6.+Middle+School+Basics

Middle School Basics
toc This represents the intermediate level of the AGSD Writing Program. Most students have now had at least three years of experience with the structures and organization of the method. During grades 6-8, many of the basic concepts, such as the structure of the enthymeme, evaluating the enthymeme, funneling, and implied questioning, still need to be drilled continually. Remember, we are emphasizing internalization of this method. Students in these grades will be moving from a basic knowledge of structure and organization, to creating better, more interesting enthymemes.

This is generally a time when most students are still doing some fiction writing (creative writing) and writing about personal experiences. However, during these grades, the bulk of their writing will be writing in relation to their content courses such as science, social studies, and literature.

WHERE TO BEGIN
If students have been attending school in the Alaska Gateway School District, you can assume some familiarity with the structure and organization used in this method. If the students are new to the district, it is imperative that they get on board with the process immediately. If you have a new student in your room, work with them right away to familiarize them with the basic structure of the enthymeme and the organic outline. Students at this age level will likely be able to do fine with a crash course in the basics. Their understanding of how the enthymeme makes effective communication will come later, after practicing the method. Be patient with these students through at least the first couple of papers, and work with them individually whenever possible so they can catch up with their class mates.

Grammar
It is imperative that students can understand, identify, and use nouns, pronouns, verbs, and describing words (adjectives and adverbs) correctly. It is not all that important that they understand the difference between adjectives and adverbs, only that they understand their function in speech. Use a grammar program that you like to stress and reveiw these concepts and practice them often. Although you will probably be teaching other grammar concepts as well, be sure to emphasize and review these as often as possible.

=What plus what because why= Also know as "W + W -> Y"

Students should now understand this structure. However, begin the year by reviewing it right away. Continue to give them practice identifying and creating this structure often.

__Relationships (the What + What)__

Review the parts of the “what plus what” statement early in the year, and continue to have students practice making and identifying relationships to create “what plus what” statements often.

This can be reviewed and practiced in a number of different ways. You can write simple statements on the board, (“I love dogs”) and have students identify the parts. Have them identify these in terms of the “first what” and the “second what”. Always make sure students understand that the “what’s” must be nouns or the pronoun “I”.

Do different drills so that they can practice making their own relationships. For example, show them a picture from a book or a magazine and have them identify all of the relationships they see, or that are implied, (“The dog is by the door”, “The man loves the woman”). Be sure to analyze these relationships to make sure they are correct. Encourage them to look for implied relationships more than the obvious relationships (“The man loves the woman” is more interesting than “The dog is by the door”). Are both “what’s” nouns or pronouns? For example if they say, “The house is big,” it is important for them to identify that “big” is not a noun or a pronoun, therefore, it cannot be a “what”. There is no relationship between two things being described.

=Getting to the “Why”=

Most “why” statements can be completed by answering the implied question about the “what” statement. For example, If a student says, “I love dogs,” and you say, “Why?”, the student may say, “Because they can protect my house.” Going back to the original discourse you taught when originally introducing the “What because why”, you can phrase it as such and then have them make the sentence.

Kid: I love dogs.

Teacher: Why?

Kid: Because they can protect my house.

Summary statement: I love dogs because they can protect my house.

What + what = why

You will see that by now the summary statement should be becoming obviously formulaic to the students, no matter what the age. It should be easy and natural for you and your students to discuss the summary statement in any or all of these terms;

What plus what because why What plus what equals why What + what = why W+W=Y

It cannot be stressed enough that this structure and the process should be internalized. Review and re-teach all parts often, no matter what the age of the students.

=The “I”= The "I" is an important part of writing, especially in personal narrative. Students who have used this program through the elementary grades should have had plenty of practice with this aspect of writing. In an "I" enthymeme, the structure of "what plus what because why" has been emphasized with the 1st "what" being the pronoun "I". For example; "I love my dog because he protects our house."

When learning the "I", students learn to introduce themselves and develop a basic narrative that does this for them time and again. They also gradually learn that the "I" is adaptable, depending on the other variables in the enthymeme. For example, a basic "I" narrative might go like this; "I am 6 years old and I live in a small community in Alaska. I have a big family with 3 brothers. My favorite thing to do is play outside."

