When (if ever) were you taught how to write a report?

In My Humble Opinion
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[QUOTE=Muffin]
One of the profs in the tech writing program at Waterloo had a close look at university student papers over several decades. Essentially the kids at that time were no better and no worse than those who went before in previous decades. Most couldn’t write their way out of a paper bag.
[/QUOTE]

I understand what you’re saying here, and sure, maybe it’s just perception bias on my part. I wonder though if there aren’t differences in Canadian vs. U.S. education that ought to be considered. I sometimes get the impression that U.S. education has wandered off down a path of worrying too much about ancillary stuff (like whether Johnny’s emotional development will be harmed if he’s fails to meet an intellectual challenge on the first go, or how many after-school activities Jane can say she was a part of) instead of focusing on fundamental skills that will serve the kids no matter what they do in life. That could be another soapbox to stand on…

Bryan Ekers - you must be my classmate Maryann’s long-lost brother. :smiley:

[QUOTE=Billdo]
The basic structure of a report I learned in eighth grade has served me well through my education and my career. Although the basic form seems laughably simple, it is infinitely expandable and highly effective.
[/QUOTE]

You couldn’t be more right. I’m just puzzled as to why this basic truth seems to have been so totally missed by some. Again, I wouldn’t expect a literary masterpiece, but how could kids have gotten into/through college without being able to write a coherent 3-page paper??

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**1. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report (book report, science report, whatever) in grade school/high school? **

Yes, we got the general Main Paragraph, Body (one idea per paragraph) and Conclusion lesson in 6th grade and it was repeated from that point on.

That worked well for the basic English paper or social studies report. Science reports were more problematic, because it felt like every teacher had a style preference – graphs at the end, graphs interspersed throughout, bullet points or not, etc etc. It encouraged students to think “oh, whatever, this is all B.S.” Now I can see the difference between personal preference about graphs and more fundamental issues like how to support a conclusion with examples, but this truly wasn’t obvious when I was first learning how, and the agita over the font size of graph headers enforced the idea that the entire process of writing a report was a crap shoot.

**2. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report in college or grad school? **
Not until starting my major (art history). Otherwise it was assumed you already knew from high school. This seemed to be a source of endless frustration to both profs and students, because not everyone had been at the same standard in high school. It was a MERCY when I started my major and the prof spent a class reviewing the exact style (Chicago), format and organization that was expected, any deviation from this would result in a lower grade. Any assignment was expected to be “publication quality” - spelling, grammar, and citation errors marked down. I remember some people grumbling about how draconian it was, but I was relieved – just tell me what you want so I can get on with the business of actually writing it. Examples were provided of correct assignments, (short answer, essay, review, research paper, thesis) and the faculty were completely together within the department, so each type of assignment had the same expectations for length and format in every art history class. I’m sort of a control freak so this was like Nirvana for me. It was also most handy for other classes, I kept using the art history standard and never had problems with any other professors.

3. If yes to either 1 or 2, were you taught how only in English class, or did other subject teachers also make an effort to correct grammar, spelling, organization, etc. in addition to the subject matter?
A bit of a mix. Some did and others didn’t bother.

4. What major were you in college, and how long ago was that?
Art history, and ~1990.

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[QUOTE=tiger lily]
I understand what you’re saying here, and sure, maybe it’s just perception bias on my part. I wonder though if there aren’t differences in Canadian vs. U.S. education that ought to be considered. I sometimes get the impression that U.S. education has wandered off down a path of worrying too much about ancillary stuff (like whether Johnny’s emotional development will be harmed if he’s fails to meet an intellectual challenge on the first go, or how many after-school activities Jane can say she was a part of) instead of focusing on fundamental skills that will serve the kids no matter what they do in life. That could be another soapbox to stand on…
[/QUOTE]
I don’t know if there is much of a difference in public education between the two countries.

I share your concern about there perhaps being too much emphasis put on ancillary stuff. Most specifically, I have my doubts about the benefits of passing kids on through the system without ensuring that they have reasonable literacy and numeracy skills. This does a disservice to them, and a disservice to their future employers.

I’m a big fan of a well rounded education – broad liberal arts and sciences with physical activity thrown in would suit me nicely, but I think it is important to keep first things first, rather than let literacy and numeracy get lost in the wash.

The flip side of the coin, however, is that it is generally better to keep a child in school than have him or her drop out. As long as a child is passed on up the chain, the child is being kept off the street and out of trouble for most of the day, the child is in an environment that promotes learning and self-betterment, the child has some sort of a safety net, and the child is well placed should he or she ever mature enough to pick up his or her socks.

