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Why "Fill in the blank" Can't . . .

5/27/2021

11 Comments

 
During our first class together, we looked at the iconic essay "Why Johnny Can't Write." Written in 1975, if came at a very particular cultural moment--the article calls it "the political activism of the past decade" by which the author means the civil rights movement. We tend to think of civil rights exclusively through the lens of race and racism--as we should, but we need also to think about it in terms of gender, class, and language, and immigration status. 

1970 is an important moment in post-secondary education. The era of "Open Enrollment" began in the wake the Civil Rights movement. It demanded that colleges and universities make a college education available to a wider and wider segment of the population. As a result, the rules that governed how one should talk and write (a middle-class, white "habits" as the writer Asou Inoue calls it in a text we will read this semester), met up against students new to the university that challenged the value and effectiveness of this rules. 

We can understand "Why Johnny Can't Write," in 1975, as a backlash to the kinds of pedagogies that were embraced as part of the work to include these students in the benefits of having a college education--which means, as well, that the article was also, at least in part, backlash against those students as well. 

Situated this way, the article feels very different. Let us now turn to the "Why blank can't blank" articles you found.

For this post, please identify the following: 
  • The title of your article and where it originally appeared.
  • A summary of who can't do the thing, what they can't do, what is to blame for that, and what we should be doing to improve it. 
  • The DATE of when the article was originally published.
  • Any observations about the similarities between your article and the original "Why Johnny Can't." 

BE PREPARED:
Once folks have posted and we have spent some time reading each other's posts, I am going to ask you to talk in small groups about what this says to you about literacy instruction today. You'll have some time to talk in small groups and then I will ask you to come back to class and share what you talked about. 
11 Comments
Alexis Medeiros link
5/27/2021 11:17:38 am

The article, “Why Johnny Can’t Write” focuses primarily on the distractions that push students away from the desire of writing. Since the article was written in 1975 the times have changed. If people thought students couldn’t write back then they haven’t seen students writing now, especially after the COVID-19 Pandemic. Students were distracted by then from television where as students are distracted now by smart phones and the pointless videos that people make that draw students in for hours on end. The article, “Why Johnny Can’t Write” says that the focus has changed. Students are no longer putting an emphasis on writing but instead they are putting an emphasis on speaking. The dialect of our current language has changed so much from 1975 to now, even our current slang does not compare to the slang of that year. When searching for an article I wanted to see if there was one that relates to the one that we have currently read. The article I found is called, “Why Kids Can’t Write”. This article was published August 2nd, 2017, 42 years later. The emphasis of this article is that students are not allowed to express themselves. The article, “Why Johnny Can’t Write” describes how students are forced to be creative. The current article emphasizes that students should be taught self-expression at an early age as it will help them write when they are older. Sentence fragmenting and basic grammar rules can always be corrected but if students have not been taught to write creatively at an early age, their writing will not suffice when they take the ACT exam or submit a college resume. The article, “Why Kids Can’t Write” mentions the fact that students are always on writing now, whether it is text messages or using the mobile app, Snapchat. The article states that students can write but they can’t formal write because their teachers have never been taught to formally write. The article calls the attention to massive teacher education, if teachers were more educated in writing they would be able to teach students. Students are taught by their teachers, if the teachers haven’t been taught correctly the problem is never corrected instead it is passed down. Dr. Hochman states that the emphasis needs to be taken off “free-writing” often times teachers think free-writing is a good way for students to express themselves but instead teachers should be prompting their students. If students are only focusing on expressing themselves when they get into the older grades they will not be able to write properly about a text because they never practiced that skill until the exam. The article also goes on to say that before students are taught to write paragraphs they need to be taught to write good sentences. In Kindergarten students are pushed to write paragraphs without good sentences, if the focus was centered around budding good sentences first then students would be able to create great paragraphs. Students should also be taught to transcribe both by hand and on the computer. Now that society is leaning more towards electronics students should also know how to type on a computer since many standardized tests are now on the computer. If students are never taught to transcribe on the computer how will they be able to do it in a timely manner on a standardized timed test. Both articles, “Why Kids Can’t Write” and “Why Johnny Can’t Write” display a great emphasis on practicing the skills. If students don’t practice they will never be able to become great at the skill.

Reply
LT
5/27/2021 11:27:35 am

There are a lot of similarities here between the 1975 article and the 2017 article--the role of technology, the role of teachers and badly trained teachers and, if I'm reading right, that there needs to be more of a particular kind of structure to improve student writing.

Reply
LT
5/27/2021 11:23:55 am

I have to admit, this is a little bit of ringer because I did my dissertation on reading in the writing classroom so I have, just laying around my house, excerpts of some pretty obscure texts. I'm going to start with a direct quote: “Those of us who have been doomed to read manuscript written in an examination room--whether at a grammar school, a high school, or a college--have found the work of even good scholars disfigured by bad spelling, confusing punctuation, ungrammatical, obscure, ambiguous, or inelegant expressions. Everyone who has had much to do with the graduating classes of our best colleges, has known men who could not write a letter describing their own Commencement without making blunders which would disgrace a boy twelve years old.”

