The Five-Paragraph You-Know-What

My earliest memory of the five-paragraph you-know-what happened in fifth grade. We were the big kids of the school and we were expected to write as such. 9/11 was still a fresh memory and naturally, we were asked to write about how it affected us and our experience with the whole ordeal. A lot of parents didn't want my fellow classmates to write about something this complicated or write an entire five-paragraph you-know-what. 

I overheard a lot of kids telling each other what their parents had been saying. 

"How do you expect a ten year old to be able to write this much about such a complicated issue?"

"I never even told my kids about what really happened!" 

I remember my mom being a little apprehensive about this assignment, and reassuring me that she'd help because she was so sure that I'd struggle with it.

My teacher got his way, and I remember being excited about this new fancy grown up assignment. We even had to put it on a floppy disc (wow we've come far) and submit it to a writing contest where you'd win $100, that was such a huge deal to me. I felt like those cool college kids I saw on MTV's The Real World. 

I was ready. 

It was straight to the point, introduction, three body paragraphs and a conclusion. I thought I aced it and that I would win the contest for sure. Maybe buy a new doll house with the money, a swimming pool for Barbie and Ken.

I didn't win. And from that point on essays just became a symbol of disappointment for me. 

Once sixth grade rolled around, writing from our own perspective was frowned upon and I failed my first middle school essay because I had used "I" too many times. 

"You can't write in first person. That means you can't say "I" in your essays or mention yourself or your opinion"

The red marks all over my essay were discouraging.

"I didn't know that! No one ever told me. I did great on the last essay I wrote and I used I! My last teacher said it was ok!!" 

I got to rewrite it, but my grade didn't improve much because I was so sure I was right and my teacher was evil. As much as I loved words, books, and writing...this whole essay thing was not my forte.

To this day, I still struggle with essays. I do quite well on them, and I'm often consulted to help others with theirs. I've mastered the structure of essays, and although my collegiate essays surpass five paragraphs they are still very reminiscent of the black and white, factual, straight to the point essays that were drilled into my brain the years before my English regents exam. I got a 98 on my regents exam and always did well in English classes but the creativity was completely lost for me.

It always made me laugh how my teachers would tell me "your thesis statement should grab the reader's attention!" and "your first paragraph should make the reader want to keep reading!" 

How could I make such boring topics sound so interesting? All of my essays were basically just reiterating the obvious in every adolescent book, play, or story we read. 

As a future teacher of writing, it worries me that I'm going to fall into the same trap that was set for me when I was a middle/high school student. 

In Christensen's Essay With an Attitude she says,

"I've never found a five-step Betty Crocker boxed essay recipe. Because students don't all learn the same way or enter my class with the same background knowledge or confidence, I need to teach essay writing rather than assign it"

I hope that I can do the same in my future classroom and let students get personal with their writing. Inciting their emotions and allowing them to break free of the typical five-paragraph you-know-what.

Of course it's important to teach students how to write these typical five paragraph essays with an introduction, thesis statement, body paragraphs and a conclusion that summarized the thesis. Because as Romano says, students have to be able to do this to get their "ticket", and once they are "ticket holders" they can have a little more artistic freedom over how they choose to write.

If standardized testing is still around when I begin teaching, it'll be my duty to make sure that students can perform up to the "standards". However, it would be ideal for both the students and myself to give them creative freedom on how they choose to submit their writing assignments. 

It would be beneficial to students to write more essays like Leslie's Understanding Dad in Romano's The Five-Paragraph You-Know-What, and much less boring for me as the teacher (lol).