We have started down the road toward the five paragraph theme in my Comp II class. Even though I despise it, I do teach it. Some classes - unfortunately - will call for it later.
Their fifth essay is a personal struggle essay. So I called for them to write about an obstacle they face or a problem they have. I encouraged them to think of problems or concerns they might have about college (since most are seniors).
Then I had them write some solutions to their problem.
Now I will have them take their drafts and wrench them into the five paragraph theme.
This is where I have to be careful.
Whenever I teach personal writing (and some will argue that is the only thing writing can really be), I am not really teaching at all. I'm just kind of a long for the ride. I can offer tips and suggestions. I can copy edit. But ultimately, the students have the final say - after all, they are writing about their stories.
And to some teachers that is scary. For I often don't feel like I'm teaching them a damn thing. And - worse yet - I enjoy the hell out of their essays. So here crops up the old idea of getting paid to do something that one absolutely loves - and that shouldn't happen. In order to earn one's pay, one must work - dammit - and that means drudgery. That means labor. But really, when I read good essays, there's nothing laborious about it.
So the five paragraph theme is a way for teachers to actually feel like they're teaching writing (and some will argue that they are not teaching writing AT ALL -- see "The Essay" by Paul Heilker, the chapter "Engfish" in "Uptaught" by Ken Macrorie, anything by Tom Romano, Peter Elbow, Donald Murray and a smart little essay by Richard Larson entitled "The 'Research Paper' in the Writing Course: A Non-Form of Writing" in the anthology "The Writing Teacher's Sourcebook"). And when I introduce it, I do finally feel like I'm teaching the kids something - though I know I'm not teaching them how to write; I'm just teaching them really how to organize.
What is really seductive about the five paragraph theme is that kids can master it rather quickly. So I see results right away. Kids have no problem coming up with an intro and supporting reasons. Sure getting them to add a thesis to their intro and coordinating it with the topic sentences in their supporting paragraphs is tricky - not to mention getting the conclusion down, but it can be mastered - because there is only one way to do it.
Teaching personal essays, on the other hand, cannot be mastered (and that's part of the charm/appeal). No one tells the same story twice. Either it changes or you change. And mostly likely both occur. Plus you adapt to audience - most of the kids will tell quite a different story about how they spent their senior skip day when they recount it to their parents than they will when recounting it among their peers tomorrow in my class.
All of that is lost in the five paragraph theme.
I liken teaching the five paragraph theme to learning how to paint by numbers. How many great artists were inspired by filling in the spaces between the lines? Or how many musicians were inspired by those infomercials where you can master the guitar (or whatever instrument) in five days or less? Zilch.
Those things churn out 'canned' results. The same is true for five paragraph theme teaching.
So now when I'm teaching it, I have to be careful that I don't get seduced by the dark side. Today when we go over how to write a thesis and coordinate it to their topic sentences, I can see results right away. When I tell them to support their topic sentences with specific examples, I can see results right away. But the overall result I'll see is that I get to read, basically, the same essay 18 times tonight. And while I'm grading them, I never find myself saying, "Wow. That's a neat way to phrase that. Or, Kristie, let me read you this paragraph. Or even, This is funny!" I get none of that. Instead I find myself examining their thesis and making sure it coordinates with their topic sentences and that the supporting sentences fully develop each topic sentence, and that the conclusion summarizes their main ideas. Then I check for proper citation and grammatical stuff.
Now where is the fun in that?
Maybe that's why so many of us hate grading those types of papers. I know that's why I do.
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