Ideally, I’d like to see resources focused on identifying and assisting the students who are having trouble, so that problems can be solved early on and the kids can pass legitimately. I don’t know if such resources are available to the degree necessary, given that the public’s purse is only so big. As it stands, every time a post-secondary instructor has a semi-literate student land in his or her lap, it could be because the resources in the public system that could have improved that student were used to help much less gifted students climb up to at least a minimal level of literacy and numeracy – Bentham in action.

Something that I would like to see that would not cost anything is greater integration between subjects. If science teachers would insist on good writing from their science students, and if English teachers would insist on good technical information and logical arguments from their English students, and so on between all disciplines, then I expect the level of literacy and numeracy would increase, and the students would develop better skills with which to tackle all their courses, including non-core courses.

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[QUOTE=tiger lily]
Again, I wouldn’t expect a literary masterpiece, but how could kids have gotten into/through college without being able to write a coherent 3-page paper??
[/QUOTE]

I noticed that students with poor literacy skills generally had poor grades across the board. My guess is that they were not that bright relative to their classmates, and that they were not used to rigorous critical thought, regardless of the subject matter.

They did not know their technical subject matter, and they were not clear thinkers, so they were lost when it came to having and organizing thoughts, let alone then putting them all down on paper in some comprehensible manner.

The flip side of the coin was that I noticed that students who where doing very well in their other courses had no difficulty doing well my writing courses. They knew how to think critically, and simply applied that skill to writing. A logical argument is a logical argument, whether it is expressed through algebra, or through symbolic logic, or through prose. Facts are facts; structure is structure; syllogisms are syllogisms; all are key to critical thought, and all are required across disciplines.

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[QUOTE=tiger lily]

  1. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report (book report, science report, whatever) in grade school/high school?
    [/quote]

Yes. I believe by 8th grade we were taught the basics of outlining and writing a report, but certainly it was covered by sophomore year. This includes stylistic issues like proper formatting of papers, citiation style, how to make end notes or footnotes, and so forth.

Not really. This was mostly assumed to have been taught to you in high school. I took classes in the journalism school, as well as the arts & sciences school at my university, so proper stylistic guidelines and conventions for each discipline was discussed, but the nitty gritty basics of how to write a paper, no.

As mentioned, each discipline had its own rules, so we’d be corrected on that, as well as grammar, spelling, organization, etc. In chemistry class, we’d be corrected if we strayed outside the conventions of a lab report. In psychology class, if we didn’t use proper APA style for citations, we’d get docked for that. In journalism class, we’d get an automatic F if we spelled anyone’s name wrong. And so forth. So, yes, there was more-or-less feedback on the mechanics and organization of writing, as well as content, through most of the classes.

I ended up an English literature major, attended college 1994-1998.

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1. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report (book report, science report, whatever) in grade school/high school?
Nope. Well, kind of. I remember being taught what a thesis statement was, and I remember being told to write an introduction, body and conclusion, but that was never really followed up meaningfully.

2. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report in college or grad school?
Yes, but only because I took a composition course in my first year. I don’t recall getting much paper-writing instruction from an English course, because it was assumed we should have been taught how to do it in high school. I was also taught how to write lab reports in biology labs, but that was just the outline of what we should include.

3. If yes to either 1 or 2, were you taught how only in English class, or did other subject teachers also make an effort to correct grammar, spelling, organization, etc. in addition to the subject matter?
IME even in English courses it was rare to see a real emphasis on the fundamentals of language, let alone argument or rhetoric. This is despite the fact that my university English department had a policy that 3 or more grammar / spelling errors per page merited a full letter grade deduction.

4. What major were you in college, and how long ago was that?
I was in English and Fine Art, and I graduated in 2006. English was bad for quality of writing, but Fine Art was abysmal. The kicker, though, was that the worst of the Fine Arts students were the ones looking to go into Education post-grad! :eek:

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  1. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report (book report, science report, whatever) in grade school/high school?

Yes. I was taught how to write a “paper” which was usually a report of some kind. This was in the seventh or eighth grade. (Thanks, Mrs. Skjerven! You are basically responsible for me getting into Cal.)

  1. Were you ever explicitly taught how to organize and write a report in college or grad school?

No.

  1. If yes to either 1 or 2, were you taught how only in English class, or did other subject teachers also make an effort to correct grammar, spelling, organization, etc. in addition to the subject matter?

English class only.

  1. What major were you in college, and how long ago was that?

Environmental Science (previously Chemistry, and before that Chemical Engineering.) Graduated 1997.

