This teaching idea comes from Megan Butler, a doctoral candidate at the University of Washington who teaches composition in the Program in Writing and Rhetoric at U.W. She also teaches English to refugees and new immigrants in Seattle.
All the images in this post are from the Times Magazine article that grounds her idea.
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I knew I had come across something valuable for the undergraduates in my composition class when I first read “The Tragedy of America’s Rural Schools,” by Casey Parks.
The piece has become the “center of gravity” reading for the section of my class about education in the United States. The article helps students think about education as more than an academic or theoretical issue and consider it as something with very real consequences in individual lives, their own included!
In the assignment that I describe here, students read the story, which was published as a long-form investigative article in The New York Times Magazine, take what they learn from it and compose something for a new audience. The thought that goes into creating the right approach for a new audience gives students an opportunity to be creative in their own unique ways.
Most of my students are freshmen, so high school is not too far back in their pasts. They are still feeling their way into college, and, for the most part, their knowledge about education is confined to personal experience.
In Ms. Parks’s article, the students read about a topic that evokes complicated emotions — usually shock and anger. They also learn that education is a “wicked problem.” That knowledge helps them understand the complexity of these kinds of societal issues and become comfortable with, or at least acknowledge, gray areas where solutions are not simple.
Here is what we do in this assignment.
Warm-Up: What is education’s reach?
This is the first, and the longest, piece of investigative journalism that many of my students have ever read. For that reason, we divide it in half and discuss it over two class periods. Before we start, I also offer students some techniques for strong reading. These are the guidelines I give them:
Technique #1: Always read with a pencil (or highlighter) in hand. When a line grabs you, underline it! Argue in the margins, talk back or put a question mark next to a point you don’t understand and an exclamation point next to something that grips you.
Technique #2: Scan the article for clues before you read. If the piece is illustrated, what mood do the illustrations set? What can you glean from the section heads, photo captions or pull-quotes? What can you learn about the author? Are you the intended audience?
Technique #3: Be patient. Remember when you were little and would watch the same movie over and over? Maybe you still do that. With every viewing, you notice something new or see the movie differently. The same goes for reading: Each time, you get a fresh, deeper understanding. So have the patience to go back through a section a second or even third time. Do “rough readings” like we do rough drafts.
We also set the stage with open discussions about the students’ experiences during Covid, and about their transition into college. To facilitate those conversations, I assign “The Pandemic Generation Goes to College. It Has Not Been Easy,” by Eliza Fawcett. I also assign David Kirp’s guest essay about investing in children to break cycles of poverty.
Finally, I introduce social determinants of health using this infographic from the Department of Health and Human Services. With our new knowledge, we make a concept map on our classroom whiteboard. Starting with the word “education” in the center, we list all the ways it affects lives, communities and nations.
This warm-up provides a foundation for students to understand the ecosystem of American education and context for “The Tragedy of America’s Rural Schools.”
Main Activity: Make an education intervention.
I start our discussion by referring back to Technique #1: What did you underline? Where are your question marks or exclamation points? Students discuss in groups of four, then we form a circle and each group shares pieces of their conversation.
The assignment comes next. I explain that “The Tragedy of America’s Rural Schools” is investigative journalism written for a newsmagazine. Then I ask:
Is there another audience that would benefit from the knowledge in the article?
Into what format might you translate this article to reach that audience? In other words, how could you communicate an idea from the article into a different genre — and which genre would you choose?
If students are confused, we go through some “what ifs” using clues from the concept map:
… You might create a campaign through a school’s parent-teacher association or an infographic.
… You might make a campaign poster or write a speech.
… You might create a Facebook post or a union platform.
… You might write a letter to the Secretary of Education or a member of Congress.
… You might create an Instagram campaign or a pop song or a school play.
Before students start work on their projects, we revisit the Rhetorical Triangle, a concept that I introduce on the first day of class. This helps them understand where they fit in relation to their new audience, what specific message they want to convey and how their new genre is best suited to deliver that information.
This is also a time to engage the challenges of writing for communities that students don’t belong to. Will they write as themselves or as a community member? If they write as themselves, how will that shape their influence?
Student Outcome: ‘This assignment let my creative juices flow!’
My students come into class thinking that they are going to spend the quarter writing research papers. When they learn that they’ll be working on this assignment instead, they are pleasantly surprised — and I love the cornucopia of results. They have created songs, a school play, lawsuits, policy memos, comics, slide presentations to lure businesses into rural areas, speeches, campaign posters, websites, GoFundMe campaigns, and many letters to elected and appointed individuals who can make a difference.
Comments from my students have helped me refine the assignment over the three quarters that I’ve experimented with it. At first, my guidelines were narrower, directing students to create something within a specific genre. When I loosened that aspect of the prompt, students’ creativity really took off. Now I hear reactions like these:
“This assignment let my creative juices flow!”
“I loved doing this because it helped me understand the article even more.”
“I learned a lot of cool skills doing this assignment!”
“I loved being able to create and design my own Instagram post.”
Going Further: What is school for? How can we make change?
Because metacognition is an essential part of my class, the students accompany their genre translation with a reflective essay explaining why they made the choices they did. They write about the parts of the “The Tragedy of America’s Rural Schools” that inspired them to pick their new audience, and they reflect on the ways that they styled their work to reach those audiences most effectively.
But our engagement with The Times doesn’t end there. Two weeks later, we have a jigsaw conversation using “What Is School For?” — a special section published in September 2022. The readings, a series of essays from the Opinion section, give some history behind public education and help us think about what’s worth preserving and what needs a fresh look.
As we reach the end of the class, we consider solutions. Another special Times section, this one featuring reporting rather than opinion, introduces ideas like community schools, new philosophies about tutoring and course sharing between universities.
I also show an Opinion video about teachers. It vividly captures the challenges that educators face in the classroom — and the challenges that schools face as many teachers retire or quit the profession as a result.
Finally, because we spend a lot of time exploring problems in education, for their final assignment my students write a mock grant request to the City of Seattle requesting funding for a solution.
Adapting these ideas to your classroom
Times reporting is critical to my students’ broad understanding of education and to their efforts to conceive solutions. As a daily reader of the paper, I’m always scanning for stories to share or summarize. I want my students to bring that big-picture awareness and knowledge into classes and conversations on their own educational journeys.
And though I use this assignment for undergrads, it can be adapted to other grade levels and subjects. Because students will naturally apply the forms that most interest them — whether law documents or letters, plays or Instagram posts — they are engaged. And once they learn about the different people who play a part in public education, the possibilities for choosing a new audience, and reaching them with a fresh format, are endless.
