Teaching bad writing

 Teachers are often told that children should use more ‘wow words’ and ‘modifiers’ so they can achieve better grades or levels. It’s called up-levelling. But in what senses has their writing improved? Is it more interesting or more powerful?    

A few years ago, I was visiting a local primary school. I had volunteered to do some philosophising with them. It was December and it had been snowing. I was early for my session, so I sat in on the final part of a literacy lesson for a class of 11-year-olds. The children were asked to write poems entitled 'Frost'. A girl sitting next to me called Maya wrote: "My heart is warmed by the song of the robin." That’s good, I thought. I was impressed by her nice contrast of the warmed heart to the cold frost and interested in her choice of the passive voice. When the teacher asked for volunteers to read out a line, I encouraged Maya to have a go. The teacher listened and said:

"Hmm, I like that line but I think we could improve it with a modifier. What kind of sound does a bird make?"
Silence.
"It makes a tweeting sound doesn't it?"
Silence.
"So let's change that line to: "My heart is warmed by the tweeting song of the robin. There, that's better isn't it?"
Silence.
What can one say? If only Shakespeare had been up-levelled when he was a boy:

‘Wilt thou be gone?
It is not yet near day:
It was the tweeting nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear;
Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate-tree:
Believe me, love, it was the tweeting nightingale.’
(Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 5)