What is “Grown-Up” Writing?

Forcing teenagers to write is like, as friend of mine once put it, “pulling each individual tooth.” Teaching these same teenagers to write WELL is all but impossible.

At the beginning of every school year, I ask the students to write short pieces introducing themselves to me.  Some of these are crisp and full of personality, but the majority are indistinguishable from little kid writing: full of fragments and run-ons, riddled with words like “bad,” and completely lacking in any sort of central idea. My goal is for these students to transition from little kid writing  into grown-up writing before the end of the school year.

But it’s difficult to expect improvement when most ADULTS won’t write like grown-ups, either.

I hear so often from my students that they CAN’T write, and I imagine most adults would say the same thing.

Piffle.  Writing is not an exclusive club, open to only college professors and journalists.  It is a mistake to assume that one CAN’T produce strong writing. It is a further mistake to assume that strong writing is so impossibly difficult, it isn’t worth the enormous amount of time or effort that must be involved.

Grown-up writing is neither impossible nor even very elusive; it takes nothing more than a little extra care and a little common sense.

Most of us would be embarrassed to walk into a restaurant and say, “Piscetty, pwease. I wuv piscetty and meatballs! T’anks!”  Instead, we would make at least a minimum effort to come across like a functioning grown-up.

So why should we be content to sound like five-year-olds in our writing?

Who Will Rescue Written Communication From a Slow, Painful Death?

As a writer and English teacher, I find myself frequently worried that the standards of written communication have become a tad more “relaxed” over the years.  It seems like lately I’ve been receiving—from educated, English-speaking adults, no less– more and more e-mails like this:

“American idol tonite! Who r u rooting 4 let me know!”

Many people worry excessively about looking stupid in front of other people; why is it more folks don’t worry about looking stupid on paper?

Call me stodgy and old-fashioned, but yes, I’m worried.  Perplexed, even.  Are we really so busy that we can’t even write out short words like “are,” “you,” and “for”?  Are people so eager to get their thoughts across that they forget to punctuate sentences?  Do they not have even FIVE SECONDS to glance back over and proofread a line of writing before sending it my way?

This wouldn’t be such a problem if we could at least keep the laid-back vernacular out of the school and workplace.  Sadly, for every e-mail or text message I see that contains “u” as a word, at least one student is going to attempt to use “u” in a paper. The scary part in not that the “u” shows up, but that the author of said “u” will argue that such writing is totally acceptable.  The scariest part of all is that, based on popular opinion, that student may be right.

As the standards of written communication lie in the death-grip of laziness, it’s clear that someone must try to pry those slovenly fingers apart. In this blog, I plan to call out common writing snafus and offer helpful tips where ever possible.

I’m not asking that people write like experts.

I’m only asking that grown ups write like grown ups.