“What Works in Teaching Composition: A Meta-analysis of Experimental Treatment Studies”
George Hillocks Jr. is a professor of the Department of Education and English Language and Literature at the University of Chicago. In 1984, he was published in the American Journal of Education for his research in the various modes of writing instruction. Hillocks researched the various pedagogical methods of composition and outlined what worked and what failed. According to his research (1984), Hillocks found that the formal approach to composition, undoubtedly fails. Hillocks states, “The study of traditional school grammar (i.e., the definition of parts of speech, the parsing of sentences, etc.) has no effect on the raising quality of student writing . . . . School boards, administrators, and teachers who impose the systematic study of traditional school grammar on their students over lengthy periods of time in the name of teaching writing do them a gross disservice that should not be tolerated by anyone concerned with the effective teaching of good writing” (“What Works in Teaching Composition” p. 537). Hillocks suggests that if teachers are going to teach grammar, they should teach it through real writing, rather than skill and drill worksheets and repetitious lessons on SAE. In addition, Hillocks proves that the expressivist method is not much more effective. He comments that although it is a better means for teaching grammar, “it is less effect than any other focus of instruction examined” (Hillocks, 1984 p. 537). Disproving both the two most widely used approaches to teaching composition, Hillocks leaves educators at a place of uncertainty. However, he does suggest that educators take systematic approaches to teaching writing, using instructional techniques that can be evaluated on whether or not they are effective in the classroom (Hillocks, 1984, p. 540).