Writing without the Writing

"Good writing may be the quintessential 21st century skill. Just as the nature of and expectation for literacy has changed in the past century and a half, so has the nature of writing. Today people write as never before - texting, on blogs, with video cameras and cell phones, and, yes, even with traditional pen and paper. People write at home, at work, inside and out of school."

I found this quote on one of my favorite blogs: Weblogg-ed. This is a blog by Will Richardson that I have been following for a while. This was a link on Will's page to an article by Kathleen Blake Yancey about the importance of writing to all aspects of life and learning.

I have long thought that the ability to write well is the most important skill a person can have. I felt as if Kathleen had plucked this idea right from my head and put it into some eloquent words and phrases. What was new and particularly interesting for me was the role that technology could play in helping students to learn to write well.

The more and more I teach, the more I see the resistance to traditional essay/paragraph writing in a history class. Students complain, "this is not English class! Why do we do so much writing?!?!" They also have difficulty conceptualizing the importance of this skill. I also struggle with putting into words how important I think it is.

What I am beginning to understand is that technology could bridge the gap between the my need to have my students write and their desire to avoid it at all costs. Whereas my students balk at the idea of creating a thesis statement, they have no problem making arguments via a text message. While they complain constantly about how boring writing paragraphs are, many have blogs or myspace accounts in which they open up to the world.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I'm learning that writing does not have to be formal to be useful. It is hard for me to let go a little bit of the formal writing I know is so important (and I'll always make my students do this type of writing) but I am beginning to see that technology need not destroy the writing process. On the contrary, it can help many students have fun with writing without all that those "boring paragraphs and essays."