Is your HS student a good writer?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter is a fantastic writer. She reads a lot (though she was not an early, competent reader by any means!) which has helped grow her vocabulary. She had fantastic elementary school teachers who taught grammar, writing fundamentals, poetry, and critical thinking. Then her high school subjects and college majors were writing-heavy. All combined to make her writing very eloquent, fluid, and correct.

Please refrain from use of the word “eloquent,” because it is inherently racist.

Please. Educate yourself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DC has taken Hon English and is in AP seminar. A grades across the board. DC is not a good writer! This is evident from their college essays. Spelling, grammar, punctuation, vocabulary are all fine. But sentence organization is off and many sentences don’t say anything. They are fillers. What can we do to help before college?

One possible approach, if your DC wants to learn to write better:

Subscribe to a print daily paper and have your DC leaf through it every day .

Ask your DC to make an outline of a letter responding to one infuriating article per day.

Have your DC draft a letter to the editor based on each outline as quickly as possible.

Make your DC cut the number of words in each first draft by 50% without taking out many interesting facts or arguments.

For extra credit, try to find an editor let go by a nearby media organization and pay the editor to mark up drafts of some of the letters as if the letters were going to go into the Post or Times. Have the DC rewrite the drafts based on the editor’s notes.

And some of us simply learned how to be good writers by…reading.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ivy League law grad as is wife - our kids are awesome writers but their teachers give their great essays/papers B pluses. Its nuts.

Maybe you can’t write? In my experience, most lawyers can’t — especially the ones who think they can.

[Anonymous]

Read, read, read.

My oldest (in college now) was in honors English as well as AP English his senior year (at a Catholic HS) and his writing is poor. But he also doesn’t read anything beyond the ticker at the bottom of the ESPN screen.

Where my current HS senior is a great writer. Again honors English at the same HS, AP English, but the difference is she’s always been a voracious reader.

[Anonymous]

Don't worry OP, your kid is not alone. AP classes don't really help improve writing past a certain point, because they learn to write according to a rubric and will score well as long as they include certain formulaic elements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter is a fantastic writer. She reads a lot (though she was not an early, competent reader by any means!) which has helped grow her vocabulary. She had fantastic elementary school teachers who taught grammar, writing fundamentals, poetry, and critical thinking. Then her high school subjects and college majors were writing-heavy. All combined to make her writing very eloquent, fluid, and correct.

Please refrain from use of the word “eloquent,” because it is inherently racist.

This may be dumbest thing I've ever read.

[Anonymous]

My DS junior is a great writer now. It took him many years to progress to this level and he struggled with writing earlier in middle school. Now he is acing the most rigorous English literature classes at his high school and has also been helped by joining the newspaper.

[Anonymous]

To our surprise, DD has turned out to be a great writer. All credit goes to her school, especially the amazing English teacher she has this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes and he reads a ton. You can tell because sometimes he’ll pronounce words incorrectly because he’s never heard them articulated, but he’s read them multiple times. It makes me chuckle.

Mine does this all the time. Love it!

[Anonymous]

MD/JD parents. Both kids T10/ivy. Both got accolades from private school teachers on writing, many of those teachers holding phDs. One is history/prelaw one stem. Accolades continue in college. Both read independently before the 4th birthday.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ivy League law grad as is wife - our kids are awesome writers but their teachers give their great essays/papers B pluses. Its nuts.

Why is this? To stick it to this "ivy league law grad duo"? Take that parents, your kids aren't all that? Asking as a couple friends who are in health had similar experience when their kids were taking science courses which would probably be hard for most of us but those kids were way advanced.

[Anonymous]

My DS struggle with writing until he got to his private HS. He's taken two college-level English lit classes with extensive reading and writing expectations. Essay prompts have been very challenging and sophisticated as have the novels (in length, depth, historical context).

He's now a very good to excellent writer! But it's been the teachers at this school (private non-DMV) that have put him through the paces.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Both my boys are good writers. DS1 is an excellent technical writer-- his writing is very well-organized and clear, but I don't think there's a lot of "personality" to his worryi

Does this even matter in a professional or business context?

If he's going to write op eds, persuasive articles, or novels then "personality" is important but otherwise "well organized and clear" is perfect.

No argument here.

[Anonymous]

My youngest was a terrible writer in MS but he’s now a junior and I’d give him a 9/10. I’d like to see more creativity and more variation in word choice but his writing is very clear and concise. I thank journalism for the improvement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ivy League law grad as is wife - our kids are awesome writers but their teachers give their great essays/papers B pluses. Its nuts.

Why is this? To stick it to this "ivy league law grad duo"? Take that parents, your kids aren't all that? Asking as a couple friends who are in health had similar experience when their kids were taking science courses which would probably be hard for most of us but those kids were way advanced.

It is because lawyers — of any pedigree — tend not to be the best writers, or “judges” of writing. This is not exactly a secret, though it may be news to you and your ilk. As to what you are trying to convey in your last sentence, I cannot even guess.