Dear Teresa,

Since you phrased your starter self-evaluation as a letter and ended it by saying, “Yea so thats [sic]¹ the question, but wheres [sic] the answer,” I thought I would supply the answer. I feel it is important to make sure my students understand the methodology I employ in the classroom, and it is to that end that I write to you now.

You wrote that the reasons you “have no starters is becase [sic] to me there is no reason to do it.” It’s an odd thing to write: I gave you the reason at the very beginning of the year. This is a writing class: I want you writing as much as possible. Additionally, if you didn’t see a reason for doing them, perhaps you could have asked me in private why we do them. (To shout it out in class would be disrespectful, and I know you would never want to be disrespectful.) But you never asked for the reason, so I didn’t know you were confused about why we do starters. Finally, it seems fairly logical to me what the reason is: this is a writing class, and the best way to improve in writing is by doing it. That’s why most of my starters, if you haven’t noticed, are questions to help get you writing, to get your brain working in a compositional mode. It might have worked for you if you’d tried it, but you never did. So despite your claim to the contrary, there are clear and solid pedagogically-sound reasons for the starter we do in class.

Most puzzling, though, is your claim that I “don’t even check” the starters, which “don’t even get graded.” It’s a strange claim because I directly told the class several times, at the beginning of the year and throughout each quarter, that I take up the starters at the end of the quarter. I probably also said, “Take care to do them and keep up with them because it should be an easy A.” In addition, I told the class several times as we approached the due date of January 15 that they would need to bring in their starters at the end of the week. Why would I take them up if I weren’t going to grade them? There’s simply no logic in that. Finally, I often walk around the room as the class works on the starters (you excepted) and I check roll. When I do this, I’m looking at what students are writing, often interacting with them about their ideas or possibly pointing out a silly grammatical mistake. It is during this time that I often encourage students who are not working on the starter, students like you, to begin doing so. Some students do; you often do not. So to suggest that I don’t check the starters is patently misleading.

The real key to understanding your response, though, was when you contrasted my starters to Ms. H’s starters. To begin with, it doesn’t make much sense to compare them because we teach you different subjects: she teaches reading while I teach writing. Of course we’re going to have different kinds of starters; it only makes sense. However, the whole comparison is bogus to begin with. I spoke to Ms. H about your response, and she informed me that you don’t do the starters in her class either except on rare occasion. I would bet that your behavior in her classroom during the beginning of class is much like your behavior in my classroom: you sit without any materials ready, turning around in your desk, and engaging in conversation with everyone around you. Thus your attempt to contrast my starters with Ms. H’s starters is fairly meaningless.

I trust this explanation answers any questions you have about my starters. It is my sincerest wish that during this penultimate quarter, you mend your ways and begin taking this assignment seriously: it is intended to be a fairly easy way for students to improve their grade, and I hope you see and treat it as such. However, the choice is ultimately yours. I cannot make you or anyone else do anything. Don’t make the mistake, though, of suggesting that I haven’t fully explained to you the consequences of your choices.

Sincerely,
Your Teacher