The Rare Annoying Days
“Are you serious?” one of my students asked today when I handed them their writing assignment.
“Oh no, I was just kidding, guys. We’re in school, why in the world would I assign work?” I replied, my sense of humor begin to deteriorate with the constant complaints of the day.
“You just gave us a writing assignment last week,” the student replied.
“And I’m giving you another one,” I replied. “That was a 300 word summary of a news article last week.”
Silence.
“Now,” I continued. “This is a creative writing assignment. 600 words.”
Groans throughout the room.
“What is with you guys today? Knock it off. That’s one page typed. Of creative writing. Not an essay. Which means you are mostly using, oh, what is that called… oh yeah, your imagination. Which I know from your conversations I hear that none of you are lacking.”
Blank stares.
“Tell me, why do I have you guys and gals write so much?”
Blank stares.
“Please, someone tell me, why?”
“Because everyone needs to know how to write,” a student thoughtfully piped up.
“Right, why?”
“It’s just something everyone has to do, whether they go to college or not.”
“Right. So, what happens if you decide to apply to college or put in an application for a job and you can’t string together coherent sentences? Or you make one, even one spelling error? What will the person looking at that application do?”
“Uh, throw it away?” one student said questioningly.
“Exactly! Especially in this recession we are in, which, you know, we are still going to be in when you all graduate next year.”
“This is stupid,” one student muttered under his breath.
“You’re stupid,” another student said.
“Anyone that complains about the twenty-five easiest points in the history of this class is stupid. Now, if I hear one more person whine, I’ll double the word count.”
Silence.
“Get to work.”
April 17, 2009 at 3:53 am
Crack that whip! Nice work Molnar Junior. I do not consider myself an excellent writer, but because of him I am confident in my skills. I loved when we had essays on exams or take home essay tests in college. Multiple-choice tests can result in too much second guessing. Essays you just throw down and if your thoughts are well put together you have a chance to snag some points. Text messaging and instant messaging have destroyed the written word. Stay strong my friend, those kids will thank you in the future.
April 17, 2009 at 5:44 pm
beautiful
April 18, 2009 at 12:03 pm
Occasionally in teaching you’ll have moments where words seem not to serve it justice. This, however, truly captures the essence of that moment and the underlying problem with students today. They’re stupid. Welcome to the ranks, good sir.