Five Paragraph Essay

I just completed two more semesters in college.  I have only three to go before I graduate. One of the English classes I took last semester discussed the different emphases available to students. It was mostly a lot of reading and group discussions, but I enjoyed the relaxed feel of the class and the student-based course assignments. One day, we discussed the educational side of English for those who want to go on and be teachers in some form or another. Our discussion included a variety of topics including the validity of the five paragraph essay format taught to most middle and high school students around the nation. The teacher and most of the students do not think that the five paragraph essay is a good way to teach students. I agreed with them in class, but as I went home to think later that day, I decided that I disagree.
The five paragraph essay is a basic format for students to convey their thoughts in a manner that is easily graded by the teacher. The different paragraphs are outlined simply and clearly, often with a "hamburger" or "sandwich" illustration. The student is to write an essay that includes an introductory paragraph with a thesis statement describing the claim and evidence that will be explored in the essay (the hamburger bun); three separate paragraphs explaining the claim and evidence that supports that claim, each paragraph with their own topic sentence, quotes, and explanation (the meat, lettuce, and cheese); and finally a concluding paragraph summarizing the claim, the evidence given, and the details of the essay (the bottom hamburger bun). This format is straightforward and simple for students to understand and replicate. It is also easy for teachers to grade. All a teacher has to do is examine the essay for the format guidelines and then assign a grade accordingly. Because of the ease of grading, the students in the class I attended felt that the five paragraph essay format was ill-suited for students to learn and improve. The claimed that teaching the five paragraph essay format encourages students to learn the form without adapting the form to other papers. They also claimed that a teacher might grade only on those criteria without helping the student learn.
However, as I thought about the five paragraph essay, I realized that I had missed the point of a five paragraph essay. Writing a five paragraph essay is about having an idea, supporting it with evidence, and explaining it in an easy-to-understand manner. An essay isn't just about format, it's about the development of ideas. A student can write a five paragraph essay that meets all the form requirements without developing his or her ideas fully. To me, the content and expression of content matter just as much as the format in which the content is displayed. For this reason, I feel like my fellow students missed the purpose of teaching the five paragraph essay and felt like it was ineffective. If the teacher grades in a manner that emphasizes the form of the five paragraph essay, he or she is not benefiting the students as much as assessing the student's ability to convey meaning. My teacher encouraged us to find the deepest why, to think critically about what we were reading, and to analyze material. All three are possible in a five paragraph essay if the student takes the time to go beyond the requirements of the form. Also, the five paragraph essay form is easily adaptable to any essay-type document because it teaches students to have a reason or a focus to write, an organization and flow to the thoughts expressed, and sufficient support to the claims made, which are necessary in any paper. I often adopt the five paragraph form when writing a paper, no matter the amount of paragraphs I have, because I know the form is an easy way to express my ideas, as long as my ideas show that I am thinking critically about my topic.
For some students, writing a five paragraph essay might be torture. For some teachers, grading a five paragraph essay might be cruel and unusual punishment. But for me, I understand the use of a five paragraph essay and I am grateful for the foundation it has given me towards writing the right.

The Return of the Writer

Wow. It's 2015. November 2015 for that matter, almost the beginning of December besides. So much has happened, and there's so much on which to comment.

I think I shall begin by explaining my absence. In Februrary 2014, I left school to serve a mission for the Chruch of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My purpose was to teach people about the gospel of Jesus Christ, but God's purpose was to humble me, to nurture confidence in me, and to help me meet people and gain experiences that would have been neglected otherwise. There is so much that I gained from serving a mission, many of which applies to writing or "the right" or my knowledge of the world (which influences my writing). I may refer to some of my experiences in future posts. As I do so, I will tag the articles with tag "Interregnum," meaning "any pause or interruption in continuity" so as to fill that gap and spur continuity. 

I returned from my voyage in Arizona In August of 2015, having conquered much. But it didn't take long for me to start school again. My mom helped me to arrange my classes for this semester and it is amazing how they all fit together. I'm learning so much! There is much I want to ponder and study. Expect a post/explanation about each of these in the future, maybe even several.  The list includes

•Visible writers and visible God 

•How Frankenstein and Wicked are similar.

•Revisiting French grammar with an increased knowledge of English Grammar. 

•The wonder of my connecting classes. 

•The process and joy of writing a story. (And the pain of editing it to make it better).

•A general comment about how I like to play board games and be with family. (Referencing Thanksgiving.)

•Journal writing and scripture study and ponderizing. 

