Practicalities

Oh the beloved/hated five paragrapher. Raise your hand if you’ve ever concentrated more on the intros, bodies, and conclusions than you have on the content within. Guilty. While I agree that design and organization is paramount, the five paragraph essay its not for everyone, and may not even be necessary for some. Graphic organizers and outlines anyone? This is certainly not to negate the importance of teaching students how to write in specific styles, for a particular audience, or how to orchestrate information. However, I see structure like this potentially imprisoning the written word, which I do think negates the objective of writing. Where’s the idiosyncrasy in that?

I’d like to meet the person who can actually organize their thoughts and feelings. Speaking of feelings…

Poetry. That word fills me with anxiety without even beginning to think about its implications or the expectations of me. Wordsworth:

A slumber did my spirit seal,
I had no human fears:
She seemed a thing that could not feel
The touch of earthly years.
No motion has she now, no force;
She neither hears nor sees;
Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,
With rocks, and stones, and trees.


Is this slumber literal sleep, or a lack of mortal awareness? I’m stressed out already, and I haven’t even been asked to write my own poetry. This makes the five paragraph essay look pretty good right about now.

I find it terribly interesting that something that is to be so personal is so difficult for so many. Many of us (ahem, as current students) roll our eyes, shoot one another looks from across the room, groan and sink into our seats when poetry is mentioned. Not all of us though, I envy those on the flipside. Now this isn’t to say I do not enjoy poetry, it’s just easier to give up on things that are difficult, right? How does that go? Nothing worth doing is ever easy.

The poetic illustrations within Romano are invaluable. He makes poetry seem less untouchable. And God help me, it’s extraordinary. I love that the multigenre paper is essentially anything goes. There is something for everyone, whether five paragraphs or two voices. Differentiation?

School should be a place for practice, not perfection. The multigenre affords a "try-on" before purchase, and brings about many alternatives or modifications to “the norm.” My coop told me that we all too often try to create change for the sake of creating change without every questioning whether or not it’s meaningful. This is something different that has the power to be meaningful in more ways, to more people, than can be registered. Today at the Young Writers’ Workshop, photographer Wing Young Huie was asked whether he shot or preferred film over digital pictures. His response was that he used film as it always seemed more real to him. He stated, “Authenticity doesn’t exist anymore. Keep it real.” I believe a multigenre paper helps a student explore and find their personal authenticity, whether their choice of film is a five paragraph or prose.