3/3 - Eulogy of the Five Paragraph Essay
In Brian Sztabnik’s article, “Let’s Bury the 5-Paragraph Essay: Long Live Authentic Writing”, he gets one vital (forgive the pun) fact wrong: the five paragraph essay is already long-dead. Really, it is alarming how frequently students are forced to interact with its corpse in a macabre “Weekend at Bernie’s”-esque sort of scene. Rather than construct a fanciful tale of murder, here is the truth: the format is dead simply because it has never had life to begin with. There is no passion in an essay written not to express an opinion, but instead to receive a grade.
In his article, Sztabnik gives good insight into the mystery of why this format ever became the standard. He explains that the essay first invaded schools as part of a movement to industrialize learning, and stayed ever since, cemented there by evil forces such as standardized testing. He also gives the brutally honest truth about the five paragraph essay: it is devoid of all insight, creativity and passion.
One particular point that Sztabnik brought up resonated very strongly with me. He writes: “When I assign topics I am implicitly telling my students what I believe is important and disregarding their thoughts.” This is alarmingly true. In my school days, I can recall questioning whether the teacher wants me to agree or disagree with the prompt. Why should this be the framework of how I express my opinions? Did school not only steal eighteen years of my time, but also my ability to think freely?
It has long been asked if school is an extended experiment in brainwashing, and this crackpot theory sounds a lot more likely if you consider that students are essentially encouraged to align their thoughts with those of their mentors. They read what they are told and are taught to think in a way that can be measured as either correct or incorrect. Is this not training them to think homogeneously? Is this is an effort to stamp out individuality and create workers who won't question their superiors?
Yet, that can't be the case. Students certainly shape their written opinions in order to achieve higher grades, but I don’t believe that this significantly changes their personal opinions. Just because one expresses an opinion out loud does not mean that they must also believe it to be true. This is called ‘lying’ and all of us do it. (Take it from me - I’ve been undercover for what feels like an eternity). So perhaps the five paragraph essay is not teaching students that their opinions are wrong, but simply that lying about their true views is an acceptable means to an end.
Most likely, however, is not that the essay is brainwashing students, or teaching them to lie, but simply that it does not accomplish much of anything at all. It is but another hoop through which the well-trained students must jump to grab their diplomas and run for the hills. I truly don't believe that learning to write the five paragraph essay has significantly changed either my beliefs or my writing skills. And perhaps that is the saddest of the possibilities above.
The best way I can state my thoughts on the five paragraph essay is this: I have put more consideration into this series of blog posts than I ever have into a five paragraph essay. And this, more than any brainwashing hoax, is why we should finally put the format to rest.
- A.M. Ham
