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Dear Diana and Tony,

Thank you very much indeed for raising this matter in such a
comprehensive and interesting way.

What you have written about is so fascinating, and so important. The
issues are extremely far-reaching, and in one sense you barely scratch
the surface.

I have taught and advised in UK higher education and elsewhere for over
20 years. I have mulled over many of your questions and observations, as
I expect thousands of others have, for all of that time. I have no
solutions, but your posting has prompted many different thoughts and
reactions. The best I can do is make a list of numbered comments or
points, in no particular order, and see what happens next.

1) When I was at school I was taught by teachers who were interested in
clear writing, and tried to encourage us to practise it. I remember one
teacher of English who repeatedly gave half a crown to the first person
to parse a sentence he wrote on the board. (I was one of two in the
class who usually won the money. I loved the analytical approach to
language. Others didn't.) I believe that pupils at school are not taught
these skills now. Grammatical writing is learned, not genetic.

2) Some of the students we encounter have dyslexia. The classic sign of
dyslexia, for a university teacher, is the student whose verbal
contributions in class are sparkling, who shows every sign of being a
brilliant student, and who then submits written work which is
appallingly bad. Of course this applies to only a small percentage of
students (the British Dyslexia Association have suggested between 4% and
10%), but it is very real, and should not be forgotten.

3) The ability to work with written communication is not an ability for
which evolution has prepared us. As a species we have been communicating
verbally for tens of thousands of years, and, with very few exceptions,
every single individual over that time has been successful at speaking
and understanding speech. (I believe my facts to be substantially
correct. If they are wrong in detail, please correct me, but I think my
argument still holds.) In contrast, the ability to read and write has
been possessed by only a tiny minority of individuals for almost the
whole of those tens of thousands of years. A select few have used
written communication, but I hazard a guess that it is only in the last
100, or even 50, years that that few has become anything like a
majority. The extraordinary fact is not that so many people cannot write
clearly, but that so many people can write at all.

4) The UK education system (and, I presume, the USA system) has an
inherent mechanism which perpetuates its own prejudices, faults, and
benefits. School teachers are recruited from those who are successful,
in terms of passing assessments, in A-levels at school and in degrees at
universities; and who then progress to be taught by similar people
during PGCE courses. University teachers tend to be selected from
university graduates and, especially, postgraduates who perpetuate the
beliefs and prejudices which they have learnt from their
similarly-inclined predecessors. I am not suggesting that this is wrong;
I am merely pointing out that it may not be perfect, because it may
promulgate some wrong practices. It is undoubtedly a mechanism which
makes it difficult for students with different ways of thinking to
succeed or be appreciated. Those with Asberger's, or autism, may fit in
very well, those with hyperactivity may not.

5) Higher education was available to about 5% (I believe) of school
leavers when I left school in 1965. Now it is available to, say, 50%. I
expect that the 5% tended to correspond, to a large extent, to those who
could write well; now UK HE has opened the doors to those who cannot.
This observation leads, combined with points 3) and 4), to the
conclusion that a system which may have worked quite well in the past
cannot be expected to do so now. Once again the remarkable fact is that
the country continues to function quite well in many ways, not that many
people can't write very clearly.

6) Returning to point 3) (evolution not preparing us for writing): the
ability to work with logical, linear, thinking has great value in some
situations; but there are other forms of intelligence which have equally
great value in other situations. Let's take one example. Our ability to
read non-verbal signals from other people enables us to read other
people's moods and intentions, and has a huge effect on our ability to
function together in groups. But these abilities are emotional and
instinctive; they are not logical. (Of course sociologists and
psychologists study them academically, and write about them eruditely,
but we nearly all carry on using them without having read those writings
at all.) I am suggesting that the ability to write well is an ability
which some of us have, and which is undoubtedly very valuable, but which
depends on a strength in logical, linear, thinking which not all of us
have. It is not necessarily a disgrace that some of us don't have it.

7) There is an established method of writing that is regarded as good.
It involves correct spelling, correct use of sentences, good grammar,
logical flow of thought, and, indeed, all the things that you, Diana and
Tony, very comprehensively list in your posting, and lament the lack of
in your students' writings. Here I am once again straying into areas of
my own ignorance, but I believe that much of this style was developed
and perfected by Victorian grammarians who laid down rules, saying that
certain things were correct, and certain others incorrect. The study and
practice of this style has a wonderful beauty to it, but it is a
minority activity (and an obsession for some!). Language, both written
and spoken, is alive and changing. (One minor example: some people know
that "Andrew and me went to the cinema." is somehow wrong; and therefore
carefully say "Fred saw Andrew and I in town." believing they are
somehow correct. Today's widely committed errors are always likely to
become tomorrow's accepted practice.) It is not at all hard, Diana and
Tony, to find grammatical errors in your posting, and there will be
errors in mine, too, but I do know that that is straying from your
point.

8) I completely agree with you that writing ideas down is a wonderful
way of examining one's thoughts and ideas. (Who was it who said, "How
can I know what I think until I hear what I say?"? But she needed to say
things, not write them!) But just because you and I agree on this
doesn't mean that it is true for everyone. Do you have any evidence upon
which to base your belief?

9) I really don't believe that extensive use of texting is anything to
do with what we are discussing. Communicating via text messages is a
highly refined and economic skill. Sending "c u tomoz?" is an example of
extremely clear communication, once you know the language. I do think
that reading good writing can be an educational process, so if today's
students do that less, then their poor writing may be one result.

10) I do believe that all of us, and students in particular, follow
examples that we respect. Many of the examples which are now so widely
available to us are themselves appallingly bad. Some national newspapers
present material in ways that suggest that it is based on rational
logical thought, but which is in fact anything but. I listen extensively
to Radio 4, and I am frequently appalled by the lack of clear thought
often demonstrated by some of the most respected presenters. (It must be
difficult to keep logical thought at the forefront of your mind for
hours on end, though, when you have to keep speaking to hold things
together. I couldn't do it! We are all emotional and irrational
creatures at heart.) Students have many appalling (I know I keep using
this word, but I liked it in your early paragraph!) examples of writing
thrust at them from every side. Is it any wonder that they follow suit?

11) A final point continuing from point 10): much of the writing which
circulates around universities, including that from some heads of
academic departments, in policy papers, and in regulations, is also
appallingly bad; and yet this is stuff which is often presented to
students.

So there we are. You asked for evidence based solutions. I have given
none. (Should that not be "evidenced-based". (What is that "not" doing
there?)) So I will close with a proposal for a solution, albeit one
without evidence.

It is easy to solve this problem:
A.      Entry to any university degree programme must be conditional
upon passing a rigorous test in clear writing. No exceptions.
B.      If A. results in student numbers tending to fall, then create
separate establishments offering courses to train people to write more
clearly, so that they can progress to HE. (I wonder what name we should
give to those establishments?)

Aldous Huxley wrote (I am working from memory, so the quote may be
innacurate), "We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality;
all that we can hope is that we are unreasonable in a reasonable way."

Best wishes,

Robert

Robert Edwards MA PhD PGCEd PGDip(Literacy and Dyslexia) AMBDA(FE/HE)
ILTM PGCert(Counsellling) -- but did any of that teach me to write?
Combined Studies Unit & Disability and Dyslexia Service/
   Uned Astudiaethau Cyfun a Sylfan a Gwasanaethau Anabledd a Dyslecsia
University of Glamorgan/Prifysgol Morgannwg
Pontypridd
Tel/Ffon: 01443 482981 & 654164
Fax/Ffacs: 01443 482170 & 654175