Creative Writing Left Behind

[Bob Schaeffer <bobschaeffer@earthlink.net>]

NO POEM LEFT BEHIND
The Examiner -- March 19, 2007
by Erica Jacobs

One of the hidden classroom casualties of the No Child Left Behind law 
is creative writing. Research papers? Check. Thesis statements and 
five-paragraph themes? Check. Literature? Check. Creative Writing? It’s 
not on the test — so who has time?

I didn’t recognize the deficit until last week, while trying to compile 
entries for the Virginia High School League creative writing contest. 
For most of the past 15 years, I have had no difficulty collecting two 
poems, two essays, and two short stories from Oakton High School 
students for this portfolio contest.

All that has changed. On March 14, a day before the contest deadline, I 
was in possession of a few poems (many fewer than usual) and, 
alarmingly, only one short story. This was after a couple of all-calls 
to our 19 English teachers. I am used to having dozens of possible 
submissions, but this year teachers wanted to know if we could include 
research papers, or literary criticism.

Yikes! Where are the poems of yesteryear?

Not too long ago teachers vied for the honor of having “their” poet or 
storyteller represented in the portfolio. Now they barely remember what 
creative writing is. I take that back — they do remember, most just 
don’t have time to include it in their curriculum.

I brought this up over lunch last week. Mike, one of our young, hip 
teachers, observed, “Teaching students to write fiction takes a lot of 
time. And it’s not on the SOL test, so I just don’t do it.”

The others in the teachers’ lounge nodded sadly. Mike then added, “Now I 
really feel guilty. In fact, I feel terrible.” Mike is an excellent 
teacher and includes lots of innovative techniques in his classroom, but 
he confirmed what I was beginning to suspect — English teachers now 
focus on literature, research, and writing five paragraph essays because 
those are on the SOLs.

Creative writing has been pushed to the side.

I, too, have succumbed to test pressure. I have always been proud of the 
writing portfolios my students produce in an Advanced Placement course 
where poems and other fictional writing are not part of the required 
curriculum.

But this year I cut the number of writing workshops from six to four. I 
told myself it was because a few students consider these workshops 
permission to waste time, and that has certainly always been true.

But precisely because that’s always been true, I now realize that I 
bowed to the pressure of high-stakes testing by reducing in-class 
writing groups. A few distracted students made me worry: Was this the 
best use of classroom time? Shouldn’t we instead be talking about a 
novel, or reading John Donne?

I mailed off six pieces of creative writing by the March 15 deadline, 
but it was like pulling teeth to find them.

Sometimes I hope that if I shut my eyes, this testing obsession will 
disappear, and we can return to the business of providing the very best 
educational experience possible, as defined by the schools and not the 
government. And that would include writing poems, song lyrics, and short 
stories as well as essays and research papers.

Erica Jacobs teaches at Oakton High School and George Mason University. 
Email her at ejacob1@gmu.edu.

http://www.examiner.com/a-626689~No_poem_left_behind_.html