As the "I" develops and students learn to adapt it to the other variables in their enthymeme, an "I" narrative might go like this; "I am 8 years old and I live in a small community in Alaska. I love dogs and I have three of them. My favorite dog is Scooby."

This type of personal "I" narrative leads nicely into the above enthymeme of "I love my dog because it protects our house."

The "I" enthymeme
As discussed above, the "I" narrative ties into the "I" enthymeme (example of "I love my dog because it protects our house."). The "I" enthymeme is usually a personal narrative of some kind, and the first variable in the "what plus what because why" is "I".

=Using the enthymeme to write=

Begin each year spending time practicing, and reviewing the structure of the enthymeme. In the 6th through 8th grades, you should also use the enthymeme to begin writing papers right away, but continue to practice and review the enthymeme and its structure often, not just when applying it to a writing assignment. Students should be very familiar with the statement, and what its purpose is.

Writing with a content enthymeme
A content enthymeme differs from an "I" enthymeme in that both of the "what" variables are nouns. Content enthymemes are usually used in expository writing, response to literature, and research writing. It lends itself very well to all subject areas across the curriculum. Here is an example of a content enthymeme; "Orcas migrate to Alaska in the summers because the sea mammals they eat are there at that time of year."

Following is an example of how a content enthymeme might be developed and used in the classroom.

**Step One: The material**
A content enthymeme is usually an expository paper, a response to literature, or a research paper. For the purpose of talking about this type of paper, we will use the novel __Night__, by Elie Wiesel, as our example. Any good literature with a strong theme or themes will work. If you are reading shorter stories, pick a collection that shares a similar theme. You should decide what will be the most important ideas you want them to learn from reading and studying it. Everyone knows basically what the Holocaust is, and you don’t need to read __Night__ to teach just that to your students. Go further with this idea and take what the novel has to offer in terms of themes. The unique situation of the Holocaust caused the author as a young boy to lose faith in his fellow man. It was only after the Holocaust was over that he was able to see humanity with a more balanced perspective. But what impacted him most, and what he is trying to convey in the novel, is the depths to which men will sink to for a cause or to stay alive. You might want the students to arrive at and work with the enthymeme, “Eliezer lost his faith in humanity because of the Nazis.” There are many different themes in this novel, but with this enthymeme you are focusing on one – loss of faith in humanity. During the course of reading the novel, you will want to make sure that you present your students with plenty of discussion, assignments, and materials that explore this particular theme. It is also important that they do some peripheral studies outside the novel to learn more about Hitler’s Final Solution, and about the author of the book.


 * Step Two: Brainstorm**

Use any of the brainstorming techniques that have been described in this book, or any of your own to begin your students on a brainstorming session. Remember, you want to set it up so that they are likely to come up with a list that will help them get to the enthymeme. For example, you might review the plot of the story as a class, and then ask, “What were some of the things that bothered Eliezer most during his experience in the Holocaust?” Because of the themes you have focused on, and because of the focus of the novel itself, students will have no problems coming up with general ideas like; losing faith in God, thinking men are animals, not trusting his loyalty to his father, people being more cruel than he had ever imagined, the evil of men, etc. You could also brainstorm in terms of the plot – what specific events in the novel were low points for Eliezer emotionally? Use any sort of questioning or scenarios so that students will come up with a list that will lead them to the enthymeme.


 * Step three: Grade Ideas**

After some brainstorming, you will probably have a long list of facts and ideas in response to your brainstorming prompt. It is now time to take the students through the grading of these ideas. Here is where you begin to strongly bring in the idea of audience. Would the average adult who hasn’t read the novel find that interesting? Assume that most average adults know something about the Holocaust. Would this particular aspect of it still be interesting? Present your supposed audience any way that makes it helpful for the students think about. You can use letter grades to grade the ideas. Base the criteria for the grades on something specific, such as interest level of the intended audience. Don’t forget to use funneling and implied questions to try to improve or refine some of the ideas.


