Confusing Idea of the Day

I'm sitting at the first morning session of an AP Lit/Lang. Conference. One of the college professors here as a presenter/facilitator spent about 20 minutes telling us that our high school students come to him able to write, but not knowing how to contextualize their writing. Hm. It seems to me that contextualizing one's writing is a college skill, so it might therefore follow that students should learn how to do this once IN college? The professor seemed really bothered that "we" (high school teachers) have underprepared our students for this writing skill. To me, his argument is akin to me complaining that my undergraduate studies didn't adequately prepare me for my first teaching job because I still had things to learn once one the job. Methinks that friendly-AP-college-professor-guy would rather assign things to his students than teach them . . .

Irony of all Ironies

So, when I couldn't decide whether to major in English or History in college (always with an eye on becoming a teacher regardless), my wise parents directed me towards English because "it would be easier to get a job teaching English ". . . I told myself it would be great . . . I had visions of expounding on the virtues of Shakespearian prose, mining Twain for gems of wisdom, reading deeply late into the night the next best poet I would share with my students . . . little did I know . . .
 That I am indeed expounding on Shakespeare--and why indeed it IS POSSIBLE to read and understand him (and okay, let's be honest, this ONLY HAPPENS when you actually take your book home), I am mining Twain--but only for when the next politically incorrect word is going to pop off the page and catch me unawares in front of my Sophomores, and yes, the entire reason that prompted this latest blog--I am indeed reading late into the night--but RESEARCH PAPERS and they ain't poetry folks. Sigh.