•What I learned about people from companions (and the fun times we had) 

I think that is a good enough list for now. I will follow up with you. In the meanwhile, Happy Thanksgiving! Merry Christmas, and TTFN, ta ta for now. 

French for "Was"

Last Friday, in English class, we discussed how to better our writing. My teacher instructed us that nouns and verbs should do 90% of the work while writing, and the other 10% is all the other types of words, including prepositions, adverbs, adjectives, and articles. That's a big difference. He said one way to keep that percentage rate is to cut out all the "to be" verbs, in what ever tense. Words like "is," "am," "are," "was," "were," especially when the word following ends in -ing (that's the past continuous tense, a horribly ungrammatical tense in writing). Many times, an excess of these verbs leads to your character passively being acted upon, instead of your character actively acting. He said that if your writing ever seems to drag, it may be because of an overbearing presence of these verbs. That prompted me to analyze my story MtH, for I find it dragging and boring in many areas, and I'm the author! I searched for "was" and found over 300 occurances, so over the past few days, I started the process of slowly editing my work and lessening my "to be" verbs. It is a challenge, but an extremly gratifying one. I find myself on page 12 with 270 occurances of the dreaded word, and still more to eliminate. Perhaps my writing skil will increase through this exercise. Other words to avoid include "would," "could," and "should," although we did not do any excersizes related to deleting these words from our writing vocabulary.
Now, another challenge presents itself. In French class, we study various verb tenses. This past week, we learned the imperfect and the conditional tenses. Imperfect means "was doing" and conditional is "would." This makes me wonder, is there such thing as Proper French, and if so, what are the rules and do to the imperfect and conditional tenses count as improper. If so, why are we learning them? Why are we learning them in the first place, if, when we translate, we should be translating into Proper English? Until I answer these questions, however, I will continue to study hard these tenses to increase my French knowlege. Also, learning these tenses makes translating songs fun, like "If I Were a Rich Man" from Fiddler on the Roof. That song fits perfectly with these new tenses. Also, the line from Peter Pan (with Jeremy Sumpter and Jason Isaacs) "If I were you, I'd give up." "If you were me, I'd be ugly." translate more easily now. Learning French, although confusing, makes me happy.

Undoubtedly

So, here at school there's a bi-weekly writing workshop, on Tuesdays and Wednesday, that I have started to consistantly attend, and share my work. It is really fun to see everyone else's writing style and story ideas. They also give little lessons and writing prompts which helps aspiring writers be better, not just through the critiques that come. I love it. Currently, I am sharing Dreamrunners, and they love it, which makes me so happy! Perhaps one day I will share MtH, but I am still hesitant because it is still in the works. But it would be good to get a critique on it thus far.  Anyway, we're about 1/4-th of the way into the story, and each night after the workshop I make edits based on their comments. Most of the comments so far have been "Work on Showing, not Telling" which is a big problem for me, but I feel I am getting better. Plus, I get writing time for my Creative Writing Class.
Anyway, the main reason I wanted to post today was, I just observed a rather interesting phenomenon. I started writing Dreamrunners a few months over a year ago, and it has been finished for a little less than a year. During the workshop session today, we read the part when Camaron meets 901 for the first time. "[Camaron] smirk[s] as the silence continues, a sly confident smile. I hold all the answers to the questions undoubtedly running through his head." As this was being read by a fellow workshop-goer, my mind wandered to Winnie the Pooh singing the word undoubtedly in his Blustery Day song. I have not thought about Winnie the Pooh for the longest time, especially that song, but I think I did not put the word "undoubtedly" in error. I think my subconcious remembered Pooh singing "So it's rather safe to say/That it seems that it may turn out to be/It feels that it will undoubtedly/It looks like a rather blustery day, today" and added ubdoubtedly so that I could make the concious connection later.
It wasn't until I got home and began editing the section we read in the workshop that I made the connection and started singing "Blustery Day." It brought back sweet memories of childhood. I now have a strong desire to watch Winnie the Pooh, but as a college student, I will refrain.

Another writing exercise I think would be interesting to try is create a dialogue between two characters from different stories. This would help you guarantee that each character has his or her own voice, and that you're not just relying on dialogue tags between characters. That is my goal for one day. It would also just be interesting to see how two different characters from entierly different worlds meet...

Everything Else

My Goals:

I need to learn how to talk to people and not be shy, and to stop worrying what other people think of me/what I have to say. Once I step out of my comfort zone, I will be able to accomplish more, like asking people for information concerning an ancestor.