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[QUOTE=Muffin]
Something that I would like to see that would not cost anything is greater integration between subjects. If science teachers would insist on good writing from their science students, and if English teachers would insist on good technical information and logical arguments from their English students, and so on between all disciplines, then I expect the level of literacy and numeracy would increase, and the students would develop better skills with which to tackle all their courses, including non-core courses.
[/QUOTE]

Agreed. This is how it was for me, and I know I benefitted from the continued reinforcement of good writing practices across the board.

[QUOTE=Muffin]
I noticed that students with poor literacy skills generally had poor grades across the board. My guess is that they were not that bright relative to their classmates, and that they were not used to rigorous critical thought, regardless of the subject matter.

They did not know their technical subject matter, and they were not clear thinkers, so they were lost when it came to having and organizing thoughts, let alone then putting them all down on paper in some comprehensible manner.

The flip side of the coin was that I noticed that students who where doing very well in their other courses had no difficulty doing well my writing courses. They knew how to think critically, and simply applied that skill to writing. A logical argument is a logical argument, whether it is expressed through algebra, or through symbolic logic, or through prose. Facts are facts; structure is structure; syllogisms are syllogisms; all are key to critical thought, and all are required across disciplines.
[/QUOTE]

I wish I could say that that is uniformly true, but it hasn’t been, in my experience.

As an example, I look at one of the 1st-year grad students with whom I’ve been working lately. She is bright; very quantitatively gifted; has no trouble fielding difficult analytical concepts. She went through an excellent undergrad program in physics, and now is in a grad program that is in the top 5 in its field in this country. Her writing skills leave a lot to be desired in terms of organization, conciseness, and ability to explain her subject material clearly. Yet she tells me that she always received good grades for her writing, and I believe her since I’ve seen her transcripts. She is not the only person like this in her class.

So… how much of the problem lies with the student, and how much with the teachers they had? Hard to say. But it can’t be just the student, not all the time.

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I don’t recall ever being taught how to write a report (U.K., left school in 1985, university 1986-89). I think I got my main tips from Caesar and Cicero. But all the teachers were red-hot on spelling; none of the idiotic allowances that are made these days.

50

I’m sure I must have written them by the sixth grade.
In high school history class, we had to do a documented paper–and this was back in the days of loc. cit, op. cit, and ibid. Footnotes–yeesh!

These days, as a college professor, I’m trying to teach composition to people who, largely, don’t know how to spell, punctuate, or figure out one part of speech vs. another.

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Incidentally, the ludicrous quality of language instruction is wholly responsible for the fact that, in no fewer than three different classes I had to take for my professional certificate in translation program, there was actually a need for this-is-a-noun-level language instruction.

To review, these people were studying to be language professionals and had managed to get to this level without the most basic information about grammar, syntax, and punctuation, let alone style. It was to weep.

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Maybe this is one of the reasons I’m snotty about writing.

I had my first short research paper when I was in second grade. (I wrote it on the different kinds of deer in the area. I have no idea why I remember that). At that point, I don’t think they emphasized the organization very much, but I’m sure we had some instruction. By the time I had a formal 10 page research paper assignment in seventh grade, with footnotes and a style guide to follow, I’d probably written a ton of essays and other stuff. Reports and essays were usually covered in English classes, but I remember social studies and other teachers going over related instruction sometimes.

All my science classes in high school required formal write-ups of experiments. My high school biology teacher impressed on us how bad plagiarism is by relating a story of how one of his classmates in university had a paper failed for using ideas without attribution. Not even “real” plagiarism like copying, just not citing where he got ideas that were obviously beyond his level of study. He was allowed to rewrite and resubmit the paper, but the teachers in that department didn’t trust him or give him any slack for a long time afterward.

I had a couple of teachers at college who had started teaching how to write research papers, probably because so many incoming students didn’t know how to do one. My linguistics prof spent a good deal of the last part of the semester in his class explicitly going over how to do everything from the research, note taking and information gathering, proper citation and credit, quoting and paraphrasing, etc. in order to make sure that the research paper we turned in at the end was up to his standards. While much of it was review for me it was probably a godsend for about half the class, and I did learn something from it.

That teacher was also one of the most encouraging I’ve had. When you turned in your paper he spent a few minutes reviewing it with you. He looked it over, checked a couple of cites (you were required to bring your sources with you so that he could check citations) and then peered over his glasses at me, saying, “You are going to go for at least a Master’s degree, aren’t you? Based on the quality of this paper, you should.” I probably should have too. Sorry about that, Mr. Zeller. :frowning: