From an essay I wrote in 2014:
Our kids need to be reminded, early and often, that to effectively write an argument is to stake out new ground. To challenge the reader and even threaten her worldview. Tomorrow, when I tell my students (in the nicest possible way) that their papers bored me, I suspect most will, at least privately, acknowledge that they bored themselves writing them. It may take just a few more moments to stake out a position that’s not right in the center of a topic or to expertly craft a single phrase or sentence in a way no reader could forget, but that’s what teaching writing demands.
