Justice R. answered • 12/10/20
Child Development Student & Writer Teaching to Multiple Intelligences
Gosh, this is a difficult situation.
Would it help to start with material that your students are already enthusiastic about, and already have sophisticated thoughts about? By allowing your students to write about something they're passionate about, you may be able to point out their own sophistication, and help them more concretely grasp 1) what sophistication is and 2) how they got there.
From there, you might be able to help them figure out how to apply that level of thinking to something they don't care as much about, or can't invest as much time in due to the time pressures of an AP test.
For a HUGE grain of salt, my experience in the classroom is teaching preschoolers, not high schoolers. I just wonder if applying an emergent/student-led lens here might help your students connect the things they're not currently connecting. It can help strengthen classroom teaching by starting in areas your students already have strong points, sophisticated thoughts, and existing connections. Even analyzing the script for an episode of a television show they love, or the lyrics of a song, or their niche argument for why a certain NFL draft decision changed the outcome of last year's season, might help them understand how they already form sophisticated arguments in their daily lives and how to put that in an essay.
Justice R.
I love this! I think that you've married the idea of "letting students engage with their own interests" with 1) something that gives you room for classroom discussion, not just individual projects, and 2) something a little easier to grade. If it's impossible to find something that will work for all students—not that I'm saying it will be, I just know this is an obstacle that might come up—I bet you could get the same mileage out of having them pick from a small list of topics/pieces to work on in small groups. I also wanted to stop to appreciate how you've chosen your "controversial issues that relate directly to your students" in a way that's consciously striving not to be abjectly triggering. You know, some teachers would just go "hey let's talk about pronouns" for a project like this, which wouldn't be appropriate—anyway, wanted to pause and appreciate how on-the-money your topic ideas are. Wishing you and your class luck!12/11/20
Tim W.
Thanks for your thoughtful response! I'm thinking that maybe I could create an interest survey of some sort and then find a speech, an op ed piece, or a letter to the editor that relates to some sort of topic that my students are interested in. Or maybe we can just focus on controversial issues that relate directly to my students, like the cost of college tuition, or increasing the age at which you can get your drivers license. Thanks for the input, Justice!12/11/20