This week it is spring break in our school district but a teacher brought over some essays the students had written on an Elizabethan sonnet on Friday. Some of the students clearly show the beginnings of mastery and some of them continue to just throw words at the paper hoping that if they write more, they will somehow get something right. Since sonnets only have fourteen lines, the student who wrote that the author slowly developed his ideas just made me wince. As did all the students who described "animalistic imagery," when what they meant was images of animals.
I think the idea of writing more became more prevalent when the SAT included a writing sample and people who reviewed the scores found that students who wrote more in the allotted time scored higher regardless of facts or grammar. I always try to point out to these kids that having concise and cogent arguments is a good skill to work toward and I also point out that many of their college essays, just next year, will require them to sell themselves to their desired schools in 200--600 words. That is. some of the prompts ask for 200 words and some allow up to 600 but those are quite limited.
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