The Daily Standard Guest Column THE JOURNEY IS THE DESINATION Last week, the editor of The Daily

Standard wrote a response to a comic in that weeks paper. The editor made a good point when he argued that in order to improve our childrens education we have to hold them to higher standards. Those that influence children have to be honest in their criticism in order for students to improve. Also, not all students are great at every subject. I know where the editor was coming from, but I have to say that there is another side to that argument. First of all, I agree that in order to better educate children, we should hold them to high standards. Our state and national government have increased standards substantially within the past few years, and our students ARE being held to them. Its not the teachers who create high standards, we just enforce them. We dont make the rules, we just work here! Contrary to popular belief, higher standards do not mean harsher grading. When teachers are so concerned with marking up every mistake on a final draft, its already too late. We mustand we dopay more attention to the process of writing. This process includes prewriting, and drafting, and revising, and editing several drafts before a final piece of writing is published. We teach our students how to be good writers BEFORE they publish, not after. Much like the wheel, some things dont need fixing. The old way is tried and true. Education, however, is constantly changing and adapting to the world around us. Grading every grammatical, spelling, and punctuation error was the old way of grading papers, and it has recently been proven that this method of grading isnt as efficient as we thought it was. It turns out bleeding all over students papers dont encourage them to fix their mistakes at all! They skim over the markings just to seek out what matters most to themtheir grade. How often have we, as adults, been evaluated at our jobs and only wondered if our evaluations were going to result in a pay raise? The same goes for students. One of the ways that writing teachers grade papers is to grade on more than just grammatical errors and punctuation. We choose a focus for writing. It would be incredibly overwhelming to try and learn every grammar rule, how to spell every word correctly, and understand the proper placement for every punctuation mark that exists, all at once. Students are better off mastering a few rules at a time, and putting them in their writing toolbox so to speak. Then when they write another paper, theyve mastered certain concepts and rules, and we can choose a new focus to hone in on. People who hold influence over a childnot just teachers!have to learn how to respond to their work both formally and informally. As teachers, we do both while grading papers. We respond formally in the form of correcting mistakes and giving a grade, yet we also respond informally in the form of comments on content, or advice on how to make a stronger argument.

Its true. Not every student is a great writer. But its also true that writing is more than just grammar and spelling. Writing consists of a multitude of aspects, things like clarity, structure, style, organization and finally, correctness. We grade accordingly, giving each aspect of writing the attention it deserves. Thisin turncreates well rounded students. By encouraging students to take risks in their writing and not worry about every mistake until the final draft, were raising a generation of creative individuals who also know the rules. THIS is what America needs!

About the Author: Laura Chauvin is an Oakland University student, currently in her internship in the Utica Community Schools district. Shes taken several courses at the collegiate level on current educational theory and also has experience in the classroom as a teacher.