Writing

Writing, I feel, is the element of the English classroom that makes it crucial to every student. Almost every student in the classroom is probably going to have to do writing in some sort-of capacity when they leave high school. For that reason, it should be on the top priority list in the classroom.
Unfortunately, I don’t feel that many teachers approach writing in the right way. First of all, students really tend to write the same boring essays, over and over for each unit. The students never learn to experiment with anything. Then you have the issue of a teacher who wants it exactly their way. I experienced this during my schooling, and it has really taken me a long time, to both find and portray my own voice through whatever type of writing I do. I agree with the book, that the students really need to work with multiple genres, so they can learn to develop that voice, comfort, and confidence in their writing from early on.
Another thing I would like to do differently in my classroom is the actual writing process. First of all, I don’t know how helpful writing workshops truly are in the average high school classroom. When I was in high school, we took that as gossip time, and we would make our few comments, and then talk about what we were going to be doing that weekend. Students are still like that today. Does anyone have any effective ways to ensure that the students are getting the most out of this activity? I guess maybe they could each mark it up with a different color, so I could see how much effort they were putting into the helping process. We did this in a college class, and it worked pretty well, so maybe it would work on the high school level. I also like the idea of ownership in Milner and Milner, as well as the physical arrangements, but I still don’t know if it will make students take the writing process seriously.
One other thing I don’t understand is the way we turn in writing, and then we never visit it again. I really feel that students should turn something in, and then go back to it a month or two later, to work with it again. Would this type of exercise be feasible, or even worth it in a high school classroom? Just a thought.
I think writing is a great skill, and I hope I can really help my students to write in genres that will help them later in life.