Reach Out and Touch Someone--But Be Specific

One of the most common complaints we hear from our students is that they have trouble coming up with ideas. This manifests itself in paragraphs that lack specifics and, frankly, bore the bejeezus out of us.

Today, we discussed the concepts of subject, audience, and purpose; that is, what one writes about, whom one writes for, and why one writes. We realized that students--and, probably, most writers--begin by thinking of a topic. This makes sense. At the same time, though, we think this might be the source of our students' perpetual case of writer's block.

In our classes, we provide our students with topics. The thing is, these are broad, general interest topics--college, television, computers, etc.--things about which our students probably have some knowledge. One of the students' tasks, then, is to narrow the topic sufficiently so that they can write meaningful paragraphs or short essays--a concise piece of writing that makes one or two specific points about a very general topic.

It occured to us this morning that, in order to narrow a topic and come up with specific details to support that topic, students might benefit from thinking first NOT about the subject, but about the audience and purpose. If students don't take this approach, they most likely think their audience is the teacher: One can imagine how conducive to creativity that is. What if, though, they begin by choosing a more appealing--or less intimidating--audience?

Say, for example, a student must write a paragraph about television. If writing for a teacher, a student worries about giving a "right" answer (whatever that means). They take care not to say anything too provocative. We cannot count the number of times we have heard about how "The Simpsons" and "South Park" are exemplars of inappropriate television; we can only assume it is because they think, wrongly, that no educated person (i.e., teacher) could possibly enjoy such vulgar fare.

But what if students could write to anyone they wanted? Write a paragraph about television to your best friend; to your parents; to President Obama. Then, think about a purpose: WHY write something about television for this person--what do they hope to accomplish? To persuade your best friend to watch a particular show; to convince your parents to let you get premium cable channels in your room; to let President Obama know that, if he wants to get his message across to college-age kids, he sould adopt a different media strategy and appear on different shows or channels. Ultimately, once the student chooses an audience and purpose, the necessary details--the support--become obvious.

Will this be effective? We'll keep you posted.