 * Step four: Prioritize Ideas**

Now that the grading is done, you definitely want to get rid of all the failing grade ideas. If you have only a few A ideas, and many B, or C ideas, try some funneling or implied questions to improve those ideas. Make sure you have a decent sized list and begin prioritizing them. You know they are good ideas at this point so prioritize them based on what the students know most about, or what would be easiest to research. If you have taught the novel emphasizing the loss of humanity theme, chances are high that it will be at the top of the priority list.


 * Step five: Identify a relationship**

With themes in literature, identifying relationships is pretty simple. Usually the protagonist or the anagonist has a direct relationship with that theme. You can just ask who has that problem or make a list of all major characters in the novel. Ask the students to write as many “what plus what” statements as they can between some of the characters and the top few ideas on your prioritized brainstorm list. Inevitably, someone will write, “Eliezer loses his faith inhumanity.” Because of focused studies you have done, and how you have directed the brainstorming and questioning, it has to happen.


 * Step six: Write the enthymeme**

Now that you have a “what plus what” statement, it is time to guide the student through implied questions (they should be familiar with this term, or call it “IQ’s”). The first obvious question is, “Why does Eliezer lose his faith in humanity?” Some will say things like, “because of the Holocaust,”or “because the boy took bread from his dad.” Some (like Holocaust) are too vague, while others (boy taking bread from dad) are too specific. You can take these responses and ask, “Who caused those bad things?” They will certainly answer along the lines of “Hitler”, or “the Nazis”. Asking the implied “why” and completing the enthymeme should be a quick step.


 * Step seven:**

**Assess the enthymeme**
Now that you have an enthymeme, reinforce the importance of the structures yet again by having the students assess the enthymeme according to the criteria. You may have this “checklist” on the wall for easy reference. They should memorize some or all of it. Write the enthymeme on the board and break it into parts. Identify the part that is “what” statement, and the part that is the “why statement”. You can do this with brackets or simply separating the parts. Have them also identify the “what” statement as it relates to the barbell. Identify the first “what”, the second “what”, and the relationship between the two (a verb or verb phrase). First focus on the “what” statement (Eliezer loses his faith in humanity.) and ask, “Is it a sentence?” Next ask if it has two variables. In other words, two “what’s”. At this point that should be obvious. Ask if both variables are nouns. How you determine this will depend on how you have taught students to identify nouns.

If for some reason you have had difficulty directing the students to the enthymeme you have chosen and they come up with something close but not correct, it can be helpful for them to assess a wrong enthymeme once in awhile. For example, if you came up with the enthymeme, “Eliezer was depressed because of the Nazis,” students would determine that the variable “depressed” wouldn’t work because it is a describing word, and not a noun. You could then use funneling or implied questioning to get the enthymeme where you want it to be. It is important that they practice this. If they always have a good enthymeme to analyze, they will gradually discard the assessment and assume that all enthymemes you come up with as a class are good ones.

Once you have assessed the “what” statement, you need to assess the “why” statement. The obvious first question is, “Does it have the word ‘because’?” This must be stressed as important, so always ask it first. Next ask if the “why” is short. At this point your students will need some basis to make the distinction – shorter than what? Short doesn’t necessarily mean one word, but it should be a simplified statement about a big idea. “Nazis” is a very basic idea and obviously will have to be explained more fully in the paper in terms of their part in turning men into animals. What you want to avoid is writing the paper within the enthymeme.

One of the most important questions is “Does the ‘why’ repeat either of the variables?” Again, it is sometimes useful to put up wrong enthymemes so the students will have an opportunity to understand this. For example, if you came up with the enthymeme, “Eliezer lost his faith in humanity because of cruel acts he saw,” you would find that you had a good what statement. They should be able to determine that “cruel acts he saw” is circular reasoning (it repeats the idea about losing faith in humanity). Use funneling and implied questions to refine the ideas.