You wanna know who wrote that? It’s a man named Adam Sherman Hill, and he wrote this about students at Harvard University in 1879. Yes, you read that right, 1879. There are so many comparisons to make here: young college graduates unable to write a decent English sentence, the problem is what they are teaching at the university that passes for instruction, prospective employers are finding it impossible to find college graduates that can read and write.

Another commonality: there was some time that there was this golden age of reading writing, it's just not now--and by now I mean 100 years ago.So if you were wondering when the golden age of literacy in the United States was--and we must assume there was one since literally every single article above suggests that literacy has precipitously declined--it must have been sometime around the Civil War. Except remember that the Shiels article suggest that even Mark Twain felt the decline of literacy.

And let’s consider another point: he’s talking about the .0001% of super elite, rich white men who went to Harvard. And if he is essentially saying they can’t write for nothing, what does that say about the rest of us slobs? And, further, if things were so bad in 1879 and have disintegrated further, how is it even possible that we are even able to communicate with each other?

What this says to me is that people keep saying that we are a nation of illiterates getting worse with every generation, but, somehow, we remain a highly literate society. One could even argue we are more and differently literate given all the things we have to "read" these days.

Reply
Lauren Wrigley
5/27/2021 11:28:12 am

“Why cats can’t be vegetarian” by Karen Shaw Becker, DVM December 27, 2017
https://animalwellnessmagazine.com/cats-cant-vegetarian/

I might have steered a little off course for this assignment but I found this article from an animal wellness magazine in which the author discusses why cats cant be vegetarian. The author, Karen Shaw Becker, is a licensed veterinarian and wrote this article because many of her clients have admitted to feeding their cats vegetarian diets. She begins by saying that, while vegetarian diets may be beneficial for humans, it is unhealthy and dangerous for cats. She then explains how cats are 'hypercarnivores' that require high amounts of proteins and vitamins, specifically found in animal meet. They also lack they physiological ability to convert plant amino acids into the proteins that require. Essentially, Dr. Becker provides the hard facts as to why cats legitimately cannot be vegetarians. She also suggests certain meats that can contribute to a healthy balanced diet for a cat and advices cat owners to avoid fish and provide a moisture rich diet.

This article differed from the "why Johnny Can't Write" article because it has a more objective and professional tone. Although both authors provide facts and statistics, and offer suggests to face the concern at hand, Dr. Becker provides a more unbiased perspective.

Reply
David Golden
5/27/2021 11:28:35 am

My article is "Forgetting How to Read" by Doug Lemov. It was published relatively recently in February 2019. The article mainly discusses why children are reading less and less. Children see far more distractions than they have ever had to deal with before. With new media taking over their lives reading becomes less and less appealing. The article talks about how we are rewiring ourselves when are writing. We we read we are now in a constant state of partial attention. There are some definite parallels to the "Why Johnny Can't Write" article. There will always be a new media that takes attention away from the other. The article goes into depth and says that our reading and writing skills will continue to degrade. We are losing a collective patience from all these new media and it is no longer just television. I believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel. Schools can offer a safe and isolated environment for children to grow and love reading and writing. They just have to offer a place where reading is encouraged and away from these media.

Reply
Gabriel El Khoury
5/27/2021 11:28:42 am

The title of Dana Goldstein's "Why Kids Can't Write" (2017) published in the New York Times says it all: Goldstein claims that children are barely able to write. Not unlike "Why Johnny Can't Write," Goldstein's article places blames the usual culprits: technology, the disconnect between children and their thoughts, a lack of grammar study. Dr. Hochman supposedly offers "a radically different approach" to teaching children how to write: a return to the basics of sentence-level construction. This entails having to fill in worksheets, grammar worksheets which help students with the fundamentals of writing coherent sentences. Ms. Wanzer also encourages students "to freewrite," allowing them "to write anything they want" in response to an agreed upon prompt. Like "Why Johnny Can't Write," there is plenty of blame to go around, and Goldstein's article is yet another example of this tradition of "Why fill-in-the blank Can't fill-in-the blank." To Goldstein's credit, she admits that "Poor writing is nothing new, nor is concern about it."

Reply
Sarah Egan link
5/27/2021 11:29:13 am

Why these friendly robots can’t be good friends to our kids appeared in the Washington Post on December 7, 2017 by Sherry Turtle.
Robots are becoming more and more social and more part of our every day life. They are even given pronouns such as she or he. An example of this would be the Amazon Alexa who identifies as a girl. Researchers feel as if having a social connection with these robots is taking away from empathy that people feel for others. Children are befriending robots and asking them questions such as, “are we friends?” Or “do you love me?”
Robots cannot be good to be friends with. They are machines and they invade privacy. These devices record conversations, take pictures or videos, and collect data. Activities that are supposed to be done by parents are done by robots. They read bedtime stories or scan rooms for monsters; all things that should be done by parents to help strengthen the bond between them and their child.
The public needs to become more aware of what damage this is doing to our future generations. It is creating social problems and impacting people’s empathy. Though robots do have positive functions, they are becoming more relied upon for different aspects of life.
Why Johnny Can’t and Why these friendly robots can’t be good friends to our kids both describe the negative effects that technology has on people’s lives. Neither article shares the benefits of having these resources, only the damage that they are causing.

