In a high school English class, I worked with students on a tribute poem about Twister the stub-tailed dog, best friends and a mother diagnosed with colon cancer. I was surprised how their language seemed stuck in high school slang- hung out and chilled- and common word usage. We spoke about expanding their vocabulary and about how selecting the exact word to convey a specific meaning was critical in a poem because the poet has so few words to work with.
Teaching for me is not only about monitoring and assessing, it's about making secondary students aware of the potential clout and force of the words they select to sway their reader, giving them the influence to make their audience sob blood or to cause a stoic heart to beat to the time of the arrhythmia of their word choice. They need to know that it’s their voice, fluency and grace that blends words together to make meaning in the world.
Oral and written language are important for secondary students because they will soon be launched into the adult world where words are power; literacy and comprehending what they read affect the choices they make and these choices contribute to collective empowerment or collective ignorance of tiny communities and throbbing nation-states. Without words, who are we? How do we as teachers instill this love and awe of words into our secondary students' writing habits?
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