 * Step eight: The organic outline**

Once you have arrived at and assessed your enthymeme, clear your board and write your enthymeme at the top. Students are now familiar with the layout of the outline. At the beginning of the year, put the columns on the board and ask what goes in each column. After you have done one or two papers you can begin by asking how many columns you need to make. Once the columns are labeled, go through and make your major statement at the top of each one, just as you have done in practice. At the top of the “Eliezer” column, write “This paragraph will be about Eliezer in relation to the Holocaust.” At the top of the “loses his faith in humanity” column, you could write, “This paragraph will be about how some specific things Eliezer felt and witnessed that mad him lose faith in humanity.” At the top of “Nazis” column, you could write, “This paragraph will describe how the Nazis systematically turned the prisoners into animals.” These statements help to keep the comments focused.

If you don’t want to write the general statements, you could keep the input focused putting some questions under each of the elements.


 * Eliezer || Eliezer’s loss of faith in humanity || How did the Nazi’s (Holocaust) make Eliezer lose faith? ||
 * Who was he?

Where was he from?

Explain Eliezer’s faith at the beginning of the memoir.

Use examples from the text to support your explanation. || When did this loss of faith in his fellow man begin?

How did it become more obvious to Eliezer that in the face of unspeakable evil, people were morally weak?

Use examples from the text and notes to support your explanation || Who were the Nazi’s?

What do they do to make once moral men behave like animals and treat each other with cruelty?

Use examples from the text and notes to support your explanation. ||

Begin soliciting input from the class. Fill up the outline as much as possible. If you know there is information they are forgetting, ask more directed questions to get the input you want. Remember, the length of the outline approximates the length of the paper.


 * Step nine: Organize the elements.**

You want the paper to be organized so that it begins by first discussing the more general ideas, and ending with the most specific ideas. Ask the students to look at the W+W=Y elements in the enthymeme and decide which is the biggest idea and which is the most specific idea. You may also need to determine what elements need to come first in order to promote understanding. In “Eliezer loses his faith in humanity because of the Nazis,” It is necessary to first talk about Eliezer before discussing how he was affected. Nazis is fairly general, and since you want the paper to focus on how their practices led Eliezer to his loss of faith, that element should come first in the paper. Eliezer would be next, followed by the loss of faith in humanity. If the students cannot understand that Nazis is the most general, and they only order the elements in the “what” statement, that is ok too. This organizational technique takes practice. After some experience writing more papers and making some determinations about how much impact the organization has, students will get better at organizing the elements. After you and the class determine the order you can reinforce it by writing 1,2,3 over the various parts in the enthymeme, or writing the numbers in the appropriate place in the column headings of the outline.


 * Step ten: Organize the paragraphs**

Take the lists in each column and determine how you will organize them. Have the students make the determination of whether to use big to small, introduce-define-prove, first to last, or spatial. For most content enthymemes, big to small (introduce-define-prove) will almost always be a good way to organize. For content enthymemes like this example that are essentially response to literature (literature analysis), you want them to use examples from the text to support their ideas. To do this, have them organize paragraphs using the method of introduce, define, prove. For example, when discussing loss of faith in humanity, first use details that introduce this idea, then define it by discussing how it affected Eliezer. Finally, prove the idea by using some specific examples from the text that directly support it. Begin to number the ideas in the list in the order they should appear. Remember, it is ok to add ideas at this point. Just number them with decimal points so that you can fit them in.

Once you have numbered the lists in each category, it important to realize that at this stage, from the point of ideas and organization, the paper is done. All that is left to do is the actual writing. For this, students can practice and build skills in sentence fluency, vocabulary, voice, and conventions.


 * Step eleven:**

**The class paragraph**
At the beginning of the year, in 6th and 7th grade, you will want to write at least one paragraph of your papers together. For 6th grade, do this for the first two or three papers. For 7th and 8th grade, do it for just the first paper. After these initial papers, all students should be able to write the paper on their own from a finished outline.

To write a paragraph as a class, choose any element (it doesn’t have to be the first). You will probably have written abbreviated or shortened details in the outline, so now is a good time to practice sentence structure. For example, with a detail like “no dignity”, you may simply ask how we could make that idea into a sentence. Later, when teaching fluency and revising the paragraph, you can change the sentence. This is the perfect opportunity to apply the ideas of sentence fluency, word choice, voice, and conventions to a real piece of writing that the students themselves have generated, without having to worry about ideas and organization at the same time – because of the time you have spent developing a good enthymeme and organic outline, you know those elements are already solid.