Reply
Emma Healy
5/27/2021 11:31:14 am

The title of the article is, "Why Millions of Kids Can't Read and What Better Teaching Can Do About It" from npr.org. The focus of the article is that children struggle to read because there is such a misconception that reading is "natural." Just like writing, reading takes practice and years of decoding skills. The article studies how children read and why certain students struggle more than others, specifically those in lower income areas. A lot of the blame is put on educators for students unable to read at a proficient level. In this article, the Bethlehem school district spent $3 million on teacher training on how students should be taught how to read from professionals. Teachers were blamed that they didn't know proper reading sounds and how to integrate texts into the classroom that children want to read. By teachers in this school district taking courses to improve their students reading performances, there was a huge spike in reading scores from the beginning to end of the school year. To improve students' reading abilities, it relates back to how the teacher is teaching literacy components and getting the proper training necessary so the students don't suffer.
The article was posted on January 2, 2019 by Emily Hanford.
Relating back to "Why Johnny Can't Write" there are a lot of similarities despite the great year gap they were written. A lot of the blame for the article in 1975 was put on teachers as well as the recent one. Teachers were held accountable and needed to either take courses in reading or writing to improve the literacy skills for their students.

Reply
Elizabeth Cheesman
5/27/2021 11:32:21 am

“Why Kids Can’t Write” was written By Dana Goldstein on August second, 2017 (It was difficult to find an article that had a sufficient amount of information to write about in 2018-2019). This article appeared in The New York Times. Goldstein discusses why kids cannot write with correct syntax. More specifically, teachers have observed children not using correct grammar in sentences such as having pronoun disagreements. Goldstein blamed social media, teachers and teaching pedagogy. She states that kids can write extensively on social media but when it comes to actual “mechanics” and writing structure in academics, kids struggle. Similarly to the article about Johnny, teachers are blamed for having limited training and experience with improving their own writing and therefore, are not providing students with the most effective practice to become better writers. Both articles discuss the concern that if teachers do not catch these improper sentences at an early age, students will continue using unacceptable language in high school, on standardized tests such as ACT and SAT and in college. Goldstein declares that a love of writing needs to be developed before specific grammar lessons. She also believes that exposure to proficient, formal writing is huge to promote inspiration and ideas of writing first, then the syntax. If teachers focus more on developing an interest through activities such as free writing, then students will be not only more engaged but also a stronger learner.

Reply
Aliyah Pires
5/27/2021 11:32:30 am

Article Title: Why Kids Can't Write

Published August 2nd 2017



Most teachers today are focusing on the fundamentals of grammar which is one approach to teaching writing. But in this article, it is argued that it’s by no means the dominant one. Many educators are concerned less with sentence-level mechanics than with helping students draw inspiration from their own lives and from literature. A problem that was brought about was the idea that teachers have little training in how to teach writing and are often weak or unconfident writers themselves. It is stated that many teacher preparation programs show little evidence that the teaching of writing was being covered in a widespread or systematic way. Teachers find themselves comfortable with reading and were successful in college but when asked about their writing experiences they are not so confident. This is similar to the Why Johnny Can't Read article as it discussed the way that teachers are not fully prepared to teach students the necessities, they need to succeed themselves. In the Johnny article teachers began to take classes on reading, sentence structure and grammar to make themselves more knowledgeable and it seems this article is discussing the same types of idea. This article also discussed the idea that students are not writing formally as we are now more into texting and social media forms. As in the Johnny article these were distractions and now many years later there are even more distractions in different ways. Still the reason for not succeeding the way we should relies more on the idea of putting in the work and expanding on the aspects of formal writing techniques.

Reply
Tenneh Sesay.
5/27/2021 11:43:21 am

The article “Why Johnny Can’t Write where the author was focuses on the distractions and it’s can push the students away from not writing desire. Why Johnny Can’t Write was published in 1975 where things and times changed. People thinks that students can’t write because they isn’t educated or smart enough to come up with a words. Yea television can be distracted to student like smartphones and even some pointless video (like funny videos, , TikTok, etc) . The article want to teach us how we need changed and how students isn’t putting enough emphasis. The students are forced to be creative in their writing. They trying to explain how student need to be taught self -expression at a very early age how it’s would help them how to write . Fragmenting and basic grammar rules can help with the corrected if student didn’t take any creative. When applying for college their writing won’t impact them. According to the article “Why Kids can’t write “ they said that student are always writing even on social media, text messages.

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