A few thoughts about the AP exam and the in-class writing tasks. Some students conveyed some concerns about the writing assignments and their ultimate purpose. The concerns were that the focus seemed to be more on quantity rather than quality, and that they did not feel their writing was improving as a result of writing many papers. I can appreciate your concerns and imagine many feel the same way. It is always difficult to determine the best way to prepare for an exam. For a writing exam, it proves to be much more complex, because student deficiencies are diverse and often very different. I am working to find a balance, and provide you with the best test prep that I can. Much of our writing improvement comes from a personal dedication to the craft, and a determination on the individual's part to write better. While I feel that writing requires a lot of practice - and so I assign a lot of practice essays - I do agree that there needs to be a balance between writing and analyzing our strengths and weaknesses as writers. To that end, I will work on finding quality assignments that accomplish just that.
One additional thought. I realize that this is all overwhelming, and many of you feel the stress of your tests beginning to bear down. I also realize that the feedback you get on your writing is mostly negative. Let me just say that you are all very good writers. You wouldn't be in this class if you were not. You should all be proud of what you have accomplished over the years, and to be quite honest, you have all written something that has impressed me over the last eight months together. The comments I make are meant to help you improve, so they tend to focus on the mistakes, careless errors, etc. That doesn't mean you can't write, it just means all papers - including teachers' papers - need improvement. Anyway, we will discuss tomorrow.
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