So the boss comes to me today regarding a parent's complaint about another teacher and the way she is teaching writing. The boss says that the parent consulted 2 (a whole 2!) other English teachers and our teacher is misleading students about how to write an essay. I told the boss to come back with specifics but I was dubious. Later he shows me that our teacher was teaching that in an introduction to an essay there is a lead-in, a list of examples used, and then a thesis. Apparently the parent's sources INSIST that the list of examples must be a part of the thesis. This is at most a stylistic choice that will vary depending on the content of the essay and is in no way an imperative in either case. Different high school teachers and profs will have varying preferences but neither is wrong. I expect that the writing teacher is trying to teach essay structure and has been strict about it, but not all "rules" we learn in school are actually rules but rather are ways to stop mistakes. Such as the rule that you can never start a sentence with "and" ,which is designed so kids stop writing in long lists of sentence fragments. Some parents have too much time on their hands.
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