Houston Jones

Professor Meusing
August 23, 2014
Reading/Writing Background
The transition from High School level learning to collegiate level learning
comes as a shock to students. For the first time in their student lives they are free to
learn on their own terms and interact with other students to help in the learning
process. In the articles: This Isnt What We Did in High School, Writing
Punishment, and Reading Hate explains not only the transition to collegiate level
learning but also that the scare tactics used in high school are a thing of the past.
The article This Isnt What We Did in High School shows an emphasis on
the differences that a college level Writing class has from the classes students have
taken in High School. One quote in particular caught my attention as I was reading
this article, and I found it to be very accurate, the quote is as follows: .the class
atmosphere was relaxed and comfortable and wasnt as tense. As a couple
students have said its not a sit-down-and-shut-up class or a sit, listen, and take
notes class. I find this quote to be spot on, in high school, you are expected to come
to class, sit down quietly, take notes on the lecture that your teacher gives, and then
leave. In college, students are now encouraged to learn on their own, and to interact
with other students in order to facilitate learning. This transition is not only a big

step in students ability to learn on their own, but a step in the maturation process
as well.
At one point in a students career they have been subjected to the torturous
punishment of writing. In the article Writing Punishment, it explains how the idea
has translated itself throughout all levels of the education system, K-12. I myself
have had to endure such painstaking punishment, forced to write and rewrite a
paragraph explaining how I will be better and not misbehave in class. Roy Clark
states that, the tendency to equate writing to punishment is so deeply ingrained in
our education system that it has become popular culture, and it is true, at a young
age students are taught that writing is a form of chastisement rather than a way to
express ones emotions. We are teaching kids that, rather using writing as a way to
show your feelings on a topic, to rather shy away from the practice as they age.
All students, not matter the age, are afraid of making a mistake in front of
their peers. However, throughout a childs schooling career they are often put in a
situation that leads to failure, as described in John Holts Reading Hate. The story
describes the process of young children being forced by their teacher to learn new
words out of the dictionary, rather than allowing the children to search for the
words out of their own curiosity, this experience (as Holt explains in the piece) often
leads kids to shy away from their curiosity of words. Holt states, Mark Twain once
said that a cat that sits on a hot stove lid will never sit on one again, but it will never
sit on a cold one either. As true of children of cats. If they, so to speak, sit on a hot
book a few times, it will cause them humiliation and pain, then they are likely to

decide that the safest thing to do is to leave books alone all together. This quote
represents how the pressure of perfection that teachers place on students can cause
them to shy away from the activity all together. Holt does a good job of explaining
that the pressures that are placed on children should be left to the childs own
curiosity rather than force.
These three pieces show are representations of not only the transition that is
made from lower level learning to higher learning, but also some of the horrors that
students are faced with as they are coming up through the system. If we could end
these tendencies in teachers, then students would be more inclined to learn on their
own. These three passages how shown me that students are at the mercy of their
professors, be they forced to write and re-write passages, or look up every single
word they dont know in the dictionary, these tactics stun growth. Students should
be encouraged to learn on their own, to express their curiosity in reading and
writing, and teachers should be at the forefront of the encouragement.