I think Herb has hit upon the best approach we can take. When I was 
still publishing Composition Chronicle, I started to make a 
collection of state standards. I was looking particularly at 
composition, of course, but I took note of the many places where 
language issues were included.  My materials are considerably out of 
date, so maybe someone can make a new collection.

I do remember, though, that the language standards often made demands 
that were impossible to fulfill by traditional methods. The most 
common such standard was to improve the correctness of writing (in 
usage, punctuation, spelling, etc.). If anyone has a sure-fire way to 
do that, I haven't heard of it, which is perhaps one of the reasons 
why such a standard is ignored.

Or maybe it only looks as if it the standard is ignored; teachers 
could be trying to meet it in indirect ways such as teaching 
correctness in the context of students' own writing or not teaching 
it directly at all, expecting that increasing the amount of student 
writing will automatically lead to increasing correctness.

Bill


>Bill, Craig, and Tim have defined the problem pretty well.  The 
>question is how we work to change a position so deeply rooted in the 
>profession, its research, its ethos, and its curricula.  We have to 
>remember that in the absence of using grammatical knowledge as a 
>tool for critiquing texts composition specialists have developed a 
>significant body of research on the nature and teaching of writing. 
>We don't want to even appear to dismiss the very real progress that 
>has been made in this field. 
>
>That said, I think it would be useful for us to look closely at the 
>English language arts standards in our states and to see just what 
>sort of linguistic and grammatical knowledge those standards 
>prescribe and presuppose.  I have done this with Indiana's, and I've 
>been as surprised and gratified by the depth and variety of content 
>required as I have been dismayed by the extent to which the English 
>teaching profession in the state ignores those parts of the 
>standards and spends its time on non-linguistic and non-grammar 
>requirements.  Preparing content and methods courses to meet those 
>standards and presenting them as such at state professional meetings 
>may move us towards greater acceptance, since we don't have to 
>introduce new standards.  We're simply implementing what's already 
>been mandated.  Of course, we are also expecting teachers to learn 
>and implement something that's new to them and that takes time away 
>from the things they've been taught to value.  This last may be the 
>biggest hurdle.  What we want them to add, at the expense of some of 
>what they are doing, is precisely and perniciously what they have 
>been taught should not be added at the expense of what they have 
>been taught to teach.
>
>Herb

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/