In the sixties in all English-speaking countries there was a marked swing away from formal methods of teaching writing and a corresponding interest in methods that are broadly termed creative. More and more teachers were persuaded that can't write writing, and that you only write well when you write what keenly interests you. The central responsibility of teachers became the arousing of interest in each writing task, thereby engaging the mental-emotional energy and creative resources of students. I have supported this emphasis, especially against attempts to push the secondary schools into comprehensive study of one or other of the new systems of grammar. But I have not seen any need to go as far as those who now exclude from their classes all reference