The Soapbox

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Soapbox Essays

What's With All the Worksheets?

Warning! No Facts in this Fiction!

Writer's Groups or Test Readers?

What's With all the Worksheets?

When I was in elementary school we had textbooks. When we did our assignments we used lined notebook paper to write down the answers. Sometimes we would even copy down the problems. Oh boy was that taxing!

Nowadays our children enjoy the benefits of a school system completely dependent on photo copy machines. I think they still have some text books, maybe, I'm not sure. What they do have is worksheets. Photocopied worksheets. Reams and reams of them. I have three children in school, soon to be four. For the first several years I tried keeping all their worksheets, but now I've given up. The worksheets come home, I glance at them, mourn the loss of the trees, and throw them in the recycling bin.

When I go to volunteer at the school, the teachers immediately send me to the copy room with books of worksheets to photocopy. Can this possibly be more efficient than purchasing textbooks? I don't see how. Often the worksheets only have a few problems on them, with most of the space taken up by cute illustrations. What a waste of paper! Of toner! Of time! Can't we go back to using books? Back to Top

Warning! No Facts in this Fiction!

My children enjoy the Magic Treehouse books by Mary Pope Osborne. I had to stop reading them. I was laughing too hard.

In Midnight on the Moon for example, the science is all wrong. If Mary Pope Osborne was going to write a book about going to the moon, I would hope that she would learn just a teensie weensie bit about space science. First of all, the book claims that the gravity is weaker on the moon because there is no air pressure. I am not kidding. In the pressurized moon base, there is gravity, simply because there is air pressure. When Jack and Annie let out the air pressure, the gravity goes away. Just like that! If only it were so easy! For my next trick, I will cause a feather and a penny to levitate at the same height simply by pumping all the air out of my bell jar!

Just to set the record straight, gravity is caused by mass. The moon is smaller than the earth. That's why it has less gravity. It has less mass.

As if this confusion about gravity weren't enough, while Jack and Annie are galumphing about on the moon's surface, an asteroid falls down right in front of them, blocking their way out of the canyon.

Um.

If an asteroid that size lands anywhere near you, you are space dust. We're talking megaton explosion, here: vast crater blown out of the moon's surface. Jack and Annie should have been toast.

I guess that's why they call it science fiction.

Still, why didn't the editor catch that? Why didn't Osborne double check? Get on the internet, and the facts are two clicks away! There is no excuse.

So why do I care? Its just a children's book, right?

Just a children's book? Children's books are some of the most important books in the world. My children are reading these books and forming their concept of reality. If the facts are wrong, then my children will form misconceptions that will stay with them for years! There is nothing more malleable than the mind of a young child. I don't want my children, or any children, to think that there is no gravity in a vacuum, simply because it just isn't true!

So if you write children's books, please, do a little research. Don't think that no one will know the difference. It will make a big difference if a child can learn something true about the real world from what you write.

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Writer's Groups or Test Readers?

I know a lot of writers like to get together in Writer's Groups. They meet once a week to discuss each other's writing and complain about how hard it is to get published.

I suppose some writers might benefit from a Writer's Group, but I must say I've never read in the acknowledgements of some published work, "I'd like to thank my Writer's Group for all their help, support, and suggestions."

Quite honestly, I'm leery of Writer's Groups. They're made up of writers! I see two main problems with using a group of writers to help you evaluate your work:

• Writers are doing their own writing. This is an intense, all consuming process. Do they really have time to help you with yours?
• Writers read things differently from most of the population. I know. When I read I am constantly distracted by the prose, constantly comparing to my own work, constantly thinking things like,"Ah, now they are describing the kitchen. My, this prose is uninspiring. I would never waste a whole paragraph describing the kitchen. Let's get on with the story! I haven't got time for lace napkins. I want to finish this and get back to working on my book!"

  What a writer really needs is some good test readers. If you really want help in polishing your manuscript, find some readers who are willing to read your writing and then honestly describe the experience it produced. You don't need a test reader who is an English major and can point out all your punctuation errors. You only need to know if your writing had its intended effect. Did the reader understand the characters the way you wanted them to? Did the reader get the plot? Was the reader unable to set the book down, or was it hard to get through it? Were any parts confusing? Did any of it seem utterly pointless?

  I have found that test readers, especially the most honest ones, really help me bring a manuscript up to a new level. Through their interaction with my book, I can learn if I'm coming across or not.

  But then again, maybe some day I will join a Writer's Group, after I'm retired.