One of the most common mythical rules I've heard from my students is, "Never 
use the pronoun 'you' in formal writing."

I think a lot of these rules originate from teachers well-intentioned 
attempts to help students avoid error.   Since point-of-view shift is a common error 
that some student writers seem to have trouble avoiding, some teachers just 
limit their options for point-of-view by saying, "never use the pronoun you."   

I call these strategies on the part of teachers "training wheels."   When 
teaching someone to ride a bicycle, which involves doing many different 
activities at one, parents often buy a bike with training wheels, which limit the 
number of things the young bike rider has to think about at the same time.   The 
training wheels take care of balance, so the rider can focus on pedaling, 
steering, etc.   

I think telling students not to use the pronoun "you" or not to start a 
sentence with "because" or to always make the thesis the last sentence in the first 
paragraph is an attempt to limit the student writer's options, so he or she 
doesn't have to think about too many things at once.   Training wheels, for the 
writer, if you will.

The problem is that teachers, too often, fail to take off the training wheels 
and never even tell students that the "rule" isn't really a rule, just 
something to help them when they are learning to write.   Students then leave the 
classroom thinking that what there teacher taught them is, in fact, a rule . . . 
and another mythical rule is born.



Peter Adams

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