great value in academic contexts beyond the standard English classroom. It is not, however, the ultimate.
My experience with writing in secondary school was confined primarily within English and Creative Writing courses alone. Very rarely was I asked to complete a writing assignment in my science or math or social studies classes. In such contexts, the bulk of my writing consisted of lab reports or historical outlines, in which I was never required to write in complete sentences; rather, bullet points or quick, jotted-down notes were adequate.
And to be honest, looking back, I don't see an issue with this. In their article, "Snapshot of Writing Instruction in Middle and High School", Arthur N. Applebee and Judith A. Langer address the lack of writing assignments across content areas as a fatal flaw within the education system today. It may seem like blasphemy, as a future writing teacher, to say otherwise, but I don't feel that writing of a particular form--the five-paragraph essay in particular--is a necessity in all classrooms for all assignments. For instance, a historical outline was a very appropriate and beneficial assignment for me to complete in my social studies classroom. The same was true for that of my lab reports for science. These assignments incorporated writing of a particular form that aided my understanding of the specified content without requiring that I write a full-blown essay (as I probably would have in an English class).
My point is that writing, though an incredible tool for understanding, reflection and communication, is not the end-all-be-all, singular form of higher-level understanding. There are countless strategies of instruction that facilitate student learning effectively, and at times, even more so than writing. If we, as teachers (even as writing teachers), venture to say that writing is the only effective means for students to access the full potential of their understanding, then I fear that we are limiting our teaching strategies and thus, limiting the potential of student learning and putting them at a disadvantage.
The types of writing assignments that should be encouraged in schools are those which specifically aid a student's understanding or acquisition of a particular learning objective. In other words, there must be a specified purpose to the writing (as in all academic assignments). There is a great deal of research that shows that students are more likely to succeed when they understand the expectations and motivations of the teacher behind particular assignments. There is a time and place to write just to write (an English class, for instance!), but I don't feel that writing (at least of particular forms) is as essential of a component to other content areas as Applebee and Langer proposed in their article.
As teachers, we must become students of our students. We must observe and learn what excites them, what motivates them, and what helps them learn best. From there, as teachers we can differentiate and adapt our teaching strategies to best fit the student, and thus propel them into individualized academic success.
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