I found your site after my daughter’s history teacher has required her class to write a paper (7 pages). Her English class has not even had to write a paper that long. She is required to do an annotative bibliography an turn it in only two weeks after being assigned the paper. The students don’t even know what it is. The paper is on their own topic that they choose. Not one he has taught on. He has said that they are not to do a biography because he can read a book about them if he wanted that. He is not being clear on how to write the paper. The paper is to be done completely at home, with no class time being spent on it. Do you think this is appropriate for 10th graders? Just a question.

I must start by confessing that I’m happy that a history teacher is challenging his students to write on such an advanced level and.  However, I see several problems with the methodology and the lack of guidance he’s using.

I don’t think that asking a 10th grader to write a 7 page paper is unfair. Generally most students are writing 10 page papers their senior year as a major grade in English classes. So, I think that the 7 page limit is not too bad. However, the fact that the instructor is being too vague on what he wants in the paper is a bit unsettling and if he is to expect good writing (not to mention the 7 pages) on a topic, he needs to provide the students with more information on the paper.

The same statement goes for the Annotated Bibliography. This is an advanced assignment that is good to introduce students to at a younger age. However, this cannot be done without guidance. There are many ways to write an annotated bibliography and without specific instruction, students are not going to provide the teacher what he wants. This, ultimately, will result in bad grades and, in my opinion, unfair grades.

Recommendation

For starters, make sure that the teacher has not already provided an assignment sheet that your child forgot about. This does happen more frequently than any of us would like to think. If the teacher did, go over this carefully with your child and see where the questions about the assignment need to be directed at the next class meeting.

If the teacher did not provide an assignment sheet, he needs to. I would recommend that the students ask the teacher to provide a more specific assignment–in writing–for them. He needs to explain a lot  more than he seems to be explaining. For example, does he want an argument about something in history, does he want an overview of a time period, or something else. He must give these students some guidance if he is going to get them to write a paper. For each paper my students write, I make sure to spell out the assignment so they know exactly what I want from them. It can be something as brief as “Write a seven page paper explaining why some event in history is still studied today,” but it needs to give them guidance.  If he still does not provide an assignment sheet, the parents need to request one from him. If he does not comply, talk to the principal.

As for the Annotated Bibliography, he needs to tell the students what he wants in this document. How many sources does he want? What kinds of sources (books, journals, etc.)? What information does he want included (summary of the work, evaluation, etc.).

Once you have this information, there are several good websites on writing the Annotated Bibliography that will be very helpful. Purdue OWL and UNC Chapel Hill are two that I recommend highly.

I think this situation can be a learning experience for everybody involved if you walk into this with the right attitude. I would almost wager that the teacher is trying to prepare students for tougher classes in both high school and college. He knows that these are the kind of assignments that they are going to confront and he wants the chance to get them accustomed to these assignments. I also think that he just does not know how to instruct the students on how to approach these assignments. Is he new to teaching at the high school level? Keep these thing in mind when you approach him. Remember that all teachers have to be new sometimes and we often learn from our students and the mistakes we make trying to teach them. Approaching the matter in this subject will also teach your daughter how to seek clarity from teachers and to ask questions that go beyond the ever frustrating “I don’t understand.”

Of course, if the teacher is not willing to help, I don’t think you have any choice but to talk to the principal about the situation.

As always, I welcome feedback from anybody in this situation, or who has more information on the topic or better solutions. I teach English at the college level, so I’m not always clear on what and how things are intended to be taught at the high school level