Memo 3B: connecting the essay back to its origin

            I know that Montaigne developed what is now known as the essay with writings on his personal views of society in 16^th century France. And that he would often connect elements of ancient history to current events. I also know that essays are now written to demonstrate student writing, and are used to asses student writing. But how did the essay go from demonstrating opinion to a tool of skill assessment, such as seen with the writing section of the SAT? So far the answer I have come to find is the regulation and standardization of teaching methods and assessment that occurred in the late 19^th and early 20^th century.

            This is the period that the five paragraph essay became a popular tool for students to demonstrate their understanding of certain concepts. This type of writing evolved from theme writing which had an introduction, body, and conclusion. Later when standardized testing became the leading way to document student skill level, the essay became a tool to grade writing. Now what I want to look at is how to appropriately teach the five paragraph essay for what it is, and not as a tool to develop good writing.

            Through my research thus far it seems that writing and writing a formulaic essay should be separate, but the formulaic essay seems to be needed, so I am curious as how to teach good writing to students, then transport it to the formulaic essay, then expand on the essay, breaking away from the formula but using the structure as a foundation.

            Looking through the book Teaching with Hacker Handbooks, a lot of the focus is on teaching the essay through each step starting with the thesis. And also touches a lot on designing writing assignments, but not as much as teaching just plain good writing as the Gallagher book does. To take something like the five paragraph essay that has become an assessment tool on writing and not displaying knowledge or thought, the purpose of the five paragraph essay needs to be demonstrated. This is something that can be easily done with Montaigne’s work where he argues his opinions on society.

            Now the new key word is argument. Now that good writing is separate from formula essays, and the formula essay has been developed, a teacher can show what kind of purpose writing can serve. And one of those purposes is to argue something. The book Everything’s An Argument illustrates this. I have only read the introduction to this book, but it’s shown me that most things in life are opinions, and can be argued from the other side.

            Arguments can be developed with a five paragraph essay, but when a solid essay is created students need to learn how to manipulate the essay away from the five paragraph formula. I am thinking that using an argument that is incredibly interesting to a student will make it easy for them to move away from the safe structure of the five paragraph essay. It seems that I myself am forming a formula on how to instruct away from the formula essay that is sometimes necessary. Structure clearly is comforting for everything.