Index at least one record a week. Attend the temple twice a month while in Rexburg. Long Term goal/records retention project: Type up the family history records compiled by Emma Jacobson concerning my ancestors.

 Challenges: Forgetting. Not being focused. Being “lazy.”

My Dreams turning into Goals

---Goal 1--- Be Published

Daily: 

• Free-Write five minutes a day

• Edit two paragraphs in MTH a day.

• OR: Write two paragraphs on MTH a day.

Weekly:

• Review edits and make changes as necessary

• Brainstorm where I want my story to go.

Deadline: End of Sophomore year in college.

---Goal 2--- Type up Emma Jacobson’s family history records.

Daily: Type/edit one to two pages a day.

Weekly: Review information and conduct my own research about information presented.

Deadlines: When finished.

I don't have many pictures of my family.

Picture...

Oops... I was supposed to add a picture. I forgot. This is my Grandma and Grandpa Jim right before I left for college.

"Don't Talk To Me."

NOTE: THERE WILL BE SPOILERS!

Having just finished rereading the whole Harry Potter series (except the first one, I'm waiting to read that one in French), I decided to post my thoughts on the book. This quote popped into my head contemplating the gloriousness of the seventh book.

"'Don't talk to me,' Ron said quietly to Harry and Hermione as they sat down at the Gryffindor table a few minutes later, surrounded by excited talk on all sides about what had just happened. 'Why not?' asked Hermione in surprise. 'Because I want to fix that in my memory forever,' said Ron, his eyes closed and an uplifted expression on his face" (Goblet of Fire, 207).

Although this scene happens immediately after Malfoy is Transfigured into a ferret, I thought this passage detailed my feelings and actions perfectly. 

"All was well" (Deathly Hallows, 759). I love how she (J.K. Rowling) ends the series, with the Nineteen Years Later. Everything was well, peaceful, after Voldemort died. And that's exactly how I feel, peaceful. The books happened how they needed to happen. I liked how she drew out Voldemort's death. She didn't just say "He died." She described it, making people wait. She makes it dramatic. I wonder how long it took her to write his death scene. She draws out (in a good way) a lot of other scenes as well. I love how everything comes together in the end. Everything just fits, even small details that most people would overlook, she brings them back and makes them play an important role. I want to know what the very first idea about Harry Potter was, how these books came into being, how she planned everything out. I haven't gotten to that point yet, because she obviously had to have quite a bit planned out before she could actually start writing. Me, I just have a basic plot line, or even an opening sentence or two, and I go from there. She is really an inspiration to writers.

One interesting thing I would like to note is that both Sirius and Fred died with a laugh still on their faces. "The second jet of light hit him squarely on the chest. The laughter had not quite died from his face, but his eyes widened in shock" (Order of the Phoenix, 805). Sirius was taunting Bellatrix's efforts to kill him. "And Percy was shaking his brother, and Ron was kneeling beside them, and Fred's yes stared without seeing, the ghost of his last laugh still etched upon his face" (Deathly Hallows 637). Fred had been laughing because he thought that Percy was joking when he said he was resigning. And that Bellatrix gave a laugh right before she died as well, "the same exhilarated laugh her cousin Sirius had given as he toppled backward through the veil" (Deathly Hallows, 736). I don't know what to make of it, but noticed that and wanted to point that out to others. Perhaps that laughing is the best way to die? I don't know. I don't really want to think about death right now...

I had forgotten that Percy comes back in the end (thanks to the movies, they skipped over that part). I'm really glad that he did come back, and that he and Fred make up. I feel horrible for the rest of the Weasly's for their loss though... I saw a post that Molly never dreamed the twins would be separated, even when they were both lying "dead" when she was trying to get rid of the boggart in book five, they were together, albeit dead, but together. I suppose it just had to happen that way. But Tonks and Lupin? Come on! And Dobby too? WHY? She has some nerve, killing off her characters like that. But I admire her for it (only slightly)

I also saw another post that I thought was quite intriguing "The first thing Snape asks Harry is 'Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?' Asphodel is a type of lily meaning 'My regrets follow you to the grave' and wormwood means 'absence' and also typically symbolizes bitter sorrow. If you combined that, it means 'I bitterly regret Lily's death'" Now, I don't take credit for this, but I think that is really clever, whether on purpose or not, on her part. That must have take a lot of research to come up with that. I'm sure I will always be finding new meaning in the Harry Potter books.

I was going to rant about the movies, but I'll save that for another day. Anyway, the books are the best.