ChatGPT and a forklift
Ted Chiang: “Using ChatGPT to complete assignments is like bringing a forklift into the weight room; you will never improve your cognitive fitness that way.”
A wrongheaded “dead words” movement
Dressing up in an awkward costume doesn’t make a writer look smart. It makes a writer look awkward — and dumb. Did I peruse the tome? No, I read the book.
About machine-scoring
“It is worth asking: is this scheme meant to “free” professors for other tasks, or for unemployment?”
“The Writing Revolution”
In the October 2012 Atlantic, Peg Tyre reports on an effort to reimagine the teaching of writing at one Staten Island high school.
Garner on writing in law school
More writing, more revision.
The benefits of handwriting
There are many.
Cursive writing in Indiana
On the way out.
A voice from a term-paper mill
Writing other people's papers
"How to e-mail a professor" in print
My #1 post in a college textbook
The SAT is broken
On the SAT essay test
Writing by hand
I was excited to read Shari Wilson's essay "The Surprising Process of Writing" in Inside Higher Ed. Wilson (a pseudonym) finds that for many...
How to e-mail a professor
[By a professor, for students. As of July 2023, this post has been visited by more than 800,000 readers from at least 145 countries and terr...
Old and improved
”How to e-mail a professor,” improved.
The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing
Thinking about The Elements of Style prompts me to say something about a book that to my mind is far more useful, Michael Harvey's The Nuts...