A few years ago I tutored a grade 9 student in essay writing. I asked him to write narrative essays, persuasive essays, expository essays, and literary analysis essays on different subjects. After every completed essay, we would talk about the principles of good writing based on rubrics and essay samples I found online. I’d point out where I thought I saw deficiencies in his writing. Then I asked him if he’d like to try again or move on to a different essay type. Sometimes, h

A few years ago I tutored a grade 10 student who was in regular English classes but didn’t grow up in Canada. His class was working on reading indigenous literature, and we read Dead White Writer on the Floor (for his class) which featured some stories about residential schools and various indigenous film characters. For additional homework, I asked him to watch parts of shows and films (I gave him YouTube clips or links to access this media) that featured the characters from

As a student in high school, I remember submitting an assignment for a social science class and receiving a barely passing grade on it. I had spent a ton of time looking at it. It came back with lots of comments. I don’t recall reading them or understanding them. I only recall feeling like trying was pointless. That was in grade 9. There were many times throughout my time in high school and university where I completed assignments, did poorly and didn’t take the time to revie

Teachers use a combination of their assignment criteria and a rubric in order to grade you. Part of doing an assignment should always be analyzing the elements on this rubric.  A rubric accomplishes two things: it reminds a student of the basic writing principles necessary to achieve strong writing, and it provides information about a teacher’s specific essay requirements. If something seems ambiguously written on the sheet, the rubric will help a student be more certain abou

Many people (and myself) believe that to become a good writer in a genre, one must first read and analyze texts in that genre for inspiration. In the context of high school, if you want to learn to write good essays, you should first read good essays and analyze them. For me, the two important questions of essay analysis are: 1) what is the author trying to accomplish and 2) what writing techniques are they using to accomplish them. These are questions of theme and literary d